Toastage

Monday, February 9, 2009

(Now and Then There's)

I sit staring at the tickets,

My phone beside them.

The TV flashing.

The tape ticks over

(Elvis sings on)

The chairs in the parlor.

I slouch into the sofa

and loosen my tie.

Also: There's a prize for figuring out (explaining) the title.

Hint: There's a clue in the poem.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Waiting

A tick, it's just the clock

I need to think, but I'm waiting,

Waiting for her knock. The candle,

The wick is almost gone. I start

to walk, up and down. I lick

My lips. The room begins to rock.

I feel sick. Is the door locked?

I kick my toe. A rock? No a brick.

From the dock. A trick. Dumb jock.

My sock feels slick. I talk in

Epic shock, quickly, the clicking

blocks the thick mocking. Tick-tocking, tick-tocking.

The intent of my poem is to make it sound like a clock ticking as the person waits for someone to arrive. He israther anxious about the arrival and as the anxiety increases the ticking gets closer together and louder, invading his thoughts. I’m also reading Ulysses in my modernism class, so there’s some stream of conscious influenced stuff in there, I think.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Piano

This is what I'm kinda working on right now - thought I'd post it as a teaser.

A delicate ting in the empty room

I run my finger slowly down the key

Idly, lightly my left hand brushes

The black, the white

softly

Quivering light from the candelabra

Flickers in the half filled flute glass

A cork lies near the edge of a water ring

In the dark wood finish, the stain retreats

Beneath a slender green bottle

I shift my slanted posture

Following a peeling panel my eyes

Find the dots and slashes on the page

The flurry of pen strokes jostle, they breathe

In and out

My stare falls to my fingers on the yellow ivory

I absently, deliberately arrange them

Friday, October 17, 2008

Sonnet 7: A Song for Atlas, not Alone

Sweat trickles down his face, as faltering

He steadies once again his tired arms

And thinks back to that day's dark succoring

When first he was betrayed by horrid charms.

In ten years' war with virile did contend

Impious rule against which to prevail

The works of gods he mightily must rend

That delicately thus, he locks to fail.

Yet stumbling, allured by dainty worth:

How fallen art! Where naught can thus assuage

Without support to stand midst sky and earth:

Supplanter of the sun, a man of Rage.

Tho' staggering, he groans under the weight

But burden bears and shrugs not his due fate.

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

The Poet and the Madman

I wrote this in about 7 minutes. Something I read inspired me and I wanted to get the idea down before I forgot. This will for sure be rewritten sometime, but for now, hope you get and like the idea.

Incensed he stormed into the den

And grabbed some paper and a pen

The words like fire razed from his heart

As lust and passion tore feeling apart

At home he sat beside the fire

Lost deep to thoughts which do inspire

With long broad strokes he chiseled in

The feelings which pure love doth bring

His friends all cheer his raw emotion

As Hollywood hales in grand commotion

While home he sits without caprice

And locks away his masterpiece

Ten thousand years have come and gone

One is a hiss and one lives on

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Sonnet 6: To a Chrysanthemum

Unfinished fragment:

Beneath the tree a shadow hides his pain

From mem'ry's sting; He shivers deep within

Across the way he sees amidst the rain

Chrysanthemum adorned in Summer's grin

He creeps along the darkness of the day

In his attempt to reach her pleasant gaze

But petals pure and golden pollen play

In warmth and light where shadows only raze

To gain such beauty though it be his plight

Is something which his soul he would forsake

But darkness cannot change itself to light

And still remain; for light his life would take.

Through that dark glass the shadow now doth see

But hopes one day that she will set him free.

Thursday, July 3, 2008

He Stares at Nothing in Particular

Musing, thinking, lost in wonder, he stares

At nothing in particular, but dares

To let the dream which dances through his mind

Come closer as the clock ticks, marking time.

Beside him sits a table robed in white,

Two knives, two forks, two plates are placed just right

And in their midst two candles stand unlit

As on he stares contented just to sit

A sweet aroma spills into the air

Escaping from a tasty love affair

And flutters on the whims of fantasy

Which set a soul meticulously free

To soar unbound by curiosity

Above the silence of an empty chair.

He does not stir, still lost in reverie,

But calms his nerves with effort mentally

He plans what he will say once she's arrived

With words pronounced that will not sound contrived.

"How do you do?" he thinks it best to start,

The host - he must control his pounding heart.

He takes her by the hand and leads the way,

"I hope you had the most exquisite day."

Each word, with the precision of a clock,

"Your beauty sends the poet into shock,"

Is practiced to perfection in his mind,

Still he forgets the staid hand, passing time.

As on his thoughts fly to a gorgeous scene

In which he sees her incandescent mien.

Her flawless skin that glistening defines

Each strand of hair that falls across her eyes

And trickles down her phosphorescent cheeks

To touch the lips that tongue cannot bespeak.

He contemplates, just then, what he should do,

How should he act, alone, with only two.

How should he touch her, if he should at all,

Or how to stand, why can he not recall?

Should he just smile and not say very much

To fill a silence words cannot quite touch,

But then how should he make it known to her

The feelings deep within that she doth stir...

Still musing, thinking, wondering, he stares