Morning glory _
From our car
Along the hilly path
Numerous they're
With the attention
of doing math
In their voice
A guitar
Colorful headgear
Off and on
mutual whispers
The Tea Pluckers
Mingled with the green
Humming and plucking
Unique discipline
Never a machine
Sometimes carrying
their babies on their backs
While moms work
Babies relax
In sun and shadows
Day after day
On substandard pay
Mostly illiterate
Inconsiderate employer
Do you feel a jerk?
In addition
unpaid domestic work
Through the ages
The same pages in the book
The same hook
Same tired look
No brook
Many a blade
No cascade
Delicate tea leaves
believe the tender hands
Just the touches
between the skins
No command
The soft tender stem
Approvingly expand
Smilingly withstands
The pain of being torn
Thorns of death
At the love-smeared hands
of mothers
Or lovers?
The Tea Pluckers
It’d been a long day at work
So he sat in the sun
Enjoying the beer he’d earned
The day finally done
Closing his eyes he relaxed
When a persistent peep
Interrupted his dreaming
And he started from sleep
A brown and grey sparrow
Was in a tree nearby
Twittering and fluttering
Darting round in the sky
He magnanimously
Heard the internal call
To build a home for his friend
It would take no time at all
He had wood he could use
Although it had a twist
And it was rotting too
So he added to a list
Along with a tape measure
And extra nails, in case
Also, the saw was rusty
Another thing to replace
An expensive trip later
He had all he required
In fact, he had more -
His card almost expired
Building the box began
He slaved under the sun
Then slapped on some paint
And at last it was done
The bird glanced at the box
And immediately sussed
It was substandard housing
It flew off in disgust
So he was left with the bird box
All wonky and empty
It had cost him $350 -
Bunnings had them for $20
Hell has opened its mouth and spit forth Apollyon.
A brutal beast wrapped in a cloak of deceit.
A grandiose idealist with evil intention.
A reaper of racism.
A shameless rapist of intellectually rigid minds.
An artful ruler of schism.
He lives out loud in his want for a reign of vicious fascism.
Overshadowing the union of a pleading Nation.
The world is ablaze with fear of his reigning anarchy.
There are dawdling tongues and lament songs for abdication.
The faithful lift their faces to heaven and pray for intervention.
The liberals protest against social and economical injustice.
A group of withering supplication to the heartless.
His world is anchored on filth and ruthlessness.
Like many, I live my substandard life under a thunderous cloud.
Stiff back, head high, strong resistant, and proud.
copyright 2017
Looking At the Light From The Bottom Of The Lake.
Copyright 2017
March 6, 2017 Looking At the Light From The Bottom Of The Lake
Sonorous, saporous symphonies: strong;
soothingly spirited, sublime sweet songs.
Satisfied sigh, sees salubrious springs;
sharp, sizzling sunburn scream: saltwater stings.
Searing sharp satirists, snarkily snide;
subtle smart sophists show soft, specious side.
Skimpy, salacious shows sell sexy spice;
somber, sad serials scarcely suffice.
Seismic'ly sensitive subsurface screens;
substandard systems: severe shakes scarce seen.
Scaling slick surfaces, snow-scented slides;
slogging sludge swamps, smelling stinky sulfides.
Sans similarities, superimposed;
sequencing syllables, simple supposed.
----------
for the Begin with a Letter Poetry Contest
sponsored by Angela Tune
written 06/28/2022
an alliterative 'sonnet', with aabb pattern and 10 syllable lines
updated/extended from a shorter, earlier poem
I come through the birth canal alone but I have never really ever been alone I have knowledge man's knowledge it is substandard the words are finite I speak and spell them out but it's not quite I have God's word and I'm not alone I have a saving a savior who took all my sins he died for me I have Christ Christ alone upon redemption in my minimum faith minor league I stand for fixed I have God the grace I have grace alone with the faith of a mustard seed I have faith alone other than God's glory I have God's glory alone ~and when it's all said and done I am never ever alone
3/14/22
Written words by James Edward Lee Sr © 2022
Sonorous, saporous symphonies: strong;
Soothingly spiritual, sublime sweet songs.
Seismically sensitive subsurface screens;
Substandard systems severe shakes scarce seen.
Searing sharp satirists, snarkily snide;
Subtle smart sophists show soft, specious side.
Skimpy, salacious shows sell sexy spice;
Somber, sad serials scarcely suffice.
Sans similarities, superimposed;
Sequencing syllables, simple supposed.
"One who meditates of death, has disguised his life as one.
One who meditated of death, in order to disguise, knows life."
- "Should I meditate of life then?"
You probably will be 'living death'
(P.s. explanation -
A layman who thinks of nothing but death, and has the essence of it to his very depths, has, ofc, known his familiar friend, 'life'
So he does, cause he has lived and lives of life and want none. Even so, he lives to the fullest. While trying to escape to a place where no human soul has ever reached, he simply traces the paths of knows. Doing so, unconsciously makes a futile attempt of disguising his living into that of death while he actually, indeed, turns to a mortal.)
The most gifted poets who ever wrote
Occasionally penned gibberish and tripe
Even Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Keats
Sometimes were at a loss for words
In exchange for a royal coin or a token
Valued principles were sometimes broken
Even poets will follow the popular herds
To sit with the noted, the famous elites,
Writing mediocre poems of every stripe
I pluck my own beam, seeing their mote.
written June 16, 2021
Substandard Tires
The customer rants and raves at me saying it’s all my fault
And my colleague’s and my employer that he’s got no family
He threatens all of us with court and is off to see the judge
You’ll be in the dock all together he warns for murder
Treating me like I’m the CEO and God of ACME Tires
I just answer the phone and reply to emails
I never made the substandard tires on his car
That failed and killed his daughter wife and sister
He rants and raves and it lasts an hour
All recorded he states finally stopping
If I was employed by the Illuminati
Making cups of tea would he sue me?
For not making his tea sweet enough
Now I nod and say what an arsehole
I’m so glad he can hear me
His tires will soon fail…
Cycle of Life
By: Miracle Man
6/26/2020
It’s a human tendency to forget,
for even the sharpest of minds.
I forget things and oft regret,
as days pass and life unwinds.
I often take walks into my past,
where all good memories are stored.
I excavate thoughts unsurpassed,
those substandard are ignored.
My life has seen four quarters,
spring, summer, fall, and winter.
I’ve tried to be a goodwill supporter,
focused on the cross in the center.
He had a perpetual angry sneer
A lip that curled and an attitude that said
Back off
Expressed dissatisfaction with you
before you reached his eye level
you could feel his disgust
He expected the worst in everyone
Substandard treatment, racism, sexism,
and all the other isms
He had been taught by the best
that the world is horrible and
people are con-artists
it served him well in his quest
to live down to the failure
his mother always said he would be
His grandmother tried to build him up
and love him, but she died when he
was a mere babe
So he lived down the the expectations
of a mother who had always expected the
worst, seeing racism and sexism in everyone
Until she was old, then she say
ageism and spoke to him in even worst ways
treating him like the dog she had always told him
he was
It was despicable to see.
His angels were horrified
But they could not undo the damage
of a sad and angry mother
who never wanted a child in the first place.
Black slender man, bent twig on the branch of a slave’s family tree,
Planted in white culture during infamous time of our history,
From seed transported in the belly of those infernal slave ships.
Bitter tears flowing from his eyes; angry words pouring from his lips.
Spent by long days in fields under hot skies of one hundred degrees,
Living in substandard shacks: wife and babes bearing winter’s freeze.
Broken panes breach for frigid wind; shabby roofs sieve for cold raindrops,
Family worked from sun up to dark to reap the precious crop.
Truth is, most were prisoners of the system evil men devised.
Many struggling to be free from what politicians camouflaged.
Wisdom overrules such folly and the proverb is most profound;
Holding one down makes holder as much a captive as one held down.
This nation, “land of the brave and free”, held out freedom’s lamp to all,
Went out one ominous night and over “liberty’s lamp” threw a pall.
Had wiser men with hearts of love been ruled by God’s Divine Light,
Black and white would have been spared this great nation’s damnable blight.
I look around to see the beauty
of a long lost wonderland
that tells many stories.
Like those wild flowers
growing up together.
They survive and fight
like a real warrior.
I look around to see the beauty
of a long lost wonderland
that slowly kills me.
I'm not like those wild flowers
They grow up together.
Far fetched and outdated
Yes I am an inferior!
I look around to see the beauty
of a long lost wonderland
that fools me.
They are the wild flowers
Growing up together.
My substandard mind
has a place called nowhere.
I look around to see the beauty
of a long lost wonderland
that fades me.
I'm not one of the wild flowers
They grow up together.
Sooner or later
I'll fly with the weather.
Lei Strauss 2019
Nation’s Damnable Blight
Black slender man, bent twig on the branch of a slave’s family tree,
Planted in white culture during infamous time of our history,
From seed transported in the belly of those infernal slave ships.
Bitter tears flowing from his eyes; angry words pouring from his lips.
Spent by long days in fields under hot skies of one hundred degrees,
Living in substandard shacks: wife and babes bearing winter’s freeze.
Broken panes breach for frigid wind; shabby roofs sieve for cold raindrops,
Family worked from sun up to dark to reap the precious crop.
Truth is, most were prisoners of the system evil men devised.
Many struggling to be free from what politicians camouflaged.
Wisdom overrules such folly and the proverb is most profound;
Holding one down makes holder as much a captive as one held down.
This nation, “land of the brave and free”, held out freedom’s lamp to all,
Went out one ominous night and over “liberty’s lamp” threw a pall.
Had wiser men with hearts of love been ruled by God’s Divine Light,
Black and white would have been spared this great nation’s damnable blight.
millions of people,
many substandard,
although this,
i have met someone whom is contrary,
one who rambles,
about nothing, yet everything,
someone who is so kind,
warm hearted,
this is someone whom will love,
and love, and love again,
it absolutely does not matter,
how many times you shatter them,
or stomp on them like they’re nothing,
they will stop, and smile,
pretending everything’s alright,
because that is what you do,
you stand up and show the world,
it simply needs love
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