I Stare Into the Water
I stare into the water
(The water stares back at me)
In chime with Terra Mater;
I expend no energy.
Without a paddle or wind to sail,
My prospects are unavailing;
I restrain myself not to turn tail
And so sit quietly, waiting.
Better there were a rising storm
That forces challenging the elements;
Then I could stroke these listless arms
And make for the lee of Canoe Island.
Though I cherish the life given,
I dream of a different place.
This cannot be the eye’s intention,
Timeless, on an unrippled lake.
To create beings dumb and useless,
Void of expansion of faculties,
Suppresses conscious awareness
That forever is death realized.
A blight cast adrift with stigma
Whose destiny is nullified
Because I’m trapped in a quagmire,
Loath to idle in paradise.
***
Countless desires breed in my heart,
Countless aspirations take wing
from the soul of my mind;
Each aspiration has a spirit of its own
Each aspiration rides on
the wings of dream raring to soar
Each aspiration yearns to traverse
the heavens and seek its abode,
Each desire demands
the price of a lifetime
Each desire needs to be
nourished with the sap of life
Each desire yearns to be
brought to fruition—
Tearing the heavens asunder
Parching the oceans dry
Veering a staid traveler astray,
Yet, the heart aspires in vain
All its longings futile
All its efforts unavailing…
Each desire takes my breath away!
With macabre-like fear, I fret as Death glides near,
all too near! And in my ears, buried deep,
ticks a ghostly tick-tock—it's all I hear
(so deep, deep in my ears I cannot sleep)!
I'm manic; and with every breath I panic
and hyperventilate, as my lungs scream
for air—as from a nightmare truly horrific,
a dream unlike any phantasmic dream
I've ever dreamt of! With unavailing breath,
I wane—wane morbidly as though on death's bier,
embalmed for entombment in a grave beneath
(as I agonize, because the end feels so near).
In paralyzing fear of these panic attacks,
I'll soon die in their death throes and climax!?
Great thoughts once kissed my lobes
Before blank despair her flags raised;
And brimless hope reigned as globes
Of full-shining stars in glowing cased.
Now see what dismal desolate shells
Melancholy sulk where dreams stood;
Wherein arid future's unavailing wells
Barren gape amongst vipers’ broods.
Kind heaven upon my oblations smiled
Many long years dead when luck shone,
And winds favorably blew like lilacs wild;
Erst when juvenility lit bright hours gone.
Present times repugnant drown in bile
Hastily milked from some putrid reptile,
Their galling pungency outlasts high grit
Cowards laud in bold battles’ heroic writ.
If fair fortune's rotations should bring
A morsel of past’s elusive sweetness,
I’ll one dozen more grateful carols sing
Than did my lips under boyish harness.
Wandering in the woods,I had an epiphany.
My life right now is an opera without a symphony.
The plans I made turned futile,
now my body is exhausted and my spirit has turned immotile.
Dreams sometimes can become your greatest source of misery,
Broken dreams create scars and invisible injury.
My ship of hope has lost its sailor,
it's heading forward in the storm without caring about success or failure.
It happens to all once in a lifetime,
when the decisions of past seem like a crime.
Bawling over what is lost is unavailing,
fruitless is the action of wailing.
Pick up the pieces and join them all,
gather all your strength and rise from the fall.
Life is full of miracles and magic,
it is a tale both happy and tragic.
You are the protagonist of your story,
the pen is in your hand,
make it a dreary yarn or an anecdote full of glory.
Date unknown
Contest name:Your Personal Favourite poetry contest
Does your heart ever ache?
When,
you realise unavailing efforts make you drain.
you see how helpless you are in pain.
you think there is no escape but death .
you realise death is not an escape.
you know you have to live with it.
from all the crying you struggle for breath.
crying yourself to sleep doesn't help.
behind the ticks of the clock; of the silent night, you hear the screams.
the songs of death in the cricket's chirp make you flinch.
you shudder as the goosebumps pinch.
to contain overflowing emotions you struggle.
a million times your heart explodes; the agony unimaginable.
a zillion efforts go in vain.
from the blow of realities you cannot cope.
delusions hit hard with unendurable pain.
fortunately, your ego dies a hundred deaths.
all you long for is a ray of Hope.
to stop from going on a quest you refuse.
the cells within for an answer yearn.
your soul urges to ask the Almighty for safe haven.
( "There is no other in the world- Mine was the only one..." - Emily Dickinson )
Uncounting by bird-song in a morning wash
in a mango copse by the low hung melting fern
and I, a clown watcher
espy the tromping doers
the morning dove's coo
and the monarch in his rounds
left unmeasured, the banana leaves
and how the waxy-night grew
left unchallenged, the drinking-soil
the dry leaves awaiting the rain
and I, hope unavailing
fall through every image of her voice
the white of my closing eyes
breaking again
__________________
FORLORN
Gone but here,
Atop my brooding heart
Far yet near
My thoughts brings her forth
I miss my dear
And the halcyon days we had
Doughty visage shroud my tears
But lugubrious of countenance
She severed ties tween us
And loses upon me an unalloyed loneliness
I became unquiet and broody
Benighted of the path to walk henceforth
'tis loneliness all about me
My heart's desolate and hollow
Abandoned to brood
This, bitterness in my bosom
I passed into slumber at night
Perchance this feeling will vanquish
At my wake in the morn
Alas! Forlorn hope, it lingers on
Unavailing my quest for love anew
A damsel with ardour I crave for
To slough off this perpetual feeling
And cast off my woebegone visage.
Dust
Frank Halliwell
A friend wrote a lament to dust.
She swore and fumed and long discussed
A publicly proclaimed decree
That dust was her sworn enemy!
But dust we know, has long withstood
Endless attacks by womanhood,
And warded off from dusk to dawn
Their sprays and rags and feathered wands.
It merely moves from place to place
Drifting around with easy grace,
Till once again it gently drops
To shelf and desk and tabletop
And settles down scorned and eschewed,
There to remain until pursued
Again in unavailing chase
Around the house from place to place.
But in the end, they suffer pains:
Sore backs and arms: -the dust remains,
For dust is an eternal thing
Always benign, not menacing!
As husbands know, the dust exists
For writing notes and grocery lists,
For jotting down phone numbers too!
- A handy kind of residue!
For one may write on dust with ease,
And save the paper, and those trees!
...A notepad that is heaven-sent
For guarding the environment!
o0o
One white flower in a wan worn field,
The frailest of butterflies failing,
The brown-leafed grief of an old year's yield,
The last ray of sun unavailing;
I lay me down in the wan worn field,
I close up the wings of my eyes,
To the sorrow of loneliness I give in, yield,
Till you shine down again, or love dies.
Its several years now since that great spoil
By the never-desired, heartless caller.
Though you lie deep beneath the loamy soil
My love line does reach out to you under.
I grieved but was not bathed in tears for you
For to me it is unavailing still.
My love is still iridescent for you
For even the kiss of death could not steal.
The memories of your past acts of love
Have been stimulating me not to hide
The wonderful experiences thereof
And the consequence of that love denied.
So lie in peace, it's but temporary
Rest in peace, fair aunt of blessed memory
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