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Best Poems Written by Tim Ryerson

Below are the all-time best Tim Ryerson poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

Baseball Card

And there you were - 
blue cap and jersey, white pants
bat held high above the shoulder
cocked and ready to swat one out
in that perfect stance of yours...
Shoulder turned, name half visible
(Proud you were to wear that name
Proud was I you wore that name)

Yes there you were - 
smiling that smile of yours...
Cocky, confident, ready-or-not smile
The kind of smile of someone who
was exactly where he belonged
exactly where he wanted to be
in that very place, that very moment
doing what he was born to do
Fulfilling his destiny...

(Yes that's my boy out there
Yes he IS a good player isn't he?)

So there you were - 
An all-star you were, oh yes, a star
a shining, glittering star but:
Stars are born to flame out, die
We are all born to die it is said
Seems only the best of us die young
and far too soon, too soon
You died too soon...

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

A Tribute To a Major Appliance

Sub-titled: What’s in YOUR Fridge?

Please allow me to introduce myself:
My name is Ms. Fridge A. Daire
I stand tall among my lesser cohorts
and MOST of them really look up to me

However, I have two problems:
First, I’m FED UP with my owner
He's always opening my door
reaching deep inside (Oooh yeah!)
helping himself to my goodies
without EVER cleaning me out
or scrubbing me from top to bottom
Doesn’t he know a woman has NEEDS?

Then there’s that stupid stove next to me
who’s constantly flirting and making passes
Says he wants to ‘warm me up’ and ‘defrost’ me
bragging that I’ve ‘got the hots’ for him
which absolutely makes my Freon boil!
Of course, I always give him the cold shoulder
by freezing him with my famous icy stare
and responding, “Simmer down Four-Eyes"
or “I don’t date shorter appliances"
But he’s always cooking up something else...

So I asked my owner to move me to another spot
He said he would if I wasn’t so heavy...HEAVY?
What kind of thing is THAT to say to a lady?
He also claims there’s no other place to plug me
PLUG me? Who does he think I am anyhow?
I found it quite crude and vulgar! ANYWAY...
I suggested an extension cord and he blew a fuse!
Geez, no wonder he’s still single...

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

The Ghost of My Lonely

Abandoned in the fifties after the war
A freight elevator stuck between floors
Obsolete machinery, splintered old chairs
In a warehouse in Newark, New Jersey somewhere

Dead air presses down, stifling and thick
Something still dwells behind one of those bricks
Curled up in a ball, it waits for me there
In a warehouse in Newark, New Jersey somewhere

A musty gray vapor that whispers my name
It seeps through the wall and creeps to my brain
It sighs and it groans as my soul is laid bare
In a warehouse in Newark, New Jersey somewhere

It mumbles and moans and drones of ancient tombs
Of claustrophobic closets and dim, hollow rooms
I cry out for help, echoes answer my prayer
In a warehouse in Newark, New Jersey somewhere

The ghost of my lonely, my lost and alone
My hopeless and helpless, my can't go back home
It's looking at me now with a dull, vacant stare
In a warehouse in Newark, New Jersey somewhere

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

The Game, Playing the Game

'I want you to use all your powers and your skills
I don’t want his mother to see him like this
Look, look how they massacred my boy'...
Don Corleone (Marlon Brando) in “The Godfather”
-------------------------------------------------------
Playing the game. It's a game isn't it?
Life is but a game, but a dream isn't it?

I drove home by that road many, many times,
that very same short-cut country road that you took
that road where our lives crashed, exploded and shattered
shattered in jagged shards of Silver-Saturn pieces

(This is where you must have seen the swerving headlights
What were your thoughts? Were you worried? Were you alarmed?
This is the spot, oh God this is where, where it all hap...
What were your LAST thoughts? What were your last words
when that pick-up jumped, jumped and flew out of that ditch?
You always said "WHAT THE"...Yeah, you must have said that)

Driving myself to madness playing the 'what if' game
What if you had driven just a little faster?
A little slower? Stopped to pick up something?
DIDN'T stop to pick up something? (Did-didn't-did...)
Stayed at work a minute longer, or left a minute early?
(What-if-what-if what-if-why-where-what-how)

Just what are the odds? Just what are the chances?
2:AM? Maybe one car, one car every 2 hours or so?
If it were a head-on collision, you may have survived
If on the rear side, perhaps only a violent spin
But no, no it had to be on the driver’s side door
It was 'perfect timing, a 'perfect' flash in time
(Perfect-imperfect-perfect-why-where-what-when)

I drove home by that same road many, many times,
that very same short-cut country road that you took
that country road you were driving; innocently driving
just trying to get back home...
 
Yes, playing the game. It's a game isn't it?
Life is but a game, but a dream isn't it?
ISN'T it.

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

Big Bang

Your theory makes quite the impression
But I have this nagging obsession
A huge mass of matter
Explodes in a scatter
This is a layman's 'dumb' question

From whence came this gigantic ball?
Just how did the whole thing befall?
What was there before that?
And before even that?
And so on and so forth, et.al

Blank space, only vacuum you say?
Endless void? Flat nothing? Okay
Is nothing just nothing,
Or ain't nothing something
And what made the nothing I pray?

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

No Sounds of Any Kind Please, Even Silence

The Sounds of Silence
By: Simon & Garfunkle

Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
‘Neath the halo of a streetlamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never share
No one dare
Disturb the sound of silence

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said “The words of the prophets
Are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls
And whispered in the sounds of silence

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciERzSFRwzk

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With a Little Salt and Lime

Hello Jose my old friend
I've come to guzzle you again
The party started before afternoon
I started sipping on you far too soon
My last SENTENCE I fear was slightly slurred
(Vision blurred)
Forgot to EEEET----my breakfast

They look with pity upon me
'Can't hold his liquor', they agree
Now I'm weaving when I try to walk
Senseless babble when I try to talk
Then I feel the NEEEED to flee to an old-oak-tree
(To heave and pee)
but cannot LOOOZE---- my breakfast

Did not like his tone at all
Got myself into a brawl
I quickly put him in his rightful place
Broke his knuckles with my pretty face
Shoulda’ had my OOOATS but didn't so alas!
(I kiss the grass)
and now my ASSSS----is breakfast

In the morning I awake
moaning with a bad headache
Bright-sun glaring through the window pane
I whine and whimper in my wretched pain
In the next room a TV-is-blaring
and screams in my pounding-ear
(No thank you dear)
Believe I'll PASS on----breakfast

*Moral of the story: Never drink before noon OR on an empty stomach...

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

More Foolish Footles For Super Soupy Soupers -

Andrea D?...No brainer:
Dandy
Andie

Or in her younger, wilder days she may have been:
Randy
Andie?
(Just kidding! Just kid...Ouch!)

I have no choice but to categorize several poems by my mentor as:
Guzzi's
Doozies
(Now don't YOU start on me Deb!)

Ms. Macmillan's writing style is quite modern so here-to-forth she is:
Trendy
Cyndi
(You're not gonna' hit me too are you Cyndi?)

It is rumored that Mr. O is a care-free soul so some might name him:
Groovin'
Ruben

And be sure to keep up with current South African events in the:
Suzette
Gazette

A Christmas poem composed by Carol Brown could be a:
Carol
Carol

Writer's block PD? No sweat!...Just a temporary case of:
Souper
Stupor

Okay, that's enough...

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

I Recall

I recall a dirty sidewalk
running in front of grandma's house
with bumps and cracks from the roots
of ancient white oaks

Meandering down to the levee
with cane poles and sack lunches
crickets and freshly dug earth worms
Barefoot in careless summers

I recall one low spot 
beneath a straggly Chinaberry 
filled with pitch-black delta dirt
washed in by summer rains
Shuffling through and digging down
burying our toes

Often now I recall
when the heavens are shrouded in grief
when darkness closes at the edge of vision
I recall a porch light flicking on in the distance
I recall grandma’s trembling soprano calling
calling me back home

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

Star Trek and Captain Kirk's Final Frontier

Kirk: ‘Lt. Uhura, come to my quarters at 1800 hours’
Uhura: ‘Yes captain, might I ask what’s up?’
Kirk: ‘Nothing now but something WILL be at 1800 hours’
Bones: ‘Jim, is this a medical issue?’
Kirk: ‘You bet your boner it is, Bones’
Sulu: ‘Captain, a Klingon ship is approaching’
Kirk:  ‘Blast that sucker to smithereens, I got a date’
Chekov: ‘Captain, you’ll need protection on this mission’
Kirk: No problem Ensign, got a few here in my wallet’

Obi-Wan Kenobi: ‘May the force be with you’
Kirk:’ Thanks Obi, but you’re in the wrong contest’
Obi-Wan Kenobi: ‘This isn’t PD’s contest?’
Kirk: ‘HELL no, now SKAT will probably disqualify us’
Obi-Wan Kenobi: ‘Well, may the force be with you anyway’
Kirk: ‘Look Kenobi, nobody’s forcing ANYBODY here’

Spock: ‘Captain, I’m receiving a message from SKATfleet Command’
Kirk: ‘What Mr. Spock? And why do you always talk like that?’
Spock: ‘To qualify for the contest, the writer has to command the ship’
Kirk: ‘Damn it all! What the…FRONT AND CENTER WRITER!’
Writer: ‘Um…All hands on deck?...Anchors away?’

Uhura: ‘Ohh Captain KIRRK, it’s 1800 hours’…
Kirk: ‘Not now Uhura, I’m not in the mood!’
Uhura: Ohh Captain WRITERRR, it’s 1800 hours’…
Writer: ‘Kirk, you have the helm. I’ll be in my quarters’ 
Spock: ‘Fascinating’
Kirk: ‘Shut-up Spock’…

Tim Ryerson
Theme: Sexual harassment in the workplace
For SKAT’s contest

Details | Tim Ryerson Poem

The Mighty Hand

When the blackest nightmares were realized
and bitter truth pierced cracked, brittle armor
When candles of last hope flickered and faded
and darkness closed on the edge of vision
When despair careened towards insanity
and aching fists and fingers began to slip
When the abyss called, a mighty hand reached
and lifted me silent to higher ground