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Best Poems Written by John Ozemko

Below are the all-time best John Ozemko poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | John Ozemko Poem

Without

I can hope that bullets won’t fly
I can pray for a better tomorrow
I can laugh at myself when I’m foolish
I can struggle against my imperfections
But I won’t without you in my world.

I might dream of bathing in sunshine
I might struggle against an undertow
I might say yes to the panhandling homeless
Give food to the needy;  time to the ill
But I won’t without you in my world.

Mercy decided that we’d be together
Grace unfolded a plan for our lives
Now jackals of anger surround us.

Mercy decided that we’d be together
Grace unfolded a plan for our lives
Now the wolves of worry surround us

Details | John Ozemko Poem

Streets By the Beach

The streets by the beach keep moving you toward the sunny side of the sea. 
Where people in hordes strut on the boards sniffing at foods on the breeze.
And all the young boys are flexing around for all the young girls too see.
And everyone's hot, and everyone's got what it takes to be happy and free.

The heat from the beach drives you on toward the coolest side of the town. 
Where people park cars and drift into bars after the sun has gone down.
All the young guys are dreaming up lies for the hot girls who are easily found.
And every bright smile is designed to beguile someone else into fooling around.

Chorus:
Oh, the shore is the place to paint on a face,
get bathed in perfume or cologne.
yes, the shore is the place with that fabulous pace,
when you're hot and just can't be alone.

The band at the beach is pounding it out tuned to the throb in your chest.
so, you dance, and you shout cause that's what it’s about when everyone's looking their best. 
Then a girl over there gives you the stare. Looks like she could be miss right.
you say something nice, but she gives you the ice and you know it won’t be tonight. 

Chorus:
Oh, the shore is the place to paint on a face,
get bathed in perfume or cologne.
yes, the shore is the place with that fabulous pace,
when you're hot and just can't be alone.

Details | John Ozemko Poem

Auction On a Windy Hill

Beneath billowing sack cloth tent 
An auctioneer jibber-jabbers his words.
Below his red mahogany dais
Sit Fifty Amish American women and girls.
Black-bonnet-ed, bidder-number in hand, 
they chirp for cowl or coat, yelp for yarn, 
raise bid card for church books, wool hats, many lengths of linen,
plethora of patches to sew into quilts.
Each lady bides her time until she points or winks or nods.
Calling to mind a measure of a time past.
Suspender-ed men inspect implements laid firm against gray fence,
even to the unused chamber pot still pure and winter white.
Rake, hoe, watering can, all is offered, noticed, taken for a price by love.
Untimely winds spin dust from the fallow fields, through the tent.
Coarse black garments now dressed in manure brown.
The whole crowd moves down 
at the last to the front yard to bid home the furniture.
Magnificent bed- one hundred years old-, mahogany desk, 
cherry wood breakfront seven feet tall, 
shaker chairs, porch rocker and a modern recliner are claimed.
Auction done, the cows, horses, dogs and cats are led away.
As Kate and I walk to our van, an old man speaks English to me 
saying most items stayed in her family. 
Leaving, we were only strangers looking for a bargain, 
happy with a four dollar end-table we took from her friends .

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Bombing In Mumbai

Was it him?
No,
his brothers
tied grenades.
on dead black birds
heaved them high.
to fly, wings tied back,
up to a third story balcony.

Details | John Ozemko Poem

Alt Love

There is only one time when I’ll need you;
Like Ice cream doesn’t need a banana.
So, until I do, or the ice cream does,
I will be on this side of Havana.

Details | John Ozemko Poem

How To Love You

When you dance and smile
Or pet your cat, hold your dog
In your lap, arrange your flowers
Or buy a hat- I think I know 
How to love you.

When you kiss a child
Or feel her pain, save a vase
And not complain about the crack
Or the rain- I think I know
How to love you.

When you forget for awhile
That I am just a man, slow to learn 
And understand, lost sometime
Without a plan- I think I know
How to love you. 

And so again comes the time,
Will you be my Valentine?

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Last Thoughts of a Dying Warrior

His mind lay prey to mumbled threats within,
drawn to perch upon a twig-thin edge 
slung between a gauze of blatant dreams.
Like some homeless bird come to make a nest,
it yanked discarded bits of skin and hair,
from bins of vain memory's hoard, 
then joined to form a place where 
a brain might rest and preen.
Once settled, he drank
Not from the stilled rummaging 
but the distilled rum in his hand
and sang discordant notes that clanged 
above the cough of fractured words. 
“The mind is myth. And so am I."

Details | John Ozemko Poem

Having Bathed

Having bathed, we wait 
until the sun has fled the sky,
Before we dry and dress 
to take the street.
With one last blush of light 
upon the twilight wind,
we fade into the darkness of the trees.
our path is like a wire we must walk, 
like artists stepping cautiously along
nothing sure except that, finally, 
we will meld where we belong.
Become one, high arms and thighs.

Details | John Ozemko Poem

Atlantic City Sunday

Marble-sided buildings sunk in the sand
Jumped 40 glassy stories on command.
Everyone thinks life is nothing and money’s grand.
Rolling chair hawkers spiel and cutely chide
Sunday suited daddies to pay for their brides.
So, a cavalcade of marmalade mommies ride, 
(Fatted infants firmly holstered at each side),
Tossing constant comment diapers drenched with pride
To the beach where broken dreamers slept and died.

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Unrequited Love

taste my pencil fingers.
can you taste the poem I wrote for you?
the poems I may still write?
why the sour look?
tastes like scat?
sorry wrong hand.