When the poem became tears
As the ink drips,
I have become an emotional basket case.
My keyboard squeals, as the businessman's anxiety climbs
At the sound of the opening bells,
Tariff wars targeting the poor,
Evil Eyes merges with the Texas Tycoons
What is the poor trader's offense?
Going once, going twice,
To be poor is to be honest,
How can honesty be the best policy
Knowingly, a poor man can never win a war with a rich man
Going once, going twice no deal
Tariff wars targeting the poor:
“They fought with them, we feel the pain
Forget the old saying, you scratch my back
I scratch yours, what are the poor man's justifications
Tighten your podiums, ring your bells
And remember the words,
“They charge us, we charge them,
Why is the world upset?
Aggression, depression, and the will to survive
Inferior and permanent: listen to
Bob Marley's “War song we will always be in war”
Whose Words?
By Mark Stucky
Hissing whispers in the garden
twisted the warning words of God.
A shadowy tempter in the wilderness
shouted enticements to the Word made flesh.
Twisted words whisper and shout today,
from screens, podiums, and even pulpits,
spouting conspiracies and misinformation,
pushing discord, division, and condemnation,
promising power, fame, and friendship,
flaunting false pleasures and successes,
but leaving hearers hurt and angry,
or lonely, anxious, and depressed.
Listening instead to words of Jesus
centers us on truth, love, peace, joy,
and working together
for the good of us all.
So many voices clamoring for our attention,
a noisy din of distortions and contradictions,
a continuous cacophony of words.
Some resulting in harm, some in healing.
Whose words will we heed?
Whose path will we choose?
(First published in Agape Review, 19 April 2023. See also my poems “Tweeting the Truth in Love” and “What Would Jesus Tweet?”)
(Photo by Skitterphoto on Pexels.com.)
Everyone is intelligent
Of this, histories are reminiscent
You know something I don't
And I too have something to front
Then comes the flowery ideal of the idealist
To be straight-faced by the reality of the realist
And you wonder as you watch in mime
Whether you were born before or after your time
Some assert their point across
And soft spoken reason suffers loss
Some claim to be a voice for the voiceless
Claiming to air the point of the pointless
Some know how, others know what
Some have the world round and others flat
Some reside in the serenity of thought and deed
Others on the podiums of herald and creed
All these are the plenitude of God's Grace
Our striving comprehension is His Master ace
As we behold Him doing a new thing
One time a lifting shout, another a jingling ring
The greatest of a time may become a hazy memory
Or a legend commanding some unfaded glory
But all in all be not he that the enemy mildly sifts
When you hold back your ministration by your gifts.
K. Muitherero.
Our backyard
Whirlwind of summer firefly
Embers
Stirs up
From the long graves of grass
By the sprawling brooms of July 4th fireworks
Booming distant in the furled sky
Up high
The fire flies swirl to tree tops
Breadcrumb stars for swooping bats
Too many blinks to be gulped whole
Let it go
Paths split
Thunder fades to echoes
Consciousness is everywhere
So plentiful
Our heads tilt
Broken from their podiums
Like vandalized statues
Knees cracked ribs lanced
Still upright in the gallery of this summer
My wife and I
Hands freed from our marble robes
Hold together a single sparkler
Gaze to you
Private
Quiet
Uncertain future.
The pain and the success,
The aches and the medals,
The sweat before the shower,
Feeling weak where you once felt power.
The trips and the podiums,
The icy morns and the sunlit eves,
The strained pant before the joyous exhale,
A winning mentality to beat any fear of fail.
The disappointments and the smiles,
The sore backs and the comforting throb of rest,
A question of challenge becomes an answer of what if?
Choosing safe and secure or to leap from that cliff.
Synonymous
Synchronized opposites drag the lost poet to the epicenter of contradiction
Anonymous scribes share dissident virtual podiums and only appear to be
Antonymous
03rd April 2020
Let The Pens Flow Antonym Contest
Sponsor Jenish Somadas
Syllables checked howmanysyllables.com
Bat-blind to looming gripe and cold decay,
Clueless shoots jump onto life's gay stage,
Oblivious of Grim Fate's scything designs
That waste with disease and stealing age.
They wouldn't turn around and at once behold
Slowly waning sires with mean griefs to scold.
Youth's full plate such wanton cheers parades,
That no eye can see sly time's thievish shades.
Thus enchanted our pleasure-lured victims file
Onto glum podiums whereon their sires stood;
Dancing to selfsame tunes of deaded antiquity,
Decoyed by vanity's unedited rhythmical mood.
While earth's tetchy wheel of raw fun yet turns,
One in the numbed lot in death's embers burns.
To decry such brazenness by that spiteful foe,
Smitten hordes seethe and writhe in brief woe.
In the end every joy-craving dancer sadly goes,
And green offspring pop in to follow their toes.
A day to marry carries merry
Mariyah has carried my berry,
A just author of my story
Born come with mightier ferry
Nevertheless a beautiful glory
Smiling even in real tears
And the willful pearls sandwich
My day to marry my real pitch.
I marry a daring darling
Carrying my epic smile style,
That dodges my age wrinkles
The white teeth aroused laughter
A lady whose heart a golden fold
And dimples convict contrast-
Dance on emirembe podiums
Mariyah has carried my berry.
The unstoppable life journey
To the thirsty storm-
All over the heart to foam
My day has come to form
From the ancestral soap soup,
Of routine nuts on olusuusi
And simsim seeds for the scent.
I marry not the merry of maiden
But the olden folding gold
Inwards the banana embobo’s fold
Stealing the willful eyes untold
A woman’s newness shone alike-
The crazy sun’s rays bend
A cross the horizon in blend
Mariyah has carried my berry.
Mongrels gyrating on the edge of town
This it now- its going down
The chant electric, the doomsday count
It matters not that no one speaks a word
We knew it was coming, but you havent heard
Just know how I loved you , go fly little bird
A mass of hungry hatred flash of glimmering blades
Blood of the martyrs, murder and Hades
Dance of the hyena, foul flinging dung
Clinging our candles only looking up
Feeble little fingers summoning the Light
A promise in our prayers armless in a fight
This is my cry, tell it to the world
From the podiums and parliaments
Dont believe a word
l hear cries,
Praises,
shouting,
passionate voices flare,
filling the humid air,
declaring profound joy,
cries and Praises from the podiums,
unrestrained noise of joy from preachers,
who occupy every available dias,
l hear them,
l hear it,
the great tiding of the age,
being scribbled on of this epoch the page....
by Luckson Mupakamiso
Mel had to berate a bad car driver,
Who, at traffic lights, nearly hit her,
She said “Life flashed” in rigid fear,
When the car towards her did steer.
She rubs shoulders with Crockroft,
As a middle distance athlete not soft,
Because she lies in the T34 category,
Whilst also doing sprints, has agility.
Born in the July of 1977 in Worcester,
She did well in meets, her multiplier,
Of her talent and skill, her preparation,
For the 2012 Paralympics in London.
In London Mel finished 7th, the 200m,
But went on from there to have feathers,
On podiums when she came in third,
In the 100m - 2014 European standard.
Also in the 800m she came in second,
To obtain the silver medal conditioned.
And then at Doha in 2015, World’s stand,
She took silver again for her strong hand.
She made the Rio GB squad and calls,
Her wheelchair is Dolly, and her stalls,
Are as a teaching assistant because she,
Studied Equine Science, it is her sea.
Wonderful wonders woven within wild.
Titillates theatrical tender thoughts
Consistently creation, contrives conservation concerns.
Ecology evolves equations, entitling entities essence.
Empowering equality, enlarges existence.
Life lovingly leases Longevity.
Biodiversity braces, blatant brutal balding.
Deforestation, destruction devoid due definition.
People physically, plundering planet.
Prevalently procuring, products proscribed
Pilfering practices producing poisonous pollutants.
Greenhouse gases generated, generously grievous.
Temperate temperature’s tempers tumultuous.
Creating Climate changes, causing catastrophes.
Planet purges peril predominately.
Preached, placid platitudes, politicians podiums paced.
loved lives logged listed lost.
Lacuna languished, lessons least learnt.
Losing Life lingers, listing leeward lazily.
Having surpassed the ides of March.
Denounced the the baneful glare.
Yet my grief befriends Sanity.
Doctrine of hate preached from
Pulpits and podiums.
Marathon of the arms race.
Humans of another race are dispensable.
Creation of art in flesh and blood.
My heart is compelled to dwell.
In poems that rhymes life.
In a compassion that flow.
Into a stream of peace and tolerance.
Creating in my mind another alien world.
Thinking of Whitney Houston for some reason ?
Her beautiful voice like flowers in your hair rising....
Acappella and such a strange vibration; people in motion
Spirits, love's potion ? Nay these altars nor volcanos; sacrificial
Blades their children ghostly gods they chant; pin stripped podiums
Cauldrons a watchful brew poison ivy garments beating drums nighttide
Jungles sand dune dreams his Amazon sleeps, tonight ? Don't walk away she sings..
Gossamer wings the golden gate, and I don't want to cry anymore ? A kiss for love We, smile.
Eye To Open Eye
by Odin Roark
How steadfast the gaze
At times gentle
Most disturbing
Other times angry
Most transparent
Few times without shadow
Most obvious
The dead see better
Say those pursuing truth
While in our face
Podiums support
Balconies present
Photo-ops portray
Power’s ever-dark delusion
How unfortunate
Certain dilated pupils
See not opportunity’s avenue of perception
But choose guilt’s dense chameleon of deceit
That illusion to light where none exists
Ignorance cultivates many who
Unknowingly cater to a fear partnership
Darkening their eyes
Avoiding insight
Embracing immunity to consciousness
Eventually becoming destitute
They can only watch
As honesty of purpose
Knows only
Eye to open eye
Integrity
Out of reach
For the blind of heart
And thus
The wailing of helplessness begins
Desperately wondering
Why is there no end?
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