The Poetry Marathon

Is It Wrong To Love A Cartoon Dog?

When we talk of love, we claim it is blind

That what’s on the outside doesn’t matter

That the positive aspects on the inside are important.

Though she is married, I’ve found a love,

She is kind and thoughtful,

And her motherly bond is strong.

Her love for family and love for her kids

Is accentuated by her twisting fun dances

Does it truly matter if it’s all make-believe?

Steady Hands

The ball, she rolls, around and ‘round,

Whirring through the gates and chutes. 

Buzzers and lights flash bout trying to distract.

Focus cannot be sheared like electric sheep

As man versus machine becomes the war,

Each slap of the sides of the box, increasing score.

The numbers only matter slightly

There’s no true prize to be won in this battle,

Except for the possibility of another game.

.Does Lightning have a purpose?

.       Does it only serve to destroy?

.             Or is it made to strike down those

.                    Who are out of Lord’s employ?

.                          It’s a symbol made for magic,

.                         Or for power to cause fear.

.                        Yet even still it has respect.

.                      Whenever it draws near. 

.                Purple bolts of electric light,

.                  bringing nature’s wrath

.                      Are best to be avoided

.                         So as to never cross its path

.                               When it zigs or if it zags

.                                  It soon becomes so clear

.                                       Lightnings purpose

.                                          is to show that rain

.                                               is coming near.

.                   So my friends            when it                strikes

.                           Do not                    look                  away

.                                For       with the rain comes     life

.                                          On each and every day.

My Best Friend

My best friend always bites me,

She’s happy drawing blood

Though I know she loves me,

She’d kill me if she could.

She eats me out of house and home

And makes me take her crap

And though she lives inside my home

I’ve only seen her nap

She never works, she’ll never help,

Just lays around all day

But even if I could get help,

she’d never go away.

In the end I love her like I love nobody else

Because even when she hurts me, it’s just a minor flog

And as something else,

My landlord won’t let me have a dog.

The Throne

It is in the throne room my greatest ideas come to me,

A place clean and glistening, 

sterile by effort and design.

There is a beautiful waterfall that comes from a glistening chrome mountaintop

And a shallow pond in which to wade. 

Though many balk at such a kingdom

And view it as a horrid place,

After my morning coffee I can disappear within for hours

It is from this place I write this now, eager for a win

Once I’m done with dinner, I’ll return here once again.

Cursed with Nightmares, of which unseen

Lie horrors that rival reality TV

Fighting through them is rough

And every night my sleep is not good enough

But worse than that is the world of dreams

Where everything is what it seems

A life of passion and love and true romance

Entwined inside my virtual dance

At the rise of the sun, I soon awake

And am forced to do a double take

For my life of joy and fun

Is over when my sleep is done.

Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife

Art or shame?

What was the birth of a movement

But the idle daydream of an artist?

Once a mere idea, transformed by 34 rules

To contain within a mix of horror and excitement.

Was the creator depraved or genius?

Creative or cursed?

Who’s to say but the octopuses

As the fisherman’s wife seems preoccupied.

Aphantasia

Imagine a world not of images but of words,

A world where when asked to picture something

You instead write a mental novel or soliloquy. 

When you close your eyes, do you see the images you place there

Or do you read it into existence within a mental universe

Only for it to die and fade when your eyes open once more. 

Such is the life of phantasmal words,

An imagination only capable of writing. 

Ideas and concepts become as sand-castles read about in books

Beautiful words, depicting grand schemes and things to be

Only to be washed away with the incoming tide. 

From those words come all of things,

Shoes and ships and ceiling wax and cabbages and kings,

Etched into permanence on the page as was stone,

Unable to be removed except by you and you alone.

The Selfish “I” – A Golden Shovel in homage to Robert Frost

A man who bears honor is one whose

Life thrives like the ever growing woods

Working to a code, it is these

Rules and regulations that simply are.

These rules dread the selfish “I”

They don’t require a person to think

Only to ignore the “I” 

The good that must be done is felt, you know

To continue onward for the sake of his

Neighbor. To offer up to those left behind his house

So that they may rest, is

The greatest sacrifice a man can give in

His life. If he does not, he opens the

Door for the destruction of his Village

A tragedy. If he takes the time and effort though

It will bear fruit and he

Becomes a force of Will

The obligations he made serving not

To hinder him but to help him see

The future that could exist without “Me”.

When a person gives up themselves, there’s no stopping

And despite the selflessness, they will cry “I am Here”

A declaration to

The world that he is an individual to watch

The promises to keep and the charity done are his

To claim. His own personal promised woods

With kindness enough to fill

Even the emptiest hearts up

With

A joy of light as white as snow.

Is there a more noble profession than a teacher?

Constructing the minds of a new generation

Architects of lesson plans, Philosophers of education

Janitors of muck and grime, Laborer of politics

Patience of a saint, discipline of a general

Every role is another job and every job is another role. 

Yet as busy as they are, the power they wield is next to null.

The world has little thanks for them

Little appreciation for the wars they win before they begin

And they’re expected to do it all with a smile on their face

So here is an ode to the educator, a tradesman of all trades

May their seeds take root, and their trees bear fruit.

It is really all we can hope for.