Untuned Poems

The Composer

I am 1,248 songs of complicated rhythm. Prose and verses tell a story of my decisions…my indecision. I am skin shaped, in 42 different shades of foolery, a life lover doing my best to avoid an other, but they seem to be everywhere these days. Crawling out from under rocks, or latent in my twisted fantasies. I think I may be terminal with delusional romantacy. A proverbial symphony strung together with sinew and longing. Discordant chords bending into melody when I blink too long or laugh too hard at the wrong moment. 
 
I can admit, I have been the composer of songs that I was never meant to play.  Still, I finger at the keys, an untuned melody stretched thin across the vastness of possibility, a quiet rebellion whispered in 3am silences, telling truths I didn’t ask to know, but I can’t help but pick up on the tone. I am every note you thought I missed, the calloused fingertips of my mistakes, still strumming, still singing. Harmony may elude me, but the melody is mine to claim. Yes, I am 1,248 songs of messy humanity, and I’ll rewrite the chorus as many times as it takes to finally hear it in my own voice.

- Small Notes -

  Frozen window a blackboard to write on
  a motivational boost 

  Smelling romantic moonlight
  can be a two-part problem - or shared enjoyment

  Sliding down the hill in an open suitcase
  reindeer in fur coats - the merchant's profit

  The bathing season is already ended
  scientists cast doubt on the health effects of ice bathing

  The frozen untuned strings of the soul
  I'm considering buying a piano

  You don't need professional education
  look - the gooses track in the snow

  Wet lips, juicy tangerines
  garlic and ginger in a bread bag

  In the Advent calendar's windows
  soft velvet hearts and twin cherries

  Avoid this year's cold - recommend
  a splash of whiskey morning, noon and night

Paisley Swallows

That one lost their tongue
somewhere along the way
long ago, the sound,
doesn’t come out the same
anymore, so they roll it up 
like a carpet containing 
a nakedly dead body
of blunt words 
like unplucked violins
untuned to how it all 
really works 
begging to be heard,
and the flowery prose, 
purple and bruised 
like over-ripe fruit
teeth rottingly sugary sweet, 
is now seen 
day-in-and-night-out,
struggling with ease 
way too much 
like madness overgrown, 
the dense overgrowth 
of language unspoke
hides glittering gems 
blushing shamefully
more exquisite than 
the now daily averies
all penned in babel
that flow in glass jarring
anticipated patterns 
of suffocating 
paisley prose,
the simple beauty
in the plainly spoke,
never again 
to be seen nor heard,
the mercurial metaphors
birdfeed scattered
to the begging migrations
of petulant bluebirds
naughty nightingales 
honey trapping 
wet-beaked hummingbirds 
all beating hearts
with their wild wind flapping,
tossing sticks and stones 
to those tongue thirsty 
kiss lapping, lap dancing 
love parched, gargling
swallows





Candide Diderot. ‘24

Wabi-sabi

For me you’re designed, mesmeric scarred moon, 
grace gleams in the convolute cradle of cyan night, 
slithers in the silken sky I create for you,
a turquoise trail you trace in my heart incised.

Thunder cloud surges from the edge of stained night, 
the debris of the splintered sky swathes me.
You retreat in the glare of anguish lightning, 
searing the slivers of my fissured essence.

I travel in the tempest of strife,
serenade the broken notes of an unsung song,
in sync with the symphony of flawed passion,
making untuned melody in the snapped string of memory.

In the blemished visage of the veiled sun, 
I paint on the scraped sensual canvas 
your frail face with fragmentary fervor,
sedately smiling eyes sparkle my deranged dream.

On the charismatic canvas cracked,
my failing longing lingers in your effervescent eyes.
Etched in the invented lattice of patterned splendor, 
your unsplit smile shimmers unspoilt.

Blue Hole

In the seamless sky of my fervent freedom
I let the enraptured songbird of heart soar high,
gliding in the spring-rippled amorous breeze
that carried your jasmine fragrance to me,
until the splitting thunder storm surged in
from your hazy horizon receding to obscurity,
anguish of desertion crushed the wings of longing.

The crippled bird folded the collapsed wings,
painfully crumbled like autumn’s dislodged dry leaf
in my mangled mind that turned into pangs of grief, 
desolate in ruined nest made of emotion called twig.

The ruptured voice untuned the bird’s song,
disabled flight of subdued passion lost the sky,
chilled to stillness in the shadow of winter cloud.
Unshed tears froze in the blue crevasse of glacial gloom,
the pain of broken heart languished frozen unexpressed.

What in the end you would remember of me…
an off-course forlorn fading star losing the orbit,
sucked up by the blue hole of dense despair,
where the soul disappeared in timeless oblivion.

May 16, 2021
For Brian Strand's Contest : A Brian Strand Your Pick

Perfect Harmony

Bob on untuned guitar as Andrea sings, “Fly me to the moon”.





01.11.2021
For Tease a Friend Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Bobby May

City Fire Sparks

A scratching at dusty glass from piano keys

In a lace attic catacombs chests
bathed in blue panic 
room stained window

Hiding from the tell to show
away bitter clown faces without
makeup to disguise frowns
from smiles 

Glass of Rose wine in hand 

Half black and white 
harlequim dress worn
like princess Di

Bitting down on fretted untuned
strings

Yellow taxi clock running outside
in a traffic jam carpark

Great expectations Dickensian
clambering down unsteady 
unsafe ladders

Floor by floor at breakneck speed
scissors running in hand

Final destination paused

Star's

City , Sparks , Fire 

Takes me back melancholic
reminding me what it was
like to be a torturous teen

Dreaming of wanton love
and how fragile youth is

Carnal Sensibility

If love is blind, then what is carnal attraction?
Untuned fidelity can be quite the fatal distraction. 
A novel connection conjoins souls between me and new.
What is a twisted nail but a substitute screw?

Deep Blue Oblivion

In the seamless sky of my fervent freedom
I let the enraptured songbird of heart soar high,
gliding in the spring-rippled amorous breeze
that carried your jasmine fragrance to me,
until the splitting thunder storm surged in
from your mirage horizon receding to obscurity,
wrench of desertion crushed the wings of love.

The crippled bird folded the collapsed wings,
painfully curled like destemmed dry leaf
in my mangled mind that turned in grief 
a ruined nest made of emotion called twig.

The ruptured voice untuned the bird’s song,
disabled flight of subdued passion lost the sky,
chilled to stillness in the shadow of winter cloud.
Unshed tears froze in crevasse of glacial despair,
pain of broken heart languished unexpressed.

What of me in the end you remembered…
an impaled bird in deep blue oblivion,
it failed to fly in your sky.

Written : July 27, 2019
January 26, 2020
Contest : Strand Choice 6, Any Form, Any Theme
Sponsor : Brian Strand

Poetry Performer

You are angst poetry
          played on the strings
                     of an untuned guitar
     A smokers cough cord
            that grinds like grit in a turbine
 Clumsy fingers that slip
   ungracefully on the flimsy stretched nylon
           A coffee percolating flow
         of words I do not know
                  A language of sophisticated agony
            the core of your existence
                     is wretched from your gut
                             through the microphone
                        
when my sense are filled with the crudity of your song,
I can feel the pain, 
                           more than words, 
                 you are the poetry that you perform

Last Chance To Dance

LAST CHANCE TO DANCE
by
JOHN M. ARRIBAS


Woke again this morning, sky dark and gray
Sun brightly shining, just another bleak day
The unending silence, fills the empty spaces 
Fading images my heart, frantically chases
You have left me, yet I can’t let you go
Lonely, only vanishing memories to show
That you were part of me and I of you
Constantly beset  with visions of two


Chained to the memories of a joyous past
Never considering, they would not last
Alas, gone only fleeting memories remain
Wondrous times now, inflicting pain
I need a recess from the aches of my loss
I search for solace from this ugly chaos
I hoped that time would heal my wound
Tis not the case, I’m completely untuned


I searched for someone to accompany me
To divert my attention and set me free
Of the torment of being tied to the past
Break the chains, add a new face to cast
You will always be the owner of my heart
But just to continue, I need a new start
Found someone to offer me a second chance
Band is still playing, so I’m going to dance

Melancholic Glory

From my diary: Introspection 

We are a kaleidoscope of broken things, 
Angels with clipped wings;
Dyslexic writers, fallen knights.
We are an army of crushed mights.

We are the troubled therapist;
An untuned symphony, 
But we burn with our melancholic glory. 

We are the comedian that finds it hard to smile, 
We are the dreamers in exile;
A shy actor, an ugly butterfly. 
We are the colorblind painter splashing the night sky. 

We are the Beethovens and Van Goghs;
The brightest and the most magnificent are we, 
Because we burn and burn forever in our melancholic glory 
-and we can't be tamed.

Forgotten

Forgotten...
Sand of time pass over me and i fade away like the season. The sand in time droped over me and then my life was over like that, forgotten. Nothing to do to come back to the top. 
Casted artist. I become. Forgotten music i sound. 
A dead lyrist i become. 
The sand upon my time drops so fast. I lost my value with whom i never appreciate. I neever met whome i look forward to.
Like that i became forgotten. Unseen talent. Unheard song. Untuned channel. so fast i could not catch a breath. So quick, it was too fast before i knew i was left behind.

Writers Block

The day poetry stops
  words inept
    rigid strokes
      faltered attempts
A hand floats
  amputated 
    over paper white
      virgin
A blank mind
  untuned dissonants
    lonely tones
      blank bars
Dance halts
  legs cannot carry
    strangled sounds
      lost steps
And tears form
  small lakes
    round pools
      failed chances

***
June 24, 2017
Copyright © Darren White

No Country Mas

There's something so unsettling about nails on a chalkboard.
I cringe whenever I hear the tapping of pencils.
As obnoxious as loud breathing.
As disturbing as a bad Disney movie;
Nothing could be worse than off-key singing and untuned banjos.
Popcorn kernels in my teeth, legos underneath my feet-
Would be more pleasurable than hearing the grinding of country twang. 
I'd rather be friends with quitters and cheats than sit with country on repeat.
As miserable as being bed-ridden after having my teeth ripped out,
These southern tunes are grilled cheese from the school cafeteria. 
The whining and complaining are endless, but nothing can compare
To the burning of my chapped lips, dehydrated and cracked.
The awkward middle school "ugly" phase is the wardrobe of the band.
The tearing sound of satin and silk are the cringe worthy falsettos.
Depressing and lonely is my ended childhood.
It is sand at the beach that scratches my skin and won't wash off.

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