i dare you (for One Shoot Sunday)
1.
i ground my being
in search of truth
and found
a scoop of silt
superficialities
i basked in surfaces
the sun swarmed
beguiling
choked my truths
in flashes
glories in seconds
fallen as ash
my pretenses
morphing into
this mush slipping
between my lips
entrapped
in your weakness
i dare you
unclad who i am
2.
who am this
being a pallid skein
of desire tangled
in despair
words dangle
on tips of bones
their flesh i picked off
in my darkness
suns melt
on my breath
gods cower in fear
over my stink
stones corrode
from my tears falling
as flint on my trail
dead embers
rain pools
sizzle on my passing
burn secrets
my footprints bred
3.
taunt me
if you have grit
the songs i spew
rattle angels
wangle crests
of waves my stare
long petrified on seas
turned cesspools
dare to cleanse
the air i poison
my soul departed
litter ivy beds
comb my hair
your fingers hanker
for my silken scales
to root in spirit
grind your being
with mine scrape off
your bareness toss out
your soul i dare you
Posted for One Shoot Sunday from a photo prompt by Fee Easton at One Stop Poetry where poets and artists share their art and their passion for it, a nurturing gathering place. Check us out.
that is quite the dare…the desolation.destruction in the second really grabbed me…the words dangling from bones…great piece…
Glad you liked, Brian. Indeed, that prompt was ‘quite a dare’.
Love how you capture a sort of dripping disintegration through working the details. The part Brian mentions got me too. Great challenge response
Thanks, Adam! I really did see ‘disintegration’ right through. It’s a subject I had always wanted to write about as a poem but all my drafts come out as either mushy or gory. The prompt was perfect! Thanks for choosing it among all of Fee’s magnificent landscape shots.
i seond bri and adam – the desolation and destruction is haunting
Thanks, Claudia! The image does haunt me, especially the eyes!
Deep and dark, I really enjoy your take on these prompts, and the fact that you make three standalone parts that make up a tale x
Thanks again, Shan! I know, I’ve been enjoying the prompts immensely. They’ve been drawing out a lot of lines and drafts that never worked out until now.
Outstanding!
Oh, thank you so much. A single word with so much power–what a critique!
Read this earlier Alegria, but wanted to come back and read it again before i commented–it’s a complex poem, and one can get lost in all the little careless but perfect images that drive the message home. This is really striking in many ways, but I’ll just say the whole piece is like a well-written and perfectly choreographed piece of music, with the last two stanzas like a double hammer beat finale.
Thanks again as always, Joy! You got me there again! The first stanza came like a low slow drum and kept rising and falling but the basso profundo of ‘disnitegration’ and ‘destruction’ followed through. The photo prompt helped me get through it–I focused on the skin and eyes and then the hair. I think the lines draw their power from the image. But reading it again, I know, I still have to work on the rough, as you call it, ‘careless’ skids. Thank you again for your careful reading and thoughtful comment!
A great verse…and slowly you build it up to great ending. Liked it so much…
‘grind your being
with mine scrape off
your bareness toss out
your soul i dare you’
thanks for sharing.
ॐ शांति ॐ
Om Shanti Om
May peace be… praying for People of Japan
http://shadowdancingwithmind.blogspot.com/2011/03/whispers-love-and-insignificance.html
Connect me at Twitter @VerseEveryDay
Thank you, Shashi! Glad you liked it!