A new tomato burst
beneath a blade, its juice
streaking my wrist,
mimicry of something I swore off
years ago.
Seeds scatter like liquid mercury
across the cutting board,
smallest of reminders that life spreads
even if it’s cut short, stunted.
I keep slicing,
pretending the stains
will wash off this time.
Categories:
slices, food, grave,
Form: Free verse
Once there were millions.
Now there are billions.
Once there were kings.
Now there are councils.
Once there was ignorance.
Now knowledge abounds.
Once there was poverty.
Now comfort for most.
Once there was war.
Now there is peace.
Once there were traditions.
Now there are systems.
Our relative power is slipping away.
Even as we all grow greater each day.
8 October 2023
Categories:
slices, power, time,
Form: Free verse
"Amid the jagged shadows of mossy
leafless boughs;"
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Earth Rips different
Not like cloth
tearing, sharp, painful sounds
Thicker cloth nêe bursts
baritone harshness
Ripping from earth, done
solemnly, knowing greater
calamitous unearthing is
certain, feels like bursting
Buttons, brief Eyelash
Flash of shock, something
missing, phantom pain some
Describe
My drying herbs, roots and all
Gave up this way, by my hand
As the 70' Norway Spruce Pine
in front of 30 Rock NYC
Slowly weeps tears of sweet sap
Squeezed from constricting veins
Machines surprising vast
Vascular networks of life below
Ground
Forced abscission really
Slowly dying, withering, shackled
In stantions for all to admire in
Spectacled holiday lights
Politicians virtue-signal righteous
Uses for its sublimated limbs
Sticks of assorted stature for
Sordid assignments...
I'll spice my curries
with my hand-pulled
Herbs
November
2019
Categories:
slices, irony,
Form: Lyric
Everybody has a slice of profound
from the village idiot to the killer clown
but do you have the patience
to pluck the nuggets from the turd
after all everyone wants and needs to be heard
listen to the idiot ramble-between the babble
he may have the cure for war-cancer -unhappy
the mime and the butterfly may be etching
the map to heaven's secrete cache of gold...
and what secrets does the unread poet hold.
Categories:
slices, allusion,
Form: Free verse
We never knew witches were real.
Until you flashed your fingertip fire.
Across our motherless cheeks and into our lives.
We needed quilts of compassion and support.
You offered only endless task and unbridled welt retort.
Now you're old and retired the broom and the belt.
Though your hugs and words are still north pole cold.
Just like they were some five decades ago.
When you force fed us thin slices of hell.
Categories:
slices, childhood,
Form: Free verse
I want to eat
cheesy down home goodness
I want to be mozzarella vegan great
to eat the best flavors right off
a non-dairy plate
but, honest finance
has told me so
I will never know
vegan in this price range
I could stretch out my dough
I could save up multitudes of pennies
but let's face it
I will just have to
let the dream go
seventy-seven dollars
for vegan cheese
I guess sadly
vegan isn't for me
Categories:
slices, black african american, body,
Form: Bio
For a slice of splash
From the yellow and green sky
Through a chance window
Both you and I lie in wait
Sands of our blue time restless
______________________________________
20/10/2016
Categories:
slices, blue, green, time, yellow,
Form: Tanka
slices of deep night
cut through heart's embittered walls---
Dove's light passes by
Haiku On Enlightenment Contest
For: Marvin Celestial
Daniel Port
Categories:
slices, blessing, pain,
Form: Haiku
LEMON SLICES
rivulets of condensation drip down
the sides of tall glasses-- iced water
lemon slices flavour refreshing reflections
Categories:
slices, drink, fruit,
Form: Haiku
Underneath the hard tough bark of a tree
Is a porous heart
Underneath my canopy of memory
Things fall apart
The sun drops rivers of blood on wounded skies
The silver sheen of sea
The odor of the drowned carcasses denies
O let it be
Lazarus came form the dead to die again
From broken heart and care
I climb pyramids to come down again
Going under is my fear.
When you slice my throat again, be sure
And slice my heart
Desire still won't cure the pain, insecure
Time falls apart
Categories:
slices, passion, philosophy, social
Form: Verse
A little brown river,
Naked children splashing in its muddy waters,
Their mirth and laughter of raucous delight,
Untroubled by foresight.
A tiny hut made of mud,
Parching in the dazzles of the ruthless sun,
The bent figure of a farmer as he nurtures
The field of paddy that his simple heart treasures.
A bustling bazaar,
With its overwhelming array of sights and smells,
A man with a cart full of ripe plump litchis, a rickshaw puller,
Whiling away the time, adding to the cacophony as they bicker.
As the sun sets over the distant ragged hills and lush overgrowth,
I ponder on what I have retained
From the journey across the plains of my mother land,
Bangladesh, where happiness and poverty, go hand in hand.
Categories:
slices, people
Form: Free verse
Food Lion is charging about four bucks for three small watermelon slices.
It really ticks me off when I see these high prices.
An entire watermelon only costs six bucks.
Charging four dollars for three slices really sucks.
It makes more sense to buy a whole watermelon for only two bucks more.
If Food Lion would lower their prices, they'd have much better stores.
Categories:
slices, angst, food, on writing
Form: I do not know?
She straightens as she sifts though shells
a parlotry of hollow bells
aside from the ocean that heaves and swells
these are the sounds she holds in her hands.
She shivers in the midnight air
the silver salt on each strand of hair
her heart released from every care
and the toll the world demands.
She never looks behind for fear
of seeing her life too loud and clear
so she keeps the ocean forever near
a souvenir in her pocket....
A moment before these words were written
she flooded the earth with all that glistens
she called to the winds on a whim which whispered
“Flow to me, calm me inside...”
Categories:
slices, inspirational, introspection, life, nature,
Form: Rhyme