Falling King on a Snowy Evening

 

 

Falling King on a Snowy Evening

 

And horse’s move seems so queer.

The Queen’s subtle glance confirms the end is near.

The King is naked standing by frozen lake.

The checkmate will set at last – the ending year.

 

The King’s crown tilts; his eyes shake.

The Queen attacks the weaken mistake.

Taking pieces with a first rank sweep.

The King falls upon glory’s flake.

 

The chessboard is lovely, dark and deep,

And now, I must attend promises to keep,

The castle’s floors must be swept before I sleep,

And dishes washed before I sleep.

Synapse

 

S Y N A P S E

 

As it happens

A first blink in the synapse

Begins three moments

A trilogy forming ovum.

 

As it happens

In trimensions

A second binary Blink

Blends the homogeneity of empty space

 

Such as chaos of expanding;

Contracting existence -

A tertiary Blink

Meanings of light

Cascades in isotropic wends.

 

As it happens

The ovule Blinks

In the synapse

A muse contends

 

Her wands as brushes;

Paints as music-

The interlocution

Is isolated by survival.

 

As it happens:

Blink into plasmatic

Oceans of luteous forms

Changing and evolving spectrums

 

From flavous to blue; to pink; to swallow

The muse whirls and spins her vaulted universe

To save a way

And breath for one more day.

 

 

 

 Written for Old Court House Art Center Exhibit - As it Happens

by Bert Leveille "Synapse"

https://vimeo.com/showcase/7795629 

Synapse

"As It Happens" Gallery Installation (Now thru December 31st)

https://www.atrociouspoets.com/

Trial and Trail of a Pretender

The trial and trail seemed purposeful yet, his feet walked mindlessly along

while he dwelt upon the detours of all his good intentions.

 

For the toils of beauty are not equal nor just -

 

It is a vindictive enemy -

the more you resist the more insistent it becomes - demanding full fare for your life

and this, for many is not as much of a question - as it is a promise to some destiny at the next stop.

 

He became less his ideas and more the ambitions reflected by his place, his status, his money,

his friends, his haughty collections but mostly, he was a myriad of all his doubts and insecurities.

And, in the end, even the mirror could not recognize him.

 

That gifted box sitting in the closet -

contains all the compliments, real and perceived, he once numbered.

And the box wrappings with all the blossomy ribbons?

Those are the self-denials to himself as the best possible ornament. 

A Fire in Tercet

Virgil’s question, “What fears - thee

When the garden is in plea

For a bee to rest upon thy breast?”

 

I dread the beast’s silent quest

And too; when words will not rest

To fill upon a line nor form into a page.

 

Virgil’s question, “Is this a poet sage

Or a fanciful lunatic in a rage

Waiting for flowers to blossom?”

 

Neither winsome face made handsome

Or plain; shall keep sins hidden behind loathsome.

Waiting to wait - a loud adore; or the quiet abhor!

 

Virgil’s question, “Is the door on fire

With flames that create an empire;

Or is it merely a pyre – laid deep with fears?”  

  

Castings at the Fringe

If you were there at the place

where the moon sits

And if I were here at the edges of its beams,

crossing distances of time and space,

would we be casted in shadow splits;

Together as one at the fringes of existence?

(photo by Johnna Calvillo)

A Path Not In Vain

The path's veins
Bleed Light
And nothing lives in vain.

I Can't Breathe

I Can't Breathe

November ‘63; a bullet explodes

Filled with bad odes

Blood fills a titular head -

A frame too sad.

The news freezes all

And too, I can’t breathe.

Cities implode into a churn

As the song pleads, "burn, baby, burn!".

The dogs growl at the bridge

And police hold the ridge

Against a minister’s prayer call

Of a dream where all can breathe.

Brother Robert teaches hope

And then, an LA interlope

Stills Camelot’s last gasp.

Another favorite son will lapse

And, the Summer of Love will fall;

Napalm is in the air; we can’t breathe.

Young men drafted - abide

The country's outrageous ride

Into a false war's reason;

Soon, too many sons lost to a country's treason.

Students shot at campus mall;

She cried “he can’t breathe!”.

In a faraway place of ancient origins

Revolution is in the air against Americans.

Iranian students despise Western ways

Holding embassy hostages in secret stays

Insisting for a Shah’s royal pall

As the clerics claim, “We may soon breathe”

A man lurking about at the Dakota.

Imagine - John ending a sixties’ coda?

In Houston, one good heart replaces a failing one.

In LA, Rodney is beaten and killed by justice’s wand.

In Texas, David takes seventy-five into fires enthrall.

Poets and songwriters tell of a turgid air - we can’t breathe.

A quiet September morning sit two towers

As the life of a city awakens to last hours

Before hate strikes at the twin emblems of the free

And suddenly - their collapse kills all lost in flee!

Mongers of fear bite at the nation’s throat with deadly appall;

The ribs of the towers swirl with toxicity; no one can breathe.

Three men of justice stand on a man’s neck.

Perry pleads for his life not to be taken in check

And, his black color assures that he will never be set free

From the knee of injustice; and he pleads for his momma to see.

What is one more life when black is the voice that calls?

“I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe”  -  And now, we gather to breathe.

The Last Couplet

The Last Couplet 

Feted and decorous jesters of spoken sound 

Gathered a circle of romantics into a round 

To initiate their exiguous songs 

Crumpled into verse, sonnet; all sort of doggerel wrongs 

Written and sung with plaintive tone so to disabuse 

The objective of the critic’s tongue of stinging refuse 

Flavored bitters and morsels of disfavor and condemnation 

Offered as the last course - at the table of predation.

A Man and Door Perception

It’s an old door now with longing splinters.
The frame it hangs on has seen hard winters.
The key that unlocks it from dogged ways
Has been lost, misplaced like so many days.


Perhaps forgotten or traded for dreams
The story? Doesn’t really matter - seems.
The portal views are cracked and unclear
Do not see too well; it's fine no one near

To hear the rusty hinges groan and creak;
Telling stories of good years left to speak.
Door is a bit swollen and hard to close
Or open; doesn’t matter, no one knows:

  Why the door sits at the cave’s perception -
  Neither agape nor refused - to inception.

River

From an ancient place where once glaciers kept 

A small spring sprouts from loins of Earth Mother. 

A birth of pure, clear fresh pools forms a waterbed 

Over small pebbles that were once source to mighty mountains. 

The baby spring strengthens into a fountain of youth 

With a curiosity that spreads out into riddles of a brook; 

Seeking knowledge and wisdom to flow and stream 

Over the ground into rivulets; forming path and way 

That will someday channel itself to a beloved bay 

Far to the western coast; at the edge of a continent. 

The River Johnna, will find the ocean

Where both her beginnings and her destiny - fulfill life.

Distention of Apprehension

Distention of Apprehension



There is a moment when all dimensions seize

To maintain their expected condign within human seas

Where right and left; up and down are not brought to question

That is, until the peccant crown orbs bring apprehension

With their tendrils of tiny protein capsids wondering

Seeking to invade by evading the platelet’s plundering.



You have now entered the twilight zone.

Where strangers are best left to be stranger; affinity is not a condone

Keep a distance by distention of six by six

Time no longer holds to the clock face’s fix.

No flowing; no gathering allowed without hiding behind a casque

Otherwise, you will be assimilated; breath taken by a death in red mask.



And the whole of the planet shall stop

While the dead are counted daily like the corn crop.

Why does the nurse collapse in exhaustion and fear?

Why do they regret lack of a healthcare warrior’s gear?

The twilight zone is no place -

For a beautiful angel’s uncovered face.

#atrociouspoets #poetrycommunity #poetsofinstagram #artistsofinstagram #woodstockil #collaboration

A Still Painting

#atrociouspoets Prompt 25
#nationalpoetrymonth
#aprilpoetryprompt

A Still Painting


Standing; stilled at the mountain’s ledge
The extreme height and depth below strike
Fear at the gut - like a sharp knife’s cutting edge.

A 2 AM ringing call alarms awake
The slumber as stillness flees into fear
And each word forth strikes at heart ache.

Two tall military men dressed in blues;
Arriving Marines strike at the door
Fear stabs the mind still; a-son-is-lost-news.

A silent room frozen in time;
Mobile hangs still; a lone bassinet
Stands empty - life has lost all rhyme.

Fear looks like the lost in darkness;
Fear is the tender heart held to stillness:
Fear is the vacant eye lost in madness.

Rhyme Alaska - Alexa

#Atrociouspoets Prompt 24

Rhyme Me Alaska - Alexa

Spake to me dear Alexa!
My dearth hearth is dark
And my thoughts are in a lark.
Give me warmth; that I not be wretched.


Master, what relief do you seek?
Free verse, Old French ballade, love poem or prose?
Do you seek a sonnet, a quatrain, or a couplet of repose?
Should there be golden orbs or a dark mystic?

Matters not - ye foolish gutless voice!
Just give me words of wisdom or advice
For my skin crawls in fear of unseen lice.
Know you not a helpful rhyme choice?

Would you prefer served in Cartesian dualism
Where replete in abstracts of a living Tree?
Or set in concrete forms of what is to be?
Shall I facilitate the poem into existentialism?

Just do it! You cylindrical formless beast;
Give me comfort and joy
Without further respite or employ!
If need be - “Alexa rhyme Alaska”, at very least.

Very well, seeker of solace and cheer:
   There was once a man of trumpery
    With quite a dumpy way in his buggery
     With affairs and slump around in leer
      He sold his soul for the bestest robbery.

The Care Room

The Care Room

When life seems empty and annoyed

Making the mind flutter in tilts

Gather wits and sew lilts

Into covers that fill the void

The Ever Tree

The youngling came to be with the moment

Questing had begun on its path to sage

As a precious child laid to rest torment

For time urges race into adult cage

“Tell me Mother, how will I grow - ever

To be as old; as noble as Pando

The Quaking Aspen that loves forever?”

“My child, mycorrhizae is life below

Love is life, what you see above - fingers

Reaching for the sun; I never know time

I understand moments for growth lingers

Until the sun’s light eases warmth sublime.”

   “Oh my tree! The face of the dreaded clocks!”

   “Fear not, join ever here – free of time’s pocks.”

Conversation with the Universe

A Conversation with the Universe

Master of Ceremony:
Welcome Universe to this grand gathering of minds
We have a panel of poets and other scions of misfit
Seeking answers to peel back the Cosmo’s rinds.


Universe:
Ask away – where do your quandaries sit;
Do your eyes deceive the notions you cherish
Or, is the immensity of me - beyond a small wit?

Past tense:
I was a writer, lived long ago and now perish’d
Though I am since gone - past my agony’s skit;
Are not my poetic words alive whence life has relish’d?

Present tense:
I am a profound poet and master of rhyme
My words are fresh, timely meals for the soul’s nourishment;
How can words in place mean thoughts beyond this present time?

Future tense:
I am the waters of hope and replenishment
Will the future be less or more or if, it even exists;
For those who measure time - will they be forlorn by banishment?

Universe:
The answers to your quest is within midst.
Only those who hold tense to time’s meanings
Are tasked to explain how past, present and future lie in tryst.

Each of these is only real if they are given a time’s leaning
Otherwise, all is contained within one existential key;
The universe is; as real as is dreaming.

A Bad Actor vs A Good Question

Good Morning fake news questioners – my kingdom is very very much gooder today.
Red governors are my besties and so great in being smarter like no one can say!

Mr. un-Precedent, what is the death count today?
How many people did your miracle save – can you say?

I do very tremendously good because me is a wonder of a sable genus that can ever be
My faithful trumpers here on this stage can make this crisis so more than I can see
It is really all those blue old people to blame – why can’t they not die, the living numbers are about me!

Mr un-Repentant and chief deceiver with sharpie pen in little hand
Why must there be a pointless signature sent across the land?
Is your ego so large that you require praise shown - even on every funeral arm band?

Why must the fake newsies be so concerned about what is true?
Whatever I say is for MAGA red - not the failing blue.
I am doing so beautifulest – you know - it is just a little flu!

Mr. POTUS of Discontent what is the COVID count this day?
What is your strong view of testing today?
How many can count on your virus testing to begin – can you say?
Helllo –
Hello – Mr. President
where did you go – don’t you want to play?

I S O L A T E D

Isolated behind the window muntins

Dreaming of the many Colorado mountains

Still to be conquered

Yet, held stilled in shelter – sequestered

From normal daily life

By the horizon latitudes of the world’s strife

Personified by this lonely empty street

Where now - only a fleeting sun’s retreat

Is left for darkness to reign

Returning to rule once again.

Sleep – is the only respite.

Will we ever be - all right?

Solitary Path

Is alone the epitome of solitary -

or is it a sentence in isolation?

Does standing in nakedness change either?

You Are Here

The title says it is your life
Such as it is – the roads use to lead everywhere
And yet, you are here.
Where the crossroads always ask
“Now where?”

The contours show the heights you have gone
And too, describe the points when life
Went so low –
Only the oceans could understand its depths
Nevertheless, the color scheme does include swatches of green too!

The legend lists the many things that were important:
Childhood toys left behind in a wooden box;
A red dog collar of the best friend ever;
Blue track meet medal for 1st place;
A wedding picture that now seems so antique;
A baby picture that makes you smile and pain at once;
An old love poem written when the heart was still young.

The scale has changed now as the road lines seem unclear.
What was once a short distance to somewhere; to anywhere
Are now daunting and so hard to see the way there.
What is the measure for doubt?
Where does it end?

Why a Clock

It is understood by all who walk by that it moves -
Somehow?
Although, it never leaves its place on the ivory tower
And it is said that it has a face that reads!
However, it knows not how rhyme works in time…

Shamefully, someone stole its one hand - probably the church mouse
Looking for a second meal as the day was getting late.

How does it portray numbers yet, it can only account for twelve not twenty-four?
Unless of course, the bells sing out the call – “it is the middle now!”
And only then, can the heavens explain – which side falls on the black or the light.

So, who knows who moved; or why the numbers are scattered around?
How is it- that 12 is at 3 and 3 at 5 and now, 9 is at one – it’s so crazy!
Oh my, what is to be done!

A second becomes a minute and a minute becomes an hour
And too soon, those hours, become days that turn into many calendars
Like buckets, some may bring cheers while others – carry a date with tears.

My! what happened to my face it looks so old now
And memory has forgotten what time is -
While my heart so much wants to linger there
When the clock still ran young
And the future – was a thing –
To long for and wait.

Don't Take This Old Fool

What have you done - you old fool?

Gone off and lost your mind

Somewhere near where memories pool

To slowly evaporate; it's so unkind.

How the world has become so closed

And left you alone and confused

If you could only run - do you suppose

What you could catch would be of any use?

Your eyes do not follow along much anymore

Although an old song still makes your toes tap

While waiting for something; someone once more

Before the night takes you into that last nap.

What have you done - you old fool

Have you broken the one last rule?

This Manifestation Box

This blue object in the universe thrives

With organisms both immense and small;

Mother Sun’s favorite planet of them all.

Three of nine albeit poor ol’ Pluto had the jive

And was thrown out from the milky way hive!

Within this orbiting revolving sphere,

Named earth and defined as ground,

We rockin’ at 67 thousand mph ‘round

The hot sun while spinnin’ and a rollin’ with cheer

Better not stop, better not step in without a beer!

The human manifestation anthology is an old juke box

With notes from little children who wonder

Asking: is there little green things out in that black yonder?

Is the black box an entire universe filled with questions of clocks

Spinning backwards and a blinking constellation that tells of a mansion of ox?

Dinner is served at eight

The table is always set to wait

For family, friend or guest date

Come hungry for talk of fate

And please - don’t be late.