Musings and Mutterances, Poetry thread

[Haleth]

I cannot *believe* there is no place to prod Ixon to post his poetry yet! So . . just to challenge him . . since he can do far better!

Words

You didn’t have to say them
I never asked you to

I would have waded through the waves
that lapped around my wan'dring feet
And danced across your smiling beach
And you didn’t need to say them . .

They took away my compass

So
I tried to hug the soft green foam
And touch the seagulls passing by
And fling a starfish way up high

And you never should have said them . .

[Ixon]

*smiles* Sheesh... Since I've been prodded, a five-minute poem.

Letting Them Whisper

Soft light filtering
Upon the waves
And sand invading
With every tide
Cool ocean breeze
Floats past my face
Smiling with me
Smelling of new life
Letting me whisper
Of my life
My hopes and dreams
Lifting them slightly higher
Than I ever could
Making a pact
With the wind’s master
And feeling it slip past
Down across the beach
To someone I hadn’t noticed
Floating past their face
Smiling with them
Smelling of new life
And letting them whisper

[Ixon]

That Next Step

It may all seem blurry
On the other side
Nothing for certain
And nowhere to hide
But the grass is greener
And the clouds are few
So take that next step
Embark on something new
On something entirely
Out of the ordinary
Don't let life leave you
Inside of boundaries
Fenced in to a pasture
Grazing forever
In a dazed plane of
Passive ignorance
Find the fence first
And look for the gate
Open it then next
To the great unknown
Far removed from
The gentle pasture
Full of grazing grass
Though the future
May be blurry
And though it may
Dissolve into the horizon
One step more equals
One step less that dissolves
Away into the uncharted sea
So be afraid if you wish
Be scared of it if you will
But take that next step
Leave the pasture behind
And find greener grass
On which to graze
And always remember
To shut the gate

[Fleur]

Re-posted

He was remembered

He was remembered on a chilled autumn day,
Nondescript and unremarkable except
To those who knew the life no longer there.
Quietly we waited on the porch; heads bare,
Suited uncomfortably in accordance with tradition,
Blinking at a world painted in shades of grey.

Following the sleek hearse along sombre streets,
Hushed by the solemnity of the occasion
And unable to pull my gaze from the vibrant wood,
Polished handles, banks of flowers colouring the mood.
Stilled breathing misting glass in living contrast to the cold
Of that contained ahead; body, no heartbeat.

Arriving at the final farewell with eyes clear,
Bright from unshed tears, stepping out into a crowd
Blended together in black and blue. Bruised with grief.
So few to mourn a man so kind, a service so brief
That more was left unspoken than could be said,
Velvet curtain closes over he we loved so dear.

He was remembered thus, on a chilled autumn day.
We gathered outside after the last dry blessing
Was murmured, a congregation of love
Wishing into the soft slate opaqueness above,
And feeling the golden russet leaves dropped beneath our feet
As if they were his cares and hopes before us, cast away.

[Ixon]

A short nonsensical poem that I wrote, no editing done and no thought restrained... Just thought it and wrote it.

Pennies

A little boy standing on the edge of a cliff
Throwing his pennies over and down
Creating a buried treasure
If only in his mind
For some pirate to come
And find there someday
Exclaiming in excitement
Over the loot he had found
So down goes a dollar
And then two more
And three
The boy keeps on smiling
Wider and wider
Almost giggling in anticipation
When all is said and done
And there are five dollars
In change on the ocean floor
He writes a little note
And ties it to a rock
Dropping it off the side
And under the waves
For that same pirate to find
Reading: "Dear Mr. Pirate,
I don't have much in the way of
Loot or treasure of sorts
But what I do have is yours
'Cause I broke my piggy open
And decided I'd share
As where is the fun
In finding buried treasure
That you yourself hid?
Sincerely,
The boy on the cliff."

[Ixon]

Soft Old Wood

Soft old wood
On my soft old desk
We've been through quite a lot
I've sat and stared
Out through the window
Sunny or rainy
Cold or hot
Imagining the world
The world in which I'd wander
Tumbling through the years
As if they didn't matter
Soft old wood
On my soft old desk
You've always been beside me
When I broke my leg
Or caught that cold
Rasping cough
Fever of one-o'-three
But now soft old wood
On my soft old desk
Meet soft old skin
On soft old man
As I've already grown and gone
Leaving you behind
In a large dusty attic
For a small young boy
Of just the age
That I would like to be again
To find a soft old desk
Made of soft old wood
To be a forever friend

[Fleur]

As requested by Haleth and Ixon, and inspired by Steel

Harvest moon hangs pale satin gold
Lighting my way home
Through pearlescent fields
And dusk shadowed lanes
However far I have roamed.
Late berries brush sweet black stains
Across my cream skin
Pausing to taste the air
Breathe in the velvet night
And echo the October hymn.
Soft silver breeze whispers in trees
Silhouetted stark
Against that golden moon
Guiding my crimson steps
Surely through the perfumed dark.

[Ixon]

Lighthouse Man

Winding road leads to the lonesome lighthouse
With the old young man who keeps it
Who climbs the rickety stairs
To light the beam with torch
Bright pyre guiding ships to port
Blue eyes watching them come forth
Having watched them for ages now
Watching them go as well
Back into the silent night
The brooding darkness enveloping again
Until the ships are gone once more
And at some point he will look back to this
And think some ages and ages hence
How often he has climbed and climbed
Only to end up where he started once before
Torch in hand and a beam to light
Ships to guide with his pyre bright
He'll smile and slowly slip away then
Blue eyes fading and fire dying
With a few ships still out to sea

[Fleur]

Protected

Fit me with a memory that will last a lifetime
of battles with the dark of submission
and will cut swathes through the armies
black-clad in the armour of ignorance
Forge me a shining remembrance in fires
fuelled by the complete recognition
of what is right and what is wrong and what
is worse, an in-between of grey acceptance.
I will tread my path through war-torn lands
dulled by a lassitude of insecurity and fear
of that which those who live within know not
and are too resigned to try to shake or deride.
Protected and armed I will stand in my own
surety of safety, slicing those invaders’ mere
breath as they approach and wearing the gold
of victory, bright with certainty and pride.

[Ixon]

Reflection

Small little gem in the palm of my hand
Is there something more besides your many facets?
Or is there less than what you promise
A multitude of the littlest lies
Chipping away at all that I know
For if what we promise is no longer true
Then what makes reality?
If it is simply a series of those
Now proven unreal
Then what is your reality?
When things go up
They must come down
But what if they didn’t?
What if they stayed up there?
Shiny little bauble
Are you the real thing?
Can I be so lucky?
Or does your reflection lie to me?
See how your existence breeds doubt?
Once I was so certain
Certain of how my life would play
But small little gem
Found down in the sand
Your perception could change that forever
So I keep you
And head home
Risking it all in the palm of my hand

[Fleur]

Laundry

On Saturdays the washing billowed upon the line
In graceful clouds upon the blue of spring days,
Pegged out with promises.
The children ran beneath it feeling the damp clutch
At their hair and catch across the clothes they wore,
Clean and dry with honesty.

But on days when grey surrounded yard and child
The washing hung haphazardly in rooms inside,
Steam misting around.
Starched children hushed in Rainy Day pursuits
Glanced anxiously outside for signs of clearing up,
Desperate for sound.

Laundry remains - as children grow and have their sincerity
Ironed straight into an acceptable tactfulness –
An endless chore.
Wherever life takes them and through whatever weather
Washing days occur for them with greater or lesser regularity,
Though they run no more.

[Ixon]

Another Drifting Wood

Pluck me from the waves
Like a piece of drifting wood
Smooth to the touch
Yet rough in how I look
Marred and marked in my passage
Through time and through space
Called ugly perhaps by some
But beautiful by others
With a small inscription
Reading only this
Time is but a face
A face upon the water
So you carved me into a mask
A mask to hide that face
Vanishing your inner self
Leaving not a trace
And we all just become
Another drifting wood

[Fleur]

I think people will regret that this thread was opened as I seem to be quite prolific at the moment - and though I never think much of my own writing, others seem to like it so...

Shell

Hermit crab with pink edged shell scuttles
Wearily through the sand in home too tight
For his rapidly growing body, and he tries
To avoid making tracks on the beach in case
He is seen by something predatory that
Would make a meal of him without thinking
Even twice.
He knows not where he goes as he hurtles
Along the exposed grains and the new light
Hurts his tiny eyes. He knows (yet still defies)
The fact that he needs to find a new carapace,
A more modern one with room to grow, get fat.
But in shell-less time he may be eaten, blinking,
In a trice.

[Ixon]

On Canvas

In different strokes
We lay our lives
Like paint upon the canvas
So perfectly contrived
Each one expected
But perhaps
And just perhaps
We should close our eyes
Dip our brush in pant
Of any colour really
And create anything at all
On anything
Especially not on canvas

[Fleur]

He was there when the rain stopped.
I could see the droplets shine upon him
And the haze of sun form a rainbow aura
Around him. Breathless, I lifted my arm
In an awkward motion of hopeful greeting
As he hung suspended, a vision of a man,
Half mine, half his, entirely nobody’s.
I saw this golden boy when I was just
A silver girl in search of the precious gems
Of life. Now I am older and jaded and
Would rather not stay outside in a shower.
Is he but my dream? When the clouds
Disperse and the grass has dried underfoot
Will he vanish or will he be there still?