Tag: poets

Haiku #13 (NS)

Photo by Jan Koetsier on Pexels.com

The wind blows a gale;
I must fetch a sweeping brush.
Fresh air in the room

Copyright Francis 2021

Poems in Fevers of the Mind Poets of 2020 — Yesterday and today: Merril’s historical musings

I apologize for posting across social media, but some people follow me only on this blog. I an honored to have three poems in David L. O’Nan’s massive (over 300 pages) anthology, Poets of 2020. There are so many wonderful poets in this volume–many well-known names! The book is available in several formats. Here’s the […]

Poems in Fevers of the Mind Poets of 2020 — Yesterday and today: Merril’s historical musings

Poem: ‘Dance of Life’

This was long thought to be the only portrait ...
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Don’t hold out a torch
for me, I am not free of blame. This

is the dance of life where all are
culpable, soon to be drowned in

washes, the mangling gears
of pain. But who knows, these maelstroms

might be wormholes, revealing other
worlds and tableaux of night; dressings

of props across cold stone walls, taken
and rebuilt from dishevelled remains.

And where bards once played on stages,
hidden behind arras stitchings

and nom de plumes, we are all still
mere punters in pits macabre, holding

torches for celebrity – look at them, drunk,
high up with their gods of gold

© poem copyright David F. Barker 2013

Poem ‘Flux’

The window is
ajar,

just enough to
let in some air, to

tantalise the cat
hooked by

night’s soft invitation.
Something outside

is burning, hangs
in the yielding light, though

I’ve never
seen those crimson clouds

phase
to dusky pink

and then to grey.
It’s a flux which

eludes me
every time.

Magic, you might say,
like being in space,

and now

© copyright David F. Barker 2012

Poem ‘Wordspiller’

The Old English epic poem Beowulf is written i...
The Old English epic poem Beowulf is written in alliterative verse and paragraphs, not in lines or stanzas. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Wordspiller (for Christopher Marlowe)

So you are the spiller of words, almost
as far from me as
Beowulf is to you.

Wordspiller, your crosspose outstands me,
but I backthink
the falling choirs where you sadwalked

your summerwaiting mind, to
when your glories were mere
airthought,

like the Greathallow who once
shorestepped there
to see for himself

your forliving Angles (he oncebethought
angels) and their saxon King
Ethelbert redeemed to newspells that

you mindweighed as truthless.
Now I meet your clearstead gaze; for
the muse which stretchfed you

has not alleaten you yet

poem © copyright david f. barker 2012