She lived outside of Aberdeen
Where Scotland woods stood glum and gray
Above a cavern in between
The rising moon and setting day.
Her laughter seemed to plague the night—
That is, as some would say;
And oft, through yonder... – by John W. May | 1,247 Views added 1 year ago
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“Poetry must have something in it that is
barbaric, vast and wild.” –Denis Diderot
The Falcon
In lovely light and lofty pose,
It perched an autumn limb.
Rebalancing, a wing arose
Revealing something grim ...
Though... – by John W. May | 342 Views added 3 months ago
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I often wonder with a grin
What imagery my dreams might show:
I blanket deep, pull covers in,
And ponder how my dreams will go ...
For in the haunt of last night's tale
A dreadful cavern opened wide,
And in a frenzy dogs of hell
Were... – by John W. May | 328 Views added 7 months ago
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With joy he set upon the stone
Releasing from its marble tomb
The likeness of a lovely maid
Whose grandeur filled the humble room.
What hapless rock this used to be,
Half-figured now, she seemed a god:
The more his chisel carved her shape,
... – by John W. May | 156 Views added 6 months ago
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The swing that breaks the hanging bag
Sends candy bouncing all around:
The children rush, and pushing fuss,
And knock each other to the ground.
No thoughts of others—only self—
Where skewed desires all abound:
They rush and push and even kick... – by John W. May | 117 Views added 2 months ago
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"Love knows not its own depth until the hour
of separation." –Khalil Gibran
The orange moon ascends beyond the leaves
Like a child's balloon—upward it looms
Against nebulous night; upward it heaves
Its ancient amber light until it... – by John W. May | 126 Views added 9 months ago
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"I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself."
–D.H. Lawrence
Within some grassland's patchy heath
Of emerald and of springtime sedge,
Where wild grasses grow beneath
A bulging, sloping burrow's edge,—
A prairie dog is grazing free,
... – by John W. May | 150 Views added 10 months ago
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The Lilies
“What marvelous symbols there be
Of heaven and its Highest Jewel—
A living ode to God’s own rule
Inscribed on everything we see!
For Nature is a shadow cast:
A cloak, a shroud, a second light,—
A medium for inner sight,
... – by John W. May | 52 Views added 1 month ago
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When sadness has my soul distraught
And twists my weary, weary bones,
And owns my bright blue days with gray
And manifests with moans:
I will not shrink, nor I repine,
Beneath the anguish running deep;
Nor sleep will I through all the... – by John W. May | 327 Views added 2 months ago
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Dear grandma,
I could see you were just as stunned as I
When drifting its Body traversed our sky:
Noiseless, Black, Slow, it moved right overhead
Without a rumble, a wave, or goodbye.
It surprised me, too, that you showed no dread
As it... – by John W. May | 66 Views added 3 months ago
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Colorado
The lark bunting trills with lovely refrain
In these soon-to-be, snow-laced, timbered hills.
I? I stroll with wonder through the terrain,
Enraptured with feelings a mystic feels.
My home, my heart from my earliest days,
... – by John W. May | 75 Views added 4 months ago
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I slipped into a fatal sleep,
Alone the other day,
And waking found that I was reaped,
Like wheat that sickles slay …
The new realm was a threshing floor
That drew out inner grain—
My inner self, my inner core,
The ‘me’ that would... – by John W. May | 355 Views added 5 months ago
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There’s snow there now where once she lay
Alone that Autumn eve,
And though that day seems far away,
I still lamenting grieve …
For she—a daughter, mother, friend—
She pined, I’m sure, in grief:
For... – by John W. May | 57 Views added 5 months ago
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A thousand angels watched him sleep,
His slumbers, oh, so ever deep ...
And she, with gazing eyes as they,
Approaching softly where he lay,
Did ever silent keep.
She touched his cold and pallid clay,
And wiped her weary tears away:
And as... – by John W. May | 340 Views added 6 months ago
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I.
I knew, before my birth to be,
The planet that I chose,
But angels who were prepping me
Induced a gentle doze:
They brought Amnesia's velvet soup
And I, with willing heart,
Drank down the broth... – by John W. May | 61 Views added 7 months ago
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Blood
Deep red
Rims a blade
Glinting silver.
"Is that the last of them", he echoes out.
His friend, peering down the cavern, shows doubt:
"I don't think so."
Both move in,
Cautious,
... – by John W. May | 26 Views added 7 months ago
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When times of desperation greet me
With tempest and with livid storm,
And violent winds wish to defeat me,
And swallow me within their swarm ...
I will remember where I'm rooted,
And there with courage will abide;
And though the winds my... – by John W. May | 382 Views added 8 months ago
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There came to view a gleaming lake
Which beckoned him to take a drink,
But beauty seized the thirsty lad
As there he bent above its brink ...
A stunning sight appeared to him
Who marveled at its dear design—
Behold! a face beheld him back,
... – by John W. May | 110 Views added 8 months ago
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How calm the sound of snow that's falling
Soft upon these lonely stones—
As if the north winds now were calling
Sleeping ghosts from restless bones.
Some think this yard of graves as eerie,
Filled with silence and with woes:
Where... – by John W. May | 18 Views added 8 months ago
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Beneath the skies of goddess Nuit
There lies my passion's sole pursuit—
It's her, whose soul is beauty's claim,
A Nubian of Pharaoh's name:
Beauteous Nefertiti, hail!
Arise, my love, leave crook and flail,
And let us from this palace flee,
... – by John W. May | 347 Views added 8 months ago
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Come down and explore the azure realm
Where blue-cheeked butterfly fish glide in twos—
Where valleys of fire corals abound
In shimmering, reticulated blues.
Come down and see the meandering
Moray sleek her length through a... – by John W. May | 84 Views added 10 months ago
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They mingle on the naked maples—
Sparse, the yellow leaves;
And soon their plight will be our fables
Told on winter eves.
The crimson hearth, aflame and glowing,
Soothes us with delight;
And soon we come to love the snowing,
And... – by John W. May | 75 Views added 1 year ago
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They knew from Arabia's Golden past,
From fragments and scrolls that they had amassed,
That a sign, that a star would soon appear
And testify that a king is here.
"Let us gather gold, frankincense, and myrrh,
And travel... – by John W. May | 51 Views added 1 year ago
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The Buddha is my guide, my sage;
He shows me lasting joy.
He teaches me, despite my age,
To be a humble boy.
I practice every Noble Truth,
And meditate and pray.
I learn from other Buddhist youth
The best and righteous way.
... – by John W. May | 74 Views added 1 year ago
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These lift me through the airy height
(These wings acquired through a night),
Into a foreign world above
Of light and warmth and truth and love.
What seems a dream are days gone by
When I knew nothing of the sky—
Just toil on an earthly bed... – by John W. May | 40 Views added 1 year ago
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Quod est ante pedes nemo spectat, caeli scrutantur plagas
–Cicero
... and he was fixed on Pleiades
Who moved across the tranquil night:
Her glinting gown, though hard to see,
Had brought him to her precious sight.
He plotted,... – by John W. May | 29 Views added 1 year ago
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With wealth, the likes of Helen's Troy,
There are these few that think they're coy—
They seem so modest, but I warn,
Their modesty is but a ploy.
They hung two 'thieves' the other morn.
In fact, the day my son was born.
Their crime? Some... – by John W. May | 71 Views added 1 year ago
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It's late and dark. The TV flickers white
Ghostly lights, and my darling is asleep.
What dream, what world is she caught in so deep
That her slumbers would twitch her frame tonight?
What haunting image puts her peace to flight—
What goblin... – by John W. May | 33 Views added 1 year ago
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Lo, the drowsy heat of summer
Hanging humid, low and near,
As peasants gleaning frail and humble
Thank the Lord whom they revere.
Lo, the wheat-line yon receding
Into gray obscurity—
How thankless greed absconds with nature
And her virgin... – by John W. May | 25 Views added 1 year ago
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"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived." –Thoreau
Walden Pond is... – by John W. May | 23 Views added 1 year ago
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In my youth, I saw a bird's ravished body
Lying in the silence of a furrow.
Its auburn feathers were wilted and shoddy,
And ants stripped its flesh and belly thorough.
Strange, so strange imagining this bird to be—
To have once ascended the... – by John W. May | 39 Views added 1 year ago
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They held with horrid hell their lines
'Til shells dispelled their noxious fumes,
Then through the labyrinth there fell
A myriad to Earth's grey womb.
A thousand summers 'ere that day
Those fruitful fields were green and bloom—
What once... – by John W. May | 19 Views added 1 year ago
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Omniscient eyes upon us seem leering
Out from a darkness that dreadfully grows—
A deluge of darkness, dreadless, fearless,
Swallowing all as it easily goes.
This darkness fills the empyreal heights,
Its quietude the Negev's lonely plains.
... – by John W. May | 135 Views added 1 year ago
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The orange moon ascends beyond the leaves
Like a child's balloon: upward it looms
Against nebulous night, upward it heaves
Its ancient amber light until it blooms
Like a lotus in the vacuous sky ...
There, alone below the moon's tender glow,
... – by John W. May | 391 Views added 1 year ago
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