12 posts tagged “poetry”
Without warning,
light glimmers
at the end of the
relentless blackness.
The interminable tunnel of
Winter collapses.
Hopelessness dissolves
into delectable potential,
its presence permeating the air,
tangible and appreciable,
like threads of warmth
touching the core of a once still heart,
breathing life into the cadaver
of a now bygone existence.
Fecund, embryonic
Potentiality
Inhales, exhales.
Sparks of life root
themselves in rich, red earth,
the blood of rebirth.
Promise blooms afresh.
How do you feel?
Agitated.
Do you often feel agitated?
No. Recently I just feel disjointed,
temperamental, inconsistent.
What makes you feel this way?
Life.
What stops it?
Him.
Tell me about him.
He helps me,
pulls me from the depths of my wallowing heart,
with just a word.
Which word?
Any word. It's not his words.
It's his voice.
His voice?
Yes.
No.
Tell me...
It's his presence.
When I'm with him he draws me away
and cocoons me,
protects me from the world.
When do you feel disjointed, temperamental?
When he's not there.
Where is he?
Gone.
My sanity goes with him.
Share your favorite poem.
What a cruel question!!! How can I possibly choose!!??
I've managed to narrow it down to three (although there are another ten pushing their way in to my head as I type!) Three is the lowest number you're going to get- sorry.
How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
Now that's the love I always wanted to find when I was young. I am lucky. I have found it. "the breath, / smiles, tears, of all my life..."
Che fece ... il gran rifiuto
by C. P. Cavafy
For some people the day comes
when they have to declare the great Yes
or the great No. It's clear at once who has the Yes
ready within him; and saying it,
he goes from honor to honor, strong in his conviction.
He who refuses does not repent. Asked again,
he'd still say no. Yet that no-the right no-
drags him down all his life.
This poem changed my life. It made me do something I thought I'd never have the courage to do. And I don't regret saying "Yes", not for one second.
Love Poem
by Vicki Feaver
Sharing one umbrella,
We have to hold each other,
Round the waist to keep together,
You ask me why I'm smiling-
It's because I'm thinking,
I want it to rain forever.
Simple. Beautiful.
What is your legacy?
Submitted by Beautifully Broken.
I guess my legacy to those I leave behind is my poetry. The books that mean so much to me now, that have had my heart and soul and tears and thoughts poured in to them over the years.
They read like a diary of my life from the age of fourteen to present day, so they'll give someone an insight in to the person I was, should they care to find out.
I wonder whether they'll be as important to me when I die. If I die in forty years time, perhaps so much will have happened in my life that twelve years of poetry won't be significant. Or, perhaps, I will have added so much to those two books that there will be six or seven or maybe more to pass on to my loved ones, or my cats, or a charity or whoever desires them (depending on how my life pans out).
It's there,
Lurking in the background.
Ever present.
I feel it sometimes,
Breathing against my neck
Luring me in,
Teasing me,
Ever the temptress.
It would be simpler
To step backwards,
To walk blindly in to the unknown,
The folds of eternal night would envelope me,
Embrace me,
Suffocate me into a deep, dreamless sleep.
It would be simpler.
Sometimes.
How can you not love a band who's lyrics are so beautiful and emotive...?
"I miss you... I miss being overwhelmed by you." (Best I'll Ever Be- Chasing Daylight)
"The ocean wrapped around the sun, the smell of June, the taste of your tongue, is all I'll ever need." (Come Around- Chasing Daylight)
"And for the million hours that we were..." (Champagne High- Fortress)
"I wanted us to be the one that poets write their books about..." (Life Got in the Way- Chasing Daylight)
You've got to appreciate the poetry, right?
Wrote some stuff recently. Thought I'd post it for peeps to have a look if they fancy. No criticism or comments required. Just felt like posting it. :)
You said reading my poetry was
Like reading my diary.
(You saw through the words.)
Perhaps, you were right.
The words all start inside me,
Born of my imagination,
My heart, my soul.
Sometimes it comes from a place
Inside, that I cannot seem to name.
(Do you know where?)
What would you say
If you read what I write now?
Would you see only what the words say
Or hear the truth behind their voices?
Sometimes you see past it all-
The words, the lines, the structure-
To the real thoughts inside my head.
(You see me).
At home, I go through 'phases' when it comes to my writing. I can go weeks without putting pen to paper- no poems, no stories, nothing except perhaps this online blog. Then, without warning, and sometimes without a trigger, I'll write all night- four or five poems, pages and pages of scrawled words, messy in the rush to get everything down on to the paper in front of me.
I figured that, once we were on the road, I'd have plenty of time and opportunity to write; I also figured there would be a plethora of events, places, situations that would inspire my writing. And there have been. I see this beautiful scenery and words immediately come to mind to describe it. I think about how I will portray this picture to everyone back home, in the clearest detail, in the hopes that they will see the beauty and magic of a scene, through my eyes. But, at the moment, there are only lines. One, maybe two. Disjointed. Never leading to anything more than that.
When we crossed the Hudson River this morning, the new sun caressed the ripples of the water, leaving diamond kisses on the cusp of each gentle wave...
On the road through New York State, the trees were fecund with the final breaths of Summer, green, full, with only the first sign of Fall's footsteps on their branches, the slightest traces of gold on the tips of the leaves...
...That's it! I just cannot seem to make them in to anything more constructive.
Perhaps I am one of those writers who needs the 'drama' to be able to write well. When I am busy, stressed or there are pressures in my life, the poetry flows from the chaos of my mind into my ever-ready pen and on to the page. Writing is a release. Sylvia Plath wrote some of her most famous poetry when she was in her most depressed state, shortly before she committed suicide, in fact. Her best work was written as a result of her despair, her confusion, in her darkest moments.
Mirror
I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
What ever you see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful---
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.
Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.
Sylvia Plath
Perhaps I, like Plath, need the stress and drama of life to create something great... or just something. What a thought! I guess I'm going to have to channel this relaxed, stress-free feeling I have been experiencing for the last week or so in to my writing. Hopefully, I will succeed in breaking through this writer's block.
Keep checking in. If I manage to write something...anything!... I will post it here.
:)