Unremarkable Poems

Amplitude in a Small Apartment

There is a need for quietness today,
I listen to my neighbor's toilet flush,
it takes a long time for the sound
to drain away and refill,
I hold seconds inside my mind
between that rise and fall.

There is space for listening,
the trash compactor chews on
when switched off.
I hear conversations
filtering through the air conditioner,
words both distinct and garbled.
Yesterdays hurried meal
speaks still, moments explore
newly opened pocket.

This is not silence
sound moves upon carpet slippers,
yet steps are heightened
by being audible
in a lower registry of depth.

It is I who creates this lengthening,
this processional unwinding of
of unremarkable moments,
a distance between
and marked by blank labels -

every note,
an eavesdropping deliverance.

the unnamed

ghostly gray petals—
a shadow crossing the grass
I stepped on a name





______________

A minimalist reflection on mourning and the erosion of identity, set in the asphodel fields of Greek myth, where unremarkable souls wander without memory…

Stillness in Motion

I am here,
on this bench,
as if the world’s still spinning
but I forgot how to move with it.
The air is thick,
like it’s waiting for me to do something
to lift the weight off my shoulders.
But I just…
sit.

Leaves fall,
but I don’t notice
when they hit the ground,
just that they were once up there,
free,
and I wonder if they ever felt
light.

A man jogs past,
his feet like little promises
on the pavement,
and I envy how his legs keep
the rhythm.
I wonder if he knows
how it feels
to be stuck,
to not have the energy
to move
even when everything around you is moving.

A kid’s laughter stabs through the air,
sharp,
like a sound I don’t remember
ever making.
She runs in circles,
spinning,
and for a moment,
I almost remember what it was like
to be free—
but then the memory slips,
just like the wind,
and I’m back here,
alone
and unremarkable,
on this bench,
waiting for something to change
but knowing it won’t.

Memento on the Moon

A boy from a distant galaxy does wander,
calls home on his intergalactic transponder,
stares into the black where countless twinkles swirled,
at an unremarkable nearby world. 
That planet is, of all signs of life, long devoid,
unless, by geology, it has been destroyed.
More fascinating than just any rock or pebble,
peering through his brand new spacesuit's bubble, 
lies before him, on this dusty satellite,
a monument, illuminated by Sol's bright light.
It bears a picture history.  Could it be to mourn,
or possibly, for future space travellers to warn,
in a sequence of images so melancholy
the consequences of one specie's folly?

Unremarkable life

Inspired by the movie, Stardust. You aren't what you do. And true love includes mutual respect and kindness. 

Unremarkable Life 
By Michelle Morris 
29/11/2024

You aren't what you do
Your title is not your value
So many people live unremarkable lives
Their egos control every angle 

Each of us has a Purpose 
Each of us has a Path
Our Souls are blessed to be here
Earth is our Home and Heart

Here we learn our Lessons
We can grow and we can thrive 
As long as we focus on our Truth
Not on man-made limitations and lies

We can make a difference 
We can change people's lives
Create a remarkable life 
Beyond this Space and Time 

© Michelle Morris, 2024

A New Day - Wildflowers

Roads long squandered,
Routes trained to memory.
a crack in the long unyielding concrete
unremarkable.

Then, a wildflower
A peculiar pink.
Leather, nostalgia.
Cinnamon, mellow.

Stop dead in my tracks,
Wistful, yearn.
Many a while did I dream of creation
After all, what does it take?
Soil, water, an undefeated soul.

Many a while did I long for something that called me God.
Many a while did I pick up a pen,
Dropped it back down.
Afraid of laughter no one laughed,
Fearing fingers yet unpointed.

What does it mean to begin?
What does it take to begin?
Paper, ink, a sliver of hope.
Do I have what it takes to begin?

Now every new page,
A breath of awakening
In a book awaiting it's soul.
A step, far from empty pages.

Albeit one, this stride
holds strength of lifetimes far spent.
And as I sit, winds of change,
Of beginning, blowing through my hair finally let down.

A start. 
Breaking apart the shackle that is anticipation.
Everything goes, and so will this fear.
And as my soul, my blood, my sweat, my tears, I wring into form,
Perhaps, 
I have what it takes to begin.

Hey Look At This, Said The Universe

so some wooden spoons and a potato masher
with a spaghetti spoon and some other utensils
being what they are every day, stoically on duty
crammed into the unremarkable utensil holder
but one particular day when they and the light
decided to converse secretly with the universe
over an unknown coffee among chatter and din
bereft of sticky fingers, cast a phoenix in flight
majestically across the kitchen wall, the meal
was several seconds later that magical evening

and by another incredible zing, a conspiring
of the universe and other distant table waited 
secret evening suppers, the bedroom pointed
to the lampshade upon a low lit ceiling behind
it became a robot warlord’s head ripped from
its body, circuitry dangling like vein and sinew
and then – hey look at this, said the universe
I wondered how many times the universe had
reached out but I was in too much of a hurry
and sleep was several seconds later that night

A Familial Condition

Disgruntled, they come to me as bit-parts
ripped from black and white movies.
Mad aunt Anastasia, who should have been a nun,
one of her hands would refrain from touching her,
the other has been long carried off
by wolfish priests.
The Holy Ghost has pickled her in a jar,
she now floats between worlds.

Uncle Sean, the iniquitous Maître D'
looming above a meaty cleavage,
he who flambéed Steak Diane
with a slyly sapid leer,
poured cognac,
then after the salacious hunt,
triumphantly decanted his thirsty+ lusts
into any grateful woman
whomever.

Cousin Tommy died early,
but not before he had burnt through
the Old Testament.
A brimstone disorder gnawed his innards,
left him lacking normal human kapok,
kept him bubbling until a self-inflicted wound,
blew out his brains.

There are cousins removed and living,
who disassemble themselves, with zealotry,
or ennui. None took the middle way,
none quietly settled-in
to live a life of unremarkable normality,
trysting the nights away
with damp-stained regrets.

Like larks’ tongues, they sing in the invisible.
They reside in the far reaches,
until dark angels flame out
in their berserker eyes.

Partly Cloudy

From my home known as the 5th of June,
nothing remarkable about this place.

Though it was fair and warm
yet cloudy, though only partly..

Your singing seahorses..
and treasured rocks 
all strewn about
summer's seashelled dreams
adorned.

Remember seeing them
now and again..
behind closed eyelids
where the light was bent.

The sun's joyous rays, with arms 
outcast from the clouds.
Calling us, home
all of us home, invited
reunited, in that
unremarkable day.

Near misty water's edge
as vagabonds called a tune
to the placid lagoon's 
dismay.

With a little hope we'll hold on 
all the year long..
to our summer song
least partly remembered
just that way.

Driftwood

fewer …

stars there are
in the heart of heaven
than the myriad ripples of brine that
gently placed me here -
tender tongues of tide that tossed me
and polished my bark away
shaped me smooth from jagged -
turned from beast, to beauty …
courses ago -
I was loosed from a tree
and lost to the sevens in a gale -
sundered from all I’d known
yet …
my journey was ordered
as all things are
made divine not by substance
but by ministration
and singularity …
for the universe, entire,
holds no other creation like me
the countless moments
and patient, boundless energy
that my trek required
would never have been wasted
on the unremarkable …
and though one sojourn has ended
something awaits
that is more infinite, even
than waves …
OR suns …

possibility.







Copyright © Gregory Richard Barden, August 12, 2023

( photo taken 8/1/23 by Gregory R Barden, Ferry Beach, Scarborough, ME )

An Old Shovel

Today I forgot how old I was
An extra year now just because
I dug a hole to keep that year at bay
With an old shovel I bury it away

It crept up fast this passing time 
So quick I'm not sure it was all mine
So I gather up that 365th day
With an old shovel I bury it away

Odd to think which was the missing year
Where nothing must have happened here
All thoughts of then now in decay
With an old shovel I bury it away

Now deep in the ground, hidden well
An unremarkable year so hard to tell
Of the where or when I buried today
With an shovel it was buried away

Scattering a Freed Verse

SCATTERINGS

 anticipates
in sequence
a
 breathtaking
 possibility
constructive
& respectful
but
otherwise
unremarkable

a
distinctive
 image
a
level
of reverence
in a
 designed  pattern
a
  comparative
  once
 formed
as
a key
 approach
clearly
 meaningful
to explore
the
long-forgotten
 idiosyncratic
 &distinctive faux-naif style
with innate ability
 to elevate
 the everyday
carefully
 spotlighting
&highlighting
 an important facet
to celebrate
 innovation

The 'sonnet' I Wasn'T Gonna Finish Bc It Didn'T Live Up To the 1st Line

Remember when you were a fleeting thought?
Back when your smile was unremarkable?
Your ocean eyes not yet part of the plot?
Before your name caused that unconscious beam?

And now I let you go, you haunt my dreams.
I look far and wide to avoid your blue.
Each curve I touch I bend to the extremes.
I chuck my headphones to flee ragtime tunes.

And now I have a new one in your spot -
A hockey boy. No scintilla of you
Nor your song. He's cute and kind like he ought.
He even loves that game you never liked.

So... care to bring me up to speed with you?
Haha... forgot I am a ghost. What's new?

Nondescript

Not epic nor disastrous, a life mediocre
A trait that followed me down to the crypt
Expressions neutral, a good face for poker
Like everything about me, nondescript

I'm sure I could be out committing crimes
Who could describe my median brand
But after years gone by and passing times
I just wade in the plain and the bland

To people I've met before, I say hello
They seem confused, they don't remember
Now they don't have to pretend they know
I say nothing, and wait for December

One more unremarkable year gone by 
Will a new year bring excitement or change
Is there something new I should say, or try
Odd how being ordinary feels so strange

So while people look at me and draw a blank
They can get up over the words they tripped
I smile politely, wave them on, heart sank
And be on my humdrum way, nondescript

March 21, 2023
Writing Challenge, 'N' words
Sponsor Constance La France

Linen and Lace

She lived to be the oldest of a staid, 
unremarkable bourgeois family.
Lavender and off-white lace,
complemented her black ruffled attire.
She played the Granddame with much aplomb,
the matriarch of her passionless clan.

Occasionally her offspring
and her offspring’s offspring came to her for money,
a few with questions, appeals, unctuous compliments
She offered only sneers, curled and haughty lips.

In her days there were giants on earth,
they did not reach just for the middle shelves.
Their thoughts were painted hot-air balloons,
they imagined rocket ships made out of 
bicycle parts.

Was it her fault that humanity had shrunk?
Day after day she gave audience 
to unimaginative midgets, the small minded 
affronted by her regal demeanor.

When she died they gathered
to pick the spoils,  unfortunately for them
she had  long disinherited her fortune 
considering her kindred all just cheap satin
stitched over bovine buttocks.

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