Shall I compare thee to a hunter skilled?
Thou art more fluffy and flearidden:
Rough winds do not shake thou steady gaze,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a pelt;
Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shine,
And often is thou fur untrimmed;
Yet small rodents are but divine,
But cat’s evolved everchanging limbs;
But thy eternal hunter shall not fade.
Thou’s opals are like owl’s.
And such, thou is feared in sunlight and the shade
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as rats can breathe or their eyes to see,
So long lives thou claws and gives purpose to thee.
is the unsung song
of a slender, strong woman.
My untrimmed, split-ended
hair is down and free.
I want to sing
and dance in multicolor.
Pink Floyd gave me
the brighter side
of the moon.
This offering is smaller
than me, and I love
the unpublished authors
who will never be read,
and the hidden voices
that make up history.
My grandmother
and my mother
are two of the unsung beauties
who define me.
My son is cleaning his room
against his will.
He is headstrong,
kind, and smart enough
to make it.
There are millions,
that make up this marbled
world of perfect complexity.
They call me weed, as if my name itself
is a curse spat between teeth.
I do not grow in obedient rows,
nor do I beg for the gardener’s hand.
Like the poet’s misunderstood words,
my roots clutch the cracks of forgotten places~
a shrug, an insolent in a vacant lot.
The wind combs through me, rustling my leaves~
and, like a poet, I answer only to that.
Like the writer hunched over a page
no one will read, I am my own audience.
People walk past me, boots scuffing near my face,
too busy to notice how I bend but do not break.
Oh! What freedom I have in being overlooked~
Censorious shears do not scare me
nor do worldly stakes measure my beauty.
Let the prime and proper roses preen in their curated beds.
I am the sentence left untrimmed~
the wild ink bleeding through the margins,
alive, stubborn, and creative where I was never meant to be.
Was it off-white?
A cavity on the hem of my socks
Undulation,but palpably grazed
like the letters you never unfastened
I set sail for my untrimmed toenails
A cavity on the edge of my nail plate
“Ma, its uneven”
Notes, chords, and bolted doors
Inaudible, I pulled more thread
Attenuated, I pulled
The darkest possible color
Reached my wavering fingers
“Ma, it wouldn’t look good”
Chortled, was something funny?
I couldn't catch it
“Ma…my needle broke”
Rainbows glimmered after a laugh
I'm thirsty
My sock is missing
Two large figures left the room
Loose clothes
And covered feet
“Ma, my thread is thin”
Great tiny apple
Consequence of branches untrimmed
Will anyone bother to learn
That you are
Defiantly delicious?
Temperate gold buds, untrimmed, lease heaven,
In the wake of an avarice moment,
The grandeur Laurentian Abyss, she came.
Love witnessed a desire being potent,
Her hair the color of passionate heat,
Trailed sparks in the carved vale of the Abyss,
She brought the ardor of men their defeat,
And vanquished hearts with her outpour of bliss.
Genteel tasks in her liquefied domain,
Her expressed lured eyes left their thoughts to wane,
From Neptune Masiff, left many in vain,
The heights alone made the challenge, a strain.
Abyss turned Masiff, mermaid of pardon,
Her laughter championed her trust wanton.
"My name's Lucy, what's yours," with outstretched palm.
"My name's Kirk,""Hi Kirk," "Hi Lucy, you're calm."
Temporal a passage traipse in units,
partitioned Earth's axis and Sun's movements.
Temperate seasons bud the cosmos plains,
Text the gods, link the nightshade, spare the chains.
Constellate heaven, possession errs bliss,
Lease the sky morning dew, sunrise--lips kiss.
Evergreen sanctioned untrimmed yields to gold.
Shade, consumed by the sun, glaring, behold.
Unique tan for the wayward souls loosen,
Fading footed beach traces ought proven.
The eternal god's shade Sun's complexion,
Temperate gold buds, untrimmed, lease heaven.
strolling through the countryside
The air temperate and the sky’s blue
I’m surrounded by Lush green foliage
from swollen buds Flowers are bursting
Giving the landscape a new lease of life
birds whistle their prettiest tune while
Critters scuttle into an untrimmed hedge the
Cows lazily graze under the shade of a tree
The rivers clear complexion shimmering Gold
as a child’s tossed stone causes it to ripple
This stroll through heaven, bringing Eternal bliss
A memory forever kept as a prized possession...
Now, I am speechless; I am without speech
As you transcend the simplistic to grand
Grant me the guidance of your gifted hand
In the temple of your pen, I beseech
To climb in your footsteps of verse, and reach
Green summits of imagery-laden lands
My throat growing tight as your voice expands
As my eyes feast on all you have to teach
Seeds planted long past still flower, untrimmed
Beyond the span of pink springs come and gone
Nor even the darkness of death can dim
Words lit luminous in eternal dawn
A timeless poet's timely passions brim
In lyrical legacy, sonnet drawn.
6/11/20
(this is an ode to my all time favorite poet, Edna St. Vincent Millay; if you would like to read some of her work, I recommend 'The Spring and the Fall', 'Dirge without Music', 'Prayer to Persephone', or the sonnet which begins 'Love is not all, it is not meat nor drink' or 'I shall forget you presently, my dear' - but I love all of it!)
Solaris
Temporal a passage traipse in units,
Partitioned Earth's axis and Sun's movements.
Temperate seasons buds the cosmos plains,
Text the gods, links the nightshade, spare the chains.
Constellate heaven, possession errs bliss,
Lease the sky morning dew, sunrise--lips kiss.
Evergreen sanctioned untrimmed yields to gold.
Shade, consumed by the sun, glaring, behold.
The complexion, the surface enlightens.
Eternal trolls rest, withdraw the Titans,
Unique tan for the wayward souls loosen,
Fading footed beach traces ought proven.
Temperate gold buds, untrimmed, lease heaven,
The eternal god's shade Sun's complexion.
2019 August 17
There were skies onyx at night... moons by day...
lakes pale as her eyes... breathless winds
undressing tall elms; ... she would say
that we loved, but some book said we'd sinned.
Soon impatiens too fiery to stay
sagged; the crocus bells drooped, golden-limned;
things of brightness, rinsed out, ran to gray...
all the light of that world softly dimmed.
Where our feet were inclined, we would stray;
there were paths where dead weeds stood untrimmed,
distant mountains that loomed in our way,
thunder booming down valleys dark-hymned.
What I found, I found lost in her face
by yielding all my virtue to her grace.
Originally published by Romantics Quarterly as "A Dying Fall"
Temporal a passage traipse in units,
Partitioned Earth's axis and Sun's movements.
Temperate seasons buds the cosmos plains,
Text the gods, links the nightshade, spare the chains.
Constellate heaven, possession errs bliss,
Lease the sky morning dew, sunrise--lips kiss.
Evergreen sanctioned untrimmed yields to gold.
Shade, consumed by the sun, glaring, behold.
The complexion, the surface enlightens.
Eternal trolls rest, withdraw the Titans,
Unique tan for the wayward souls loosen,
Fading footed beach traces ought proven.
Temperate gold buds, untrimmed, lease heaven,
The eternal god's shade Sun's complexion.
Sacred Realm
As dawn's light appears in temperate azure skies
Gold rimmed clouds display the hues of heaven.
Untrimmed trees blow in the billowing breeze
Where verdant leaves re-gift their cooling shade.
As thoughts of you swirl and dance within my mind, how
We sought each other's kisses beneath these boughs.
How quickly buds soon bloomed in love's complexion,
A lease of unexpected pleasures as you took possession
Of my enchanted heart in our sacred realm of eternal bliss.
8-16-19
~Second Place ~
A Summer's Day Redo Poetry Contest
Sponsor Michelle Faulkner
Required Words:
temperate, heaven, gold, untrimmed, shade, buds, complexion, lease, possession, eternal
The fabric of temperate night unravels,
Embellishing August her red gown
Through heaven’s lease… this daughter of flame
Spreads buds, their complexion pure as dew.
And mornings welcome sunlight , gold as her locks,
While this maiden romps along untrimmed fields
That She , in possession of eternal wantonness grant
An explosion of wildflowers crowing her limbs:
By the meadow’s shade, heated breeze changes into fog
To augur Fall’s tender arrival—
Making a warm queenly exit, she leaves with a dulcet kiss.
………………..
8/16/2019
A Summer Day Redo: Michelle Faulkner’s Contest
Let me contrast you with a rose in bloom
Whose unfurled buds exude a sweet perfume.
Eternal token of romantic zeal
On lease from heaven with a loving seal.
You, in comparison, with beard untrimmed,
Complexion florid and your vision dimmed,
Have no external beauty to extol;
Possession of long life must take its toll.
Not always temperate your moods break through
And like a rose you can be prickly too.
But though a shade of what you used to be,
You're worth your weight in gold to me!
16.08.19
'A summer's day re-do poetry contest sponsored by Michelle Faulkner
(obligatory words used : temperate, buds, lease, possession, heaven, complexion, eternal, gold, untrimmed, shade)
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