I was awakened by the cuckoo
inexorably lusciously jeweled
and to a bobcat pantingly passing
enlivened ashton spirits
beauteous unfruitful rhythmic
respite
(Weekly Magnetic Poetry Challenge • September 7–13, 2026)
Sits the monkish owl.
Beneath its own cowl.
If not candled and windowed, lit as
Soft, meditative.
That, wakeful, before
Sinks, wearily, more.
Grass-burnt, sunned life. Flashed too lewd, pranced through.
Dawned; hell-reactive.
To bludgeon the curmudgeon trudging on among the blind
Or hide the Easter egg upon the stage playing your mind
When word's the play some like to stay indif'frent in the lobby
Among the corn and candy and the geegaws of their hobby
But some afoot are bigger game and so avoid the trap
Set for the blind and lame contented in their nap
A wakeful state of grace in place, entitled and enlightened
To independent thought, unbought, unsullied, and unfrightened
By those who would pretend that good is what they are about
Fooling only those disposed to follow those who shout
In that spoof, let wakeful eyes attend,
The sly concealed to serve their secret will;
So wise compeers will learn and not pretend
Shunning the loins’ demands pressing them still.
Scratchy urges fade, if ignored with the mind,
Till spring returns with tender buds soft and pure;
Then they shall till the fields, not more confined,
Escaping plights which insane minds procure.
Then will it be you whose veins fret with grief,
Who bawls for loss, bitter and snarling in pain,
Who squandered wealth on coquettes, vainly brief,
Then howls in rue as though beset by bane
So try, sketch a life with utter restraint,
Debasing dignity is but constraint.
Rights Reserved
It seems
Just yesterday
That you were teasing and
Laughing by the bedroom doorway.
Silly.
I was
Down on my knees.
When you were handed your
Beautiful iridescent wings.
You passed.
A frail
Heart hungers for
A flicker of your face,
Your ardent, flirtatious embrace.
Miss you.
Wakeful
Nights lost in thought,
Longing for your warm soul
That now Light amid Greenfields.
I'm lost.
It arrives not as a slow dawn, but a fracture—
A sudden, violent tearing of the gray,
Where neurotransmitters leap in manufactured rapture,
And logic bends to the blinding light of day.
It is a temporary kingdom built on air,
A frantic, soaring, breathless, desperate high,
Ignoring the foundation of despair,
To watch the mundane world dwindle and die.
The heart becomes a drum with an accelerated beat,
Distorting time until the seconds, stretch and bend,
A breathless rush, a sweet and sharp deceit,
That promises a joy without an end.
It is the apex where the self dissolves,
A chemical, ethereal, phantom grace,
Where gravity loses its hold, and ego solves,
Into a momentary, breathless, liminal space.
But at its peak, the architecture starts to lean,
For all ascension mandates a return,
The higher the flight, the deeper the machine
Must crash when the bright, burning engines turn.
Euphoria is a loan, a borrowed debt,
A fleeting, dazzling, brilliant, stolen breath,
That leaves the trembling, wakeful mind to fret,
In the quiet, cold, inevitable aftermath of death.
*************************************
Insomania
Wakeful serves the friendless dark
Humming brain flaps its wings loud
Fatigued body longs to rest
I'm lain with my wearied soul
City rests, midst, symphony
Speechlessness screams in my chest
Longing to drift off to sleep
Last Train to Georgia
Wheels sing their final, slow tune
The great machine commences
Fade and rumble in the night
Lights obscure the platform now
Whistling a faraway song
Iron beast, turned: to a ghost
The last station has arrived
To Not Kill a Mockingbird
Gray flash flies from the high fence
A loud, insistent cascade
He steals from feathered neighbors
A tenacious performer
Mocked the world with its great song
Radiance sings a frank bird
Hear the joy of its wonder
Hollow-
An emptiness inside,
A lonely sort of aching
Never resting,
Always present .
Hollow
Like a dead tree;
Still standing,
Wind whistling through,
But interiorly feeling
Detached
Hollow:
A darker feeling,
Happiness seems unreachable.
Trapped in the abyss of your own thoughts,
Seemingly no way out.
Hollow
Akin to hunger
But not as mendable.
Forlorn whispering,
Like a lover who was never there;
The feeling of something missing,
But what exactly,is uncertain.
Hollow,
Does it ever end?
They say it gets better -
Is that from experience,
Or just a way to be nice?
Hollow
When life seems pointless,
An ocean of solitude,
But just in my mind;
Overwhelming at times,
And relentless.
Hollow
When reality becomes bland.
Sleep,that vile temptress,
Threatens to be more interesting
Then the wakeful hours.
Hollow
That helpless feeling
That you're the only one.
Other people seem satisfied;
They all seem uncaring
Although it's the opposite.
Hollow:
A temptation
To hide behind a mask;
To keep them from knowing
Of the darkness inside.
Hollow,
Maybe it's not just me?
Perhaps everyone
Has a bit
of hollow
inside.
In my wake, if i were to awaken,
O' wakeful wonder to wrench mine withered eyes
Aware'f the withering summer haze
Out in my bright eyed future, out in my cross toe'd path
Pompous poppies t'prop mine withering body
Lest f'saken soil shall chance this chance and enwrap thy very soul
Whole, wholly in unholy disrepair
Where thy feet ne'er make a pair
In my wake, where bottomless bile surely shalln't sate,
Grace be with grace whereth fate form'd nigh near'r thy hate
voracious, inherent, timbered'n barrels
Embedded beneath thy bedded tomb t'ferment
Fraught feminal petticoats bed thy bones'n skin, t'sit within
Barrelled quarrels quashed'n quaint fricatives,
T'lace these afaced wicked motives.
Foot befitting feet b'fore foolish faces reverberate foolish vows
F'petty petticoats liven' lieu'f laced love.
In my latent wake,
Tend t'the petty posies
T'prop mine body
Towards th'lascerating ladle'f love,
And into th'deepening dish'f self-hate.
24//8//25
his lips slipped upon mine; into dreaming
in the satellite of fall's chaste shadows
sphered by the last cast of summer streaming
onto our free skin, sunk in the shallows
our first kisses, our first mature outlet
for a latent love now bursts in our ears
from seeds sown in spring's bosom, mere trinket
our little love, hedging, a nest appears
underneath the wakeful sun, its pure heat
receding; displaced by the chatoyance
of autumnal leaves waltzing where we'll meet
singing, unfazed, at the cold's arrogance
Mother of stars,
friend of the moon,
it is often quiet but for its own heartbeat?
the rhythmic sentence pronounced
in one benign-hammering syllable,
which pounds away hostile darkness
laid bare by the wakeful heavens
whose ears listen to tales from
old folks passed on to a glowing age,
and proverbs that leave one and all in awe.
Another
Restlessly
Wakeful night
Thoughts keep on
Dusk till dawn
Sleep walking
Close my eyes
One more try
Oo, popcorn!
I have been deceived all this while,
By all the angels cloaked in a dear disguise.
'Follow the way of light, my child, ' they all cooed,
For they knew too well I was never shrewd.
Off I went, probing for those lights,
Something to put an end to my wakeful nights.
But manipulation, oh my dear,
Sounds sweeter when it is feared.
I never found those lights, I never did indeed,
In the cruel footpaths of naivety and those angels' deeds.
All I ever found was a world so shadowy,
Lit up with lights that glow darkly.
I know you’re there, just out of sight,
There among the black far-reaches
Like a rider of dreams in the night
Searching for reason that impeaches.
You have left behind no traces
Of where you’ve gone or maybe sent.
Your journey seeks familiar faces
Yet posed in unfamiliar bent.
And reasons, they are vaguely veiled
While cognizance won’t clarify.
And rationale is un-detailed
While reaching does but rarify.
Oh, where does purpose hide its grail,
There in the crevice of a mind -
For wont of quests that do not fail
In hopes of dreams that are not blind?
I call you not, you’re back unpacked,
A door of no return passed through -
Rejoined with logic’s wakeful tact
And much to share betwixt the two.
Beneath Forgotten Stars
In wakeful hours, I drink my thoughts,
Letting mind and heart entwine in fraught
Reflections of forgotten dreams,
And roads that vanished with the streams.
Regrets envelop me like a warm blanket,
Comforting yet suffocating,
a heavy burden to bear.
Memories of what could have been,
Haunt me still, like whispers in the wind.
What if I hadn’t let go of those dreams?
What if I dared to traverse the narrow seams?
Would the outcome be different today?
Or would the path have led astray?
The weight of what-ifs presses down,
A relentless tide that ebbs and flows.
In the stillness of the night,
I confront the ghost of choices past
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