by phillipw | Mar 10, 2025 | TR
Against Screwtape’s Missal He knows the tongues of stones and dunes and sand, Those tiny rocks that only mystics know. He knows the languages that wind has fanned Across the deserts till they meet a mesa’s glow And dryness. Tumbleweed, mesquite, the best...
by phillipw | Mar 10, 2025 | Uncategorized
Heavenly Spheres of Orange Groves In my father’s house are many mansions If I could hold your hot heart in my heart, Then heaven would heal. That paradise would be A paradise that God alone might chart If he were everywhere. That God could be Surveyor of the citrus...
by phillipw | Mar 10, 2025 | ME, OR, TH
Worse than Whomptyjawed Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem We try to place a tulip vase to block A voodoo mask. The mask leers through, increased In size, distorted. Like a tomahawk The threat...
by phillipw | Mar 9, 2025 | AE, BE, ES
Reverie and Hypnosis Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem His irises come not from seashore waves In Florida. Their Caribbean blue Smiles, ancient though, more ancient than the caves Where men first...
by phillipw | Mar 9, 2025 | AL, AS
Constellations as Cathedrals Filled with Scientific Light Beside the seashore near my childhood home The stars are nearer, not just starlight; stars Themselves are closer in the heavens’ dome. It used to be that something like high haars Divided us from Alpha Tauri. ...
by phillipw | Mar 8, 2025 | SE, TE
Pulling on the See-through Bell Cord Your heart is made of silk but mine is made Of lycra. When your veins are touched, they make No sound as if they fear an escapade With arteries that always feel an ache For thrills. The warning bells have disappeared And so your...
by phillipw | Mar 8, 2025 | AE, AR, ES
Material Ideals Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The men who made cathedrals, workers, not The architects; the Indian men who built The temples, stone designs completely fraught With...
by phillipw | Mar 7, 2025 | IN, MA, PY, RE
Delphi, Endor and an Empty Tomb Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem His conscience seeks for oriental kings. He hopes their gold and frankincense and myrrh Will give him wisdom and, if not, the wings...
by phillipw | Mar 7, 2025 | IN
Flowers like Leis Lying on an Altar Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The sculpture of a god whose powers are not Apparent waits for you to pray to him. Can he protect a baby in a cot? If so, what...
by phillipw | Mar 6, 2025 | Uncategorized
Unruly in a Village Cemetery They did not dream it when alive, yet ghosts Are happy when they find a way to cause Disruption as in polar bear cracked coasts, Antarctic shores — or like Antarctic claws From killers, icebergs floating toward the fate Of...
by phillipw | Mar 6, 2025 | BR, CA, MA, WH
Miracle of Modern Medicine and Demonic Itching It crept along inside her like a long- Lost angel Jesus couldn’t cure. The wretch At worst had withered wings and lost its song. Inside her breast the devil couldn’t stretch And couldn’t fledge its arrows. They could...
by phillipw | Mar 5, 2025 | MA
Testosterone Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem https://preview.redd.it/2sabktru2ap91.jpg?auto=webp&s=44f636d4c1403e4c291fe5a6e3e850cdf73c4499 A rose of semen crossed with iron...
by phillipw | Mar 5, 2025 | Uncategorized
My Sonnet Wants to Be on Vellum Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem I know it’s nigh to blasphemy, but still It’s true: my focus on the form I use Is like obsessions of the monkish quill And brush that in...
by phillipw | Mar 5, 2025 | Uncategorized
The Mind’s Rule Says There Is No . . . The rain of yesterday stalks up my soul Though that is quite impossible because I do not harbor one. No, no-one stole It, not a devil or a god whose laws Forbid such theft. I simply never had A soul. I’m not from ectoplasm of...
by phillipw | Mar 5, 2025 | CH, JU
The Peaceable Kingdom Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem “Whatsoever things are true . . . think on these.” Philippian 4:8 Our world can never be pristine again. It never was, yet all too many feel It...
by phillipw | Mar 4, 2025 | CH, DO, JE, PU, TR, Uncategorized, VL
Gog and Magog to the Fray Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem “Great deceiver of the world” ~ A. Cleveland Coxe The prophets never thought about the chance That Armaggedon could be caused by...
by phillipw | Mar 3, 2025 | AN, DI, PI
Praying Mantis Unlimited Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Glass globes with snow scenes in them are alone In holding innocence. No other space Shows equal calm. Most others whisper groan While...
by phillipw | Mar 3, 2025 | HI
An August Morning and the Shukkei-en Garden Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem A song that is a light beam which is both Perfume and phosporescence brings a balm To garden minds. Above the undergrowth,...
by phillipw | Mar 2, 2025 | DE, LO
He Tries to Turn His Back on Romeo — and Siegfried Sassoon Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem He enters into something like a cage, A puzzle, more a labyrinth. His aim Is to abandon, almost in a...
by phillipw | Mar 2, 2025 | BI, LI, LO, Uncategorized
In the British Library and Later He spends his life among the books, the great Ones, yes, of course. He reads about men’s love, Of Lancelot for Guenevere, and hate When men love men. He asks himself, “When’s love If men love men and...
by phillipw | Mar 2, 2025 | AB, AS, BU, LO, RA, RO, SA, SE
Mount La Verna’s No for Me Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Along with love comes fear the way a cat Brings fur and puurs and claws, entangled, one. You cannot love the cave without fanged...
by phillipw | Mar 2, 2025 | Uncategorized
Fake Views a la Oedipus America is throbbing with those who Have thrown away the truth, have stabbed their eyes Out. Misery of coveting shoots through What used to be their heartblood. They breathe lies And when they do not get enough, a mouth Produces...
by phillipw | Mar 1, 2025 | BI, SA
Islands are Harbors for Spliced Love Sapho Sappho By Guillaume Baviere from Uppsala, Sweden – 2014-12-22, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=73289397 She sang about the love of him, of her. She had his hair in mind–and hers. ...
by phillipw | Mar 1, 2025 | BO, GA, GU, Ho, Uncategorized
Awe, the Akkadians, and Two Men in Love Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Loch Awe, embraced by Scottish hills alone, Lies long beneath the troubles caused by wind, Perhaps of troubled hearts. The cairns...
by phillipw | Mar 1, 2025 | HE, WH
Loss in the Mental Lottery Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem My mother had a stroke before the hours My oldest brother was to wed. This stripped Her brain of language output. Other powers Were...
by phillipw | Mar 1, 2025 | AM, AN, SL
Echoes in All the Senses Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem He hopes his words might cause the future’s pools To shimmer as if earthquakes dream of breath From Lucifer or maybe as if schools Of...
by phillipw | Feb 28, 2025 | BR, FL
A Florida Childhood A boyhood made of doodlebugs and bees Would be too boring, so throw in a bear His father shot and mother served with peas And carrots and potatoes — bear meat flair For lunch. Another time a coral snake Was chopped up by his...
by phillipw | Feb 28, 2025 | AR, CH, WH
From “Hog Butcher to the World” to the British Library Rare Books and Music Reading Room His father’s father worked where hanging screams Were not allowed. The carcases had had Their windpipes slashed. Warm blood in gasping streams Had fallen past his eyes. ...
by phillipw | Feb 26, 2025 | Uncategorized
Living Love I’m tired of poetry about the lack of love, How one man loves and someone fails to gasp In holiness of height’s devotion of A hoping heart and does not reach to clasp The sacrament on offer. Incense tries To send the...
by phillipw | Feb 26, 2025 | AE, BE, BL, ES, Uncategorized
The Firmament Above, the Flowers Below Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem In dawns and twilights, winds prefer their lips To whisper, breezes coming, if at all, As gently as a smile. Their fingertips Just...
by phillipw | Feb 26, 2025 | CH, ST, Uncategorized
“Adieu, adieu, adieu. Remember me.” Hamlet, Act I, sc, v, 98 Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem If you were ghost and I were ghost with you, Would specter mouths be tempted, bringing lips...
by phillipw | Feb 25, 2025 | CH, RE, WA
Skylarks Are Shot in France Despite Vaughan Williams Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The skylark soars above the corpses on The battlefield of live doctrinal hate. There often has been one bright sunny...
by phillipw | Feb 24, 2025 | Uncategorized
Burning Burnt Orange Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem There’s orange and then there’s orange of silk. That lords It over other colors. Purple bows Before it. Others have no right in chords...
by phillipw | Feb 24, 2025 | KI, OR, SE
Holy, Holy, Holy Lips Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary If I had holy lips, my mouth would bring Them to the sacred spaces that all know, Especially those ones our seers sing. Sublime prophetic lips...
by phillipw | Feb 24, 2025 | Ta, TO
The Gasp of Moons Moons suffer subtle tortures. All around Them float sweet stars, sweet water drops that wink At them. Sweet twinkling cruelties abound. Sahara dry, the moons can never drink. A shooting star or asteroid might hit A moon, but water...
by phillipw | Feb 24, 2025 | HU
Where Sandspurs and Mosquitoes Thrive Modern poetry modern verse conteFmporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem For Matt Gaetz In Florida the afternoons are a parched With crush of slugs called damp and guck and heat. The slugs leave slime on...
by phillipw | Feb 22, 2025 | Uncategorized
Dumb Confusingly, (confusedly) he claims That silences have shapes; a silence has A shape (it follows). Saying this he maims Clear thinking. Silences are more like jazz, Progressive jazz completely jagged stuff. It’s good that he’s...
by phillipw | Feb 22, 2025 | LO, MA, SE
Always All Ways Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem When men are in that kind of love, then all Is right. Then everything is rhyming red. Then every time is thrilled, unblinded Saul. Then...
by phillipw | Feb 21, 2025 | Uncategorized
Music Drama Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem We almost never want the notes in scales. We want the melodies. We want the lilts And rhythms. We want music that gives trails To memories...
by phillipw | Feb 21, 2025 | BO, GA, GU, LO, RO
“but in our stars” We wonder whether we can ever find Each other in between our words and signs, Our gestures with our hands and arms. We wind Remembered kisses as if valentines Among our pains of exile. Not just lochs Divide us; more like...
by phillipw | Feb 20, 2025 | BO, GA, GU, LO, RO, Uncategorized
Orange Passion Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Not often mango sunset clouds and sky Cause burnishing of Scottish lochs that shine In orange of special garnets. Northern Skye Is foreign to...
by phillipw | Feb 20, 2025 | Uncategorized
Lost and Spellbound The abstract breasts that jut out in the frames Of Modernism, jutting out and flat At once, Picasso’s amalgam defames, Because he wants to shock. He had a spat With lovely art and so se wegt his bile. The spewings on the...
by phillipw | Feb 20, 2025 | BO, GA, LO, RO
Stradivarius Our Language Above the Loch Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Imagine creatures flying up above Our loch, our loch that never did exist Except in minds and hearts, except in love, The love...
by phillipw | Feb 19, 2025 | LO, PU, RO, Uncategorized
Scottish Mists Cleaner than Before Marriage The air — our air — did not need cleaning. Clean Was clean already. Blackness of your hair Was perfect. Nothing like hot iodine Was needed. Scottish lochs did not need prayer. Love’s prayer was prayer...
by phillipw | Feb 18, 2025 | Uncategorized
Give Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary p My words will drown unheard without your love Upholding them. The Hellespont invites Them, as it did the young old, young pure love Of Hero...
by phillipw | Feb 18, 2025 | BA
The Object of Poetry Betrayed He starts off rhyming but he flops to slime Of almost rhyming: “oily” rhymes with “me” Supposedly. This failure comes from “crime” Of laziness. He thinks that, shiftless, he Can shift and chop...
by phillipw | Feb 18, 2025 | BO, CH, SE
The Hometown Boys When men attempt to turn a nowhere place To poetry, the nowhereness bleeds through. The problem is the peopled childhood face, Once known, is sentimental, not quite true– If true at all. The boredom is ignored The way a woman does...
by phillipw | Feb 18, 2025 | BO, CH, FL, Ho
Dulce et Floridum Est The hometown rocks the cradle of his dreams But not because he hankers for their claws To hold him close. He shies from nightmare streams Of snakes. A summer night-time insect gnaws Embedded in his memory. Spiders crawl Where...
by phillipw | Feb 18, 2025 | Uncategorized
Scotland’s Pleistocene and Little Ice Age Glaciers Were Just as Pitiless Despite the lochs our words were drowned unheard. Despite the village on the Pentland hill, Our words of love were lost. Long decades shirred Our love and words, and crinkled them to kill...
by phillipw | Feb 17, 2025 | Uncategorized
The Dripping Chimes across Millennia Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Blond honeycomb and liquid amber drop In every era, not just in our time Or through lost 1950s days. The crop Of orange blossom honey...
by phillipw | Feb 17, 2025 | FR, MO, TR
Fundamental Stuff Endangered species — sonnet, villanelle And triolet — are crushed out now by verse That’s “free,” where form and rhyme have gone to hell. If only this stuff tended to be terse . . . But, no, it dribbles,...
by phillipw | Feb 16, 2025 | Uncategorized
The Diddy and Al Capone Gnomes That leper, poetry, is exiled now To margins of the world, especially if Its lines are rhymed and rhythmed. Fat hausfrau Is how it’s viewed. It’s found to have a whiff Of corpse which seems to be like dried up crap. Now...
by phillipw | Feb 16, 2025 | Uncategorized
Logic and Love will Set You Free Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The magnifying glass of language helps. The notion of a science made without That lens makes sneers. True poets cause the whelp Of...
by phillipw | Feb 16, 2025 | Uncategorized
Saint Valentine’s Day Sonnet Sequence; five sonnets for Saint Valentine’s Day Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Are You So Sure? “You are not repeat” ~ W. S. Graham, Aimed at...
by phillipw | Feb 16, 2025 | DO, EL, MU, TR
DemocKKKracy X the Anagram of Evil When priests ignore the meaning of the rite, When God forgets the meaning of the knife That slits the throat and brings on endless night, The humans left behind in clueless strife Continue with the ritual, so bound They are to...
by phillipw | Feb 16, 2025 | HE, RA, Uncategorized, WH, WO
Healthy Helix Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem He thinks that he is not a monster, not His father, not his mother, a bit Too much like both, but too much like a clot Of two good people, sucked...
by phillipw | Feb 16, 2025 | Uncategorized
The Day before Saint Valentine’s For Granddaddy Baxter Wilson The doctor’s forms do not require to know If you have been a criminal but need To say if certain parts of you now glow With viral love and whether manly seed Shoots tinged with fun you never...
by phillipw | Feb 16, 2025 | Uncategorized
Or William McGonagall He has this feeling he will never find His home, not in this or in another more Expansive incarnation. God’s broad mind Is not an option. On another shore With Buddha we might blackly learn That we are trapped again but in a...
by phillipw | Feb 16, 2025 | AE, ES, GR, PO, W
Attention-seeking Brat like Rimbaud “he never will be missed” ~ The Mikado A poet (!) says that language traps him tight. I mean, my GAWD, that’s through the looking glass. I might accuse him, saying he is trite, Except I know the truth. ...
by phillipw | Feb 15, 2025 | CH, ST, UN
Portent, Almost Would-be Love Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Another wind is blowing on the side Where you are, signalling silently and straight. On my side, here, the curving breezes glide And you...
by phillipw | Feb 15, 2025 | RE, ST
Many Meanings and the Two-way Mirror Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem On double sides of language we can find Some truth and maybe even both at once. The truth, though, is that faiths are always blind In...
by phillipw | Feb 15, 2025 | SA
Laws in the Ark of the Covenant Made of Acacia Wood but Disguised with Gold “We wake, if we ever wake at all, to mystery, rumors of death, beauty, violence…” ~ Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek The Bible’s bushes, never blue, bend more To...
by phillipw | Feb 9, 2025 | EL, WH
God’s Intervention Like a Hurled Rock “the blueness of wounds” Those unbelieving eyes of snow surround Her. Iciness like heat’s waves travels through Her hammered brain cells like the echoed sound Of God’s creation, banging, leaving blue Its bruises in the jelly of...
by phillipw | Feb 9, 2025 | PO, SO
Licentiousness Conceived as art or prophecy, a dream Of seers, poetry is jailed. It must Be free. It must be able to redeem A broken tea cup and to kiss the mussed Coiffure of Marilyn before she dies Of blonde indifference in a clutch of pills. The poet...
by phillipw | Feb 9, 2025 | BO, GA, GU, LO, PA, RO, SC
The Lochs, Coldness, Love Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Large lochs move far away and farther. So It seems at least without you near in space And time, in eons time, or nearly slow As that without...
by phillipw | Feb 8, 2025 | CU, FU, GA, HE, IN, SE, SP, ST
Brown and Pink The bracken, as life does, has turned to rust. They make their way up through it, rustling through The brown. They need to find a way to thrust In love — or something like it. He shoves spew Inside pink guts once they are over hill...
by phillipw | Feb 7, 2025 | AE, OL, RO
God Turned Night to Light, but . . . Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem He knew his instincts and he knew them right, As right as when Jehovah ordered space And time, as when His beard proclaimed the light...
by phillipw | Feb 2, 2025 | ZE
Flat Worth Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem One faith stands out. It does not teach that souls Exist and does not say they don’t. It follows that It does not say that god or God...
by phillipw | Feb 2, 2025 | PO
Withdrawal of the Winter Heating Allowance The February air inside his house Invades the body. Even bones Feel threatened. Poverty and cold each souse His inward flesh. They both are inward clones Of shivering muscle. English air that used To be like...
by phillipw | Jan 31, 2025 | MO, TR
The Modern Ships Retreat from Searching for the Golden Fleece Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The word ship he is making is a war Machine upon the sea of poetry. The battles are between him and a corps...
by phillipw | Jan 31, 2025 | FR, SI
Disappearing Dreams and AK-47 Daydreams Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Forgetting most, he searches in between His dreams and in between his other dreams, His daydreams. Dreams are more like toluene...
by phillipw | Jan 29, 2025 | DA, MA
Coronis and Hyacinthus Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Sun daydreams are from gods, divinities From Greece who moved to France (with Rome Along the way). Their masculinities Refuse the...
by phillipw | Jan 29, 2025 | Uncategorized
The Reincarnation of Hippolytus in Florida Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Another dream he had in boyhood nights Trapped boy upon the brackish shore, lagoon Of seaweed shore, and like the nightmare...
by phillipw | Jan 29, 2025 | Uncategorized
In This Dream I Believe I Flew Near You Among Your Orange Trees in Andalusia Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem He dreamed he learned to fly, first levitate, Then fly across his father’s property. He...
by phillipw | Jan 29, 2025 | Uncategorized
Never Mind the Brahan Seer Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem At times we wake up wide in sleep called dreams. The Greece we never visited comes up In visions worthy of its Iron Age gleams. We see...
by phillipw | Jan 29, 2025 | PH, SA, ST, Uncategorized, VA
Laid Out Not for You to See The cameras cannot call up fingertip Of touch no matter what the Canon lens, Of kiss, a red caress. Ohhh, linger lip On satin touch with wet. Vas deferens Is far beyond the scope of camera click Unless removed from love, and who...
by phillipw | Jan 28, 2025 | AV, MO, SA, ST, TR
Sailor’s Intercourse in Avila Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Inside my warship made of words I feel I do not need a spyglass, do not need New maps. I do not need some other keel Or rudder. ...
by phillipw | Jan 27, 2025 | OW, SA, SI
Gaslighting Battalions Followed by Fact When poets are involved in war, they take Their stances separately, not set as corps Like soldiers in platoons. To undertake Their poet duty, each perceives the war From different angles. Some, among the first, Are those who...
by phillipw | Jan 27, 2025 | BO, GA, GU
Miniaturization of Romance in Showers .. The wind’s rain shows the light like stars across The cosmos, but some eyes decide to see The vacuum of nothingness. Shine’s gloss Is not desired enough. Instead a scree Of pessimism made of Scotland reigns. The...
by phillipw | Jan 25, 2025 | BI, BR, GA, SK
He Was Real Before He Became a Pablum English Myth Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Reduced to being hero, poet, dead And soldier, he is trapped up on a plinth Above pink paving stones, his gorgeous head...
by phillipw | Jan 20, 2025 | BI, Uncategorized
Birds Control with Melodies the Changes of the Hours Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The mockingbird sings not to us but to The hovering night. He brings the evening on Northern Mockingbird Sounds,...
by phillipw | Jan 19, 2025 | CH, SE
Perversion to Uncouth When families shun their sons, religion kills Whatever it can find. What faiths love best Entails the worst, Jesuitical skills To shunt the highest laws to sidelines, wrest Those laws away from central truths, and shrug Those principles...
by phillipw | Jan 18, 2025 | Uncategorized
Buried for Millennia in Darkness of Dead Dreams Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem If roses turned to pyramids, their weight Would add no beauty. Brilliant hues would all Be banished in blank sanctums to...
by phillipw | Jan 15, 2025 | Uncategorized
Not Silently, Not Silently, the Wondrous Gifts Do not forget the shapes that you have known. You ken the ones I mean. The ones you took Out, played with, licked, you now recalling groan As only hearts can moan. Don’t overlook The forms that you have fondled. ...
by phillipw | Jan 14, 2025 | FE, MA, Uncategorized
Curves with Weight “and Adam knew Eve” Photo by Engin Akyurt on Pixabay The beauty in a woman shows the etch Of curves. Those hips are not just there as on That early man. They forced the Christ to stretch Them in His universe at...
by phillipw | Jan 14, 2025 | AI, BO, ED, GA, LO, RO
On Wings of Longing In future I will fly to Spain to find . . . And find. I hope to find a long-lost past With someone in it, long in heart and mind Of meetings, Edinburgh, Aix . . . memories vast For me, as long as forty years and more. This one I hope to...
by phillipw | Jan 14, 2025 | SY
In a Glass of Absinthe Mixed with Trojan Blood Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The oldest Homer, blind or not, might see That caves of poetry are where the dark And torches, wavering with black, agree....
by phillipw | Jan 1, 2025 | NO, OR, RE, SU
Red Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The red around us means STOP, DANGER, NO If it is human-made. Perhaps it hints Some other code in nature. In the glow Of skies at sunset,...
by phillipw | Dec 31, 2024 | Uncategorized
“The silent stars go by” ~ Phillips Brooks The stars are silent, always silent, though If one soars through another auraed star, A roar must sound. Their particles must go Right through coronas. Each hot haar must scar The other but the silence, once profound, Turns...
by phillipw | Dec 25, 2024 | AC, AE, BE, ES, MA, PH, Ta
Alpha Men and the Arts Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem When far too manly in your thought, don’t dream Of doves collecting sighs or nightingales Amassing sobs. Your thick-thighed rugby team...
by phillipw | Dec 22, 2024 | Uncategorized
Thorny, Growing Things Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem A sonnet wants to go somewhere, not just Within itself. It travels in its thought And themes. It wants a wider wanderlust Perhaps of...
by phillipw | Dec 22, 2024 | MU
Olympus and Mount Helicon Inside Us Always Our singing starts when mind and heart awake A pen or tongue. The singing might be notes Or words, composer or the poet. Blake Or Brahms begins inside us. Singing floats Out from our fingers or our mouths. The lips Then...
by phillipw | Dec 22, 2024 | Uncategorized
Grasping Your Soil Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem The acrid root of love has gilding on It. Wrinkles on it are not hidden by The gold. They look like shrivels that are drawn By greed. ...
by phillipw | Dec 21, 2024 | Uncategorized
Though ’Twere 10,000 Waves Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem If you were near a distant loch, away The miles from England where I dream of you, Dream daydreams of the hair on you, Strathspey Between us,...
by phillipw | Dec 21, 2024 | Uncategorized
Olympus and Mount Helicon Inside Us Always Our singing starts when mind and heart awake A pen or tongue. The singing might be notes Or words, composer or the poet. Blake Or Brahms begins inside us. Singing floats Out from our fingers or our mouths. The lips Then...
by phillipw | Dec 21, 2024 | Uncategorized
Behaving Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem If I could be my Prospero, some hours Perhaps, perceive the cosmos through his eyes While hiding underneath a shrub from showers Of English...
by phillipw | Dec 21, 2024 | LO, SE
Brown and Pink Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Bracken. Public domain. The bracken, just like life, turns back to rust. They make their way up through it, rustling through The brown. They...
by phillipw | Dec 20, 2024 | Uncategorized
Nosebleeds in a Coffeehouse Might Help “I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked” Howlers annoy. The “poets” speak their lines In limping prose and then expect the rest Of us to call it verse. There should be...
by phillipw | Dec 18, 2024 | Uncategorized
Spitting Cobras Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Spitting Cobra | The Toxic Sprayer The darkest planets are the ones you taught Me I should fear. Pink holes of blackness are Their realms. ...
by phillipw | Dec 18, 2024 | ST
Interior Forever Regrettably Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem Remembering her nakedness with black Triangle patch there at her center, he Recoils these decades later, patch myth black Now, more like...