Submissions by Baldwin
POEMS AND SHORT STORIES
LOVE POEM
Published
13th May 2023 8:02pm
13th May 2023 8:02pm
Gilly Juliet
You hid behind your door
at my approach.
Ensured the phone was off the hook,
refused to heed the call
my finger made upon your bell.
And I,
all outward upward swelled towards you,
my chest
a barrel filled beyond capacity
and tautened rough
against its bandings and its staves,
heavy, heaving, strained
with leashed-up words
I wanted then to say,
was left,
head hung and hollowed out,
a cold stone in my stomach’s pit,
outside,
denied the chance to speak,
and made a...
at my approach.
Ensured the phone was off the hook,
refused to heed the call
my finger made upon your bell.
And I,
all outward upward swelled towards you,
my chest
a barrel filled beyond capacity
and tautened rough
against its bandings and its staves,
heavy, heaving, strained
with leashed-up words
I wanted then to say,
was left,
head hung and hollowed out,
a cold stone in my stomach’s pit,
outside,
denied the chance to speak,
and made a...
#UnrequitedLove
194 reads
2 Comments
MISCELLANEOUS POEM
Published
12th May 2023 1:03pm
12th May 2023 1:03pm
piety
I’ve laid the bull’s bones
and its thigh fat on
the altar stone
and set the pyre beneath them into flame
then prayed my sacrifice
would find some favor in
the eyes of Him,
the holy one
I call The Name..
But I was not so pious or
so brainless as to think
that breathing in the rising smoke,
however sweet the smell of it,
would take me up to Him
or cause me anything but agony
within my lungs
and make me Him disdain.
No, such a thing, I knew,
would root me to the earth
in coughing fits...
and its thigh fat on
the altar stone
and set the pyre beneath them into flame
then prayed my sacrifice
would find some favor in
the eyes of Him,
the holy one
I call The Name..
But I was not so pious or
so brainless as to think
that breathing in the rising smoke,
however sweet the smell of it,
would take me up to Him
or cause me anything but agony
within my lungs
and make me Him disdain.
No, such a thing, I knew,
would root me to the earth
in coughing fits...
#sacrifice
#PopCulture
134 reads
2 Comments
MISCELLANEOUS POEM
Published
7th May 2023 5:12pm
7th May 2023 5:12pm
Blame
Why should I be shamed
for choosing what my senses said
convincingly
was something full of light
but then was afterward
revealed by cunning devils
and their kin
to be a damning sin?
The only person who’s to blame
for this entrapmenting
is God.
For He created man
without endowing him
with His omnisciency,
and made him from the start
as creaturely and weak,
unable, absent grace,
and even then,
to know with...
for choosing what my senses said
convincingly
was something full of light
but then was afterward
revealed by cunning devils
and their kin
to be a damning sin?
The only person who’s to blame
for this entrapmenting
is God.
For He created man
without endowing him
with His omnisciency,
and made him from the start
as creaturely and weak,
unable, absent grace,
and even then,
to know with...
#morality
#PopCulture
#CallToAction
141 reads
0 Comments
MISCELLANEOUS POEM
Published
30th Apr 2023 4:31pm
30th Apr 2023 4:31pm
the elements of poetry
"I believe a good subject matter, and a good, flowing rhythm are the two essential elements that make poetry." J-Z
I wonder if old J-Z knows
that if the language used
inside a rhythmed line that flows
unhindered in the way
it runs upon a page
is not itself beguiling, fresh
and full of images and sense
that cause a reader to be swept up in
a new experience
the composition
that the lines are set within
is hardly poetry
no matter how exalted, grand,
its subject’s thought to be.
To wit
...
I wonder if old J-Z knows
that if the language used
inside a rhythmed line that flows
unhindered in the way
it runs upon a page
is not itself beguiling, fresh
and full of images and sense
that cause a reader to be swept up in
a new experience
the composition
that the lines are set within
is hardly poetry
no matter how exalted, grand,
its subject’s thought to be.
To wit
...
#WritingPoetry
110 reads
0 Comments
MISCELLANEOUS POEM
Published
28th Apr 2023 9:01pm
28th Apr 2023 9:01pm
Bards
I wonder if all bards
of ages past
who sang of love
however pure
or God’s good world
were clean?
I think that if we searched
their catalog,
we'd find a few quite bawdy songs
and some that are obscene.
I’ll wager, too,
the songs that they were most proud of
are those
that stirred men to desire
and set the souls of humankind
on fire.
of ages past
who sang of love
however pure
or God’s good world
were clean?
I think that if we searched
their catalog,
we'd find a few quite bawdy songs
and some that are obscene.
I’ll wager, too,
the songs that they were most proud of
are those
that stirred men to desire
and set the souls of humankind
on fire.
#music
#PopCulture
129 reads
0 Comments
LOVE POEM
Published
27th Apr 2023 8:43pm
27th Apr 2023 8:43pm
lashed
I listen hungrily
for you to sing again
the silvered song you sang to me last night.
It is not often that
my heart’s made limitless
while all disordered, lashed,
or I am robbed of breath
and words,
my body stricken, rooted to the earth
my senses tempest tossed
and surged electrically
I wish it so
while I come nearer to my end
to be once more
within it ravaged, graced,
and lost.
for you to sing again
the silvered song you sang to me last night.
It is not often that
my heart’s made limitless
while all disordered, lashed,
or I am robbed of breath
and words,
my body stricken, rooted to the earth
my senses tempest tossed
and surged electrically
I wish it so
while I come nearer to my end
to be once more
within it ravaged, graced,
and lost.
#love
#PopCulture
150 reads
0 Comments
LOVE POEM
Published
25th Apr 2023 5:46pm
25th Apr 2023 5:46pm
Song
I heard today some notes
that shaped the ending of my Oxford days
and wove themselves
within the memory of my last love.
And present time was banished for a while
as I was swept up in a wave
of thoughts and images
of a gilded Autumn long since past
when I was held amazed,
tongue-tied, heart flared,
by Gilly's gaze and Gilly's grace.
that shaped the ending of my Oxford days
and wove themselves
within the memory of my last love.
And present time was banished for a while
as I was swept up in a wave
of thoughts and images
of a gilded Autumn long since past
when I was held amazed,
tongue-tied, heart flared,
by Gilly's gaze and Gilly's grace.
#memories
#PopCulture
170 reads
13 Comments
MISCELLANEOUS POEM
Published
22nd Apr 2023 9:49pm
22nd Apr 2023 9:49pm
Liar?
There is here a man
whose writing oft displays
a poor grasp of the things that Scripture says.
And when it's shown
his claims about them are untrue
he edits his text and changes its words***
to conceal that he made some great boo-boos
and blatantly lies
that he never inscribed
what a critic has noted he did
so he can maintain
unwarranted claims
to knowledge he doesn’t possess
and that he is not talentless.
***Note that I have changed what I originally wrote in lines 3-6,...
whose writing oft displays
a poor grasp of the things that Scripture says.
And when it's shown
his claims about them are untrue
he edits his text and changes its words***
to conceal that he made some great boo-boos
and blatantly lies
that he never inscribed
what a critic has noted he did
so he can maintain
unwarranted claims
to knowledge he doesn’t possess
and that he is not talentless.
***Note that I have changed what I originally wrote in lines 3-6,...
#WritingPoetry
#PopCulture
172 reads
10 Comments
SPIRITUAL POEM
Published
17th Apr 2023 9:10pm
17th Apr 2023 9:10pm
Resurrection
I did not know that when
Lord Jesus shed
by heaven’s grace
his cerements
his purpose was to be
a mirth maker,
a clown.
Yet there’s a fellow here
insisting that it’s sound
to claim the resurrection aimed
to bring mankind
some merriment.
Should I take him
at his word?
Or has he said
what’s known by anyone
who’s Bible versed
and looked up just where “mirth”
is used within the holy text
and what it means**
and whether it is ever said
to be the...
Lord Jesus shed
by heaven’s grace
his cerements
his purpose was to be
a mirth maker,
a clown.
Yet there’s a fellow here
insisting that it’s sound
to claim the resurrection aimed
to bring mankind
some merriment.
Should I take him
at his word?
Or has he said
what’s known by anyone
who’s Bible versed
and looked up just where “mirth”
is used within the holy text
and what it means**
and whether it is ever said
to be the...
#WritingPoetry
#PopCulture
254 reads
32 Comments
MISCELLANEOUS POEM
Published
9th Apr 2023 8:25pm
9th Apr 2023 8:25pm
Haiku on one of my cats
Motor in your throat
a small sawmill burring wood
lulling me to sleep
a small sawmill burring wood
lulling me to sleep
#cats
209 reads
2 Comments
OBSERVATIONAL POEM
Published
16th Mar 2023 3:44pm
16th Mar 2023 3:44pm
The Source of Sin
If we listen to just what the Bible
has to say,
most notably in Jacob’s book
regarding what it really is
that’s at the root of mankind’s going astray
from God
and all that’s good
it isn’t sex of any kind
or desire for it.
It’s when the love of money’s
on a person’s mind
and fills his soul.
The only ones who think it’s
otherwise
are joyless puritans
and withered sour sexist souls
who, because they fear they are
but creatures weak and know
they have
no...
has to say,
most notably in Jacob’s book
regarding what it really is
that’s at the root of mankind’s going astray
from God
and all that’s good
it isn’t sex of any kind
or desire for it.
It’s when the love of money’s
on a person’s mind
and fills his soul.
The only ones who think it’s
otherwise
are joyless puritans
and withered sour sexist souls
who, because they fear they are
but creatures weak and know
they have
no...
#morality
#PopCulture
186 reads
1 Comment
SELF POEM
Published
22nd Feb 2023 7:36pm
22nd Feb 2023 7:36pm
Ash Wednesday 2
Must I have the mark of weightless ash
upon my brow
to be reminded that
my destiny is dust?
Oh no.
It is not so
For all I have to do to see
that I am decomposing fast
and lack my youth’s solidity
is turn my face
to gaze upon
the image in my looking glass.
upon my brow
to be reminded that
my destiny is dust?
Oh no.
It is not so
For all I have to do to see
that I am decomposing fast
and lack my youth’s solidity
is turn my face
to gaze upon
the image in my looking glass.
#aging
292 reads
3 Comments
DU Poetry : Submissions by Baldwin
