Travailed Poems | Examples


List of Member Poems

Who's gonna tell

Who is going to tell my little girl
If or when I close my eyes
Stay guarded with faith
And don't fall for those forsaken non existent
White lies
If or when I say goodbye
Will my life be fulfilled 
Will I sit down with the angels
Reminding myself of quiet tears
Will I fall asleep tonight with God
Calming all my fears
As I hold my child up in prayer
I share knowledge in layers 
Hoping that she can keep up the dreams
One girl
One world conquer with no defeat
No losses
Some wins
New york best seller list
My work on the shelf
Decades to come
All starting from a little girl who travailed through life's storms

At The End Of The World; An Ode To Family

Funny, what the end could mean, 
when it only ushers memories of days beginning 
Trick and treats, it trickled;
the goods we laughed and jiggled, 
and the bads we travailed, and pickle.
Our little world was rocked with its ‘ends’,
Mama’s sabbath rice treat to spirit that never bends;
over a steaming rite, lows made aright.
Please, world, while you end, right!,
build a wall round my memories’ site.

Premium Member The Wise Man's Fear

"Sometimes, we don't see the truth, not because they don't exist or are too well-hidden, but because we've never learnt to read the signs that point to it," — poet 

How lovely shall all things be
Should life be as honeycomb
When burdens from your path shall flee
And all desires shall yours become

How languid shall all things be
Should life be bitter wormwood
Fair is made all misery
And naught is hope for all things good

Yet should life be bittersweet,
All choices made shall be travailed
Futile as grasping sifted wheat
Unsure if good or evil would prevail

Cannot wisdom be my guide
And speak to me the way to live?
Yet wisdom eludes my sight
That i know not what to believe

For how can i find the way
Whilst so many cry out, “come!”
How can i walk and not stray
To find the path that will lead me home?

The rose of winds point to the hills
But i know not what that means
So i watched the stars and remained still 
Forever stranded in-between


It's Yours

The wait is over, or maybe
there was never a wait 
A time to pull your pencil and
pad and illustrate

Create your masterpiece in this realm of 3D
Sweetly usher your dreams into reality

All the times you looked at them in their time
And oh, how you pleaded and cried, "When will
it be mine?"

But how could it be yours when it's theirs?
To be prudent is to flee from others' affairs

But quietly and somewhat balky, you travailed 
You had no idea that soon and very soon you
would prevail

So look no more, your time has come
Only look back to give thanks for the distance
you've traveled from

Premium Member After Pain

The one who brought fun, laughs, and smiles
travailed his path for miles and miles.

Amusing quips that filled his mind
Were formed by tragedies behind.

When one has never felt real pain
True joy the soul cannot attain.

Do not let pain that storms your way 
Deprive your heart of joy each day.

So Close So Far

My ambitions elitist
reality bourgeois
My palate continental
taste buds still raw
My ambition ennobled
vocation unhailed
My reality sordid
—future travailed  

(Dreamsleep: May, 2023)


Days Ahead

She read the writing on the wall,
She saw it before the fall,
The time it would be,
She didn’t know,
The direction the wind would blow,
She couldn’t tell.

She saw the days ahead,
She heard the cries,
She saw the wounded and the bled,
She saw the fallen haloed by flies,
The vision haunted her nights,
They were days of blurred lights.

The invaders were from an unknown land,
A sage said they emerged from the sand,
They were brutal warriors,
They target the interiors,
The people prevailed,
They relentlessly travailed.



March 24, 2023.

Premium Member It Will Come

When God completes you
You will know it
As He’s been working on you
You've been travailed
Go through the whole process with Him
If you are going through it
You know what I am talking about
He wouldn’t do it
If He does not care 
And if He does not have a goal in mind 
Mine came tonight
And I love it
So there will be the end of the tunnel
You will find it
He will give it
To you
What you wanted the most
So keep on going 
It will end
You will feel so happy at the end
So peaceful and rested
Complete
So don’t give up
Just go with the flow
He will know what He is doing
And will guide you
You don’t have to do a thing

Julius Caesar

Oh, Caesar, though our touch is lost in time:
Weeks, passing years, and years long eons, passed,
I still can hear and feel in learnéd rhyme
Your essence. Like some bee which has amassed
Sweets of the digitalis and the rose,
So have you much amassed in glory’s sack.
Yet just as power strengthens, so greed grows
And weighs much heavy burdens on the back!
Oh, Caesar, stricken soul who now weeps on
The fallen ashes of your flaming lands
Who roamed into the gold of Egypt’s sun
The spirit who travailed on its sands,
    It looks as if the boon of glory’s womb
    Had come to stow the image of your tomb

© 2014 Gleb Zavlanov

Hilary Rodham Clinton

Angel moved to and fro in Chicago, Illinois
Edgewater Hospital door opened
Dorothy Emma Howell Rodham was received
Travailed for a contributor to American she bore
Suddenly Hilary Diane Rodham Clinton
First page began, October 26, 1947

As a child in Park Ridge, Illinois
Her ability couldn’t be ignored
She displayed perfection in church and school
Received awards amongst her peers
She knew the sky would embrace her someday

She prepared her pages to Wellesley College
Her seed of greatness began to germinate
All eyes knew she was heading for the top
Diligence elected her president, Wellesley College
She was ready for her pages to be published to the world 

She is a woman of notable character
Her virtue who can find
She worked hard with a vision
She is a woman sent to this generation
Committed to her responsibilities for her country
She is a woman the whole world
Is watching with big hands of applause

A Cowgirl's Dream

To walk through a paster full of 
wild flowers, up to her West.

To sit under the shade tree's, with
the one she loves.

To lie in the cool grass at night 
staring at the moon and stars talking about forever.

To listen to the stories from the old' days,
told by an old' cowboy.

To lie in the cool grass in the light of day,
listening to the birds singing.

To sit in a swing and listen to the 
rain on a tin roof.

To walk down an old dirt road,
that has long not been travailed.

A cowgirl's dream is not only like 
the words to a country love song,
But is the dream of all dreams that 
gives her the freedom she longs for.

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.

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