SLAM FINALS: Poets

[UFO the Phoenix]

THEME: DREAMS

Ok this is where it all counts....this is for the big one....(big prize is to have your POEM be sticky all over RM on the top of random boards....and points donated by Madnick....and other prizes....1st, 2nd, and 3rd)

The theme is poems based on or inspired by DREAMS!

this contest also serves a double purpose because right now Natural Bridge is accepting submissions for issue #15 on this theme

www.umsl.edu/~natural

^peep for more detail


Address:

The Editors, Natural Bride
Department of English
University of Missouri - St Louis
8001 Natural Bridge Road
St. Louis, MO 63121

THE POETS THAT ADVANCE TO THE FINALS ARE:


1) TRUEMCEE
2) Absolute Zero
3) Rikoshay
4) REALMS
5) NisLaniF
6) Johnnie French
7) POETICKZ

Verses are DUE June 20

good luck to everyone.....bring your heart and soul to this one....I recommend keeping it under 40 lines but do you....no rules.....just follow the THEME of the SLAM and










dream

[NisLaniF]

Checkin' in...

[Poetickz]

checkin in
one

[RealMS]

^you and that 'one'

say uno! lol

I'm here UFO!

[Johnnie French]

word

[TrueEmcee]

check check

[absolute zero]

Check.

[RIKOSHAY]

I accidentally clicked on Poetry Realm and I'm lucky I did.
Check.
PEA

[NisLaniF]

damn @ everyone holdin' out.

[RealMS]

^Including yourself

Almost is Incomplete

She’s free-falling uncontrollably into a quest where
Neither may end.
She has met reality, walking with new torn
Realistic shoes
Ever since the mediocre number became
Another year of life;
In her eyes the myth has been broken
Years after she could finally open up her eyes…

(XIII)

…

I’ve been trying to write about this for some time,
But to begin writing the completed phase was just halfway pursued.
I knew what dreams were from experience-the least;
I needed to know
To feel
To see-taste
What was perhaps opposite…what is real.
Even if that meant I didn’t want to.
Often is it misconstrued, the two
I believe a deeper thinking will pull one through
And understand an already developed concept.
I only hope to you my poetry makes some logical sense

This is a poem my poem-what seems like herstory.

And regardless of such age a simple dream may still affect one’s brain wave, excessively
A cold sweat, or awakened afraid
Afraid of the motive behind a feeling that does not cry tears of joy.
I’ve felt all and many more.

But the greatest dream I have had
Is the one where dreams and reality formed a clash.
Someplace along meaning I’m not relaxed being on both sides,
I’ve wanted to write about this for sometime,
This is the one dream
I have yet to actually feel.
So therefore my story is merely a rough draft.

[absolute zero]

Bless the Burning Oracle, Fireside

Two nights I've spent praying
To a tunnel for light.
And as the moon grew,
I faded as does sand into waters deep,
When crescent Summers bend as promises Keep.
Who could look into bluer eyes,
And beg for 2 minutes to weep?

Have you noticed
The way
Teardrops Dance
Down her cheek
When she sighs?

Two nights I've spent prying.
Caressing the crevices for shelter,
And leaving my near future, submissive,
Whispering, "Nothing has changed at all."
I once believed in dreams;
But reality is an awkward stone
That never burns.

Sister society lays in her grave
And turns, turns, turns....

[NisLaniF]

Originally Posted by RealMS

[i]^Including yourself

I ain't gon' front, y'all cats got an old man shook.

[Poetickz]

Title: The Modern Day Underground Railroad

sittin on a greyhound goin northbound
recalling the memories of being held down
sucked dry...someone benefits from my labor
sure as hell aint me...better do myself a favor

sittin on a greyhound goin northbound
breakin free from my chains that for so long have detained me
escaping the boundaries of parental slavery
finally free from the abuse i received since a baby

sittin on a greyhound goin northbound
no longer will i be your neck to feed on
a pawn for your petty source of income
mile after mile i come closer to freedom

sittin on a greyhound goin northbound
im no longer afraid to defy my constraints
and slap the long arm of my prison gaurd
that keeps me locked within myself

i move on...im no longer afraid
no longer alone...starting from scratch
with only the clothes on my back
im ready to be free...only 5 days left...

Im coming freedom

one

[NisLaniF]

Thirty One Thousand Two Hundred Fifty Steps

I saw an old man walking. He’d count his steps
Fifty for each finger on the hand on his left
That’s how he exercised, and learned not to think.
When he confronts people he wished he’d learn not to stink.
See, he’s homeless, forty two, looks sixty
Walkin’ enough steps to his home when he’s six feet
Above. He calls this exercise his progression.
Sometimes, he calls it his own funeral procession.
“No one walks with me, I’m every day by myself
Yeah, I do it to exercise or run away from myself.”
He sleeps at night, and all the thoughts he didn’t have
Rage against his soul all alone in his nightmares
Hates spending nights there, the park ain’t pretty
It’s hard when the system has you lost in the city
Homeless by forty and forgotten by fifty
He knew through and through that was the life he was living.

When his left hand is full, two hundred fifty steps,
Each time, that equals one finger on his right.
He whistles in the daylight, days bright, play right
Paid like a playwright who has no pen.
Last time he changed clothes, he wasn’t a day over
41 years old, now he stands at 42.
Old man with old shoes that no one else knew,
He inherited the nightmares of the man who gave em to him.
He lost the label to them, but he has mad soul
That old man knows that all he has is walking
Always fast when talkin’ to the one who isn’t there.
But he really doesn’t care, he speaks to his ex-wife
See, she left him ‘cause he drank too much, gave strife.
Took away her life, so she took it right back
He lost the kids and the house, like “you ain’t really want that”
In a loop, when he tries to walk away, he’s right back

Each time his right hand fills, he counts one toe.
Closer to that last step, with one toe up.
He was toe up, but his hunger and the sun stroke
Gives him euphoria, plus he’s not thinking.
He sleeps mumbling old stories to his dead kids
Well, he hasn’t seen ‘em in years, they dead to him.
He tried to be a father, recreating their dreams
But his father never bothered and his step dad was mean.
He doesn’t know a different way to raise a king
Beat ‘em the same way he got beat as a teen.
Just like him, he seemed to confuse the youngest.
“Loved” him every night when he thought nobody saw.

So to him, his life is over. His kids are getting older.
The distant past of children are beaten out from the shoulder
His youngest is seventeen, rediscovering himself.
In West Hollywood, the old man counts his steps.
Tormented by the thoughts of his day dreams
Late screams, fake scenes of history
Make fiends of derision
Drugs made it easier to deal with past afflictions
Until the drugs actually became the addiction
Adding to the vice, now he thinks of his youngest
Wishing he could die or…learn how to love?

Each toe on the right foot equals one on the left.
Each one left is sixty two fifty.
So he sits alone and got to the last toe,
Thirty thousand steps, only a few steps to go.
Blisters on his feet and the feat of his loafers
Notes of his own misfortune force tears
No remorse for him aside from drugs he holds dear
Whores of old cigarettes, acid trips and beer
Sleeping pills, chills in the night with no fear
A calm resides upon his face when the night nears
No more disdain for hearings and court orders
No more mourning for his kids, it’s all over
But the old man is tired of living with no hope.
He lays down for one last nightmare, never awoke…




He dreams of when he needn’t worry what the toes meant.




Death is the Dream of Thinking Freely without Torment…

© BlackSoultan Ad Infinitum 2005

[Johnnie French]

oh that's today... thought it was the 23rd... ok later I'll do it.

[RIKOSHAY]

I was dreaming when I wrote this.
If it goes astray so goes it.
You’re welcome to go with the flow if you so wish,
just know this…
it’s at your own risk.

My dream is caught in a stream of thought cascading to notion.
Pen gripped, hand shaking, impotent.
Fantasia approaches, unheard.
Weakly,
I shape my sinking fears.
Translating emotion to words,
seeking…
escape, succinct, sincere.
Hand shaking, my focus is blurred,
streaky.
The paper drinks the tears
my eyelashes toss in slow motion.
I watch the tip of my pen playing “Keep Alive”
as it crosses the ocean.
My thoughts become too deep to dive.
Now I’m lost in the moment
Succumbing to the whimsy of the sleep deprived.
My exhaustion is potent.

I've barely written a word, the ink isn't dry.
I think, if I try, it will all sink in.
Contrived memories assembling on the brink of reprise.
Too late, insidious inkling denied.
Delinquent inside of the blink of an eye.
Indistinct in demise.
Like a firefly lost in the twinkling sky.

Undaunted, I grin, for I have the staunchest of chins.
Plus I know that, yet still, I am haunted with sin,
and it won't be long till a twinge of grief intervenes and the gauntlet begins.
With night advancing, my flight of fancy launches within.
I'm merely a pawn of "The Wind" that I'm "Gone With".
Convinced that the dawn is a myth,
I take a leap of faith off of a cliff as a song of chagrin plays in the background.
So much for facing the facts proud.
Brace for impact now.
Consciousness fades into black cloud.