Tag: poetpardy

vagabondprophet:

Suburban Pirates

Remember when we were

Suburban pirates

Hoarding all the

Best sticks

For our tree fort

In our plastic war

It all felt so real

I can still hear the screams

I Attila the Hun

Taking hostage

Of the nun

Then you came

A shining knight

Dealt a brutal blight

Now we’ve both

Known defeat

Groveled at

Each other’s feet

Can we make up yet?

Can we be friends again

I’ll give you my

Favourite candy

It’s not poisoned this time

I promise.

– vagabond prophet

Pulp

I’m wide asleep and dreaming

Of a future where the world’s not caving in.

Always presumptuous,

Always idealistic.

Today I saw convict wearing green

Shackles on both hands and feet

Those in chains

Still have pains.

In my optimistic stupor I imagine

His crime one that’s victimless.

Dark hair and dark eyes

He had with dark remarks

For the guards at either arm.

I too have a hamartia

A kryptonite, Achilles heel.

Yet surely the stories not yet finished

Are the ones most in need

Of divine intervention.

I’ve been incorrigible

And the man in green may be too,

Yet I hope that on our piles of kindling

Similarly damp

That when a spark does catch

Our hearts can some salvation snatch.

That’s not presumptuous

That’s not idealistic,

I’m crushed by the weight of a savior,

And from pulp comes hopeful seeds.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @josy57 for prompting @mildreflections and myself with “A presumptuous dream.” Hope this wasn’t wasted on the likes of me.

Antlers

Antlers sharp and many pointed

Broader than shoulders

Threatens without words,

Lean and muscular

Bounding high into the sky

Fences meaning nothing.

These creatures wise without books

Knowing the language of the wood

Hissing in the whispered wind

And threatening in it’s quiet.

Knowing things by instinct,

Meaning that nobody knows

Just how it knows things.

Aware that given long hours

In sunlight some things bleach

And some things burn.

Ears turn around

As my feet the ground pound,

You already know

By the shape of my thorax

That I’m rather different.

You vanish as you smell me,

You taste my breath on the air

And foresee that I always fail

More thoroughly than I succeed

I just might try to spare your life,

So naturally you’re afraid.

– Vagabond Prophet

Fireside Memories

Some trains won’t return to station

Yet as I travel long I see

Limbs tossed aside.

The thin arms that carried me thus far

Cast into the ditch

Now flaunt no leverage

Only strength,

Now travelling at great length

Finding enough pieces for a creature.

Pieced together makes a person

That I sit with at fireside,

Telling stories until stars illuminate

More than last remaining embers.

Telling me my own tales

That are strangely familiar

Yet gone unthought of for years.

Young enough to think

The weather man made decisions

Rather than predictions,

A man behind a desk with buttons

Overwhelmed by choice

And always choosing to be unkind,

Rather than a simple man

Trying his best to convey bad news.

Old enough to know that

Black is the colour for mourning

Because it attracts the most heat

Those grieving hearts need

As much as they can get,

Almost like an embrace.

Watching moving pictures with the neighbour

Father implores me to send him home,

Takes me to the driveway where

Man’s best friend is wrapped

In a yellow wool blanket.

People came to help

Digging a hole next to the tree

That reached halfway to heaven.

Now his bones are turned to soil

That roots wriggle against

To further their kingdom

Spreading fingers spreading shadows

On a boy fallen fully awake and weeping.

He’d been companion

He’d been protector

He’d played catcher and outfielder,

But most of all

He’d played my friend.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @josy57 for prompting @mildreflections and I with “dismembering a memory”. A great prompt, hope I did a halfway decent job with it.

Paper Boat

Paper boats, mache moats

Cardboard levee, not at all heavy

Pretend solutions, real problems.

Nest of twigs and spit

Protection from monsoon,

Corrugated house

Shelter from the quake.

Water kicks up dirt

Dirt is turned to mud

Mud bakes into clay

Begetting ceramic crockery.

Ceramic pots hold dirt

Watered diligently every day

Round and round we go

In a paper boat dissolving.

While pirates in ships wooden

Papers rigid ancestor

Won’t be softened

Or misshapen by the storm.

To my paper boat I cling

Putting every hope on board

For wood never let me mark

With words from pen.

The secrets of a heart

Marred by tempest strong

Though I may sink

Behind I’ll leave my ink.

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @josy57 for promoting @mildreflections and I with “Paper Boat.”

Shapeless

Souls, water, wind,

Angels, demons, and love.

Things most likely to dance

Between polar opposites of good and evil

Can’t take shape, won’t take shape.

Molded my nurturing and vitriol,

Only shaped by what it pushes against,

I’ve been shaped by a God above

That loves me somehow,

A devil below

That loves me like

A beautiful yet poisonous plant.

I’m shaped by people on either side

That love me wonderfully

And hurt me wonderfully.

A candle burned at every side

Not just at the ends

Until all that’s left is wick.

Needing something to slow my melt

But God is above and that doesn’t work

Until he turns me upside down

Whispering in my ear,

“I’ll shape you masterfully.”

Cut away the gnarled bits

Sand the rough edges.

Wipe stain upon the wood

Bringing out the grain

That needs that touch

To come to the surface.

– Vagabond Prophet

   Thanks @mildreflections for prompting @josy57 and I with “the shape of a soul.

Bulletproof


Security and obliviousness for skinny child

With temperament mild,

Never a bruise

And never a ruse.

Until this solid home

Rose up into a treehouse

Just to fall back to the ground.

Debris scattered

None of it mattered

Not the trickle of doubt

Left glinting in the grout

That never made itself obvious before

But I can’t not see it now.

Having been so sure

In a family secure,

Talk so big

The walk was doubly disappointing.

I’m left swinging in branches above

Wondering if I should come down at all.

If too much of a good thing

Isn’t a good thing

Was it ever really good?

Was I fed deceit for breakfast?

My people eating it themselves

Gulping down hot mouthfuls

To make themselves believe?

Why did I never doubt?

So eager to trust

In planks so thoroughly knotty,

So unwilling to question

What I thought was bulletproof.

What can come next

What steps could I take

When ones who held me taking my first

Broke their deepest promises?

Where could I even start

When all I knew was contentment

Suddenly stripped away.

I wonder if it had been wretched all the while

Would it have been easier.

– Vagabond Prophet

Black Out

Trees fall on lines and everything goes dark

The knight has fallen

The night has risen

Suddenly and with no warning.

Like the deepest parts of the ocean

Not yet explored

I delve into closet corners

That I never knew before.

We’d play games

To make the time pass

To laugh away the darkness.

Hide and seek

With everybody hidden,

Scavenger hunts,

For the daylight that we sought.

Amidst stubbed toes

And flashes of smiles with no bodies,

We found family enough shelter

In blackest of blackouts.

As quick as quicksand beneath my feet

Everything comes back with lightning speed,

Ironic, as lightning started all of this.

Hearing furnace pump

A heartbeat ahead of the lights,

Ready or not here I come..

– Vagabond Prophet

Thanks @mildreflections for prompting @josy57 and I with “When the lights go off.”

Deadly Sin #7

Envy, as defined by the poets dictionary.

Definition:

Some wounds so deeply seated

As to be enthroned

Waving scepter giving orders

From kingdom long outgrown.

Other definitions include: Wanting the neighbours grass for it is greener than your own, forgetting that grass will only ever be green when it is watered.

Contempt for what you have, hunger for what you don’t.

Green eyes making inventory on things not belonging to them.

A condition known to make content people steal.

Quicksand effect, rapidly turning to nothing what it has and lying in wait to lay its treacherous grip on whoever may come it’s way.

Antonyms include: Generosity, non materialistic, content, selfless, brown eyed.

Envy only seeks to cheat and steal to build itself up in it’s own mind. Imagine Pride with an inferiority complex that also has kleptomaniac tendencies.

– Vagabond Prophet

Okay everybody just for your information I do intend to balance this list out with a similar one about the fruits of the spirit.