THE ANGLER and THE WAITING GAME
Along the shallow sloping winter bourne
The water trickles to the stream to drain
The rain-wet fields on bone cold winter morn
It’s life held brief by seasonal refrain
All summer long it played the waiting game
In breath-held stillness trees unmoving stand
Except where twig is touched by drip of rain
With oaks and elders all across the land
A premature tumescence they restrain
For sun’s return they play the waiting game
Aligned along the margin of the lake
Bullrushes stand in arid martial lane
No longer from the water do they slake
The thirst that will return at Nature’s deign
For satiate quench they play the waiting game
The angler - bent and clothed in woodland green
On river bank he sits alone, no name
An allegory of patience, ever seen
He troubles no one, none would seek to blame
Through seasons all he plays a waiting game
GET-DOWN LET-DOWN
He took rhino muzzle excrescence
For boost of his hoped for tumescence
But in spite of big dose
From a pachyderm‘s nose
It was useless with no acquiescence
29 June 2019
For Humorous Limerick Contest
Sponsor: Tania Kitchin
THE BULL
His regular emissions
Worthy of politicians
THE ANT
To the anteater
Nothing is sweeter
THE SLOTH
Feel his chagrin
Labelled deadly sin
THE TURKEY
With justified reason
Deplores festive season
THE EEL
Mobile on belly
Recumbent in jelly
THE CAMEL
Far from pretty
Designed by committee
THE HIPPO
A chubby figure
Mouth even bigger
THE RHINO
His muzzle excrescence
Prescribed for tumescence
22 October 2018
Six Word Couplet Series Encore Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Mark Toney
Sky tinged with phosphorescence
Moon pale, convalescent
Incandescent lunar crescent
Adolescent lips meet in acquiescence
Hopes blaze, steamy flourescence
Hush! thy quiescent quintessence
Shy effervescence, her backdrop incalescence
Tumescence lurks too, fraught essence
In Love's Mirror of Evanescence
Tethered by life's boundless gyre;
doltish in the headlong plunge.
Swirling in its turbid mire;
mock demur feigns to expunge.
Inchoate thoughts swell pathos' rosters;
errant guides whose hack beguiles.
Pay scant regard to such impostors;
debar with glee their rueful smiles.
Then peerless grow your firm resolve;
abjure ego its tumescence.
Ascend the arc and thus evolve;
render glacial your senescence.
Else succumb as prisoner of your thought;
Fashioned into something you are not.
Sparring with demons, and dragons and deadheads
It bobs and weaves like a drunken sailor.
Omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient
I'm quite attached to it - joined at the psyche.
Image of an incubus twirling as I do.
Patron Saint of agony, I curse it
And relegate it to a 2nd-class personage.
Out, damn spot, out - and take the blood with you.
When I am naked, it is clad (no projection),
No libido, no tumescence, no consummation.
How's that for a declension?
When it ascends, I float in the ether.
This hermaphrodite queen is superior
To all mono-sexual beings
And since I am bound and bounded
It supplies the rope, the pins and the Worchestshire Sauce
Third person singular with plural overtones.
No objection for this object of my affectation.
Alas, the narcissus cannot not spin like lilies,
But only vegetate with the legumes.
The coda, finale, epilog await
Looming like a sarcophagus awaiting its occupant
And alcohol cannot still the tooth
That nibbles at its soul.
As dawn vanquished the winter solstice
the celebrations were over but
Mary and Joe felt frisky,his fingers
underneath her dress, stirring her pot
keeping her simmering till she
arched her back and moaned,
pressing against his hand
as her juices overflowed.
Joe settled back licking his fingers
as Mary dropped to her knees
and burrowing under his robes
released his staff and slowly,
teasingly relieved his tumescence,
although her hymen remained intact.
Satiated they spooned, chatting
of their upcoming nuptials
and Joe shared the rumor that
King Herod was to grant passage
to some learneds from the East
who were seeking to observe
next year's comet.
They always brought
trade goods with them,
so Joe was short selling
frankincense and myrrh
but he thought gold
would stay firm.
Their conversation then turned
to their upcoming journey
to register in Joe's natal town.
Another damned tax,
the Romans would run
them into penury.
And he'd better book a place
at the Inn early, or else
they'd end up sleeping
in the stable.
Seems like good humor grows positive,
healthy
resonant
confluent
sometimes co-invested
passionate consciousness
And bad humor grows negative,
unhealthy,
dissonant
contentious
dispassionate unconsciousness
So, maybe compassionate consciousness grows
global intelligence.
And, perhaps shared intelligence could grow
universally cooperative
sacred unitarian integrity,
co-passionate joy
commingling health and beauty,
co-invested peace,
wise therapeutic humor,
amusing comprehension.
Wouldn't it be unsurprising if love's omnipotent comprehension
feeds good humor,
feels healthy,
breeds universally wise
and unitarian wealthy,
trauma-free compassion?
Above a cloud, in soundless, still tumescence,
a goddess rests; below her is the sea.
A strip of it is rippling luminescence,
a path of light in night’s serenity.
A solitary boat now passes through
the lane of radiance. One man regards
the sky and ocean, both a cobalt blue,
and ponders inspiration of the bards.
For what could man want more than such as this -
-the tranquilness of dark in Luna’s glow!
At times he longs to taste a woman’s kiss
though he embraced this life so long ago. . .
His gaze is fixed on her who shines above.
He chose the sea. . . and moon became his love.
September 18, 2010
Submitted Oct. 7, 2022 for
Mark Toney's 2022 Poetry Marathon Mile 16 Poetry Contest
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