May each new generation…understand the stakes.
May each generation learn from the generation before…
and not make the same mistakes.
When it comes to each generation
may more love, kindness and acceptance find them…
so they can hand off a better world
to the generation coming up behind them.
High-stakes impression,
style is never casual.
All in, fresh laundry.
Did you bear contentment, leave a fragile footprint?
or were you a swine rooting pristine into mud?
What will they say as your bones blow away?
Did you paint stars or did you spill blood?
Were you a tin giver or impish gold taker?
Is the character granite or woven from coal flake?
Did you knead love or did you weld lust?
Did they avoid you, or could you be trusted?
Did you weave wayward together or polish division?
How did you play that hand of black sins?
Did you glitter the fault line or ask for forgiveness?
Did you steer the beast toward another's religion?
Did you leave this earth in a much better state
or play the vamp, licking blood off the stake.
Trippy hippie likes risky frisky.
Doing gambles of one's living.
losing at some game
produces very little shame
no one else to blame
pride quite easy to reclaim
nothing ventured nothing gained
big or little stakes
wagers may keep minds awake
or make weak souls shake
don't bet what shouldn't be lost
keep in mind that final cost
losing in a war
involves relatively more
lost for evermore
may be people you adore
wagered in deadly gore
bet all of one's mind
on what remains undefined
life a non-stop grind
of intensely out of line
dancing with wild emotion
keep the odds in scope
know when it's time to say nope
don’t ante last hope
when on that slippery slope
full of angles and false tropes
...as you politely said
please don't pay attention to the color of my skin.
but you keep shoving it in my face.
...you keep filleting yourself
, sewing your skin onto mine
it doesn't fit-never will
we're different.
but the same.
We came from the same seed
but have different experiences
I can never walk in your shoes
because once upon a time
you didn't have any.
For certain, you can never walk in mine.
But we do have more in common than not.
Our hurdles are of the mind now
and growing by the second.
There are many that wish to destroy us.
By dividing us.
The media is a nest of vampires
and should be treated as such.
They feed off of our blood.
They spotlight us at our worst and lowest, for the sake of ratings.
Nothing sells better than a race riot
or blue-on-black crime.
They need a change of heart or a stake to their old hollow hearts.
Or they'll quickly drain the pond of humanity.
In troubled times, when people join,
United in resistance,
They share a common hope to find
A peaceful coexistence.
Perhaps they march or chant or sing
While others watch and wonder
If change can be the end result
Of anger’s zeal and thunder.
Or will the protests and the pleas
Fade back to what we’re used to
Before our phones replaced the need
For any network’s news crew?
The expectation now is that
Events may yet compel us
To raise the stakes and seek reform,
But only time will tell us.
the worse it gets, it gets “worser”
a better death is a misnomer
those greedy fingers
and trespassing eyes
the passing of a plate of lies
the only thing that’s shared —
a shovel that heaps dirt
over the “loved one’s” hurt
7/26/2018
will you anti your stake
when I bring this all up
or will you be surprised
that it isn't enough
will you chuck these past months
thinking I gave what I had
or will you work harder
and take one more stab
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.