Sapling

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NOTE: I use this lass to stash the poems I write for personal reasons (vs. poems I write for shops/contests). In clan canon, she's something of an outsider--another one of Gladekeeper's forgotten creations, but one imbued with enough intelligence to understand the world and try to make sense of it. Unfortunately, her slow ways and lack of speech make her frustrating to communicate with, so only a few dragons (namely Riptooth, Capensia, and Zachariah) regularly approach her. She publishes her poems anonymously (normally by hanging them from the Ironwood's branches) but her authorship is an open secret.

Anything with a title in brackets (ex: [Tide]) was inspired by ToonKuriboh's Writer's Place thread. Anything with a designation (ex: POM-A) was originally for my shop, but it fit the clan too well and I kept it.

Vaguely sorted with better, shorter, and/or newer poems near the top.

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[Tide]


The pier's a bit shorter than what I remember, but as I got taller, all the tales did,
too. Nothing's ever quite left just the way you left it, on account of all the ghosts
________________________________________sifting through
________________________________________all the things
________________________________________better buried
________________________________________underneath,
________________________________________in the pools.
Do you remember_________when the tides came in? Do you remember
drawing lines on our shore? The tall tales say you were a bit peculiar, but
the pools all flooded, and I don't quite remember why we came here anymore.

---

Love Poem (This is a "rant poem," I was furious at the time. Read with that in mind!)

I’ve seen hearts bound together by the heavy thread of fear;
stitched primarily in promises, it burrows fibers deeper.
Duty’s thread is hardly lighter, and its price is somewhat steeper,
for society’s its needle and it keeps its needle near.

The once-free organs, freed of each, primarily unwind,
like balls of yarn each tossed across the careless waves of Time.
But Time’s a healer. Given time, most land re-wound ashore
where most will grab a needle each and sweetly ask for more.

This heart's known both love and loss, and it was not impressed
for all it lost was found again within the wilderness,
and all it loved was there to start, and more to love besides.
Forgive me please—I’m not at ease with needles by your side.

---

[Wild]

The sands that pace their barren, trackless cage
all gnaw and screech defiance at the sky,
and lick and bite in turns the shapeless muse
who in her callousness still bids them fly.
For stone-lipped cavern rims must pen them in,
and taunt the sharp-edged tooth the winds all bring.
The sky forever dances with the sand;
"forever" doesn't soothe the cage's sting.


(orig: forever lessens not the cage's sting.)

---

Permafrost

There’s a freedom in the absence I can barely stand to know
as I stand here at the precipice, knee-deep in virgin snow.
A thousand doors and windows line the abyss far below.

All the homes and hearths stand open, but the frigid wind is calling,
and the moment’s spell is broken, for as long as snow is falling
I would sooner go not knowing than I’d chance the cliff at all.

---

[Burn]

Embers fade, the darkling sea
casts remonstrations freely.
The wild tides unbidden rise
and drown the soggy shore.

We few left gathered at the hearth
spy storm clouds. Seems unseemly
to drown here, down here,
all alone, upon the oily rocks.

Cast the flare, bid smoke-masts rise
a ship of flame and smoldering peat.
The pyre-fire, piled higher
ignites the sea, and oceans burn.

---

[Darkness]

Wondering just where you were
I followed in your steps, and found
the ground you walked forever sloping
down
_____down
__________down.

The streetlights never worked there,
and the moon seemed out of place.
I'd swear the clouds that hung above,
existing far past fear or love,
through sheer and stupid apathy
obscured your lovely face.

I'll call your name from sundown-streets,
from where the light and dark last meet;
the airless, lightless maze you walk is pathless in your night.
My twilight's soft and open still,
and if I find I lack the will
to pull you free, then let me be a marker that you might.

---

Dragonslayer

There’s the old sewer outlet,
just like I said.
Its concrete-claw
Rust-jaw
Burning, blinding, stench-belching,
Growling, sharp-edged grin stretching,
Evil, evil eyes, dripping, grasping in the night.
(Can we go home, sis? The dark feels wrong here.)

---

Breathe [Tide][Relax]

Still waters smother depths, and air is for escaping,
so never mind the breaking of the keel against the reef;
the sucking mouths below don't know the benefit of teeth.
Sink your fingers through the water, they won't bother you the least
for their sightless eyes still recognize a different sort of beast.
They'll respect the air within your lungs until the beatings cease.

---

POM-O


Pampered, precious little poppet,
frilly laces, fancy locket.
Night grows sharp and shadows long--
Where has your protector gone?

---

[Hunt]

Oh, where'd I leave my Sanity?
I saw it just today.
Its claws were here, and still I fear
it's lately gone away.
Where's Decency, Serenity,
and Innocence all gone?
My mind seems bare, and yet I fare
the same, and trundle on.

---

[Thought]

Between the slivered sunset sea
and slipping, silvery shore,
she spotted sparrows wheeling there,
wings outstretched and plumage fair,
and with a lock of auburn hair
she sweetly asked for more.

They snatched the strands and struck the wind,
and bearing down and back again,
each wove their nests and safe within
they placed their precious eggs.
Within the space of turning tides,
a new flock dared the winds to rise
and pitched themselves to friendly skies
to bid the dance begin.

Questions born to questions
as wings are born to wings,
for every thread of inquiry's
a deadly, fragile thing.
The waves will break the surface,
but the birds can break the waves.
Raise not a thought or lock of hair
expecting they'll behave.

---

Folk Song Snippet (ranty piece)

We'll all warm our hands in the flames of ideology;
it sputters in a barrel on the banks of Times-Gone-By.
The rose-colored shards that ring the place are glittering,
inviting in their sharpness 'mong the roots of edelweiss.

Don't dance in the moonlight, don't sing by the shore side.
The others are still listening; they have their chants and chimes.
Forget them, if you'd like, and dance naked in the hedgerows.
Out past the shattered fence we warm our hands in virgin skies.

---

The Flash of Neon Keeps Me Up at Night [Light]

Rain-slicked dreams on the sill
still swimming in the small pond
big fish
long gone
just us bottom-licker-feeders
swimming wrong.

Neon rain
brings violent reds on broken panes
where the blue just doesn't show.
Sickly glow still beating like a pallid little heart.
Don't start, dear, I know.
What an awful way to go.
But the phosphorescent streetlamps led us wrong.

---

Advice (character piece)

There's no one here to save you
(says the man in black and gold)
and of the options I've presented
that's the kindest, truth be told,
for the sort compelled to save folks
aren't compelled to save them whole,
and imperfect as we are, it's best
to spare our spoilt souls.

"Salvaging from darkness"
is a process done in parts.
Reassembling from salvage is
a Necromancer's art.
So believe me when I say, my dear,
some only take the heart
(or brain or lungs, beliefs or songs,
or lips). They'll leave the flaws and wrongs
aside the pit they pulled you from
to choose what they'd impart.

---

[Apocalypse]

they said to watch for ashes
where we found flowers instead.
don't lose your head,
Old Man Nuclear Winter.
we sowed the seeds of daisies in a skull
we found down by the railroad tracks.
They thought it was morbid.
We thought it was spring

---

I Used to Live in Cleveland [Beauty]

There's Winter's lace upon the sill
where Spring still sips her tea.
Summer hangs a drying frock
and hums hymns secretly.
Autumn pauses at the door,
poised to knock, but still unsure
for surely, surely she'd have sworn
they'd been taking turns this time.

---

[Moonlight]

The light of last September
was the last that I remember
when the moon that hung so pregnant
rested laurels on the sky.

But moonlight leads to morning,
and the day was rich with warnings
so, before the rays that evening
brings had broken, I was gone.

I miss the moonlight dearly
and remember it so clearly
that it's more real--or so I feel--
than this dark night is long.

---

[Wings]

Beat into submission
all the winds that pin you down.
Those honeyed words and promises
are merely chains wrapped round
a straining, strapping pair of wings--
such shimmering, pretty, useless things--
that shed their casings and gnarled, brown,
emerge to test the storm.

---



[Hatred]


Don't hang up the phone.
I know you're mad, alright?
I'll be in town tonight,
and I'd hate to be alone,
so come on back.
p.s. i love you ;)



---

[Battle]

The wind was dead,
the field dusty,
the stalks grey,
the plows rusty,
the knives all growing sharp.
Can't eat guns or combat boots,
so we'll just eat what we can shoot,
and hope we learn the special art
of reaching half-past war.

---

[Thief]

You stole my heart, it's only fair
(I guess) I stole your time,
and wasted it on second-guesses,
false-starts, feints, and rooftop-chases,
a stolen kiss in empty places,
disappointment mine.

---

Unsorted
(It takes me anywhere from half an hour to forever to figure out how much I hate a poem. They live here until then)

---

Written for the Remnants poetry contest
Roadtrip

The last threads of light spooling over the forest.
Granite-capped old mountain, tumbledown,
face up in pooling shadow as it rests.
December air, cold, sharp beneath its ice-crown.
You could see into the crucible where every star is born,
comet trails, god's claws against the night,
vast, spilling pinpricks over the corn,
soft slivers of moonlight.

Shafts between boughs in an evergreen nursery.
Tell me, oh Night, what you've called me to see?
The waves here break heavy and icy and lonesome;
if love is what frees us, I guess that I'm free.


An Honest Love Poem

Your butt just so goddamn cute
It almost makes me mad to see.
I want to squeeze your precious cheeks,
both face and arse (but sexily).
You smell real good, like clothes and cats.
I love your mind. I love your face,
and where you are just feels like home,
and where you aren't is just some place
like grocery stores, just kinda...there.
There's nothing wrong with that, y'know.
Sometimes it's nice to be alone.

Truce

Look, let me
touch, let me
grasp for a moment.
You're too quick
and too sly
and too good,
and you're going
down the road
down the way
down a path I can't follow.
Where'd you go?
I got lost.
Let me wait,
let me rest.


Anchor Stone Experiment

Take a hand
take another
hand in hand
they grasp each other
anchor points
in rising water
you're the flood
you're its daughter
strike a course
and when you're home
you check the hands.
Were they your own
or did you take another's?

(No right answer, except for this:
the fact you bothered.)


Writer's Block

Pen on paper.
Try again, half a letter.
Try again, little better.
Where's a friend
when you need one?
Try for happy.
Try for-ever, or try after.


Fed Up With Cthulhu (and back to struggling with freeform)

Your marrow's leaking out
and coats the slimy-slick pool
you crawled from at your crowning.
Still-born of kings, won't you
reach up and mute the sun?
Its empty jewel belongs on your brow.
Just start this apocalypse
so we can get it over with.


Green Soul (Love poem, sort of)

Green soul, clean soul,
studying-the-leaves-soul,
free as all the birds you love,
free as apple pie.
Free as in the chiming bell,
or tossing coins in wishing wells,
or Dante through the flames of hell.
Why stay when you can fly?

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"NOT MY POEM" ZONE

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The unknown is a darkness
And in dark we cannot see
Yet we wish to examine it
And make an inquiry
To ask will change the answer
And to see will change the sight
For darkness disappears
When brought into the light
(Author Unknown)


(Author Unknown)

Life is short
And pleasures few
And holed the ship
And drowned the crew
But o! But o!
How very blue
the sea is.
(Clive Barker)