Splay Poems | Examples

List of Member Poems

Premium Member VAN GOGH'S CHAIR

Van Gogh’s chair sits patiently 
with the stubborn dignity  
of something that has held  
more weight than wood should bear.

Its legs splay slightly,  
as if tired from listening  
to the long monologues  
of a man who painted  
as though the world  
were always on fire.

A pipe rests on the seat~  
a small, domestic witness  
to his restless hours,  
the way he paced the room  
searching for a color  
that could tell the truth.

The straw seat glows  
with a worn, sunlit patience,  
a quiet counterpoint  
to the fevered strokes  
he left on every wall.

And the room around it  
leans in,  
holding its breath,  
as if the chair  
might speak at last  
and tell us  
what he carried  
when he sat down  
and let the world  
fall away.

Premium Member In Summer on a Beach

He lay on the beach in his underwear
So happy, not knowing it had a tear.
As he enjoyed the cool breeze,
From close, he heard someone tease-
"Don't splay your legs, 'tiny guy's out, take care"!

Open, Unowned Country

No such lifeless heat-pulsed void
Nothing inhabits.
Whose unimpeded view flits
Screechy hazed away!

And mistake not those ripples
Creeked and grassed a-gleam
For a wind's own stepped cheer-beam.
Eel and snake out-splay.


Premium Member Anticipation

It's time to play, your chance to tease,
massage my mind and gently squeeze.
Seductively, you'll dance for me,
attentively, you're all I'll see.

Your tempered touch will fuel my dreams,
invade my world, ******* my screams.
My blood will rush, my body yearn
to taste your heat, sizzle and burn.

Your whispered words will scream and shout,
your tongue will probe, your lips will pout.
You'll fondle flesh and slowly strip,
your fingers will splay, stroke and dip.

You'll take my passion deep inside,
unleash your hunger, own the ride.
We'll fight fatigue's ferocious kiss,
all guns blazing... We'll die of bliss.

Premium Member The Pink City


At the edge of the Thar desert’s sandy festoon,
the train of the ancient Aravalli hills cascades 
with the undulating landscape of antique dunes, 
cradles joyous Jaipur, the pink city of Rajasthan.

On carved hill-top mighty forts’ stone walls splay, 
wrap the pictorial city portrait with history drape.
Aligned through the sculpted ornate gateways
the orthogonal roads symbolize cubic cityscape .

The archaic forts on the chiseled hill crest
stand like the regiment of outdated sentinels 
on the ramparts of the glorious olden times,
embedded in the wind-scraped craggy ridges.

The tinsels of drizzling moonbeam in satin nights
paint murals with stardust on concrete canvas, 
framed as silhouette on the smoky desert sky.
I’m charmed by the charisma of this colorful city.

Acoustic Shadows

I cup my hand
  no Doppler's circle 
this well of emptiness 
        as I splay my fingers
   more of the same
hits the floor
          fits of giggles 
        screams
               groans 
murmur then fade 
     eyes hold the sound of the afterimage
   as ears seek its nuance 
          observer - the end/in the beginning 

      the hatching in the darkness
 a dance within the drift of focus 
     of every empty
             cupped hand


Premium Member Brave Soul Thaw

Written: December 27, 2025

                *************

How quietly your counsel shaped my days—
A lantern-mind that steadied all my doubt.
At your first word, my tangled maze displays,
My weak brain found logic—rise of burnout.

Now, I feel the void where you used to be,
A bare calm chills even the warm banshee—
Your wisdom drifting from my solitude,
To bless life—passion is known to obtrude.

No trusted compass now to mark my way;
You turn your tact to a different need—
So I must school my heart to bear the sway,
Of walking on without your gentle lead.

Yet still I praise what your eidolon splay—
It's sound thaws loss—it's buffer a heyday.

It's Christmas Day

Morning bells peal 
         its Christmas day !
An array of lights splay  
       across earth's quay 

Angels trumpet 
           in mellow gold 
a peaceful presence   
       arrives, enfolds.

Premium Member A Poet's Art

Poets mold ideas with heart and soul-
at first scattered, coming from the mind.
Poetry is born from deeper wells
where metaphor and nuance craft words
which the mind alone cannot foresee.
A trance-like hunt to gather their best flow
rising above in a rhythmic dance
there to splay a vision unforeseen
leaving every reader's heart fulfilled.

Hollow Chest

Bonfire fly it’s light high into the nigh
A flicker where I see you countenance
Ironically to splay the feast
In that glimmer
Something simmered
Two never be released

Touch me, rub me, kissy
Ask you if you missy
Princess in a grim’s fantasies
Another night I sit to sing to the sky
Sang this sylph dirge mellifluously
Arc rampart tracing hearts in the stars

You took my breast beat from me
Hollowed out my chest cavity
Scalpel edge serrated blades
I gaze up velvet lips edict low whisper
Keep it no there is no returns
It’s broken

Sweet Tooth

Grimoire enchantress beguiles vetala invictus, slicka min kisse, hehe just kidding, just a u’i lata spreading sugar, a sweet gift. A snarl like smile crosses my countenance as I manifest into a deity of quintessential grandiloquence on this edifice, casting thy maestra symphony to be or not to be liminal esoteric Mnemosyne velleity, but in fact a vatic edict on tantalizing your most intimate sultry.

Necromantic kissy kissy muah, to the necrobiotic, rictus lambent lament, melodious songbird choir of sempiternal complexity to make sanguinary fervid incipient lachrymose flooding the streets. Cross this lycanthropic malediction for I ventriolic assanina husks empyrean arcana dismal fates under thy hex with the depths psychopomp Yggdrasil.

Careful where you tread mortal, goddess of the nigh is here, witchess gazes through the fenestral, nocturne saucers glimmer as the siren lures you with serenades and her visage, just an itty bitty bite is how it starts, catch a sweet tooth and it will splay you apart. Velvets bear jagged fangs emptying your chest cavity of your heart, delicate if it’s eaten before it stops.

Premium Member Harvest of Osyter Pearls



her ethereal gaze tucked    me into nirvanic waves
tore me asunder amid    quixotic abyss and seraphic throe 
I harvest pearls    from mollusks in swimming oysters 
strip it in kaleidoscopic iris    fiercely fleeced mote sand
pearls evolved    into a sumptuous elixir necklace
a seashell conceals a jewel-like hair as dark as obsidian
pristine girl with a pearl necklet and mellifluous voice 
with her smile    flings delicate pearls
her eyebrows cling to me beckoning me    near 
abrim    with tears    cleansed her azure iris
I tidied her sylphlike trail    some sobs    stuffed a cup
It soaked roses    threw daffodil pearls    bit jujubes with hail
hence    my previously sealed heart thawed
a phoenix    in its zenith    sweeps me to skies 
In a cosmic splay studded with stars    I dwell
her wispy eyelashes distract me from her gaze
she eviscerates   dumbfounds me with    dark detritus
may my love ram-raid and induce her to ponder    again

Premium Member Dulcet Dawn


The aromatic air ripples with the rhythm of rapture, 
the harmonic whisper of the wafting southern wind
serenades in sync with the symphony of rhapsody, 
when dawn drifts into enchanted meadows.

Rising sun’s flare sets ablaze within pictorial inferno 
the sedate skyline on lawn with the cold fire of color.

Pearls of topaz dew bejewel the chartreuse pasture,
wearing the dazzling diadem of gleaming grandeur.
The bent blades of olivine grass shimmer beguiled
in crimson splay of strawberry sun of the new day.

The buds blush in colors of sky in mesmeric meadow,  
where the fluorescent butterflies flitter engrossed.

In the amorous aura of the nascent sunshine shower,
my window frames fascinated nature’s pristine panorama.
The sky composes chromatic collage with sunshine sequins, 
the cadence of dulcet coral dawn pulsates in my heart.

#5

Premium Member Yet I Cling Long Version

Blue
twinges
of lament
cast gaunt shadow
o’er my dreadful  pang
as a grim mist segued
into dark claustrophobic
cantons where rabid zeal of hearts
once smouldered from magma’s deep red vein
Yet I cling to golden dawn recall
of lazy strolls in lush green mead
wild sniff of purple heather
neath sun-drenched sky aflame
gusts of joy rippling
froth-rim brook waltz
now toilworn
gaudy
dream
Haze
born of
mellow flight
as hunches splay
across foamed pool morn
plop of jaspers echo 
icy shriek as chalk mark toe
dips into a whirlpool eddy
to soothe stark reflections so forlorn 
Those august palpitating heartbeats 
etched in vivid ripple canvass 
entwined that fleeting pearl drop 
bead keen ink glint token 
a pledge once fervent
now rose tinted 
phase on brink 
of times
lapsed

Tell Me How to Box-Breathe

Breathe in,
1, 2, 3, 4.
Hold it,
1, 2, 3, 4.
Breathe out, 
1, 2, 3, 4.
Hold it, 
1, 2, 3, 4.
Breathe within the box
Feel as your lungs expand
Swallow the planet
1, 2, 3, 4.
Exhale your breath
Collapse your lungs
Vomit your soul
1, 2, 3, 4.
Dig your hands into eroded soil
Bent down in worship of Earth
Dirt under fingernails collecting poppies
1, 2, 3, 4.
Splay your fingers toward the sky
Collapse onto a garden bed
Bloom wildflowers from your eyelashes
1, 2, 3, 4.
Ignore the lost faces
Ignore your name
Ignore your senses
1, 2, 3, 4.
Ignore the stars falling
Ignore the trees dissolving
Ignore the lack of temperature
1, 2, 3, 4.
Do not close your eyes
Do not move
Do not panic
1, 2, 3, 4.
Tell me it's real
Tell me I'm real
Tell me the truth
Tell me- 3, 4. 
Continue your box-breathing
Ignore my voice
Tell me nothing
1, 2, 3, 4. 
Breathe in,
1, 2, 3, 4.
Hold it,
1, 2, 3, 4.
Breathe out, 
1, 2, 3, 4.
Hold it, 
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9,...

Sub Categories

Looking for the formal definition, structure, and history of this poetry form? Visit the Poetry Dictionary entry below. Then return to explore how PoetrySoup members bring the form to life through their own poems.

Get a Premium Membership
Turn off ads, get more exposure for your poetry, and get more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace