June Poetry Challenge: Poem-A-Week (your style!)

[Ambient4190]

Your 1st poem? Welcome!
Your 1500th poem? Wonderful!

Challenge: Compose a poem once a week.

Each week runs Sunday to Saturday, starting now.

The poems can be any style i.e. Free verse, Limerick, Ode, Haiku, erotic, non-erotic, etc...

This thread is for Poems Only!
Please place comments in the '2024 Poetry Challenge Discussion' thread.

Anyone can join this challenge at any time!

 

[Ambient4190]

thrust skyward
rain and wind
can not
break
beauty
nature made

i won't
pluck thy bloom
but allow
age
fade
petals gracefully

 

[AlinaX]

time runs backwards
sunday to saturday
like a bird in flight
glimpsed from a harrier jet
like the decay of city streets
beneath the wheels
of electric limousines
like the wrongs of rights
being lost beneath the trampling feet
of those elected to uncare
like words being unwritten
beneath the oppress
of the delete ke-

 

[vagrantx]

smoldering cigarette
the muted red of fading stories
whose lips held you tonight
and did you ease their worries?

a wisp of smoke
a hint of warmth
a sign of life
in this dying town

 

[butters]

Time limps along dirt tracks
nose to mud and gravel
never once glancing back

 

[Lyricalli]

One of the most important things I've learned
about sewing
is to not watch the needle
that thing that can seem most important
to give your attention
while it's doing its work

So easy to get lost
in that repetitive motion

Instead, you have to watch
everything around it
steering fabric edges along the guide
ensures straight lines
making small adjustments
keeps seams aligned
before the pressure
of the presser foot grabs them
and they're fed
to the pistoning steel
that will seal them together

When you're too focused
on what's right in front of you
you can miss peripheral signs
that your project has gone wonky

 

[Wat_Tyler]

Because I am coming to like/appreciate you lot:


Wet Feet



Jesus, Mary and Joseph!!!
Fuck me to tears,
I fucking hate wet feet!!!
Hate with a passion,
A capital H.
Like when it rains
And you can’t do anything about the fact
That you have to get from here to there.
Outside.
In the wet.
Downpours, puddles, splashes.
You step where it should be barely deeper than your soul is thick,
And your soul is having a Doubtful Moment.
The puddle is deep.
You have on your gym shoes.
Fabric.
Non-waterproof fabric.
Unless the water in on the inside
Which is now is,
And all in your non-waterproof socks, too.

Motherfucker!!!

Slog.
Slosh.
Squish.
Bother, says Pooh.

As the old saying goes,
Some days, you can’t win for losing.
Soggy armpits and ball sweat are annoying,
But I don’t walk on those.


The absolute worst:
You are out riding your bike.
Motorcycle.
Harley fucking Davidson.
And the rain arrives.
You keep going because
You’re not a pussy,
So you keep going.
And it keeps raining.
Continues.
It doesn’t relent.
Your pants get wet
Because the water is beating into your lower legs
And on the tops of your thighs.
Driven through the fabric.
Wet to your skin.


Where does all this water go?
Gravity says,
Down the fleshy bits
To the insides of

Your

Waterproof

Boots.

That’s right.
Your lovely boots are now
Acting to water
Like the Maginot Line
Acted to the Wehrmacht.

Stepping into a stream
Deeper than your hiking boots are tall
Is simply the same thing
More suddenly.
At least the motorcycle boots
Don’t squish because
You’re not walking.

 

[Angeline]

Simple Truths

You loved Henry Miller, Saul Bellow. You loved Kerouac. I love you.

 

[Angeline]

Joy Spring

The joy of sound that bubbles and sings
a meaning of greening the trees beyond

budding unfurl their leaves, lift
them like supplicants to the Sun.

Awaken Earth, arise new shoots
clover, honeysuckle, marigold even

the common weeds have purpose
to cover the ground, drink rainwater

which is life and raindrops are music.
Listen: when the saxophone swoops

and the trumpet flutters in kind,
drums all a bash in this ecstasy,

heartbeats and the glad procession
of these seasons and sounds travel

in me like time is timeless
and music the source of delight.

 

[42Below]

American Jedi


Far far away the impossibility of blue sky
Four brown kids In a barefoot boys break
Eat a loaf of bread No butter No spread

Behemoth Overhead Endless Star Cruiser
Their Galaxy of Stars a Sarlacc pit No R2
No fleeing ship No moisture evaporators

Just Tatooine and illimitable US interpreters
There will be No Rebel Alliance with the Sith
A hand full of Presidents will get them killed

 

[Wonderer67]

Coming Clean

I am
Just a hurt little boy in
Man’s clothing

Covering up my wounds
W tattoos and pickups
And sixth grade humor

I might look tough
But I am not
I am gentle
And hurting inside

Now you know

 

[Ambient4190]

bubbling soft murmur
faux water feature
fails to relax

sublime interior
masks death
in back

not today
not today
angel speaks

elation follows relief
out front door
we forge on

 

[42Below]

Spring Magic

I see you flowering: Distending my Trunk in two beats, Swellings in your lines My cannibal dancers will Pluck You.

 

[Mrtenant]

Storms of Spring

Storms ripping across the city
Huddling in our homes
As it rages without pity
How may mere mortals survive

With the storm's blinding fury passed
Sunlight streaming through the blinds
Awakened to a new world at last
Stepping out into the dawn

Destruction in every direction
Trees, fences, homes, power lines
Not enough words for inflection
How oh my goodness wow why

Like ants after a flood
Neighbors, friends, family, strangers
Come together and stood
In fellowship with each other

Storms, they affect us all
Random fury random kindness
How my heart feels the call
Of fellowship in our rebuilding

 

[29wordsforsnow]

A Dove's Death - a villainnet

I in this quarry, quarry month of May
was not quite sure of life's breath to be found
for the dove to take spread out on the ground
eyes wholly opened the skies in dismay

Silence and peace we share the stone cold hard
beneath our feet tread on dust and sorrow
avoid the dry spot where tears had been downed

Right of the middle where once was a heart
beating no more since only the hollow
words of justice brought to the blind follow
what's left of its center now torn apart

The endless crescendo plays on until
no more ol's trumpets go with the solo
too tired of the same old line: en garde

It's fallen victim to a bird of prey
from high above once to the one last will
inherit all the blood-red spots mark still
the stainless coat I found turned ashen grey

 

[SashaS_EroticaQueen]

The Passion Inside

It so happened, one cool winter's morning
that I woke up, just as the day was dawning
and from deep inside, I heard a voice say
what will you do, today?

The answer, as always, was - writing
this being the thing, that special thing
that started when I was only small
and that I do without any effort, at all

Then the voice said
- in my head -
what if it's all a waste of time
like it was almost a crime

Just sitting down to write
Like I do every night
And every spare chance, as well
Again, the voice resounded like a knell

'tis all for nought, admit it, now
I shook my head and said, how?
How do I admit it, when I don't agree?
This writing, this passion, it is me

It is me
and so, it will be
for eternity

Sasha S

 

[Angeline]

Love Grows Wild

Happiness is a miracle
and also a choice I learned
the hard way after snips
and snides, punishing silences,
swallowed resentments,
a clenched insistence
that the whole point
of love is loyalty.

Jesus what a clusterfuck.

Mama used to say I've had it
up to here. Well I did too
and I made my choice, walked
away from the perfect house
the perfect suburban lawn,
walked away from slow death
Mama.

And somehow through serendipity,
divine intervention or pure chance
my lover showed up as if the storm
ended and the Sun came out
to rain down laughter, kindness,
affection. I never knew

love is easy, so easy:
a song, a swaying dance simple
as a breeze, unexpected
as a flower growing wild
from a broken pavement.

 

[Ambient4190]

of the snow I dream
heat rages violent screams
silenced by frost's bite

 

[Lyricalli]

Looking into your eyes
I question if even their color has changed
so little seems the same
can't trust my memory anymore

Who am I missing
as my fingertips touch yours
is it the person you were
or a character created
by my curious heart

The truth, if one exists
lies somewhere between what I know
and the stories that you told
none of which I can believe

Even in this grim light
the shadows of doubt you cast
loom large
and I'm weary of the darkness

 

[Remec]

Catching up

I rush about,
bemoaning my situation
even though it's a pretty
common one,
practically my personal
status quo;
And no one cares,
the maid has mislaid my gloves
again
and I simply have not the time
to return for them,
so I send her and,
such an enormous mess of things
she made that I find myself
later than ever.
I do hope it's the headsman's
day off at court.


Behind...count as wk 1

 

[Remec]

I started with a flower, counting the ways
in which plucking petals detemines forever
whethe or not I have chose rightly in love;

But I quickly moved on since my Love
is many-faceted and there are so many ways
for me to discover our place together today and ever

more, little ways, big ways, ways that would ever
linger between us--in our hearts, minds--our love
grows all the time and looms over us in various ways

How many ways can I ever show my love?


Week 2

 

[Angeline]

Nothing But Flowers

Two middle-aged fools
dancing in a tiny apartment
over a barn and it's cold,
snow throwing it down, piled
so high on the deck we can barely
see the road to Bangor.

Who cares? It's fucking minus
something degrees. We're going
nowhere. You made soup. I baked bread
and now we're dancing, laughing
and spinning to a ringing guitar
that sounds like bells, guitar bells
played by a man from Cameroon.

It's a lot warmer in Cameroon
no doubt, but who cares
when you have music and words,
when you can dance with abandon
and even in the midst of a blizzard
the world feels like nothing
but flowers.

 

[Tzara]

Daydreaming in ENGL 540: Modern Literature
...stirring / Dull roots with spring rain.

Though way hot for my English professor,
I could not for my shyness confess her
That reciting The Waste Land
Left me rapt on her waist and
How I desperately longed to undress her.

 

[HumpDayHoratio]

The Deal

How might the devil show his hand
The deal was made
Nigh thirty years on

Promises of wealth and glamour
If only I toil
Never be weak

I worked the mine
In darkness and peril
Covering my stake

Always alone
Feeling the heat
No slake

Dig as I might
This hole never grows
Only six feet

 

[Nicefella]

Sepulchre

I stand alone on this hill
With my heart
In your hand
My sepulcher of dreams
Drowns each breath