Any poets? - Comments, CONSTRUCTIVE critisism, ideas.

clark · 2004-06-22 09:34:03

Falling rain upon the window sill
Like children clapping
As gray sky floats by, above
Empty bottle half filled-
A ribbon waits to be found
Along a dirt path
Where footprints
Act as markers of a history
Never read, but lived
Beneath a full moon arm in arm
From some summer dance
Where a freckled girl, kissed
For the first time,
Made her last wish on a now
Fallen star.

clark · 2004-06-22 14:26:24

So I wrote this yesterday, but I don't really think much of it. I wrote this after Space Ship One had landed, and tried to capture some of that feeling, and I have been trying to think of how to improve it, but alas, I got nuthin.

Perhaps it catches the feeling better that way, being a bit unfinished, since the private space venture is still a work in progress.

It begins at dawn
With blue sky gone
And the stars twinkling by day,
In rocket fire
By hearts desire
To once more declare we come to stay.

And the blood does speed
Carrying ancient life's first seed
Of hope beyond next hill,
We children born of oceans blue
Take tenuous steps anew
Defying all by mere virtue of our will,

It is the sky torn wide
And doubt shall no longer hide
The promise of what waits ahead,
It is the dream long held
Icarus returned, now unfelled
To Earth we are no longer wed.

Ever on, ever on, till our final day of rest,
Ever on, ever on, let us meet each test
Of every hope, of every star,
Ever on, ever on, till the sun has finally set,
Ever on, ever on

clark · 2004-06-23 10:33:23

Quiet stars do twinkle
Upon the raging night,
Forever distant wishes,
Wait upon this light.

Winds do howl in raging storm
And bitter cold does hold,
Tender touch against the skin,
As daydreams grow so bold

Of dancing on the pinhead's light,
As angels sing in song,
Heaven waits to welcome all,
And give us what we long.

Is it hope of what could be,
Or of what just might?
Is it chances unknown yet,
That wait upon our flight?

Answers hang upon the stars,
As questions follow where we go,
The path ahead, above does call,
To venture is to know.

clark · 2004-06-28 15:10:40

Landscape drenched in desert red
As if this land had once long bled
From crevices, cracks, and tumbled ravines
Bequeathing our telescopes the Martian dreams
Of ancient old, of alien way
Of flowing canals and unknown May
Where spring and flowers bloomed in rain
And waters cover the dusty plain
No, no, just these weathered rocks asleep
Where civilizations never grew to weep
Over the setting blue sky so high
Never to wonder beneath the stars, never try
To reach across the vast emptiness of space
Where perhaps they might have found the human race
We orphaned brothers will never know
The Martians we dreamed will never show
Their faces, their voices, their exotic songs
No enlightened wisdom to right our wrongs
Just fancy lore in books and story
Mankind's imagination their unmade glory
Such sad could be might have been
If fate and chance had let life win
Upon a distant shore of orange and red
Where life never lived, where it never bled
Except in the rich red heart of Man
Who dreamed, conspired, and did plan
To remake what infinity never could do
And cast this world into colors blue
For if even the gods did once ordain
That the time of Mars shall ever wane
Our path is our own, and ever on
Let us humans go and birth the first Martian dawn.

clark · 2004-06-29 12:13:22

Harvest

I watched a sea of wheat
Fall beneath my feet
As gracefully as a cat
Tripping lightly upon the tiles
Of barn yard dawn
Waiting in the gray morning dew
Ever mindful of the yelps and the mews
While waiting to pounce
Upon the frail timid form
Of a field mouse
Unaware of impending doom

clark · 2004-06-29 16:26:08

Silent are these words you read,
Unvoiced letters, stunted seed
Of blooming song and flowering verse,
Muted now by unspoken curse,
That wears upon the whispering lip,
Dancing on the tongues idle tip
To wait in sullen peaceful hush,
As paint is without the brush-
So free this nightingale, let her sing,
Speak these words, let them ring
Upon the ears and untouched heart,
Set the stage, play your part,
And loudly cry out among the din,
Unchain these words from the pen!

clark · 2004-06-30 10:33:39

An addiction
Self imposed affliction
In the veins
It reins
Though it pains
With every drag
Of a fag
Cigarette burn
Never learn
To let go
I know
It kills
Like pills
But the taste is sweet
From head to feet
I kneel
As I feel
Rapture
A capture
Of my will
Like a chill
In the soul
The goal
To release
Never cease
Cause I choose
To lose
Myself one more time
A little crime
Adding up
Adding up
Taking away
One more day
Until there's nothing left.

clark · 2004-06-30 11:32:48

The stars came out that night
Winking in delight,
For all the world to see
Evening grace had set them free,
To dance languid across the sky
Above each mountain high,
Across vast fields of wheat
Each horizon did they meet,
As time spun inexorably on
Never fearful of waiting dawn,
That eternally chased their trail
Forevermore, ever on will it fail,
To extinguish fires set glowing afar,
For infinity numbers the star
That swing upon an invisible wind
Which jealous daybreak tries to rend,
Yet fear not their loss from sight,
For the stars will return, tommorrow night

clark · 2004-07-06 12:06:43

Cathedral made of brick and stone
Built by fleeting lives on loan
Monuments all to our creation
In this work comes our salvation
And wisdom learned by sweat of brow
Seeking forgiveness as we bow
In supplication to unseen god
Singing praise, eternally laud
Good works and good deeds,
Curing afflictions, answering needs
These are the teachings left unspoken
Help in mending spirits broken
As fallow land is left to lie
To bloom in glory beneath endless sky
So to our effort in celebrating dream
As humble flesh becomes more than wold seem
In life to death comes the final rebirth
Proof then of our ultimate worth
To become bearers of a holy name
Joining in ever eternal flame
Until then, there is but this time
To understand clockwork and the chime
That sounds, and sounded throughout all days
Revealing the intricacy of mysterious ways
That built the foundation of brick and stone
Allowing us to build a cathedral to atone
For sins and acts we each do despise
Leading us towards truth, away from lies
So we might learn, as we each must
To find faith in each other, to trust
That the distant shores far from sight
Wait cathedrals great, filled with light-
Ah, but a simple prayer this is
Yet in the end, that's all it ever 'tis.

clark · 2004-07-06 15:13:06

The stars are farther than they seem
With life, they will not teem
For too vast is this celestial sea
This dream is not to be
For Man is consigned to flail upon
Until the final days when Sun is gone
And oceans all boiled away
And chance has passed upon our day
Till then, till then, will we gaze above
Our sight the limit of our love
For stars and moons and planets high
To accept the sentence, instead of try
This fate, our fate, the one we now choose
The Universe and her secrets, ours to lose
So let us pause now, in acceptance's serenity
Forever on, we shall merely stare at infinity.

Cobra Commander · 2004-07-07 07:56:40

After another round of extreme sleep-deprivation...

A small red world hung before us,
dead and frozen desert.
But beautiful.
We took of the land laid out before us,
Drilling and digging, destroying.
But useful.
Rending the ground to build upon it,
Fists in space to melt and bomb it,
The tools of war that brought us here and made this world home.
Scourged the land and ripped the waters
from the ground, our sons and daughters
carried on the work we started, freedom from the domes.
Ever on our people labored,
Envied by their old world neighbors who looked in awe at what we'd built,
they covet for their own.
Cursing us who burn the desert, melt the ice and fill the rivers,
This world was pure and cold and dead,
but beautiful they say.
And we agreed, but living on it makes it ours, to build upon it,
just as they did on theirs before us, and we intend to stay.
They speak of rocks and dust and winds as casualties of the life we bring,
while we have brought the best of their world here.
And looking at the trees and rivers, our cities and our Mars born children,
we see beauty greater than before.
If you want dead deserts, preserve that which is yours.

clark · 2004-07-07 10:28:03

Well done Cobra. Your voice carries through.

Perhaps you should get less sleep more often.

Speaking of that editorial... I found a Walt poem I thought appropriate.

When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer

When I heard the learn’d astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,
When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,
When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,
Till rising and gliding out I wander’d off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.
Walt Whitman

clark · 2004-07-08 11:51:02

In wandering musings of red red wine
Far beneath the stars divine,
Comes a wondering of what may be
Waiting by an empty Martian sea,

Lost cities of gold, covered in dust,
Ancient machines broken with rust?

Are there fields of exotic fruit
All withered away,
Do paintings neglected
Remember children at play?

Was there life unknown to man,
With eyes of gold and skin so tan?

Did thoughts float through
Thin invisible air,
As laughter floated among
The Martian fair?

How far did their carved canals run,
With emerald water sparkling in sun,
As boats floated on liquor free,
To a full and waiting Martian sea?

How long was this time, their age,
Is it recorded upon any page?

In tattered books or electric disks
Now long lost,
All buried deep beneath
Winters frost?

Has Spring passed and finally set,
Leaving nothing but sad silhouette?

Will Mars never recall these flowers in bloom,
Forever more consigned as memories tomb
For imaginations wishful childhood dream
The one that yearns to touch, and redeem?

Questions to ponder of what could be,
While wondering of an empty Martian sea.

clark · 2004-07-15 13:40:05

Austere beauty ever deep
Covering desert in a sleep
To slumber on and on and on
Unaware of sunset or the dawn
Crawling across a landscape bare
Sterile beauty made so fair
Without a hint of green or blue
Just a million pigments of reddish hue
Painted on this cratered broken land
Untouched horizons in silence grand
With mountain towers climbing ever high
Their reach tearing open an empty sky
And wind, soft wind, winds through canyon crawl
But no ears do hear this wail or call
Of birth, of life, of endless death
Of Mars and her final breath
That hangs upon fine ruby lips
And calls to men and their ships
To sail and fly on light and fire
Chasing towards unspoken desire
That waits to break this sleeping dream free-
Mars, a dream, and all it could be.

clark · 2004-07-27 13:46:18

Fly me to the Moon
Can't get there too soon
Where Apollo has gone
Lifted by Von-Braun
That's all that I want
Just a little lunar jaunt
Only three days away
It doesn't matter how long I stay
Cause I just want to be
A moment on Tranquillity Sea
When the Earth will soon rise
Above empty Moon sky's.

Fly me to the Moon
Can't get there too soon.

clark · 2004-07-29 12:51:01

Distant Mars among the stars
Where sleeping dreams do lie,
It hums a tune, no words to sing
In silent Martian sky,
Clouds might break in wisps of smoke
while huddled rocks do gaze,
At sun unseen by any eyes,
Yet cold bitter is this far off blaze,
Upon a chilled and dusted wind,
Whose howl was choked by thinning air,
Eternal vigil of silent night and day
Wears unseeded land left bare,
Colors bleed from rocks in bloom
With petals never to unfold,
Rivers stilled and boiled away
Where life could never hold,
This empty place never sung
Never spoke a word,
Empty seas did dry away,
Existence cries were never heard,
And thus this ancient tune did play,
Hummed without a sound,
Thus the dreams of distant Mars,
Waiting to be found.

Morris · 2004-07-29 13:55:01

Clark,

Where do find the time to be so productive. Are you one of those 4 hour a night sleepers?

clark · 2004-07-29 14:01:41

Sleep? What's that?

I have my good days and my bad days, it just depends. How much effort should it really take?

clark · 2004-07-29 15:24:21

Wide eyes reflecting heavens Moon
while small hands
trace comet tail
Blazing blue-red on black night,
The child's laughter drowns out
Chirping crickets,
Unaware.

clark · 2004-08-02 13:50:59

Red moon circling distant sun,
Further out than the bluer one-
Yet for each orbit twice,
Blue Earth does close to entice,
Wayward hearts that set upon,
Desolate desert and waiting dawn
On rusted shores and empty sky,
Filled with dusty seas for them to ply,
Reworking this absence into wealth,
Restoring ancient beauty to health,
For a common good left unspoken,
Returning a chance for life once broken,
An image made in the likeness of Man,
To continue what once began
On ill fated planet far from sun,
Completing what chance did shun,
For fate did choose those with choice
To fill the cosmos with their voice,
And spread the work of sweat and hands
Reshaping untilled lands,
To birth, to bloom life unknown
To take our seed where it has never sown,
Celestial infinity waits beyond the stars,
As life does wait for distant Mars.

John Creighton · 2004-08-04 13:58:08

In the Kayos,
One word meats another,
One sentence another,
The idea spreads with,
Only dreams for fuel,
Burning higher, burning brighter
The sparks probe though the abyss of darkness
lying beyond the light of green fire.
which crackles and roars tossing,
The embers of life to nurture a distant
Flame, ignite...bringing the abyss light.

clark · 2004-08-05 16:06:06

Setting sun in oceans chill,
Horizons burn, colors spill,
Across vast canopy of drawing night,
As stars reveal their distant light,

A western sky is burning free
Upon the sands and shimmering sea,
Day does drown, deluged once more
As night creeps soft upon the shore,

This scene before I noticed not,
To savor passing twilight, I forgot,
Until fate did bring me to this day
When from oceans sunset I will stray,

To where the sun does rise instead
And sunset sleeps in mountain's bed,
East, east, to daybreaks ocean birth,
Where sun does chase the night from earth.

John Creighton · 2004-08-11 21:07:35

Marching in groups of ten
This is what replaces the pen
The rything of the mind
The portal of hart
The network of knowledge
Like one mind
Ideas wrap around the sphere of life and thought
The pitter patter of the fingers never stops

clark · 2004-08-16 12:17:32

The old Pied Piper plays a tune
Of Martian winds and untouched dune
Where feet have yet to mark the sand
And children dream of distant land
Aye, teasing song does hypnotize
Gathering spirits forth to rise
Past the yonder blue sky above
Casting a pall, a spell of love
On faint ruby red light so far
Hearts hopes now pinned to far-flung star
"Come," the melody does play on
To empty seas and unseen dawn
Where mountains streak through broken sky
And oceans beach is ever dry
While green a color never seen
Does wait longingly in-between
The cracks and crevices of dirt
A sultry image that does flirt
From haunting hum upon the ear
Mars is calling us ever near
Until that day when Earth is left
Her children long gone, she bereft
Of generations felled by Mars,
Seduced by a song sung by stars.

clark · 2004-08-16 15:35:54

What awaits beyond this known
Where shadows hold fast to rocky stone
And invisible breeze does never move
To still its pace or approve
The form that stands and waits upon
Rocky shores where none have gone
This question asked in innocence
While silence responds in ambivalence
To temporal beings in quests long made
Upon new shores they have wade
To gasp at sights not of earth
Far from world of their birth
Yet even here, the hills do climb
Where questions remain, ever sublime
For this destination is but one more pause
Along journeys road, unspoken cause
To lift long veil of darkened night
Expanding further our mortal sight
Until we find all left to know
This journey waits, let us go.

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#126 2004-06-22 09:34:03

Re: Any poets? - Comments, CONSTRUCTIVE critisism, ideas.

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#145 2004-08-02 13:50:59

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