What is a castle, but a vain attempt
to keep at bay a horror, dark, adverse,
that sniffs its way towards our flesh and bone?
It seeps through portals, leering with contempt
at battlements and barriers. The Curse
can find us, where we sleep, alone.
Rank weeds creep up, malodorous, unkempt:
a moaning wind weaves through them, to disperse
their evil seeds, unstoppable once sown.
Our crude carnality can fool us, tempt
a sense of something “out there”. This perverse
conception causes castles. Walls are thrown
around us. Though we toil on soil and stone,
the menace is internal – and our own.
Ah, words, the lunacy of language
The cackling currency of the confused
Squandered in vain attempt at conversation
Words, the spit balls and snow balls of youth
Sharpened to become the epees of aging
Slashing thrusts rendering opponents silent
Daggers wielded swiftly in rhetorical deceit
Pretentious pandering of pointless swords
Dancing on the edge of a quiet moment
Words, guttural curses of hurled invective
Hard eyed tortured faces spewing city venom
Tone, tenor and force strangling logic and reason
Thus, do we share a common tongue
Yet cannot understand each other
For it is our hearts that define our words
Amid the where’s and when’s and whys
The can’ts and won’ts and whiney sighs
Sit they with pencils as they paint
In words of metaphoric blue
In vain attempt to tightly grasp
The moment as it flashes past
Do not knock on the door of my heart
if you don't know how to love
How many times have I tried in failed effort to deny the love I live in you
How many times have I in desperate resolve tried to walk away from this love which was born at the foundation of time ?
Do you not see in me the raging torment of my soul as I struggle in vain attempt to set aside a love which is forbidden by the laws of men..... and yet I can not deny it, I will not deny my love for you for to do so would deny my own breath, my own heartbeat, my very life. I am but a mortal man, powerless to escape that which is part of my being and you my love are my completing part. You are in me, my heart, my mind, my soul, my every fiber. From the formation of this earth we were of one thought, one spirit, one hope and one path.
What should have been, what is indeed, is withheld from me and I am unfulfilled and incomplete —- leading to my undoing.
Though separated in the long ages of time the vail of deception is past as now I see clearly we are to be one once more. A more perfect woman I shall never know.
Methinks it is a hidden curse
This vain attempt to write in witty verse
To take the words and put them in reverse
Turn them to sardonic lines quite terse
Yet I pamper them as bedside nurse
With shaking head and lips that tightly purse
While rolling crumpled musings to the hearse
John G. Lawless
©1/17/2023
The first - a vain attempt to cleanse the soul.
The second - a customary rinse of sweat from a run.
The third - necessary defense against the itchy consequences of visiting a barber.
It's not that a shower is particularly special ... but so rare is the day that I'd take three.
Multiples of the mundane -
Suddenly charged with significance.
Might the days in my ordinary life
add to such a revelation sometime?
12 November 2022 (1 day prior was the subject of this poem, however)
WHEN ISN'T THE QUESTION TO ASK
When isn't the question to ask.
You will find no answer to satisfy
The curious mind or anxious heart,
You can look all you want into the middle distance
But you will see nothing emerge
Out of the perfect darkness
Which seems to mock you
In the vain attempt at seeking
To be justified for who you want to be.
No, you are still the way you always were,
Nothing changes - even an iota,
And all.this time you never once
Questioned your rightful existence
To discover if there was another path
To serene enlightenment
As you sit cross-legged, waiting for a sign,
Blank as a pristine sheet,
Waving in the unforgiving breeze.
When isn't the question to ask?
You've slipped away from the shore line
Without realising you can't hold
On to anything in the boat
Which carries you to your destination,
Creaking its wobbly passage through
The lapping waters of an ancient river.
The now has broken your time
Into tiny unseen fragments of doubt,
And seeps into a conscious stream,
Where the when becomes a seamless eternity.
Unpurged sad memories invade my dreams.
How fragile man is despite vain attempt!
Could be the waning moon with dreadful beams?
Useless to look back on sins in contempt.
Wake up my love, Wake up. Look at the sky,
High-freezing clouds fly amassing cold ice
It's the end of night. See the sun is high
Paint the sky blue, so that all will be nice.
Dreams will be forgotten, work we attempt
All shattered thoughts escape in sleepy eye,
Let memories fade and no longer tempt.
At night, soft memories return with sigh.
I’m sick of wanderin’ o’er the page
In search of distant, mystic sage
muttered manta that confuse
stupefy my stoic muse
torment the silence of the keys
while in the distance Shakespeare flees
to curse his feather blotted ink
his red, red rose now turning pink
yet still I sit behind the veil
challenge him and always fail
there are those who disagree
some say he wasn’t one, but three
conspiring in mock defiance
of poetry’s inane compliance
counting syllables and rhymes
that challenged then, the present times
and yet I steal a line or two
in vain attempt to make it new
to think, somehow, it glorifies
the master when I plagiarize
John G. Lawless
©9/23/2022
Another reminiscence of West Texas. There have been many times in my life when I have felt very much like...
Tumbleweeds,
Lonely searching souls
Adrift on ever-shifting sandy seas,
Roll blindly by.
Spindly, prickly fingers
Rasping, grasping,
Scraping, scratching,
Trailing skeletal ribbons
Behind them in their wake,
Ephemeral reminders
Of their sad, brief passing
And their desperate,
Vain attempt
To reconnect with earth,
And life,
And each other.
In a brutal landscape of arid desolation,
Under a relentless and unforgiving sun,
Tumbleweeds,
Unwilling vagabonds composed, perhaps,
Of memories of where they've been,
Tumble onward,
Forever impelled by an also searching,
And equally lonely,
But coldly impartial desert breeze.
Walking on air now
Floating on a cloud,
That’s how I feel
For I’ve taken time,
To reside inside me
To meditate and set
My still mind free,
Letting all the stress go
Letting go of all anxiety,
I’ve taken time to love
Everything about me,
Of which I am not ashamed
Because it’s the right thing to do,
And I will no longer suffer
And deny this simple truth,
I am walking on air now
I am floating on a cloud,
Peaceful and contented
Looking down upon the crowds
Who’ve never felt this,
As they rush around like ants
In a futile and a vain attempt ,
To make somehow what they do
Somehow important and worthwhile,
While suffering feeling
That they keep failing at every time,
They need to find a way too
Breakout of this and set themselves free,
To focus on the love and kindness
And not just hate, envy and greed.
The crowd shuffles
hands raised in vain attempt
to catch a windblown lottery ticket
If you spend 25 bucks
(not counting the price of the turkey)
You can get the turkey
for 89 cents a pound
If not….you’ll pay more
for the turkey than for
the entire dinner.
Took my grandkids to the park.
saw 32 wild turkeys crossing the street
without a crossing guard.
Never play checkers with a cat.
I made Rock Cornish Game Hen for supper.
My kids wanted to know what happened to the turkey?
I told them I washed it…..and it shrunk.
I once ate “Blood Pudding” and Parsnips with my father.
Don’t ask!
How long does it take to become “indigenous”?
I asked Mom: “how many jelly beans can I have?”
She answered: “how many is too many.”
If you factor in all the cleaning, shopping, arranging, set-up, preparation….
the Thanksgiving meal comes to about $89.73 per person..
More if you have a “kids” table.
John G. Lawless
11/23/2021
We sailed upon a ship of fools
no sails and rudder bent
lost sight of land and pondered
“I wonder where it went”
As we chased the rising sun
we begged it: “please slow down’
for we hadn’t figured out
how to turn the ship around.
Becalmed amid a rising gale
we battened down the hatches
unfurled our tattered drooping sail
wind blowing through its patches
so we grabbed the long boat oars
to paddle to the beach
a vain attempt at seamanship
as they were too short to reach.
And here we sit on mirror sea
rewriting all the rules
too late to change the fate of those
book passage on a ship of fools.
10/19/2021
A Noteworthy Ship Poetry Contest
No matter what deep wells are drilled
through a white cloud,
never does enough rain spout
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