YOUR BODY NEXT TO MINE
We roamed the town from spot to spot,
And when we got a bit too hot,
We shared a glass of golden wine;
Come lay your body next to mine.
We strolled museums one by one,
Enjoyed a spree of high class fun,
The art we viewed was truly fine;
Come lay your body next to mine.
We found the divey music dens,
And tapped our toes to now-and-thens,
The jazz was slipper sole divine;
Come lay your body next to mine.
We walked the neon streets alone,
And made the night our very own,
You sighed like silk and moved like shine;
Come lay your body next to mine.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Kyrielle
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
(136) July 9, 2010: No Tomorrow
NO TOMORROW
The ceiling fan is spinning down
It's temporary airy sound.
There's nothing true that I can borrow;
Today's today there's no tomorrow.
My love's asleep beside me here,
Her quiet breathing, Time's frontier,
A steady speeding golden arrow;
Today's today there's no tomorrow.
I'm covered by these crimson sheets,
I feel my heart's insistent beats,
My blood the gift of bone and marrow;
Today's today there's no tomorrow
The sky is clear, the air is thin,
The mind it's play begins again.
It's time to climb Mount Kilimanjaro;
Today's today there's no tomorrow.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Kyrielle
The ceiling fan is spinning down
It's temporary airy sound.
There's nothing true that I can borrow;
Today's today there's no tomorrow.
My love's asleep beside me here,
Her quiet breathing, Time's frontier,
A steady speeding golden arrow;
Today's today there's no tomorrow.
I'm covered by these crimson sheets,
I feel my heart's insistent beats,
My blood the gift of bone and marrow;
Today's today there's no tomorrow
The sky is clear, the air is thin,
The mind it's play begins again.
It's time to climb Mount Kilimanjaro;
Today's today there's no tomorrow.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Kyrielle
(135) July 8, 2010: A Story In Verse, Part 4: Over The Chasm
A Story In Verse, Part 4: OVER THE CHASM
Awakening from dreams that have never been dreamed,
The scorch of the day pooling sweat in my eyes,
I staggered up faint and through razors I screamed,
My throat full of froth and all clotted with flies;
A vulture had landed to greet my demise.
Behind me the crevice, abyssmal and still,
The blast of the tempest expunged and serene;
So eerie the hush, my voice echoed shrill—
A child exhausted with fear inbetween
A bottomless pit and an eating machine.
I looked to the left and I looked to the right,
Behind me the chasm, before me the bird;
I wished for a moment I'd died in the night.
Which way should I run, each way unpreferred?
And then came the answer, completely absurd.
I asked the great vulture to give me a ride,
To carry me over the pit of remorse.
He answered me, "Sir, I would do so with pride."
And lifted his head growing large as a horse,
With Pegasus wings of incredible force.
"Climb up if you're willing." He said as he bowed,
His two giant legs kneeing down in the dust.
And tipping a wing like a stair he allowed
My tottering legs to step up and adjust
On his featherless neck I had chosen to trust.
"I'll carry you over, but don't you look down.
One look and you’re screaming—a song decomposed.
You’ll fall in the noise till you pray for the sound,
The drum-beating rhythm your heart has composed,
The sound of sweet silence embraced and enclosed.”
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
Awakening from dreams that have never been dreamed,
The scorch of the day pooling sweat in my eyes,
I staggered up faint and through razors I screamed,
My throat full of froth and all clotted with flies;
A vulture had landed to greet my demise.
Behind me the crevice, abyssmal and still,
The blast of the tempest expunged and serene;
So eerie the hush, my voice echoed shrill—
A child exhausted with fear inbetween
A bottomless pit and an eating machine.
I looked to the left and I looked to the right,
Behind me the chasm, before me the bird;
I wished for a moment I'd died in the night.
Which way should I run, each way unpreferred?
And then came the answer, completely absurd.
I asked the great vulture to give me a ride,
To carry me over the pit of remorse.
He answered me, "Sir, I would do so with pride."
And lifted his head growing large as a horse,
With Pegasus wings of incredible force.
"Climb up if you're willing." He said as he bowed,
His two giant legs kneeing down in the dust.
And tipping a wing like a stair he allowed
My tottering legs to step up and adjust
On his featherless neck I had chosen to trust.
"I'll carry you over, but don't you look down.
One look and you’re screaming—a song decomposed.
You’ll fall in the noise till you pray for the sound,
The drum-beating rhythm your heart has composed,
The sound of sweet silence embraced and enclosed.”
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
(134) July 7, 2010: The Barista's Blend
THE BARISTA'S BLEND
The Water comes down and the Fire goes up,
The Wind spins around and the Earth's in a cup.
The elements blend and their blending is sweet,
As sweet as the latte you sip while you tweet—
That digital taste for the zips and the rips,
Embedded and shredded removable chips
Of chocolate, vanilla, and carmel panache.
Whatever you're doing don't empty the trash.
It's all in the way you've imported the beans,
And if you've been faithful to clean the machines,
Bacterias come and the viruses go,
They go for the cutest baristas who know
The meaning of life and the clue to the games,
The chart (periodic), the new user names
Of every invader and phisher of files,
Their coffee served up in the grandest of styles.
Don't say it's too costly to pay for a drink
Of flowing elixir that speaks with a wink,
And listens like leather about to be worn,
Or something like beauty about to be born.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
The Water comes down and the Fire goes up,
The Wind spins around and the Earth's in a cup.
The elements blend and their blending is sweet,
As sweet as the latte you sip while you tweet—
That digital taste for the zips and the rips,
Embedded and shredded removable chips
Of chocolate, vanilla, and carmel panache.
Whatever you're doing don't empty the trash.
It's all in the way you've imported the beans,
And if you've been faithful to clean the machines,
Bacterias come and the viruses go,
They go for the cutest baristas who know
The meaning of life and the clue to the games,
The chart (periodic), the new user names
Of every invader and phisher of files,
Their coffee served up in the grandest of styles.
Don't say it's too costly to pay for a drink
Of flowing elixir that speaks with a wink,
And listens like leather about to be worn,
Or something like beauty about to be born.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
(133) July 6, 2010: Construction 4: Bots Dots & Pinwheels
CONSTRUCTION 4: BOTS DOTS & PINWHEELS
Find a stretch of country road all desolate at night.
Find it when the sky is clear, the moon is full and bright.
Take a bunch of pinwheels made to magnify the light,
Made of cut-up roadway signs like No Left Turn & Stop.
Drill a hole by every dot, and fill each one with glop.
Glop means glue, I knew you knew; just let it go kerplop.
Stick a pinwheel stick in every hole until it dries.
Do be careful not to get the bot-glue in your eyes.
Cars may pass but you'll be dressed in some benign disguise.
Fifty pinwheels ought to do, five hundred would be best.
Work until the sun comes up, or till you face arrest.
When you're done go take your car and give the road a test.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
Find a stretch of country road all desolate at night.
Find it when the sky is clear, the moon is full and bright.
Take a bunch of pinwheels made to magnify the light,
Made of cut-up roadway signs like No Left Turn & Stop.
Drill a hole by every dot, and fill each one with glop.
Glop means glue, I knew you knew; just let it go kerplop.
Stick a pinwheel stick in every hole until it dries.
Do be careful not to get the bot-glue in your eyes.
Cars may pass but you'll be dressed in some benign disguise.
Fifty pinwheels ought to do, five hundred would be best.
Work until the sun comes up, or till you face arrest.
When you're done go take your car and give the road a test.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
(132) July 5, 2010: Semicircular Prayer
SEMICIRCULAR PRAYER
Good morning God I don’t feel good,
And though my head’s attached,
It isn’t working as it should,
I think my brain’s detached;
I need some Treatment if You would.
I know my eyes are open wide,
But I can’t see a thing.
I feel an ear on either side,
But all they do is ring;
Perhaps my cranial nerves are fried.
I’m standing on my own two feet,
But not for long I fear.
I’ll try my best to be discrete
When my old inner ear
Decides to dump me on the street.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
Good morning God I don’t feel good,
And though my head’s attached,
It isn’t working as it should,
I think my brain’s detached;
I need some Treatment if You would.
I know my eyes are open wide,
But I can’t see a thing.
I feel an ear on either side,
But all they do is ring;
Perhaps my cranial nerves are fried.
I’m standing on my own two feet,
But not for long I fear.
I’ll try my best to be discrete
When my old inner ear
Decides to dump me on the street.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
(131) July 4, 2010: A Story In Verse, Part 3: Across The Flatlands
A Story In Verse, Part 3: ACROSS THE FLATLANDS
I followed the bird with its herald of love,
Imagined it hovered about and above,
As white as a cloudlet all empty of rain—
The magical bird I'd been dreaming of
That kept me engaging the barren terrain.
The dunes now behind me, the flatlands ahead,
I'd heard from my grandfather tales of the dead
All picked to the bone by the vultures that glide
On wings that surpass an eleven foot spread,
That dive on the living who've no place to hide.
So traveling by night with the cross in my eye,
The four fuzzy stars through the dust-shattered sky,
I made my way south doling food from my pack,
A dwindling slosh of a water supply;
My mind pushing forward, my heart pulling back.
When suddenly there up ahead in the gloom
A darkness much darker, a chasm, a tomb;
A column of wind shooting out from the deep
That smelled like the scent of a witch's perfume—
The pungence of incense for langourous sleep.
I stopped like a stone and I stood like a bear,
My senses alert and my muscles aware.
I edged toward the lip of the chasm to look,
Got knocked to the ground by the blast of cold air,
And there, as if frozen, I trembled and shook.
The wind from the chasm was wind of a kind
That blows through your head and erases your mind.
I lay like a living cadaver it seemed,
For hours on end, eyes open but blind,
And fell into visions unwillingly dreamed.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
I followed the bird with its herald of love,
Imagined it hovered about and above,
As white as a cloudlet all empty of rain—
The magical bird I'd been dreaming of
That kept me engaging the barren terrain.
The dunes now behind me, the flatlands ahead,
I'd heard from my grandfather tales of the dead
All picked to the bone by the vultures that glide
On wings that surpass an eleven foot spread,
That dive on the living who've no place to hide.
So traveling by night with the cross in my eye,
The four fuzzy stars through the dust-shattered sky,
I made my way south doling food from my pack,
A dwindling slosh of a water supply;
My mind pushing forward, my heart pulling back.
When suddenly there up ahead in the gloom
A darkness much darker, a chasm, a tomb;
A column of wind shooting out from the deep
That smelled like the scent of a witch's perfume—
The pungence of incense for langourous sleep.
I stopped like a stone and I stood like a bear,
My senses alert and my muscles aware.
I edged toward the lip of the chasm to look,
Got knocked to the ground by the blast of cold air,
And there, as if frozen, I trembled and shook.
The wind from the chasm was wind of a kind
That blows through your head and erases your mind.
I lay like a living cadaver it seemed,
For hours on end, eyes open but blind,
And fell into visions unwillingly dreamed.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
(130) July 3, 2010: A Story In Verse: 2 - The Knowledge
The Story In Verse, Part 2: THE KNOWLEDGE
My grandfather taught me the way of the runes,
The symbols on stones that he tossed in the bowls,
The clearest of pebbles like seven full moons;
Consulting each morning those Seven Old Souls
To help him determine his two daily goals.
One day was repairs and a rabbit for meat,
The next was a blade to be sharpened and shined,
And a poultice of melon to rub on his feet.
Each day had a name and a number combined
To write in the book and to keep in the mind.
My grandfather died on the day I turned ten,
The hair on his head just as white as a moth.
I burned his remains in the desolate fen.
I sprinkled his dust in the Cup full of broth,
Took only one sip; poured the rest on the Cloth.
I followed the Knowledge the best that I could,
And lived in the dunes for another ten years.
But then in my dreaming I saw the deep wood,
The forest that harbored my ominous fears,
That grew by the sea of my sorrowful tears.
“Come down to the ocean and flourish your sail.”
The song of the bird in my dreaming beseeched.
I’d not seen the ocean except in a pail
Drawn up from the depths of the well’s easy reach.
The ocean for me was a figure of speech.
But just like I know when I’m thirsty for drink,
I knew that this bird was from someone above—
A spirit beyond my endowment to think;
And the forested seacoast I kept dreaming of,
A promise of something I knew must be love.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
My grandfather taught me the way of the runes,
The symbols on stones that he tossed in the bowls,
The clearest of pebbles like seven full moons;
Consulting each morning those Seven Old Souls
To help him determine his two daily goals.
One day was repairs and a rabbit for meat,
The next was a blade to be sharpened and shined,
And a poultice of melon to rub on his feet.
Each day had a name and a number combined
To write in the book and to keep in the mind.
My grandfather died on the day I turned ten,
The hair on his head just as white as a moth.
I burned his remains in the desolate fen.
I sprinkled his dust in the Cup full of broth,
Took only one sip; poured the rest on the Cloth.
I followed the Knowledge the best that I could,
And lived in the dunes for another ten years.
But then in my dreaming I saw the deep wood,
The forest that harbored my ominous fears,
That grew by the sea of my sorrowful tears.
“Come down to the ocean and flourish your sail.”
The song of the bird in my dreaming beseeched.
I’d not seen the ocean except in a pail
Drawn up from the depths of the well’s easy reach.
The ocean for me was a figure of speech.
But just like I know when I’m thirsty for drink,
I knew that this bird was from someone above—
A spirit beyond my endowment to think;
And the forested seacoast I kept dreaming of,
A promise of something I knew must be love.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
(129) July 2, 2010: A Story In Verse, Part 1: A Start Of A Journey
A Story In Verse, Part 1: A START OF A JOURNEY
I lived in the desert with no one but me,
No brimming oasis, not even a tree;
My home made of stone and my heart made of glass.
I dreamed of the forest that grew by the sea
With fountains of flowers and rivers of grass.
I woke with a start of a journey in mind,
An inkling of danger, a chill-riddled spine,
My belly in flutters of butterfly flights
Whenever I saw myself leaving behind
The dulcimer dunes and the harpsichord nights.
With only the vaguest of notions I went,
A spring in my step, on my lips a lament,
Amazed with each step as if some other soul
Were moving within me without my consent,
Convincing myself I was out for a stroll.
I walked with the sun, then I walked with the moon,
The sun came again, and I walked until noon.
At last the momentum of rapture subsided,
The flank of a boulder the dust storms had hewn
I gladly received as the shelter provided.
My pack for a pillow, my coat for a quilt,
I dreamed I was plunging my sword to the hilt,
A beast at my feet writhing awful and great—
The dragon of sorrow, the demon of guilt,
The two-headed fury of envy and hate.
I woke with a shiver as cold as the sky,
Took one look around me and didn't know why
I'd wandered so far from my home in the dunes,
Perhaps my good reason had kissed me goodbye,
Or was it the message I'd read in the runes?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
I lived in the desert with no one but me,
No brimming oasis, not even a tree;
My home made of stone and my heart made of glass.
I dreamed of the forest that grew by the sea
With fountains of flowers and rivers of grass.
I woke with a start of a journey in mind,
An inkling of danger, a chill-riddled spine,
My belly in flutters of butterfly flights
Whenever I saw myself leaving behind
The dulcimer dunes and the harpsichord nights.
With only the vaguest of notions I went,
A spring in my step, on my lips a lament,
Amazed with each step as if some other soul
Were moving within me without my consent,
Convincing myself I was out for a stroll.
I walked with the sun, then I walked with the moon,
The sun came again, and I walked until noon.
At last the momentum of rapture subsided,
The flank of a boulder the dust storms had hewn
I gladly received as the shelter provided.
My pack for a pillow, my coat for a quilt,
I dreamed I was plunging my sword to the hilt,
A beast at my feet writhing awful and great—
The dragon of sorrow, the demon of guilt,
The two-headed fury of envy and hate.
I woke with a shiver as cold as the sky,
Took one look around me and didn't know why
I'd wandered so far from my home in the dunes,
Perhaps my good reason had kissed me goodbye,
Or was it the message I'd read in the runes?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
(128) July 1, 2010: Dead Girl
DEAD GIRL
Dead girl rises late
to blossoming hunger pangs—
her bite of passage
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Haiku
Dead girl rises late
to blossoming hunger pangs—
her bite of passage
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Haiku
(127) June 30, 2010: Can't Beat Poetry
CAN'T BEAT POETRY
You can sail around the world
You can get yourself a girl
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
You can drive across the land
You can find yourself a man
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
You can pull a thousand strings
You can get a thousand things
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
You can make yourself a name
You can find yourself some fame
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
If you've got to have some fun
If you've got to get it done
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
You can sail around the world
You can get yourself a girl
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
You can drive across the land
You can find yourself a man
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
You can pull a thousand strings
You can get a thousand things
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
You can make yourself a name
You can find yourself some fame
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
If you've got to have some fun
If you've got to get it done
You can have a cup of coffee
You can have a cup of tea
But you can't beat poetry
Da dum...da dum
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(126) June 29, 2010: Farewell, Sweet Dream
FAREWELL, SWEET DREAM
No matter what I tell myself to do,
With arguments fine-tuned to best persuade,
I still can’t seem to drop the other shoe.
I’m always premature or overdue;
The time is never right for a crusade,
No matter what I tell myself to do.
The stage is set but the actors are too few,
And though the lights go up and the band is played,
I still can’t seem to drop the other shoe.
My practiced speech is ready for debut,
And yet I wait immobile and afraid,
No matter what I tell myself to do.
Conceiving and believing? Yes I do!
And even when I trash the masquerade,
I still can’t seem to drop the other shoe.
And now, relieved, I bid my dream adieu.
The truth I’ve known, my heart’s at last conveyed:
No matter what I tell myself to do,
I still won't ever drop the other shoe.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Villanelle
No matter what I tell myself to do,
With arguments fine-tuned to best persuade,
I still can’t seem to drop the other shoe.
I’m always premature or overdue;
The time is never right for a crusade,
No matter what I tell myself to do.
The stage is set but the actors are too few,
And though the lights go up and the band is played,
I still can’t seem to drop the other shoe.
My practiced speech is ready for debut,
And yet I wait immobile and afraid,
No matter what I tell myself to do.
Conceiving and believing? Yes I do!
And even when I trash the masquerade,
I still can’t seem to drop the other shoe.
And now, relieved, I bid my dream adieu.
The truth I’ve known, my heart’s at last conveyed:
No matter what I tell myself to do,
I still won't ever drop the other shoe.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Villanelle
(125) June 28, 2010: What Is Is What What Is
WHAT IS IS WHAT WHAT IS
No matter what I say,
What is is what what is.
A circumstance chalked up to Chance
Is just the what that is.
Exactly what that is,
Is melted in the Stream.
And how it flows I cannot know
My dullness too extreme.
The Stream is not a stream,
The Flow is not a flow,
This metaphor is nothing more
Than saying I don’t know.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
No matter what I say,
What is is what what is.
A circumstance chalked up to Chance
Is just the what that is.
Exactly what that is,
Is melted in the Stream.
And how it flows I cannot know
My dullness too extreme.
The Stream is not a stream,
The Flow is not a flow,
This metaphor is nothing more
Than saying I don’t know.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(124) June 27, 2010: WIth Joy Unspeakably Extreme
WITH JOY UNSPEAKABLY EXTREME
Our God defends us every day
Protects us from the Devil's snares
His Holy Spirit lights our way
We walk in truth where no one dares
We walk in truth where no one dares
We walk in truth where no one dares
His Holy Spirit lights our way
We walk in truth where no one dares
In Christ we stand where others fall
Our confidence in Him complete
At His sweet Spirit's whispered call
We leap by faith without defeat
We leap by faith without defeat
We leap by faith without defeat
At His sweet Spirit's whispered call
We leap by faith without defeat
The Holy Spirit fills our minds
With joy unspeakably extreme
In nothing else such joy we find
For by His blood we are redeemed
For by His blood we are redeemed
For by His blood we are redeemed
In nothing else such joy we find
For by His blood we are redeemed
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Hymn Lyrics
Our God defends us every day
Protects us from the Devil's snares
His Holy Spirit lights our way
We walk in truth where no one dares
We walk in truth where no one dares
We walk in truth where no one dares
His Holy Spirit lights our way
We walk in truth where no one dares
In Christ we stand where others fall
Our confidence in Him complete
At His sweet Spirit's whispered call
We leap by faith without defeat
We leap by faith without defeat
We leap by faith without defeat
At His sweet Spirit's whispered call
We leap by faith without defeat
The Holy Spirit fills our minds
With joy unspeakably extreme
In nothing else such joy we find
For by His blood we are redeemed
For by His blood we are redeemed
For by His blood we are redeemed
In nothing else such joy we find
For by His blood we are redeemed
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Hymn Lyrics
(123) June 26, 2010: All Said & Done
ALL SAID & DONE
Would you like to be real, Wikipedia-real,
With your name all in black and your links all in blue,
What the students will find when they’re searching for you?
Would you like to be wise, Wikipedia-wise,
With the best of your work all precise and unchanged,
And the footnotes and references neatly arranged?
Would you like to be known, Wikipedia-known,
For your clever remarks and your depth of good sense?
Then you’d better get down to your past perfect tense.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
Would you like to be real, Wikipedia-real,
With your name all in black and your links all in blue,
What the students will find when they’re searching for you?
Would you like to be wise, Wikipedia-wise,
With the best of your work all precise and unchanged,
And the footnotes and references neatly arranged?
Would you like to be known, Wikipedia-known,
For your clever remarks and your depth of good sense?
Then you’d better get down to your past perfect tense.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(122) June 25, 2010: What I Want
WHAT I WANT
I’ll tell you now just what I want,
The day you find me dead and gaunt,
Go lather up your legs and shave,
And build a dance floor on my grave.
When all the eulogies are said,
And your blue eyes are puffy red,
It’s time for you to misbehave,
And build a dance floor on my grave.
Just call the girls to get the guys,
Forget the wherefores and the whys,
Go find yourself a kindly knave,
And build a dance floor on my grave.
I hope the moon is full that night,
(I’ll do my best to time it right),
And you’ll announce my tomb side rave,
And build a dance floor on my grave.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Kyrielle
I’ll tell you now just what I want,
The day you find me dead and gaunt,
Go lather up your legs and shave,
And build a dance floor on my grave.
When all the eulogies are said,
And your blue eyes are puffy red,
It’s time for you to misbehave,
And build a dance floor on my grave.
Just call the girls to get the guys,
Forget the wherefores and the whys,
Go find yourself a kindly knave,
And build a dance floor on my grave.
I hope the moon is full that night,
(I’ll do my best to time it right),
And you’ll announce my tomb side rave,
And build a dance floor on my grave.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Kyrielle
(121) June 24, 2010: Sweet Significance - A Love Story
SWEET SIGNIFICANCE—A LOVE STORY
He’s a spurious digit and everyone knows,
No matter how clever his math-manic prose,
His vacant expression is all that it shows.
They call him a cipher, a nothing, a naught,
A circular reference, a bubble, a blot;
His brain is a goose egg that can’t hold a thought
But last night he went out for a leisurely roll,
And found a sad Three who he tried to console.
She was right of the decimal not feeling quite whole,
So he offered to bump her once left from the right
To help her reverse her superfluous plight.
She gave him a look mixing fear and delight.
“I’ll be gentle,” he told her, “You won’t feel a thing.”
And there on the spot he sprang her a spring,
And she, “Oh my gosh! I’m commencing a fling
With a crazy-eyed zero!” and landed with grace
And a smile, in a westerly decimal place,
As a bit of a blush multiplied on her face.
Then before she could thank him he did it again
And bumped her once more by a power of ten.
“That’s all I can do.” He said with a grin.
“My goodness,” she said, “I’d never ask more.
Since you leaped to my rescue and made my heart soar,
I’m a hundred times better than I was before!”
“It's YOU, Miss” he said, “I’m as proud as a pig.
Since I leaped to your rescue I'm feeling so big.
Thank YOU, I’m at last a Significant Fig!”
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
He’s a spurious digit and everyone knows,
No matter how clever his math-manic prose,
His vacant expression is all that it shows.
They call him a cipher, a nothing, a naught,
A circular reference, a bubble, a blot;
His brain is a goose egg that can’t hold a thought
But last night he went out for a leisurely roll,
And found a sad Three who he tried to console.
She was right of the decimal not feeling quite whole,
So he offered to bump her once left from the right
To help her reverse her superfluous plight.
She gave him a look mixing fear and delight.
“I’ll be gentle,” he told her, “You won’t feel a thing.”
And there on the spot he sprang her a spring,
And she, “Oh my gosh! I’m commencing a fling
With a crazy-eyed zero!” and landed with grace
And a smile, in a westerly decimal place,
As a bit of a blush multiplied on her face.
Then before she could thank him he did it again
And bumped her once more by a power of ten.
“That’s all I can do.” He said with a grin.
“My goodness,” she said, “I’d never ask more.
Since you leaped to my rescue and made my heart soar,
I’m a hundred times better than I was before!”
“It's YOU, Miss” he said, “I’m as proud as a pig.
Since I leaped to your rescue I'm feeling so big.
Thank YOU, I’m at last a Significant Fig!”
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
Sunday, November 28, 2010
(120) June 23, 2010: Midnight Skin
MIDNIGHT SKIN
The room is dark with shadows feigning
Melancholy airs, ordaining
Some deep mystery to begin,
As you wrap me up in midnight skin.
A branch against the window brushing
Softly snares your gentle blushing
Chest and cheek and lifted chin,
As you wrap me up in midnight skin.
The candle's flame in fits of flutter
Guides your touch of melted butter,
Gives my mind an easy spin,
As you wrap me up in midnight skin.
Just you and me with time to squander
Over fields of flesh to wander,
Places where we've never been,
As you wrap me up in midnight skin.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Kyrielle
The room is dark with shadows feigning
Melancholy airs, ordaining
Some deep mystery to begin,
As you wrap me up in midnight skin.
A branch against the window brushing
Softly snares your gentle blushing
Chest and cheek and lifted chin,
As you wrap me up in midnight skin.
The candle's flame in fits of flutter
Guides your touch of melted butter,
Gives my mind an easy spin,
As you wrap me up in midnight skin.
Just you and me with time to squander
Over fields of flesh to wander,
Places where we've never been,
As you wrap me up in midnight skin.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Kyrielle
(119) June 22, 2010: Learning To Learn
LEARNING TO LEARN: THE PSYCHODYNAMICS OF SELF-LIMITING
SUBCONSCIOUSLY MOTIVATED PRECOGNITIVE CONSTRUCTS
IN THE LATTER STAGES OF POSTGRADUATE ACADEMIC FRUITION
Thesis
Kinesis.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplet
SUBCONSCIOUSLY MOTIVATED PRECOGNITIVE CONSTRUCTS
IN THE LATTER STAGES OF POSTGRADUATE ACADEMIC FRUITION
Thesis
Kinesis.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplet
(118) June 21, 2010: First Day Of Summer
FIRST DAY OF SUMMER
Our axial tilt is most inclined
At twenty three and a half degrees,
And all of northern earth mankind
Must take its turn at getting burned,
And perhaps some retinopathy.
To those who will—our sympathy.
The Tropic of Cancer gets the most,
Where rays of sun turn every bun
That's nakedly exposed, to toast,
And all the rest get baked at best;
And yes, it'll come as no surprise—
A few Hot Cheeto flaming thighs.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
Our axial tilt is most inclined
At twenty three and a half degrees,
And all of northern earth mankind
Must take its turn at getting burned,
And perhaps some retinopathy.
To those who will—our sympathy.
The Tropic of Cancer gets the most,
Where rays of sun turn every bun
That's nakedly exposed, to toast,
And all the rest get baked at best;
And yes, it'll come as no surprise—
A few Hot Cheeto flaming thighs.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(117 June 20, 2010: Go Out And Play
GO OUT AND PLAY
Go out and play before it’s time for bed,
You’ve been inside for far too long today.
Turn off the Spider Fight inside your head;
Go out and play!
Your fingers are so quick to catch your prey,
Your thumb can spin a thousand spiders dead
In one fell swoop inside your web display,
But here on earth no foe will cringe with dread,
No Frisbee falcon fly, no squirt gun spray
Unless you capture fire-breathing Fred;
Go out and play!
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Roundel
Go out and play before it’s time for bed,
You’ve been inside for far too long today.
Turn off the Spider Fight inside your head;
Go out and play!
Your fingers are so quick to catch your prey,
Your thumb can spin a thousand spiders dead
In one fell swoop inside your web display,
But here on earth no foe will cringe with dread,
No Frisbee falcon fly, no squirt gun spray
Unless you capture fire-breathing Fred;
Go out and play!
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Roundel
(116) June 19, 2010: A Song For The Zombies
A SONG FOR THE ZOMBIES
If zombies are real and they're walking your way
With blood borne contagion to make you obey,
A Borg-like collective pursuing their prey,
Resistance is futile; they’ll catch you someday,
When your well-wielded weapons won’t hold them at bay,
When you’re down on your luck and you’re sore to the bone,
You’re not on your game, and you’re out of the zone,
The battery’s dead on your cellular phone,
And you’re hidden away in a cavern alone,
In a cold silent darkness like on one has known.
With bravery and skill, you’ve fought and endured,
For years you’ve evaded them grimly obscured
In your camo-chameleon skin undeterred,
Avoiding the virus that cannot be cured;
Now your number is up and your death is assured.
You sense them; you smell them approaching your den,
The living dead women, the living dead men,
Uncannily finding you time and again,
Empowered by what must be demons, and then—
“Dear God O dear God, please save me! Amen.”
Then into the darkness a flame He will bring,
A flame not of fire but of song—and you’ll sing,
“The vipers may bite me, the scorpions may sting,
But the venom won't harm me, it won't do a thing.
I'll stand up and walk, I'm a child of the King.”
Then standing you’ll listen, and know that they’re near,
You’ll walk to the mouth of your newest frontier,
No gun in your hand, no bludgeon, no spear,
Just armed with a song for the zombies to hear,
And you’ll walk out among them without any fear.
They’ll fall back in horror and let you go by,
You’ll pass on beyond them, as crawling they’ll cry,
And drag themselves after you not knowing why.
At the edge of a cliff you'll bid them goodbye;
They'll dive for the rocks at the bottom and die.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
If zombies are real and they're walking your way
With blood borne contagion to make you obey,
A Borg-like collective pursuing their prey,
Resistance is futile; they’ll catch you someday,
When your well-wielded weapons won’t hold them at bay,
When you’re down on your luck and you’re sore to the bone,
You’re not on your game, and you’re out of the zone,
The battery’s dead on your cellular phone,
And you’re hidden away in a cavern alone,
In a cold silent darkness like on one has known.
With bravery and skill, you’ve fought and endured,
For years you’ve evaded them grimly obscured
In your camo-chameleon skin undeterred,
Avoiding the virus that cannot be cured;
Now your number is up and your death is assured.
You sense them; you smell them approaching your den,
The living dead women, the living dead men,
Uncannily finding you time and again,
Empowered by what must be demons, and then—
“Dear God O dear God, please save me! Amen.”
Then into the darkness a flame He will bring,
A flame not of fire but of song—and you’ll sing,
“The vipers may bite me, the scorpions may sting,
But the venom won't harm me, it won't do a thing.
I'll stand up and walk, I'm a child of the King.”
Then standing you’ll listen, and know that they’re near,
You’ll walk to the mouth of your newest frontier,
No gun in your hand, no bludgeon, no spear,
Just armed with a song for the zombies to hear,
And you’ll walk out among them without any fear.
They’ll fall back in horror and let you go by,
You’ll pass on beyond them, as crawling they’ll cry,
And drag themselves after you not knowing why.
At the edge of a cliff you'll bid them goodbye;
They'll dive for the rocks at the bottom and die.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
(115) June 18, 2010: Sunshine 7
SUNSHINE 7
We took what we could from the soil;
The timber, the water, the oil.
Now we're solar as hell,
And we're doing quiet well,
In our igloos of luminous foil.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Limerick
We took what we could from the soil;
The timber, the water, the oil.
Now we're solar as hell,
And we're doing quiet well,
In our igloos of luminous foil.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Limerick
(114) June 17, 2010: Looking To Jesus
LOOKING TO JESUS
We're passing the time,
We're waiting for You,
We're watching and praying
To see what You'll do.
We're spinning in space,
We're doing our best,
We're hoping and trusting
To enter Your rest.
We're taking Your love,
We're giving it free,
We're looking to Jesus
To bring it to be.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
We're passing the time,
We're waiting for You,
We're watching and praying
To see what You'll do.
We're spinning in space,
We're doing our best,
We're hoping and trusting
To enter Your rest.
We're taking Your love,
We're giving it free,
We're looking to Jesus
To bring it to be.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(113) June 16, 2010: Color's Wheel
COLOR'S WHEEL
The colors fade and turn to shades
Of summer beige and gray.
Do colors know some place to go
We cannot pass to play—
A brilliant world of pooling swirls
With haloed neon saints,
Awaiting Spring's next color fling
To barrow out the paints?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
The colors fade and turn to shades
Of summer beige and gray.
Do colors know some place to go
We cannot pass to play—
A brilliant world of pooling swirls
With haloed neon saints,
Awaiting Spring's next color fling
To barrow out the paints?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(112) June 15, 2010: Let Loose The Song
LET LOOSE THE SONG
Let loose the song of gladness
Let loose the song of praise
Lift up His grace and goodness
The Father of our joyful days
Refrain
O Lord of all we praise Your name
The source of Light's eternal flame
Your love from age to age the same
All glory to Your name.
Let loose angelic voices
Let loose the Melody
Embrace His flawless choices
The Architect of Harmony
Let loose the obligatos
Let loose the clarion call
Recite His endless cantos
The Anthem of the All in All
Let loose the royal choir
Let loose ten thousands songs
Crescendo high and higher
The Center of the circling throngs
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Hymn Lyrics
Let loose the song of gladness
Let loose the song of praise
Lift up His grace and goodness
The Father of our joyful days
Refrain
O Lord of all we praise Your name
The source of Light's eternal flame
Your love from age to age the same
All glory to Your name.
Let loose angelic voices
Let loose the Melody
Embrace His flawless choices
The Architect of Harmony
Let loose the obligatos
Let loose the clarion call
Recite His endless cantos
The Anthem of the All in All
Let loose the royal choir
Let loose ten thousands songs
Crescendo high and higher
The Center of the circling throngs
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Hymn Lyrics
(111) June 14, 2010: Night Fall
NIGHT FALL
Grant me one last wonderful midnight meeting,
One more night fall into your heart completing
Every thought of loving so sweetly given
Carefree and fleeting.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Sapphic
Grant me one last wonderful midnight meeting,
One more night fall into your heart completing
Every thought of loving so sweetly given
Carefree and fleeting.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Sapphic
(110) June 13, 2010: Love On The Factory Floor
LOVE ON THE FACTORY FLOOR
Bright are the lights from the factory floor,
Rusted the latch on the furnace door,
Nothing but dust in the bottom drawer.
Where will she find the route to the sea,
Bandage her leg with a bag of tea,
Lie in the sun by a silver tree.
Why does he wait for the blossom to bloom,
Open the letter that lies in his room,
Sleep in the vacancy left by perfume?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
Bright are the lights from the factory floor,
Rusted the latch on the furnace door,
Nothing but dust in the bottom drawer.
Where will she find the route to the sea,
Bandage her leg with a bag of tea,
Lie in the sun by a silver tree.
Why does he wait for the blossom to bloom,
Open the letter that lies in his room,
Sleep in the vacancy left by perfume?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
(109) June 12, 2010: Invented Games
INVENTED GAMES
Invented games to pass the time,
Described in semicircle rites,
Some tricky hooks stay lured for years,
The best hang on for centuries.
Described in semicircle rites,
The amphitheatric chanting dirge,
Conscripts the mind and feeds the urge.
Some tricky hooks stay lured for years
Beyond the memory, back to what
The dead men heard in the hermit’s hut.
The best hang on for centuries
Enshrined in books and citadels,
Their fame proclaimed by steeple bells.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Trimeric
Invented games to pass the time,
Described in semicircle rites,
Some tricky hooks stay lured for years,
The best hang on for centuries.
Described in semicircle rites,
The amphitheatric chanting dirge,
Conscripts the mind and feeds the urge.
Some tricky hooks stay lured for years
Beyond the memory, back to what
The dead men heard in the hermit’s hut.
The best hang on for centuries
Enshrined in books and citadels,
Their fame proclaimed by steeple bells.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Trimeric
(108) June 11, 2010: The Buzz In The Window
THE BUZZ IN THE WINDOW
A buzz between the glass and screen,
A blizzard spindling fizzle whizz,
A battling bio buzz machine;
I wonder what it really is?
I’m not sure why, but it’s not a fly.
I know it’s not a bumble bee.
I think it’s got one crazy eye
That seems to stare right in at me.
It buzzes like the blurry whirr
Of chainsaws dueling up the street;
They’re slicing up a conifer
Like butchers carving frozen meat.
It might be part robotic droid
Or a micro-helicopter thing.
It must be surgically destroyed
In case it has a deadly sting.
It smacks itself on the window pane,
Backtracks itself in dizzy spins
On a random swerving slam campaign;
It stops abrupt and again begins.
I’d like to let it out of there,
But I’m afraid it might decide
To vanish up my nostril flare
And choose my brain as a place hide.
That buzz between the glass and screen,
That blizzard spindling fizzle whizz,
That battling bio buzz machine,
Can stay right there, whatever it is.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
A buzz between the glass and screen,
A blizzard spindling fizzle whizz,
A battling bio buzz machine;
I wonder what it really is?
I’m not sure why, but it’s not a fly.
I know it’s not a bumble bee.
I think it’s got one crazy eye
That seems to stare right in at me.
It buzzes like the blurry whirr
Of chainsaws dueling up the street;
They’re slicing up a conifer
Like butchers carving frozen meat.
It might be part robotic droid
Or a micro-helicopter thing.
It must be surgically destroyed
In case it has a deadly sting.
It smacks itself on the window pane,
Backtracks itself in dizzy spins
On a random swerving slam campaign;
It stops abrupt and again begins.
I’d like to let it out of there,
But I’m afraid it might decide
To vanish up my nostril flare
And choose my brain as a place hide.
That buzz between the glass and screen,
That blizzard spindling fizzle whizz,
That battling bio buzz machine,
Can stay right there, whatever it is.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(107) June 10, 2010: A Word To The Zombie Warrior
A WORD TO THE ZOMBIE WARRIOR
One sinister night you’ll awake in a fright
To the sound of the scratching of fingers;
Don’t open the door like so many before
Where the odor of dying still lingers.
But harness your gun and get ready to run
With a purpose that’s truly tenacious.
You’ll find your success if you don’t acquiesce
And your tactics are raw and audacious.
Believe what I say, by the breaking of day
You had better be high on a tether;
A place of retreat with a stash that’s complete
And be ready to fly like a feather.
Be mobile, be wise, and don’t look in their eyes
Just be nimble and quick on the trigger;
And pray that you’ll find some more of your kind
To pursue them with unflinching vigor.
Your knowledge and skill, to track and to kill,
Will leave them all brainless and bleeding.
At last if you’re strong you shall right what is wrong
And resume the old life you were leading.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
One sinister night you’ll awake in a fright
To the sound of the scratching of fingers;
Don’t open the door like so many before
Where the odor of dying still lingers.
But harness your gun and get ready to run
With a purpose that’s truly tenacious.
You’ll find your success if you don’t acquiesce
And your tactics are raw and audacious.
Believe what I say, by the breaking of day
You had better be high on a tether;
A place of retreat with a stash that’s complete
And be ready to fly like a feather.
Be mobile, be wise, and don’t look in their eyes
Just be nimble and quick on the trigger;
And pray that you’ll find some more of your kind
To pursue them with unflinching vigor.
Your knowledge and skill, to track and to kill,
Will leave them all brainless and bleeding.
At last if you’re strong you shall right what is wrong
And resume the old life you were leading.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(106) June 9, 2010: Crimson City Run
CRIMSON CITY RUN
We're raging raucous cotton candy
tripping into town,
We'll make the city melting down
our modus operandi.
They see us want to be us racing
twisty hipped and fine;
They'll take the change we bring to mind,
enjoy the piece we're chasing.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
We're raging raucous cotton candy
tripping into town,
We'll make the city melting down
our modus operandi.
They see us want to be us racing
twisty hipped and fine;
They'll take the change we bring to mind,
enjoy the piece we're chasing.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(105) June 8, 2010: Second Skin
SECOND SKIN
I've now been watching someone else's life
For twenty years inside my living space.
I see the image streaming from his cam
Attached by plastic straps beside his face.
I eaves-and-eye-drop every move he makes
Enchanted by the chances that he takes.
I've been disabled now for eighteen years;
I get my meals-on-wheels at my front door.
My lawyer blames the LifeCam engineers
My doctor hasn't seen this thing before
Will treat it as he would an OCD
But all the pills I take aren't helping me.
For now I sleep and wake in sync with him,
His gallivanting generosity's my own.
They're sending SecondSkin by EpiSym
For free, since I've become an LC-Clone.
My life with him is just about to start;
Together skin for skin and part for part.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Venus & Adonis Stanza
I've now been watching someone else's life
For twenty years inside my living space.
I see the image streaming from his cam
Attached by plastic straps beside his face.
I eaves-and-eye-drop every move he makes
Enchanted by the chances that he takes.
I've been disabled now for eighteen years;
I get my meals-on-wheels at my front door.
My lawyer blames the LifeCam engineers
My doctor hasn't seen this thing before
Will treat it as he would an OCD
But all the pills I take aren't helping me.
For now I sleep and wake in sync with him,
His gallivanting generosity's my own.
They're sending SecondSkin by EpiSym
For free, since I've become an LC-Clone.
My life with him is just about to start;
Together skin for skin and part for part.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Venus & Adonis Stanza
(104) June 7, 2010: Saggy & Silly & Sullen & Shy
SAGGY & SILLY & SULLEN & SHY
Saggy and Silly and Sullen and Shy,
Went out one night to look at the sky.
And Saggy said, “Look, there's a triplet that slants;
It looks like Orion is losing his pants.”
And Silly saw see-saws & spinners & springs,
And up from the south two piglets with wings.
And Sullen was struck by the black empty space,
With no stars at all (not even a trace).
And Shy dropped a spark in a little glass jar,
Not breathing a word of her wee shooting star.
For whatever we find in the sky overhead,
We’re certain to dream of (asleep in our bed)s.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
Saggy and Silly and Sullen and Shy,
Went out one night to look at the sky.
And Saggy said, “Look, there's a triplet that slants;
It looks like Orion is losing his pants.”
And Silly saw see-saws & spinners & springs,
And up from the south two piglets with wings.
And Sullen was struck by the black empty space,
With no stars at all (not even a trace).
And Shy dropped a spark in a little glass jar,
Not breathing a word of her wee shooting star.
For whatever we find in the sky overhead,
We’re certain to dream of (asleep in our bed)s.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
(103) June 6, 2010: Stalin's Girl
STALIN'S GIRL
Two cups and a saucer
Was all she was wearing,
Out walking with Chaucer O. Mega Three Herring,
Her fetish Komodo,
Misnomered by Stalin,
Her friend from Kyoto who’s half Guatemalan,
A quarter Icelandic,
A quarter to seven
Each morning eccentrically looks up to heaven
Repeating a passage
From Ovid in Latin,
Then down to her cleavage like folds of pure satin,
And bows to her beauty,
And kisses her shoulder,
And makes it his duty to have and to hold her.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
Two cups and a saucer
Was all she was wearing,
Out walking with Chaucer O. Mega Three Herring,
Her fetish Komodo,
Misnomered by Stalin,
Her friend from Kyoto who’s half Guatemalan,
A quarter Icelandic,
A quarter to seven
Each morning eccentrically looks up to heaven
Repeating a passage
From Ovid in Latin,
Then down to her cleavage like folds of pure satin,
And bows to her beauty,
And kisses her shoulder,
And makes it his duty to have and to hold her.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(102) June 5, 2010: Whiskey Cure
WHISKEY CURE
The mockingbird is singing in my brain,
That crazy bird is singing in my brain,
His lonely tune just like the midnight train.
My baby left me right past supper time,
She up and left me right past supper time,
She said she’s gone to lead a life of crime.
She’s tired of the way I earn my dough,
So tired of the way I burn my dough,
No money left to pay the debts I owe.
I know she’s riding down that midnight rail,
I can feel her riding by on that long rail,
She’s never coming back to tell the tale.
My baby took her love this time for sure,
And left me nothing but this whiskey cure.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Blues Sonnet
The mockingbird is singing in my brain,
That crazy bird is singing in my brain,
His lonely tune just like the midnight train.
My baby left me right past supper time,
She up and left me right past supper time,
She said she’s gone to lead a life of crime.
She’s tired of the way I earn my dough,
So tired of the way I burn my dough,
No money left to pay the debts I owe.
I know she’s riding down that midnight rail,
I can feel her riding by on that long rail,
She’s never coming back to tell the tale.
My baby took her love this time for sure,
And left me nothing but this whiskey cure.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Blues Sonnet
(101) June 4, 2010: A. C. Bacall
A. C. BACALL
The clockmaker giant called "Big Time" Bacall
Said, "Honey, our son is so minutely small
I think we should christen him
Anak Chronism
He's only as short as my long hand is tall.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Limerick
The clockmaker giant called "Big Time" Bacall
Said, "Honey, our son is so minutely small
I think we should christen him
Anak Chronism
He's only as short as my long hand is tall.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Limerick
(100) June 3, 2010: Lounging By The Fire
LOUNGING BY THE FIRE
The candle in the fireplace
Is melting like a cube of ice.
And sipping on the molten wax,
The yellow man in yellow slacks,
Keeps grinning as he drinks his fill
While there beside him Jelly Jill
Is sitting on a red hot coal
Enjoying hers in a golden bowl.
When down the chimney comes the rain,
A lightning rod and a weather vane,
A cloud, a whirlwind and a boat
And at the helm is Quotable Goat
Reciting William Shakespeare's best,
A sash of green across his chest.
He leaps from boat to piano keys
And starts to play in Japanese
Until the notes that no one knows
Like candles burning decompose
And all the guests swim off to beds
With paddle feet and feathered heads.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
The candle in the fireplace
Is melting like a cube of ice.
And sipping on the molten wax,
The yellow man in yellow slacks,
Keeps grinning as he drinks his fill
While there beside him Jelly Jill
Is sitting on a red hot coal
Enjoying hers in a golden bowl.
When down the chimney comes the rain,
A lightning rod and a weather vane,
A cloud, a whirlwind and a boat
And at the helm is Quotable Goat
Reciting William Shakespeare's best,
A sash of green across his chest.
He leaps from boat to piano keys
And starts to play in Japanese
Until the notes that no one knows
Like candles burning decompose
And all the guests swim off to beds
With paddle feet and feathered heads.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
(99) June 2, 2010: The Method
THE METHOD
And so and so the method carries on,
The delicate Corvette of curving stride,
The pure naiveté to doff and don.
The factory of novel sprouting spawn
Conveyor belts the raw resilient hide,
And so and so the method carries on.
The gears of motion turn from dusk to dawn,
And nightly carry in the Jekyll side;
The pure naiveté to doff and don.
The bells and whistles cheer the day undrawn
To draft the still unwieldy Rolls of pride,
And so and so the method carries on.
The engine bolted down in roaring brawn
Disturbs and stirs in search of spins untried;
The pure naiveté to doff and don.
At last the giant doors exhausted yawn
Releasing one more swift vestigial ride,
And so and so the method carries on,
The pure naiveté to doff and don.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Villanelle
And so and so the method carries on,
The delicate Corvette of curving stride,
The pure naiveté to doff and don.
The factory of novel sprouting spawn
Conveyor belts the raw resilient hide,
And so and so the method carries on.
The gears of motion turn from dusk to dawn,
And nightly carry in the Jekyll side;
The pure naiveté to doff and don.
The bells and whistles cheer the day undrawn
To draft the still unwieldy Rolls of pride,
And so and so the method carries on.
The engine bolted down in roaring brawn
Disturbs and stirs in search of spins untried;
The pure naiveté to doff and don.
At last the giant doors exhausted yawn
Releasing one more swift vestigial ride,
And so and so the method carries on,
The pure naiveté to doff and don.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Villanelle
(98) June 1, 2010: Balls
BALLS
I've got such balls to ask,
Why doesn't God do this or that?
The very balls He hung,
I use to flippantly combat
His cause-enormous Fatherhood,
And jibe as if I understood.
My swinging selfish pomp
Decides what's right or wrung from Him.
I drag Him off to school,
The One who clayed me at His whim,
Who sprung my skin & bone & breath,
And breathes me daily out of death.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
I've got such balls to ask,
Why doesn't God do this or that?
The very balls He hung,
I use to flippantly combat
His cause-enormous Fatherhood,
And jibe as if I understood.
My swinging selfish pomp
Decides what's right or wrung from Him.
I drag Him off to school,
The One who clayed me at His whim,
Who sprung my skin & bone & breath,
And breathes me daily out of death.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(97) May 31, 2010: Stardom
STARDOM
Exhibition’s station man
Voyeurism’s dancer girl
Met by chance on Platform’s ban
Breaking through the Crowd’s control
Looking out on Place’s past
Crooked Stallion’s took them fast
Suckled off to Actor’s cast
Dressed to kill with Ceiling’s fan
Paparazzi’s public swirl
Taking Innocent’s, "At last!"
This they knew and knew it well:
No one left the tale to tell.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
Exhibition’s station man
Voyeurism’s dancer girl
Met by chance on Platform’s ban
Breaking through the Crowd’s control
Looking out on Place’s past
Crooked Stallion’s took them fast
Suckled off to Actor’s cast
Dressed to kill with Ceiling’s fan
Paparazzi’s public swirl
Taking Innocent’s, "At last!"
This they knew and knew it well:
No one left the tale to tell.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(96) May 30, 2010: One On One
ONE ON ONE
There's always a story beneath the face,
The look on the lookers is not what it seems,
The rules of estrangement will not erase,
One guilty acquitted with masterful grace,
One innocent hung from the beams.
There's one in a million who chisels fear
And answers the mask of the hider no more,
Who steps from the crowd with a piercing leer,
One innocent fist that refuses to hear
One guilty unlocking the door.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
There's always a story beneath the face,
The look on the lookers is not what it seems,
The rules of estrangement will not erase,
One guilty acquitted with masterful grace,
One innocent hung from the beams.
There's one in a million who chisels fear
And answers the mask of the hider no more,
Who steps from the crowd with a piercing leer,
One innocent fist that refuses to hear
One guilty unlocking the door.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
(95) May 29, 2010: Arizona Scroll
ARIZONA SCROLL
I own a piece of Arizona,
The easy piece I took to ride,
A narrow strip of Arizona,
Only seven inches wide.
I rolled it up for when I'm older,
To play the memory of that day,
A shoulder soft for when I'm older,
Riding off in dreams away.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
I own a piece of Arizona,
The easy piece I took to ride,
A narrow strip of Arizona,
Only seven inches wide.
I rolled it up for when I'm older,
To play the memory of that day,
A shoulder soft for when I'm older,
Riding off in dreams away.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(94) May 28, 2010: Thousand Mile Ride
THOUSAND MILE RIDE
The full moon's rising on the open road
My bags are packed, my treasures stowed
My tank is full of golden fuel
The midnight sky is clear and cool
For a thousand mile ride.
My engine's tuned to a fine refrain
My headlights beam through the dark terrain
I've left behind the bleak and bland
To stretch my wheels across the land
For a thousand mile ride.
My riding boots are laced up tight
My helmet's snug and feels just right
The folks back home are safe and sound
I'm flying two feet off the ground
For a thousand mile ride.
I'll just be gone a day or two
To catch a glimpse of a wider view
It's hard to tell what I might find
But I'll be back with peace of mind
From a thousand mile ride.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
The full moon's rising on the open road
My bags are packed, my treasures stowed
My tank is full of golden fuel
The midnight sky is clear and cool
For a thousand mile ride.
My engine's tuned to a fine refrain
My headlights beam through the dark terrain
I've left behind the bleak and bland
To stretch my wheels across the land
For a thousand mile ride.
My riding boots are laced up tight
My helmet's snug and feels just right
The folks back home are safe and sound
I'm flying two feet off the ground
For a thousand mile ride.
I'll just be gone a day or two
To catch a glimpse of a wider view
It's hard to tell what I might find
But I'll be back with peace of mind
From a thousand mile ride.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Quintain Stanza
(93) May 27, 2010: Beyond Repair
BEYOND REPAIR
If you should find me crumpled in a heap
Beyond repair and very nearly dead,
My words erased by quickly coming sleep,
Please whisper gently as you hold my head
And tell me something I might want to know
Like, “Please don’t worry now, & please don’t dread.”
Remind me that this world is not my home
And soon with Jesus I will ever be;
Then dial 9-1-1, but do it slow.
Come ride along in back, and stay with me,
And if you would, please softly sing a hymn
Like “Morning by morning new mercies I see.”
And don't you cry; no sense in getting grim.
Just stay with me, and pray with me, and tell
Me all about the shining Seraphim
That soon will carry me to where they dwell
In feathered flight, no time to stop and grieve;
Hello, hello, and never more farewell.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Terza Rima
If you should find me crumpled in a heap
Beyond repair and very nearly dead,
My words erased by quickly coming sleep,
Please whisper gently as you hold my head
And tell me something I might want to know
Like, “Please don’t worry now, & please don’t dread.”
Remind me that this world is not my home
And soon with Jesus I will ever be;
Then dial 9-1-1, but do it slow.
Come ride along in back, and stay with me,
And if you would, please softly sing a hymn
Like “Morning by morning new mercies I see.”
And don't you cry; no sense in getting grim.
Just stay with me, and pray with me, and tell
Me all about the shining Seraphim
That soon will carry me to where they dwell
In feathered flight, no time to stop and grieve;
Hello, hello, and never more farewell.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Terza Rima
(92) May 26, 2010: Away
AWAY
A sharp and fancy jackknife jewel
She perches prim upon her stool
With leggings crossed she plays it cool
As all the boys confused with pain
Refreshed by her sweet dazzling rain
Keep circling circles round in vain
Not really knowing what they want
In jest and swagger nonchalant
While she with lonely-hearted flaunt
Just wishes one would stop and stay
And scoop her up in love's display
And walk her out the door—away.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
A sharp and fancy jackknife jewel
She perches prim upon her stool
With leggings crossed she plays it cool
As all the boys confused with pain
Refreshed by her sweet dazzling rain
Keep circling circles round in vain
Not really knowing what they want
In jest and swagger nonchalant
While she with lonely-hearted flaunt
Just wishes one would stop and stay
And scoop her up in love's display
And walk her out the door—away.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Monorhyme
(91) May 25, 2010: The Amphibious Flier
THE AMPHIBIOUS FLIER
I see a ship come sailing in,
A sculptured frigate long and thin;
Her body’s carved like a violin,
Her timbers tall
With windmill blades that spin
The blurring squall.
The gale blows hard and strong,
But lightly like a nursery song
The shining schooner flies along
Approaching land
As if terrestrially her wheels belong
Upon the sand.
And as I watch, she leaves the seas
To skim the beach and onward flees
Before the ever-chasing breeze;
A chariot now
Seduced along by unseen steeds
Before her prow.
Across the countryside she goes,
Her motion serpentinely flows
As deep within her neck their glows
A brightening flame
Of blooming energetic rose
That none can tame.
And as I watch, her sterns ignite,
Her double sterns now rocket bright,
Careening to a stellar height
In one swift arc;
And left behind her streaking flight—
A question mark.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Burns Stanza
I see a ship come sailing in,
A sculptured frigate long and thin;
Her body’s carved like a violin,
Her timbers tall
With windmill blades that spin
The blurring squall.
The gale blows hard and strong,
But lightly like a nursery song
The shining schooner flies along
Approaching land
As if terrestrially her wheels belong
Upon the sand.
And as I watch, she leaves the seas
To skim the beach and onward flees
Before the ever-chasing breeze;
A chariot now
Seduced along by unseen steeds
Before her prow.
Across the countryside she goes,
Her motion serpentinely flows
As deep within her neck their glows
A brightening flame
Of blooming energetic rose
That none can tame.
And as I watch, her sterns ignite,
Her double sterns now rocket bright,
Careening to a stellar height
In one swift arc;
And left behind her streaking flight—
A question mark.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Burns Stanza
(90) May 24, 2010: Acquittal
ACQUITTAL
I woke up late and walked outside
To take a look around.
Though nearly noon my cast-off pride
Still lay upon the ground
Just where I'd left it late last night
When first I let it go.
The look of it was thin and slight,
A latticework of snow.
I picked it up and tried it on
But it had shrunk so small,
I swallowed it with half a yawn
And one quick swig of gall.
I felt a wave within my chest
Of something leaving me,
A swift exchange of hornet's nest
For hushed tranquility.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
I woke up late and walked outside
To take a look around.
Though nearly noon my cast-off pride
Still lay upon the ground
Just where I'd left it late last night
When first I let it go.
The look of it was thin and slight,
A latticework of snow.
I picked it up and tried it on
But it had shrunk so small,
I swallowed it with half a yawn
And one quick swig of gall.
I felt a wave within my chest
Of something leaving me,
A swift exchange of hornet's nest
For hushed tranquility.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(89) May 23, 2010: The Astronaut Stripper
THE ASTRONAUT STRIPPER
The astronaut stripper confessed,
"My zero-gravity breasts
May flatten I fear
In the atmosphere,
So please let's get on with these tests."
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Limerick
The astronaut stripper confessed,
"My zero-gravity breasts
May flatten I fear
In the atmosphere,
So please let's get on with these tests."
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Limerick
Saturday, November 27, 2010
(88) May 22, 2010: Reach
REACH
I have eleven thousand verbs
That I can chose to Do.
I give the cue, the brain perturbs
The nervous system stew,
And all at once I'm doing just
The verb I thought about,
With no real time to think-adjust
Before the action's out.
But if I switch the mode to Speech.
Allowing just pretend,
When I say "reach" I do not reach
Though mental arms extend.
What is this act I did not do?
What difference did it make?
Is there a meaning to construe?
Is anything at stake?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
I have eleven thousand verbs
That I can chose to Do.
I give the cue, the brain perturbs
The nervous system stew,
And all at once I'm doing just
The verb I thought about,
With no real time to think-adjust
Before the action's out.
But if I switch the mode to Speech.
Allowing just pretend,
When I say "reach" I do not reach
Though mental arms extend.
What is this act I did not do?
What difference did it make?
Is there a meaning to construe?
Is anything at stake?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(87) May 21, 2010: The Allergic Novitiate
THE ALLERGIC NOVITIATE
The allergic novitiate Katherine Quinn,
Began her vow of silence again
Whenever she sneezed,
Falling down on her knees
Crying, "Bless me Father for I have sinned!"
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Limerick
The allergic novitiate Katherine Quinn,
Began her vow of silence again
Whenever she sneezed,
Falling down on her knees
Crying, "Bless me Father for I have sinned!"
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Limerick
(86) May 20, 2010: One Dimension Up
ONE DIMENSION UP
Let's say for sake of argument
That like a map which signifies
A territory not itself,
This earth of ours beneath blue skies,
This habitat we call our home,
Is just a map of someplace else—
Some Kubla Kahn, some pleasure dome,
Just one dimension up the stair
From map to globe, and globe to there.
And if our supposition's true,
That This is just a map of That,
Then every stone and leaf and face
Is pointing off to where it's at,
An emblematic metaphor
Of some immense uncharted place;
Degrees of freedom to explore
Beyond our tethered flesh and bone,
A field of vision still unknown.
What follows then from this new view,
This paradigm of shifted scale?
How should we move toward this new light
From our topography of Braille?
How would a two-dimension man
Imagine climbing, jumping, flight,
Beguiled within his diagram?
If we would go, then let's begin
By asking God to change our skin.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
Let's say for sake of argument
That like a map which signifies
A territory not itself,
This earth of ours beneath blue skies,
This habitat we call our home,
Is just a map of someplace else—
Some Kubla Kahn, some pleasure dome,
Just one dimension up the stair
From map to globe, and globe to there.
And if our supposition's true,
That This is just a map of That,
Then every stone and leaf and face
Is pointing off to where it's at,
An emblematic metaphor
Of some immense uncharted place;
Degrees of freedom to explore
Beyond our tethered flesh and bone,
A field of vision still unknown.
What follows then from this new view,
This paradigm of shifted scale?
How should we move toward this new light
From our topography of Braille?
How would a two-dimension man
Imagine climbing, jumping, flight,
Beguiled within his diagram?
If we would go, then let's begin
By asking God to change our skin.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(85) May 19, 2010: H2
H2
It’s colorless, odorless, tastelessly bland,
But makes up three-quarters of all that’s at hand.
It’s solid by land, and liquid by sea;
You breathe it in you and I breathe it in me,
There isn’t a place where a Hydrogen’s not
No matter how cold, no matter how hot,
No matter how far, no matter how near
There’s even a Hydrogen stuck in your ear.
It’s made of just one tiny proton of stuff
And a speedy electron that give it some fluff.
Wherever you go you’ll find Hydrogen there,
And wherever there’s one, you’ll find it’s a pair.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
It’s colorless, odorless, tastelessly bland,
But makes up three-quarters of all that’s at hand.
It’s solid by land, and liquid by sea;
You breathe it in you and I breathe it in me,
There isn’t a place where a Hydrogen’s not
No matter how cold, no matter how hot,
No matter how far, no matter how near
There’s even a Hydrogen stuck in your ear.
It’s made of just one tiny proton of stuff
And a speedy electron that give it some fluff.
Wherever you go you’ll find Hydrogen there,
And wherever there’s one, you’ll find it’s a pair.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
(84) May 18, 2010: Construction 3: Flying Keyboard
CONSTRUCTION 3: FLYING KEYBOARD
Unfold your laptop till it breaks in half,
Then burn the screen with Kerosene
And don’t feel badly if you laugh.
Then get a tube of gold, a tube of green,
And carefully on every key
Paint brand new symbols never seen.
Encrust the rest with reddish two's & three's,
Then left & right attach a kite
And fly it on a Florida breeze,
And keep it flying high by lantern light,
Between a calf & a giraffe
Until the middle of the night.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
Unfold your laptop till it breaks in half,
Then burn the screen with Kerosene
And don’t feel badly if you laugh.
Then get a tube of gold, a tube of green,
And carefully on every key
Paint brand new symbols never seen.
Encrust the rest with reddish two's & three's,
Then left & right attach a kite
And fly it on a Florida breeze,
And keep it flying high by lantern light,
Between a calf & a giraffe
Until the middle of the night.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(83) May 17, 2010: Protection
PROTECTION
Protection is the platinum I crave,
To stay the grief and chain the beasts of pain;
And if robust enough, to misbehave
Without a consequence to entertain;
Immunity from any poor result;
A place to thumb my nose as I exult.
If only pure impunity were mine,
A Teflon coating thick and slick as ice
That no contrived suspicion could malign,
No finger pointing out some minor vice,
But free & clear and sailing through the fray,
I’d glide the gauntlet’s maze like child's play.
Indemnify me, mollify me, stage
A coup d'état before they pick the lock
Of my encrypted antiviral cage.
Let none approach me, no one knock
Or tap or tamper with my crystal calm,
No agitator cockle my aplomb.
Protection is the platinum I choose
To thwart the silver rounds of circumstance,
That will not ever fail to always lose
While I outwit the sloppy rules of chance.
I’ll flirt with every game that can be swayed,
Completely safe within my masquerade.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem #83
Venus & Adonis Stanza
Protection is the platinum I crave,
To stay the grief and chain the beasts of pain;
And if robust enough, to misbehave
Without a consequence to entertain;
Immunity from any poor result;
A place to thumb my nose as I exult.
If only pure impunity were mine,
A Teflon coating thick and slick as ice
That no contrived suspicion could malign,
No finger pointing out some minor vice,
But free & clear and sailing through the fray,
I’d glide the gauntlet’s maze like child's play.
Indemnify me, mollify me, stage
A coup d'état before they pick the lock
Of my encrypted antiviral cage.
Let none approach me, no one knock
Or tap or tamper with my crystal calm,
No agitator cockle my aplomb.
Protection is the platinum I choose
To thwart the silver rounds of circumstance,
That will not ever fail to always lose
While I outwit the sloppy rules of chance.
I’ll flirt with every game that can be swayed,
Completely safe within my masquerade.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem #83
Venus & Adonis Stanza
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
(82) May 16, 2010: Steerage
STEERAGE
Hello there Captain Burton, Sir,
I never thought you’d stoop to this.
Why aren’t you topside wearing fur
And sipping bubbly, kiss by kiss,
With your propitious dilettante
Who surely knows just what you want?
I can’t believe you’d climb down here
Below the decks of decadence
To chew the fat and bend an ear
With all us bums-in-residence.
We tip our gallon jugs of rum
And take our women as they come.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Daffodils Stanza
Hello there Captain Burton, Sir,
I never thought you’d stoop to this.
Why aren’t you topside wearing fur
And sipping bubbly, kiss by kiss,
With your propitious dilettante
Who surely knows just what you want?
I can’t believe you’d climb down here
Below the decks of decadence
To chew the fat and bend an ear
With all us bums-in-residence.
We tip our gallon jugs of rum
And take our women as they come.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Daffodils Stanza
(81) May 15, 2010: The Manuscript
THE MANUSCRIPT
If only I could find the manuscript
I buried underneath the house last spring
Inside a freezer bag both locked and zipped
All strung up snug with fifteen yards of string
And duck taped thick with two full rolls of tape—
A silver bullet brick of dynamite
To blast a ragged crack for my escape
From Dawdle South to Northern Expedite—
I'd be the happy man I thought I'd be
When way back when I first imagined it,
And sweet significance would shine on me.
I'd have the very thing to set me free
To grant myself the laurels of legit
And humbly cede to my celebrity.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Sonnet
If only I could find the manuscript
I buried underneath the house last spring
Inside a freezer bag both locked and zipped
All strung up snug with fifteen yards of string
And duck taped thick with two full rolls of tape—
A silver bullet brick of dynamite
To blast a ragged crack for my escape
From Dawdle South to Northern Expedite—
I'd be the happy man I thought I'd be
When way back when I first imagined it,
And sweet significance would shine on me.
I'd have the very thing to set me free
To grant myself the laurels of legit
And humbly cede to my celebrity.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Sonnet
(80) May 14, 2010: Folgers Forever
FOLGERS FOREVER
A coffee cart somehow came loose
And started rolling down the street.
The guy in charge, Barista Bruce,
His latte loving Marguerite
All French and kissing him hello,
Was unaware until he heard
The homeless cowboy yelling, “Whoa!”
And saw the cart just crossing Third.
He left that latte loving mouth
And dashed down Main in tragic haste,
While overhead and flying south
A flock of geese no time to waste
Descended on that coffee cart
And lifted it with honks of glee
Like some surreal performance art
Ignoring Bruce’s frenzied plea,
“Come back you geese! That’s all I own!
That’s all I have for Marguerite!”
Just then he felt his mobile phone,
It was a tender touching tweet
From his true love just two blocks back.
Her text went, “Darling, don’t you fret,
For kissing French, you’ve got the knack,
There’s always money we can get.
But what we’ve got cannot be bought.”
The second tweet, “I’ll marry you,
If you’ll just bring a coffee pot;
I’ve got some Folgers we can brew.”
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
A coffee cart somehow came loose
And started rolling down the street.
The guy in charge, Barista Bruce,
His latte loving Marguerite
All French and kissing him hello,
Was unaware until he heard
The homeless cowboy yelling, “Whoa!”
And saw the cart just crossing Third.
He left that latte loving mouth
And dashed down Main in tragic haste,
While overhead and flying south
A flock of geese no time to waste
Descended on that coffee cart
And lifted it with honks of glee
Like some surreal performance art
Ignoring Bruce’s frenzied plea,
“Come back you geese! That’s all I own!
That’s all I have for Marguerite!”
Just then he felt his mobile phone,
It was a tender touching tweet
From his true love just two blocks back.
Her text went, “Darling, don’t you fret,
For kissing French, you’ve got the knack,
There’s always money we can get.
But what we’ve got cannot be bought.”
The second tweet, “I’ll marry you,
If you’ll just bring a coffee pot;
I’ve got some Folgers we can brew.”
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(79) May 13, 2010: The Drowned Cathedral
THE DROWNED CATHEDRAL
Adrift in my craft on the after-storm ocean,
The clouds have departed, the moon's nearly full,
While Betelgeuse, Bellatrix, Rigel and Saiph,
(The limbs of Orion) unmoved by the motion
Of little disturbances, tiny distortions,
From where their important celestial events,
In sync with the turning of seasonal shifts,
Hold fast to their golden indwelling proportions;
I suddenly find in a moonlit enchantment
The sunken cathedral immersed in the flood,
My eyes disbelieving, my mind welling joy;
I've found the safe harbor, the place of pure moment,
Unsinkably solidly founded on something
Akin to the four in the heavens above—
A cross in the sky with a Trinity nave,
A cross in the sea with the power to save.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
Adrift in my craft on the after-storm ocean,
The clouds have departed, the moon's nearly full,
While Betelgeuse, Bellatrix, Rigel and Saiph,
(The limbs of Orion) unmoved by the motion
Of little disturbances, tiny distortions,
From where their important celestial events,
In sync with the turning of seasonal shifts,
Hold fast to their golden indwelling proportions;
I suddenly find in a moonlit enchantment
The sunken cathedral immersed in the flood,
My eyes disbelieving, my mind welling joy;
I've found the safe harbor, the place of pure moment,
Unsinkably solidly founded on something
Akin to the four in the heavens above—
A cross in the sky with a Trinity nave,
A cross in the sea with the power to save.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(78) May 12, 2010: Something Slow
SOMETHING SLOW
Dear God, Your majesty, Your highness stands
Much higher than
The orders of our ego-smitten world
In self so curled
That not unless You cut us free, unwrap
Our arms that strap
Our selves within ourselves all tethered sick
Of living quick...
We long for something slow and pure and true
Like loving You.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
Dear God, Your majesty, Your highness stands
Much higher than
The orders of our ego-smitten world
In self so curled
That not unless You cut us free, unwrap
Our arms that strap
Our selves within ourselves all tethered sick
Of living quick...
We long for something slow and pure and true
Like loving You.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
(77) May 11, 2010: Promised Land
PROMISED LAND
Here in the basket like Moses in Egypt,
a life papyritious about to begin,
There on the shore stepping into the river
a princessly maiden with fairest of skin,
Bathing and beautiful, muse for the boy
who oblivious floats toward a fate unforeseen;
Orphaned elusively, swaddled in secrecy,
soon to be son of Hatshepsut the Queen.
Who is Hatshepsut, and who is this Moses,
and what is this river of fate called the Nile?
Let me be Moses, and you be Hatshepsut,
and let’s call the river the Digital File.
Out of the river and into the desert
to wander my people for forty long years;
Never to step into Canaan’s immensity
seen from the mountain through penitent tears.
Where is this desert and who are my people
and why must I stand on a mountain and grieve?
Speech is my desert, and Words are my people;
projecting my voice toward a future I leave
Up in the air and down for the count where there’s
more of the Mystery and less of the Truth,
Where all the King’s horses and all the King’s men
have drowned in their visions unschooled and uncouth.
Dying on Nebo, old Moses was shown just a
glimpse of the world he would never command.
This is my moment of seeing the future
and knowing for me there is no Promised Land.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
Here in the basket like Moses in Egypt,
a life papyritious about to begin,
There on the shore stepping into the river
a princessly maiden with fairest of skin,
Bathing and beautiful, muse for the boy
who oblivious floats toward a fate unforeseen;
Orphaned elusively, swaddled in secrecy,
soon to be son of Hatshepsut the Queen.
Who is Hatshepsut, and who is this Moses,
and what is this river of fate called the Nile?
Let me be Moses, and you be Hatshepsut,
and let’s call the river the Digital File.
Out of the river and into the desert
to wander my people for forty long years;
Never to step into Canaan’s immensity
seen from the mountain through penitent tears.
Where is this desert and who are my people
and why must I stand on a mountain and grieve?
Speech is my desert, and Words are my people;
projecting my voice toward a future I leave
Up in the air and down for the count where there’s
more of the Mystery and less of the Truth,
Where all the King’s horses and all the King’s men
have drowned in their visions unschooled and uncouth.
Dying on Nebo, old Moses was shown just a
glimpse of the world he would never command.
This is my moment of seeing the future
and knowing for me there is no Promised Land.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
(76) May 10, 2010: A Quartet Of Double Dactyls Loosely Coiled Around James Watson & Francis Crick
A QUARTET OF DOUBLE DACTYLS
LOOSELY COILED AROUND
JAMES WATSON & FRANCIS CRICK
I
Hicketty-Picketty
Watson-and-Crick-ity
Never was meant to be
Holy as Grail;
Etiological
Cytopathology
Often comes down to a
Head or a Tail.
II
Back-in-Oz, Back-in-Oz,
Jimmy D. Watson was
Hiding behind the old
Curtain of tricks;
Not very nobly said,
“Deoxyribonu-
cleic was mine only
Mine it’s not Crick’s.”
III
Hobbity-Nobbity
M. H. F. Wilkins’
UV microscopy
Gave them a thrill;
Watson & Crick took a
Look and got hooked on the
Biogeometry,
Wilkins got nil.
IV
Barney-has-Bernie-has
Alfred no belly has
Watson & Crick are the
Ones who got phat;
Appetites hungry for
Sesquipedalian
Acids and Bases and
Dishes like that.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Double Dactyl
LOOSELY COILED AROUND
JAMES WATSON & FRANCIS CRICK
I
Hicketty-Picketty
Watson-and-Crick-ity
Never was meant to be
Holy as Grail;
Etiological
Cytopathology
Often comes down to a
Head or a Tail.
II
Back-in-Oz, Back-in-Oz,
Jimmy D. Watson was
Hiding behind the old
Curtain of tricks;
Not very nobly said,
“Deoxyribonu-
cleic was mine only
Mine it’s not Crick’s.”
III
Hobbity-Nobbity
M. H. F. Wilkins’
UV microscopy
Gave them a thrill;
Watson & Crick took a
Look and got hooked on the
Biogeometry,
Wilkins got nil.
IV
Barney-has-Bernie-has
Alfred no belly has
Watson & Crick are the
Ones who got phat;
Appetites hungry for
Sesquipedalian
Acids and Bases and
Dishes like that.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Double Dactyl
(75) May 9, 2010: A Synopsis of Sons
A SYNOPSIS OF SONS
It was the 30th of May in 1952
That Davey Dreekis full of wisdom
made his way to you,
And you became a mother.
And then on the 9th of March in 1954
Tommy Tinkle Toe Rabbit began
to challenge and explore
The outer limits like no other.
And then on the 9th of August in 1956
Bobby Bacchus came out of the African
jungle and into the mix;
A tender son and brother.
But the 29th of August in 1959
Was the auspicious day that the light
of Donny Dinkis began to shine!
What mother could need another?
Today is the 9th of May in 2010
Your labors are over and no one will ever
expect you to do it again—
So why all the fuss and the bother?
Because you’re the best of all mothers,
And we as your four faithful sons,
Are surely the luckiest ones
Among the most fortunate few
To be blessed with a mother like you!
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
It was the 30th of May in 1952
That Davey Dreekis full of wisdom
made his way to you,
And you became a mother.
And then on the 9th of March in 1954
Tommy Tinkle Toe Rabbit began
to challenge and explore
The outer limits like no other.
And then on the 9th of August in 1956
Bobby Bacchus came out of the African
jungle and into the mix;
A tender son and brother.
But the 29th of August in 1959
Was the auspicious day that the light
of Donny Dinkis began to shine!
What mother could need another?
Today is the 9th of May in 2010
Your labors are over and no one will ever
expect you to do it again—
So why all the fuss and the bother?
Because you’re the best of all mothers,
And we as your four faithful sons,
Are surely the luckiest ones
Among the most fortunate few
To be blessed with a mother like you!
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(74) May 8, 2010: The Swimmer
THE SWIMMER
The naked swimmer backstrokes up the bay,
At peace with all the sky and all the sea,
In deep repose upon the surface sway.
Discretely bundled on a rock the small cache
Of clothes implies a comeback guarantee,
As the naked swimmer backstrokes up the bay.
A figure on the cliff not far away
Commands a view of the swimmer pure and free,
In deep repose upon the surface sway.
The water’s arms still warm at end of day
Suggest delirious eternity,
As the naked swimmer backstrokes up the bay.
The figure climbing down evokes dismay,
And waving calls the swimmer, with a windswept plea,
In deep repose upon the surface sway.
Then dropping down as if to pray,
The figure falls in fierce calamity,
As the naked swimmer backstrokes up the bay
In deep repose upon the surface sway.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Villanelle
The naked swimmer backstrokes up the bay,
At peace with all the sky and all the sea,
In deep repose upon the surface sway.
Discretely bundled on a rock the small cache
Of clothes implies a comeback guarantee,
As the naked swimmer backstrokes up the bay.
A figure on the cliff not far away
Commands a view of the swimmer pure and free,
In deep repose upon the surface sway.
The water’s arms still warm at end of day
Suggest delirious eternity,
As the naked swimmer backstrokes up the bay.
The figure climbing down evokes dismay,
And waving calls the swimmer, with a windswept plea,
In deep repose upon the surface sway.
Then dropping down as if to pray,
The figure falls in fierce calamity,
As the naked swimmer backstrokes up the bay
In deep repose upon the surface sway.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Villanelle
(73) May 7, 2010: Driving Directions
DRIVING DIRECTIONS
Maps are not the territories,
Tales are not the stories.
What we've seen of what we're telling,
Witnessed and compelling,
Is at best approximation,
One interpretation.
Prime reality is ever
Caught behind endeavor,
Our unconscious mind redressing
All that it's confessing;
What we know's been conjugated
With the words we've stated.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
Maps are not the territories,
Tales are not the stories.
What we've seen of what we're telling,
Witnessed and compelling,
Is at best approximation,
One interpretation.
Prime reality is ever
Caught behind endeavor,
Our unconscious mind redressing
All that it's confessing;
What we know's been conjugated
With the words we've stated.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
(72) May 6, 2010: No Anthem's Blaze
NO ANTHEM'S BLAZE
I hear there's something chain link fence
About those trust fund guys,
No matter how their codes condense
There's still no room to rise.
And since their beveled edging glass
Outshines their golden ring,
They have no wink to move en masse,
No anthem's blaze to bring.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
I hear there's something chain link fence
About those trust fund guys,
No matter how their codes condense
There's still no room to rise.
And since their beveled edging glass
Outshines their golden ring,
They have no wink to move en masse,
No anthem's blaze to bring.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(71) May 5, 2010: Dyne & Dash
DYNE & DASH
Let's dyne on some cognitive joules,
And chew on reality's rules,
Just slice up the Gordian Knot,
And nuke it right here on the spot,
Let why be the coming because,
And here be the dream that once was.
It's time to dash out of this place,
Escape from the old data base,
Leap into the quantum of things,
Thread silicon needles with strings,
Release our old Icarus fear,
And fly the new tip of our spear.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
Let's dyne on some cognitive joules,
And chew on reality's rules,
Just slice up the Gordian Knot,
And nuke it right here on the spot,
Let why be the coming because,
And here be the dream that once was.
It's time to dash out of this place,
Escape from the old data base,
Leap into the quantum of things,
Thread silicon needles with strings,
Release our old Icarus fear,
And fly the new tip of our spear.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rhyming Couplets
(70) May 4, 2010: The Cursor's Touch
THE CURSOR’S TOUCH
If I traverse the strange canals of Mars,
Or dive the Marianna Trench—online;
If with my cursor I finesse the stars,
Imagineering nerve to joule to dyne
In ways fantastical to Newton’s mind,
Unproved by academics in their chairs,
Who say what can and can’t be thus combined,
Should I defer, descend to splitting hairs?
Or should I just admit that I don’t know
The whys and wherefores of this orphic art,
Concede my grasp statistically below
Their knowledge of the periodic chart,
And wave them off like a unified field of gnats,
Back to their boxes of Schrodinger Cats?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Shakespearean Sonnet
If I traverse the strange canals of Mars,
Or dive the Marianna Trench—online;
If with my cursor I finesse the stars,
Imagineering nerve to joule to dyne
In ways fantastical to Newton’s mind,
Unproved by academics in their chairs,
Who say what can and can’t be thus combined,
Should I defer, descend to splitting hairs?
Or should I just admit that I don’t know
The whys and wherefores of this orphic art,
Concede my grasp statistically below
Their knowledge of the periodic chart,
And wave them off like a unified field of gnats,
Back to their boxes of Schrodinger Cats?
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Shakespearean Sonnet
(69) May 3, 2010: Half-Daddy Birthday
HALF-DADDY BIRTHDAY
Today you're half your Daddy's age,
Which means you're relatively sage;
You're half as prudent, half as wise
And half of every other gauge
By which maturity is sized.
You're half for real and half disguised,
Prestigiously, just half as ranked.
You're half brand new and half revised,
You're half as honored, half as thanked,
But half as likely to get spanked.
So count your blessings on both hands
Today you're getting piggy-banked
For nothing special but your plans
To do your best as life demands
And know your Daddy understands
'Cause he's the truest of your fans.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rubaiyat Stanza
Today you're half your Daddy's age,
Which means you're relatively sage;
You're half as prudent, half as wise
And half of every other gauge
By which maturity is sized.
You're half for real and half disguised,
Prestigiously, just half as ranked.
You're half brand new and half revised,
You're half as honored, half as thanked,
But half as likely to get spanked.
So count your blessings on both hands
Today you're getting piggy-banked
For nothing special but your plans
To do your best as life demands
And know your Daddy understands
'Cause he's the truest of your fans.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Rubaiyat Stanza
(68) May 2, 2010: Under The Midnight Sun
UNDER THE MIDNIGHT SUN
There really isn't that much more to do;
This planet earth of ours,
A dot among the stars,
Is just the aftermath of nothing new.
There's food and drink in endless sweet supply;
A spoon of caviar
By candlelit guitar,
Or keep-it-simple moonlit apple pie.
There's passage you can buy to anywhere,
From here to NYC,
So fleet of foot and free,
Until the globe's been played like solitarie.
There's money to be made in suitcase lots
To spend on fancy goods
And upscale neighborhoods
All tied up tight in ribbon glitter knots.
There's power to wield and posts of enviable fame;
A corner penthouse view
Defines just who is who,
And everything comes down to place and name.
There comes a time when everything's been done;
The bucket list's complete,
What's left is just repeat
The same old loopy loops under the midnght sun.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
There really isn't that much more to do;
This planet earth of ours,
A dot among the stars,
Is just the aftermath of nothing new.
There's food and drink in endless sweet supply;
A spoon of caviar
By candlelit guitar,
Or keep-it-simple moonlit apple pie.
There's passage you can buy to anywhere,
From here to NYC,
So fleet of foot and free,
Until the globe's been played like solitarie.
There's money to be made in suitcase lots
To spend on fancy goods
And upscale neighborhoods
All tied up tight in ribbon glitter knots.
There's power to wield and posts of enviable fame;
A corner penthouse view
Defines just who is who,
And everything comes down to place and name.
There comes a time when everything's been done;
The bucket list's complete,
What's left is just repeat
The same old loopy loops under the midnght sun.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(67) May 1, 2010: A Latte In Your Honor
A LATTE IN YOUR HONOR
A latte in your honor my old friend,
In memory of the memories we have made;
The years have rolled, but love admits no end.
The ancient canvas cannot help but fade,
And neural pathways lose their sharpened groove—
The memory of the memories we have made.
The wind and rain a mountain may remove,
Or rivers carve a canyon through the rock,
While neural pathways lose their sharpened groove
Through ages lost in drought, and blown with chalk,
Refreshing rain no more than thristy dreams
Of rivers carving canyons through the rock.
But now I see you here unchanged it seems,
The living proof that friends endure, although
Refreshing rain, no more than thirsty dreams,
Have vanished into times of long ago.
A latte in your honor my old friend;
You're living proof that friends endure although
The years have rolled—that love admits no end.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Terzanelle
A latte in your honor my old friend,
In memory of the memories we have made;
The years have rolled, but love admits no end.
The ancient canvas cannot help but fade,
And neural pathways lose their sharpened groove—
The memory of the memories we have made.
The wind and rain a mountain may remove,
Or rivers carve a canyon through the rock,
While neural pathways lose their sharpened groove
Through ages lost in drought, and blown with chalk,
Refreshing rain no more than thristy dreams
Of rivers carving canyons through the rock.
But now I see you here unchanged it seems,
The living proof that friends endure, although
Refreshing rain, no more than thirsty dreams,
Have vanished into times of long ago.
A latte in your honor my old friend;
You're living proof that friends endure although
The years have rolled—that love admits no end.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Terzanelle
(66) April 30, 2010: Roofs Of Siena
ROOFS OF SIENA
O take me away to the roofs of Siena,
Alone in a window of memories lost.
Away in the distance the Torre del Mangia
Looms as it did in those days long ago.
Remembering you, and feeling as though
This place where our paths in a yesterday crossed,
May cross once again in the dark streets below.
It wasn't quite here, but I'm sure it was close,
This view from this window seems nearly the same.
And hidden from view the Piazza del Campo
Where strolling we first ever spoke of desire,
Pledging our hearts the true love they require;
A moment in time with no adequate name,
Something like air mixed with laughter and fire.www
O take me away to the roofs of Siena,
And let me remember your beautiful face.
We tossed silver coins in the blue Fonte Gaia
Not telling the secrets we knew that we shared,
Chasing in haste to our haven prepared
In a room with a window, a night to embrace,
To burn in our memories a time uncompared.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
O take me away to the roofs of Siena,
Alone in a window of memories lost.
Away in the distance the Torre del Mangia
Looms as it did in those days long ago.
Remembering you, and feeling as though
This place where our paths in a yesterday crossed,
May cross once again in the dark streets below.
It wasn't quite here, but I'm sure it was close,
This view from this window seems nearly the same.
And hidden from view the Piazza del Campo
Where strolling we first ever spoke of desire,
Pledging our hearts the true love they require;
A moment in time with no adequate name,
Something like air mixed with laughter and fire.www
O take me away to the roofs of Siena,
And let me remember your beautiful face.
We tossed silver coins in the blue Fonte Gaia
Not telling the secrets we knew that we shared,
Chasing in haste to our haven prepared
In a room with a window, a night to embrace,
To burn in our memories a time uncompared.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Novel Verse Form
(65) April 29, 2010: The FAce
THE FACE
I was out in the woods on the mountainside
Just looking around at the place.
It was close to my home on the other side
Of what they've been calling, "The Face,"
Since some locals reported a curious stone
Resembling Sigmund Freud.
But to me it resembled the pelvic bone
Of a counterfeit alienoid.
I had taken some pictures and mailed them on
To my contact at ArcheType,
Then decided to bushwhack for possible spawn
But figured the story was hype.
Then I heard a sound like the tapping of nails
From a customer waiting too long,
Or the plotting of evil as in the dark tales
Where the dragons and demons belong.
All at once I determined to head for home,
With a shiver of dread through my veins,
For I saw on my left a silvery dome
That was covered all over with chains.
As I turned to run, a chain caught my leg
And I fell with a thud on the ground.
Then the chain pulled me into that colorless egg
Where inside I was silenced and bound.
After seemingly hours alone in the dark,
A most radiant creature appeared;
Like a woman in beauty, but stern and stark,
A commander respected and feared.
As a mother her infant, she lifted me up
And cradled me close to her chest.
To my lips she presented a red-rimmed cup
That I drank till my mind was at rest.
Then she whispered a word in my somnolent ear,
A word of maternal embrace,
And I knew I had come to the final frontier,
For that wonderful word was, “Grace.”
And she kissed my lips and lay me down
Just a bundle of boyish pride
And I woke in my bed in our little town
Tucked away on a mountainside.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
I was out in the woods on the mountainside
Just looking around at the place.
It was close to my home on the other side
Of what they've been calling, "The Face,"
Since some locals reported a curious stone
Resembling Sigmund Freud.
But to me it resembled the pelvic bone
Of a counterfeit alienoid.
I had taken some pictures and mailed them on
To my contact at ArcheType,
Then decided to bushwhack for possible spawn
But figured the story was hype.
Then I heard a sound like the tapping of nails
From a customer waiting too long,
Or the plotting of evil as in the dark tales
Where the dragons and demons belong.
All at once I determined to head for home,
With a shiver of dread through my veins,
For I saw on my left a silvery dome
That was covered all over with chains.
As I turned to run, a chain caught my leg
And I fell with a thud on the ground.
Then the chain pulled me into that colorless egg
Where inside I was silenced and bound.
After seemingly hours alone in the dark,
A most radiant creature appeared;
Like a woman in beauty, but stern and stark,
A commander respected and feared.
As a mother her infant, she lifted me up
And cradled me close to her chest.
To my lips she presented a red-rimmed cup
That I drank till my mind was at rest.
Then she whispered a word in my somnolent ear,
A word of maternal embrace,
And I knew I had come to the final frontier,
For that wonderful word was, “Grace.”
And she kissed my lips and lay me down
Just a bundle of boyish pride
And I woke in my bed in our little town
Tucked away on a mountainside.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(64) April 28, 2010: Sheriff Stan Sniff
SHERIFF STAN SNIFF
Sheriff Stan Sniff,
Needs only the slightest whiff,
To find the grizzly scene of the crime,
And collars the criminal every time.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Clerihew
Sheriff Stan Sniff,
Needs only the slightest whiff,
To find the grizzly scene of the crime,
And collars the criminal every time.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Clerihew
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
(63) April 27, 2010: Not An Astronaut
NOT AN ASTRONAUT
I could not be an astronaut
No matter how I'd like to;
I'm more adept at diddlysquat,
And places I can hike to.
Aboard the shuttle I would freak
Just thinking I could die there.
I'd really have to hugely tweak
A job where I just lie there
Looking out the window at
The earth so far below me,
Hoping that I don't go splat
If parachutes won't slow me.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #63
Ballad Meter
I could not be an astronaut
No matter how I'd like to;
I'm more adept at diddlysquat,
And places I can hike to.
Aboard the shuttle I would freak
Just thinking I could die there.
I'd really have to hugely tweak
A job where I just lie there
Looking out the window at
The earth so far below me,
Hoping that I don't go splat
If parachutes won't slow me.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #63
Ballad Meter
(62) April 26, 2010: Autonomic Weapon
AUTONOMIC WEAPON
I'm wired up with reflex loops
So powerfully tenacious,
That all the armies, all the troops,
No matter how predacious,
Could stand and threaten me with death,
In torturous rendition,
And yet at my next halting breath
I'd cough without volition.
And that would be my last cough coughed,
My final itching itched,
My autonomics molotoved
By Vyacheslav Mikhailovich.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #62
Ballad Meter
I'm wired up with reflex loops
So powerfully tenacious,
That all the armies, all the troops,
No matter how predacious,
Could stand and threaten me with death,
In torturous rendition,
And yet at my next halting breath
I'd cough without volition.
And that would be my last cough coughed,
My final itching itched,
My autonomics molotoved
By Vyacheslav Mikhailovich.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #62
Ballad Meter
(61) April 25, 2010: C. S. Lewis
C. S. LEWIS
Clive Staples Lewis
Most certainly knew his
Holistic devotion to Aslan and Tash,
Would offer a dualistic dipping of cash.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #61
Clerihew
Clive Staples Lewis
Most certainly knew his
Holistic devotion to Aslan and Tash,
Would offer a dualistic dipping of cash.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #61
Clerihew
(60) April 24, 2010: The Old Telescope
THE OLD TELESCOPE
I found the old telescope under the chair.
I looked all around, but no one was there.
I lifted the scope for an eye full of stare,
And heard a thin voice from out of thin air.
I heard the voice say, "You'd better beware.
Before you start gazing, you'd better prepare.
A Time Telescoper may give you a scare
Unless you're a man who can do and can dare."
"I am," I replied. "And in truth I declare,
The future is something I'm ready to square,
To tie up its braid in a ribbon with flair,
And let it reveal every step, every stair,
All the way down from here to where
I'm sitting alone in a telescope chair,
Watching the future I knew wasn't fair,
Finding myself the unfortunate heir
Of a Time Telescoper beyond all compare.
But now it's become an alarming affair,
I see myself watching me looped in despair;
Finding that telescope under that chair,
Looking around to find nobody there,
Lifting the scope to my eye for the rare
Glimpse of Future that none can repair.
I wish I had taken the Time to prepare.
I can't stop me watching myself isn't there.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #60
Monorhyme
I found the old telescope under the chair.
I looked all around, but no one was there.
I lifted the scope for an eye full of stare,
And heard a thin voice from out of thin air.
I heard the voice say, "You'd better beware.
Before you start gazing, you'd better prepare.
A Time Telescoper may give you a scare
Unless you're a man who can do and can dare."
"I am," I replied. "And in truth I declare,
The future is something I'm ready to square,
To tie up its braid in a ribbon with flair,
And let it reveal every step, every stair,
All the way down from here to where
I'm sitting alone in a telescope chair,
Watching the future I knew wasn't fair,
Finding myself the unfortunate heir
Of a Time Telescoper beyond all compare.
But now it's become an alarming affair,
I see myself watching me looped in despair;
Finding that telescope under that chair,
Looking around to find nobody there,
Lifting the scope to my eye for the rare
Glimpse of Future that none can repair.
I wish I had taken the Time to prepare.
I can't stop me watching myself isn't there.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #60
Monorhyme
(59) April 23, 2010: The Puppet's Question
THE PUPPET’S QUESTION
There once was a puppet named Drew,
Who wanted to know if I knew,
“Without all these strings,
Would I do all these things?
And if you were like me, would you?”
"It's hard to admit, but it's true,
I'm sure I'm a lot like you.
I can't see the strings,
But I do lots of things
That really, I don't want to do."
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #59
Limerick Stanza
There once was a puppet named Drew,
Who wanted to know if I knew,
“Without all these strings,
Would I do all these things?
And if you were like me, would you?”
"It's hard to admit, but it's true,
I'm sure I'm a lot like you.
I can't see the strings,
But I do lots of things
That really, I don't want to do."
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #59
Limerick Stanza
(58) April 22, 2010: Here & Now
HERE & NOW
No matter what the Fates allow,
Come lonely sorrow, pain or fear;
One truth remains: it’s always now,
And God is always here.
No matter what the Future brings,
Your failing flesh can persevere;
“It’s always now,” your spirit sings,
“And God is always here.”
Whenever thoughts of death assail,
And shadows press so very near;
It’s always now—in Christ prevail—
Your God is always here.
And when in Glory 'round His thrown,
Where all is light in every sphere;
It will be now, as you have known,
And God is always here.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #58
Ballad Meter
No matter what the Fates allow,
Come lonely sorrow, pain or fear;
One truth remains: it’s always now,
And God is always here.
No matter what the Future brings,
Your failing flesh can persevere;
“It’s always now,” your spirit sings,
“And God is always here.”
Whenever thoughts of death assail,
And shadows press so very near;
It’s always now—in Christ prevail—
Your God is always here.
And when in Glory 'round His thrown,
Where all is light in every sphere;
It will be now, as you have known,
And God is always here.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #58
Ballad Meter
(57) April 21, 2010: The Animal Alphabet
THE ANIMAL ALPHABET
If you were as strong as a tiny ant,
You could carry a car, but I bet you can’t.
If you were a beetle fat and round,
You’d fly from the grass with a buzzing sound.
If you were as quick as an alley cat,
Instead of a ball you’d be catching a rat.
If you were a dog with a noisy bark,
You’d never again be afraid of the dark.
If an elephant had a nose like you,
He’d need a long straw to drink water through.
If, like a frog, you could jump real high,
You could leap over trees, and not even try.
If you ran out of grass for your pet goat,
He’d settle for boots and an overcoat.
If you had hair like the mane on a horse,
You wouldn’t go back to the barber, of course.
If you were a gentleman’s pet iguana,
He’d buy you a necklace and name you Rashawna.
If you were a jellyfish out in the sea,
Not jelly, not fish, but a plankton you’d be.
If you were a kingsnake, you would be king.
But a queen for a kingsnake? No such thing!
If you were a lion, Lord of the Pride,
You'd never be scared or have to hide.
If you like bananas and swing by your tail,
That makes you a monkey instead of a whale.
If you were a newt you'd live in a bog;
You'd look like a lizard but act like a frog.
If an octopus wanted to roller skate,
Two wouldn't do, he'd have to use eight.
If you're hearing an echo of just what you said,
It could be the parrot perched on your head.
If you were a bee-egg who ate Royal Jelly,
You’ve grown to be Queen Bee with eggs in your belly.
If you ate some stew and they said it was "Rabbit,"
Would eating that stew be your regular habit?
If you were a snail with one foot and a shell,
Your footprint would look like a slick line of gel.
If it is your 200th birthday today,
I’ll bet you’re the turtle who lives in the bay.
If you were a horse with a long sharp horn,
You’d live only in myths—you’re a unicorn.
If you were a vulture, circling the sky,
You’d be waiting for some poor creature to die.
If you are a warthog, of bacon you’re made;
Two tusks and a snout in the African shade.
If a swimming fish skeleton is in your aquarium,
It’s an x-ray fish; no need to bury him.
If you were a yak, a tall shaggy beast,
On high mountain grasses you’d happily feast.
If you were a zebra with white stripes and black,
You wouldn’t let cowboys ride on your back.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #57
Rhyming Couplets
If you were as strong as a tiny ant,
You could carry a car, but I bet you can’t.
If you were a beetle fat and round,
You’d fly from the grass with a buzzing sound.
If you were as quick as an alley cat,
Instead of a ball you’d be catching a rat.
If you were a dog with a noisy bark,
You’d never again be afraid of the dark.
If an elephant had a nose like you,
He’d need a long straw to drink water through.
If, like a frog, you could jump real high,
You could leap over trees, and not even try.
If you ran out of grass for your pet goat,
He’d settle for boots and an overcoat.
If you had hair like the mane on a horse,
You wouldn’t go back to the barber, of course.
If you were a gentleman’s pet iguana,
He’d buy you a necklace and name you Rashawna.
If you were a jellyfish out in the sea,
Not jelly, not fish, but a plankton you’d be.
If you were a kingsnake, you would be king.
But a queen for a kingsnake? No such thing!
If you were a lion, Lord of the Pride,
You'd never be scared or have to hide.
If you like bananas and swing by your tail,
That makes you a monkey instead of a whale.
If you were a newt you'd live in a bog;
You'd look like a lizard but act like a frog.
If an octopus wanted to roller skate,
Two wouldn't do, he'd have to use eight.
If you're hearing an echo of just what you said,
It could be the parrot perched on your head.
If you were a bee-egg who ate Royal Jelly,
You’ve grown to be Queen Bee with eggs in your belly.
If you ate some stew and they said it was "Rabbit,"
Would eating that stew be your regular habit?
If you were a snail with one foot and a shell,
Your footprint would look like a slick line of gel.
If it is your 200th birthday today,
I’ll bet you’re the turtle who lives in the bay.
If you were a horse with a long sharp horn,
You’d live only in myths—you’re a unicorn.
If you were a vulture, circling the sky,
You’d be waiting for some poor creature to die.
If you are a warthog, of bacon you’re made;
Two tusks and a snout in the African shade.
If a swimming fish skeleton is in your aquarium,
It’s an x-ray fish; no need to bury him.
If you were a yak, a tall shaggy beast,
On high mountain grasses you’d happily feast.
If you were a zebra with white stripes and black,
You wouldn’t let cowboys ride on your back.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #57
Rhyming Couplets
(56) April 20, 2010: Alias Face
ALIAS FACE
I wonder if a man can change his name,
And if he changed it, what his face would do?
But I, not knowing how, have stayed the same.
To call a fire something not a flame,
Like looking through a different lens, may skew;
I wonder if a man can change his name?
The felon wanting to avoid his blame,
May banish who his prosecutors knew,
But I, not knowing how, have stayed the same.
Can twisting labels really turn the game,
Or is it what it is, both P and Q?
I wonder if a man can change his name?
The singularity of starring fame
May take an alias for its debut,
But I, not knowing how, have stayed the same.
I daily face my crimes and eat my shame,
With no one else but me to pin it to.
I wonder if a man can change his name;
But I, not knowing how, have stayed the same.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #56
Villanelle
I wonder if a man can change his name,
And if he changed it, what his face would do?
But I, not knowing how, have stayed the same.
To call a fire something not a flame,
Like looking through a different lens, may skew;
I wonder if a man can change his name?
The felon wanting to avoid his blame,
May banish who his prosecutors knew,
But I, not knowing how, have stayed the same.
Can twisting labels really turn the game,
Or is it what it is, both P and Q?
I wonder if a man can change his name?
The singularity of starring fame
May take an alias for its debut,
But I, not knowing how, have stayed the same.
I daily face my crimes and eat my shame,
With no one else but me to pin it to.
I wonder if a man can change his name;
But I, not knowing how, have stayed the same.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #56
Villanelle
(55) April 19, 2010: All Night Jam
ALL NIGHT JAM
2200
Hello to this my all night jam;
I’m starting here from where I am.
It’s ten o’clock and all is well,
Room one-thirteen just bid farewell
And sits already down by grace,
All tears of joy in Jesus’ face.
I’m not quite sure if fires of hell
Burn now or not, but time will tell.
My motivation to believe
I hope remains a bit naïve
Because the more I try to squeeze
The doubt, the less my spirit sees.
2245
Hello to this, hello to that,
Hello to where the music’s at.
I want to sing the circle round,
My footsore soul on grassy ground,
To dance like Adam for his Eve,
Her eyes a glossy quick qui vive,
And mine intent to know her wish
To have me swim her angelfish
As far upstream as it can go
To find the meaning of “to know,”
To learn the Braille of flesh and blood,
To do our blooming, bud for bud.
2345
Hello to this sweet night of ease,
And getting paid for expertise
Not needed when the problems solve
So easily, and troubles all dissolve
In effervescent bubble-ash
And blow their suds to sate the trash.
I’ve rounded once to every floor
Establishing a snap rapport.
The usual superstition’s gone,
And “quiet” needn’t be withdrawn
Or knocked-on-wood or quickly shushed,
Because tonight, we won’t be rushed.
0030
Prolific and audacious are
The words I’ll make my double star,
The guiding principle of this,
A day to fathom just what is,
And just what might have been
Or what might be if I begin
To tell the things I see and sense,
The things that ask for recompense.
I’ve got the time; I’ll take the stairs,
I’ll check to see if someone cares
That in these hours of easy work
The simple needs of living lurk.
0100
Its one A.M. and only six
Emergencies of pick-up sticks
Are counting gurney-minute sweeps
As at the desk the dozer sleeps;
His basal metabolic rate
Shrugs off a caffeinated state
And in agreement nods his way
From late at night to early day.
And who am I to shake my head?
And who am I to wake the dead?
Tonight we’ll love our very best,
We’ll take our time, enjoy our rest.
0145
Amiri Baraka, you’re pretty good,
You’d do much better than Al Young would,
If staying alert and being alive
Depended upon your black-lash jive.
You know the hip hop flip of the tongue
But can’t compete with Mister Young
In cool sophisticated calm
The kind that might defuse the bomb
And bring the White Man to his knees
To ask forgiveness, if you please.
You’re still a fighter, round fifteen,
A greased-up lightning war machine.
0300
For those who sleep the night is brief,
For those awake the night’s a thief,
Come sneaking in to steal their piece
Of what it is they must release
If ever they are going to heal
Resume their lives of sweat and steel,
Enjoy the fruits of work and play
To live like kings for another day.
The woman who awoke in pain
Just now, just needed to explain
A thing or two of such and such—
And one unspoken need for touch.
0430
At half past six that triple shot
Was just the thing to hit the spot,
To energize my foggy brain
And shift me into my domain
Of cool collected leadership,
Just grab the wheel and let ‘er rip!
But now ten hours down the line
My empire’s in a steep decline,
It once was vast and powerful
But now is small and sorrowful,
And no amount of stimulant
Will get me back to full percent.
0530
It’s data-gathering time again;
Distill the atoms from the skin
Of some two hundred mouths
Pronouncing each their morning vows
To get themselves a clean report
Or pay some devil at last resort
To get them out of here by noon
Or if not then, then make it soon.
And now I sit me down to count,
To tell the Day what Night’s about,
To tally beds still occupied
And sketch the plot of those who died.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #55
Rhyming Couplets
2200
Hello to this my all night jam;
I’m starting here from where I am.
It’s ten o’clock and all is well,
Room one-thirteen just bid farewell
And sits already down by grace,
All tears of joy in Jesus’ face.
I’m not quite sure if fires of hell
Burn now or not, but time will tell.
My motivation to believe
I hope remains a bit naïve
Because the more I try to squeeze
The doubt, the less my spirit sees.
2245
Hello to this, hello to that,
Hello to where the music’s at.
I want to sing the circle round,
My footsore soul on grassy ground,
To dance like Adam for his Eve,
Her eyes a glossy quick qui vive,
And mine intent to know her wish
To have me swim her angelfish
As far upstream as it can go
To find the meaning of “to know,”
To learn the Braille of flesh and blood,
To do our blooming, bud for bud.
2345
Hello to this sweet night of ease,
And getting paid for expertise
Not needed when the problems solve
So easily, and troubles all dissolve
In effervescent bubble-ash
And blow their suds to sate the trash.
I’ve rounded once to every floor
Establishing a snap rapport.
The usual superstition’s gone,
And “quiet” needn’t be withdrawn
Or knocked-on-wood or quickly shushed,
Because tonight, we won’t be rushed.
0030
Prolific and audacious are
The words I’ll make my double star,
The guiding principle of this,
A day to fathom just what is,
And just what might have been
Or what might be if I begin
To tell the things I see and sense,
The things that ask for recompense.
I’ve got the time; I’ll take the stairs,
I’ll check to see if someone cares
That in these hours of easy work
The simple needs of living lurk.
0100
Its one A.M. and only six
Emergencies of pick-up sticks
Are counting gurney-minute sweeps
As at the desk the dozer sleeps;
His basal metabolic rate
Shrugs off a caffeinated state
And in agreement nods his way
From late at night to early day.
And who am I to shake my head?
And who am I to wake the dead?
Tonight we’ll love our very best,
We’ll take our time, enjoy our rest.
0145
Amiri Baraka, you’re pretty good,
You’d do much better than Al Young would,
If staying alert and being alive
Depended upon your black-lash jive.
You know the hip hop flip of the tongue
But can’t compete with Mister Young
In cool sophisticated calm
The kind that might defuse the bomb
And bring the White Man to his knees
To ask forgiveness, if you please.
You’re still a fighter, round fifteen,
A greased-up lightning war machine.
0300
For those who sleep the night is brief,
For those awake the night’s a thief,
Come sneaking in to steal their piece
Of what it is they must release
If ever they are going to heal
Resume their lives of sweat and steel,
Enjoy the fruits of work and play
To live like kings for another day.
The woman who awoke in pain
Just now, just needed to explain
A thing or two of such and such—
And one unspoken need for touch.
0430
At half past six that triple shot
Was just the thing to hit the spot,
To energize my foggy brain
And shift me into my domain
Of cool collected leadership,
Just grab the wheel and let ‘er rip!
But now ten hours down the line
My empire’s in a steep decline,
It once was vast and powerful
But now is small and sorrowful,
And no amount of stimulant
Will get me back to full percent.
0530
It’s data-gathering time again;
Distill the atoms from the skin
Of some two hundred mouths
Pronouncing each their morning vows
To get themselves a clean report
Or pay some devil at last resort
To get them out of here by noon
Or if not then, then make it soon.
And now I sit me down to count,
To tell the Day what Night’s about,
To tally beds still occupied
And sketch the plot of those who died.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #55
Rhyming Couplets
(54) April 18, 2010: My Little Medley
MY LITTLE MEDLEY
The numbered scaffold built for this façade
Has thirty thousand six eight two connections.
I’m eighteen thousand four nine six toward God,
With just twelve thousand one eight six odd questions,
To ask His instant-answer measuring rod,
Before I add to His pure golden sections,
All fractalled neat within His omni-quad,
My little medley for His vast collections.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #54
Novel Verse Form
The numbered scaffold built for this façade
Has thirty thousand six eight two connections.
I’m eighteen thousand four nine six toward God,
With just twelve thousand one eight six odd questions,
To ask His instant-answer measuring rod,
Before I add to His pure golden sections,
All fractalled neat within His omni-quad,
My little medley for His vast collections.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #54
Novel Verse Form
Friday, November 12, 2010
(53) April 17, 2010: Recital
RECITAL
She's learned to play it wrong so well,
I've promised not to tell.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #53
Epigram
She's learned to play it wrong so well,
I've promised not to tell.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #53
Epigram
(52) April 16, 2010: The Joneses
THE JONESES
Everybody’s got their brand of cool,
Looking out their window silly eyes,
Sipping up their private label fuel,
Screen play acting out their numbers pool,
Betting through derivatives of size,
Faintly risking their Pyritic Rule,
All dressed rightly up in their disguise,
Plagiarizing Einstein’s Nobel Prize.
Each in soulful anguish tiptoes past,
Hoping not to wake the jester’s dream.
This is all they know that may not last,
All that may not be though it may seem.
Mutually they feign this casual air,
Flawlessly pretending not to stare.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #52
Sonnet
Everybody’s got their brand of cool,
Looking out their window silly eyes,
Sipping up their private label fuel,
Screen play acting out their numbers pool,
Betting through derivatives of size,
Faintly risking their Pyritic Rule,
All dressed rightly up in their disguise,
Plagiarizing Einstein’s Nobel Prize.
Each in soulful anguish tiptoes past,
Hoping not to wake the jester’s dream.
This is all they know that may not last,
All that may not be though it may seem.
Mutually they feign this casual air,
Flawlessly pretending not to stare.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #52
Sonnet
(51) April 15, 2010: Oral Tradition
ORAL TRADITION
It's all about oral tradition.
Assume the mnemonic position:
It has to be said
So it sticks in the head,
If crafting a quote's your ambition.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #51
Limerick
It's all about oral tradition.
Assume the mnemonic position:
It has to be said
So it sticks in the head,
If crafting a quote's your ambition.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #51
Limerick
(50) April 14, 2010: Lava Tube
LAVA TUBE
Cavern’s dark
Little spark
Water still
Air is chill
All alone
In the stone
Underground
Not a sound
Lost my way
One more day
I’ll survive
If I dive
Water’s deep
Walls are steep
Hold my breath
Life or death
Kick my feet
No retreat
This is it
Never quit
Aching chest
Air obsessed
Light at last
Faster fast
Reaching through
Overdue
Fainting now
Know not how
All is lost
Pay the cost
Sudden splash
Brilliant flash
Living air
Everywhere
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #50
Rhyming Couplets
Cavern’s dark
Little spark
Water still
Air is chill
All alone
In the stone
Underground
Not a sound
Lost my way
One more day
I’ll survive
If I dive
Water’s deep
Walls are steep
Hold my breath
Life or death
Kick my feet
No retreat
This is it
Never quit
Aching chest
Air obsessed
Light at last
Faster fast
Reaching through
Overdue
Fainting now
Know not how
All is lost
Pay the cost
Sudden splash
Brilliant flash
Living air
Everywhere
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #50
Rhyming Couplets
(49) April 13, 2010: Night Shift Blues
NIGHT SHIFT BLUES
I worked all night, I slept all day,
I didn’t get a chance to play,
And now it’s night again.
When I got up the sun went down;
There’s not a blinkin’ soul around;
I think I’ll ring a friend.
But all my friends are sound asleep,
And those awake are counting sheep;
I’m stuck here all alone.
I’ll watch a movie (hope it’s long);
I’ll sing myself a sanguine song,
And sit here by the phone.
And if I’m lucky you might call
To say you just can’t sleep at all
And would I care to chat.
But then just as I’d start to speak
You’d do that snoring snorkeling squeak,
And fall asleep—like that!
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #49
Novel Verse Form
I worked all night, I slept all day,
I didn’t get a chance to play,
And now it’s night again.
When I got up the sun went down;
There’s not a blinkin’ soul around;
I think I’ll ring a friend.
But all my friends are sound asleep,
And those awake are counting sheep;
I’m stuck here all alone.
I’ll watch a movie (hope it’s long);
I’ll sing myself a sanguine song,
And sit here by the phone.
And if I’m lucky you might call
To say you just can’t sleep at all
And would I care to chat.
But then just as I’d start to speak
You’d do that snoring snorkeling squeak,
And fall asleep—like that!
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #49
Novel Verse Form
(48) April 12, 2010: Abide With Me
ABIDE WITH ME
Saved by the Father’s gift of wondrous grace;
Raised from my sleep to see Thy shining face;
Life everlasting, Lord, with Thee I’ll spend;
Praising Thy name in glory without end.
So in this hope I live from day to day,
Knowing that Thou wilt keep me in Thy way;
Not life nor death, nor any other thing,
Can separate us, O my Lord and King.
I gladly pledge my life to this good news
If Thou wilt send, I never will refuse;
Thou, Christ, my Savior, rest I find in Thee,
My joy is full if Thou abide with me.
D. Edgar Lamp
Additional verses to the hymn by Henry Francis Lyte, 1847
www.TheDailyPoem.org #48
Hymn Lyrics
Saved by the Father’s gift of wondrous grace;
Raised from my sleep to see Thy shining face;
Life everlasting, Lord, with Thee I’ll spend;
Praising Thy name in glory without end.
So in this hope I live from day to day,
Knowing that Thou wilt keep me in Thy way;
Not life nor death, nor any other thing,
Can separate us, O my Lord and King.
I gladly pledge my life to this good news
If Thou wilt send, I never will refuse;
Thou, Christ, my Savior, rest I find in Thee,
My joy is full if Thou abide with me.
D. Edgar Lamp
Additional verses to the hymn by Henry Francis Lyte, 1847
www.TheDailyPoem.org #48
Hymn Lyrics
(47) April 11, 2010: Among Thieves
AMONG THIEVES
Before your pyromantic dancers
Resume their gyroscopic waltz,
Before their esoteric answers
Confute this con’s agnostic faults;
I’ll find an ordinary hustler
Who wants to make an honest buck,
And call the hardest working rustler
To steal me blind and call me schmuck.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
Before your pyromantic dancers
Resume their gyroscopic waltz,
Before their esoteric answers
Confute this con’s agnostic faults;
I’ll find an ordinary hustler
Who wants to make an honest buck,
And call the hardest working rustler
To steal me blind and call me schmuck.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org
Ballad Meter
(46) April 10, 2010: The Fourth Flight
THE FOURTH FLIGHT
A helicopter built for one
Was parked beside a golden tent;
The note attached read, “Just For Fun.”
The envelope, “Informed Consent.”
The box was labeled, “Cinnamon Bun.”
And I arrived with great delight,
Not knowing why or whose intent,
But leaped aboard and took my flight.
The blue propellers blithely spun
And braved me through a swift ascent,
Till landing in a spot of sun
I asked myself, “To what extent
Have you gone mad or come undone?”
You’ve gentled on this towering height
Beside a glider’s soon descent…”
I leaped aboard and took my flight.
I lofted out through evening sun,
A serpentine of timing spent,
Until at last though just begun
I wafted in on slick cement
With visions clearly all-for-one.
But there a pontoon flier kite
Enticed me with its wind-filled vent:
I leaped aboard and took my flight.
Just as I made my sea-wing run,
There drew beside me slow and light,
The Giant Osprey Diver sent—
I leaped aboard and took my flight.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #46
Ballade
A helicopter built for one
Was parked beside a golden tent;
The note attached read, “Just For Fun.”
The envelope, “Informed Consent.”
The box was labeled, “Cinnamon Bun.”
And I arrived with great delight,
Not knowing why or whose intent,
But leaped aboard and took my flight.
The blue propellers blithely spun
And braved me through a swift ascent,
Till landing in a spot of sun
I asked myself, “To what extent
Have you gone mad or come undone?”
You’ve gentled on this towering height
Beside a glider’s soon descent…”
I leaped aboard and took my flight.
I lofted out through evening sun,
A serpentine of timing spent,
Until at last though just begun
I wafted in on slick cement
With visions clearly all-for-one.
But there a pontoon flier kite
Enticed me with its wind-filled vent:
I leaped aboard and took my flight.
Just as I made my sea-wing run,
There drew beside me slow and light,
The Giant Osprey Diver sent—
I leaped aboard and took my flight.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #46
Ballade
(45) April 9, 2010: Magic Catch
MAGIC CATCH
Catch a bit of downtime for me,
Lay it on me thick and quick.
Take a minute to explore me,
Try to talk what makes me tick.
Give your shoes a hefty kick,
Upload giggles to adore me.
Maybe we can slight a trick,
Hand an answer whether stormy,
Whether not your clothing tore me,
Made me dizzy dealing sick,
Not to mention please ignore me
If I drop my magic stick.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #45
Novel Verse Form
Catch a bit of downtime for me,
Lay it on me thick and quick.
Take a minute to explore me,
Try to talk what makes me tick.
Give your shoes a hefty kick,
Upload giggles to adore me.
Maybe we can slight a trick,
Hand an answer whether stormy,
Whether not your clothing tore me,
Made me dizzy dealing sick,
Not to mention please ignore me
If I drop my magic stick.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #45
Novel Verse Form
Thursday, November 11, 2010
(44) April 8, 2010: The Place
THE PLACE
I’ve been to love a time or two,
But all my lovers proved untrue.
They say, “Third time’s the charm,” and I
Believe the truth those words imply,
Though not the number’s magic square,
And not the charm’s encircling flair,
But this, and only this, I know:
We’ve found the place true lovers go.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #44
Rhyming Couplets
I’ve been to love a time or two,
But all my lovers proved untrue.
They say, “Third time’s the charm,” and I
Believe the truth those words imply,
Though not the number’s magic square,
And not the charm’s encircling flair,
But this, and only this, I know:
We’ve found the place true lovers go.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #44
Rhyming Couplets
(43) April 7, 2010: Heads Will Roll
HEADS WILL ROLL
You pretty maidens watch your heads,
Or someone cruel and evil will.
Don’t leave your fate to Chance’s roll,
Nor think that Time will safely roll
From year to year around your heads,
Like moons their orbits ever will.
Your Queen, whose lost her beauty will,
Her jealous rampage on a roll,
Surveil the curls upon your heads,
And your sweet maiden heads will roll.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #43
Tritina
You pretty maidens watch your heads,
Or someone cruel and evil will.
Don’t leave your fate to Chance’s roll,
Nor think that Time will safely roll
From year to year around your heads,
Like moons their orbits ever will.
Your Queen, whose lost her beauty will,
Her jealous rampage on a roll,
Surveil the curls upon your heads,
And your sweet maiden heads will roll.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #43
Tritina
(42) April 6, 2010: Construction 2: Pebble On The Eiffel Tower
CONSTRUCTION 2: PEBBLE ON THE EIFFEL TOWER
Start with a pebble the size of your thumb,
Paint it with Skin-Of-A-Plum,
Dab it with juice
All sticky and green,
Feathers of goose,
And one string bean.
Take it to Paris and climb every stair,
Clear to the top but beware,
Eiffel is tall
And balance a trick.
Don't let it fall,
Just make it stick.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #42
Novel Verse Form
Start with a pebble the size of your thumb,
Paint it with Skin-Of-A-Plum,
Dab it with juice
All sticky and green,
Feathers of goose,
And one string bean.
Take it to Paris and climb every stair,
Clear to the top but beware,
Eiffel is tall
And balance a trick.
Don't let it fall,
Just make it stick.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #42
Novel Verse Form
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
(41) April 5, 2010: Sweet Mr. 243
SWEET MR. 243
More bodies than souls,
More partials than wholes,
A higher percentage of dying;
Each hospital bed
Holds living and dead,
Or those who lie patiently trying.
I feel it tonight,
It's wrong and it's right,
It's something too empty to see.
And try as we did,
We nailed down the lid
On sweet Mr. 243.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #41
Novel Verse Form
More bodies than souls,
More partials than wholes,
A higher percentage of dying;
Each hospital bed
Holds living and dead,
Or those who lie patiently trying.
I feel it tonight,
It's wrong and it's right,
It's something too empty to see.
And try as we did,
We nailed down the lid
On sweet Mr. 243.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #41
Novel Verse Form
(40) April 4, 2010: Trash Duty
TRASH DUTY
I carried out the trash
Just like I'd done a thousand times before,
But there behind a bin I found a cache
Of unused open doors.
The one marked Reverie
I chose, and stepped across and through,
And there detached in boyish ecstasy
I roamed the morning's dew.
Investment's coorway called
To me, as if to say, "How much, kind sir?"
I gave him five, "But are you sure?" he stalled,
"I will ten-fold confer."
Another door named Friend
I found, and with suspicion warily passed,
Unsure of who might be the one to end
My woe, and would it last?
I carried in the trash
Unlike I'd ever thought to do before,
And left behind that bin no hidden cache
Of unused open doors.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #40
To A Waterfowl Stanza
I carried out the trash
Just like I'd done a thousand times before,
But there behind a bin I found a cache
Of unused open doors.
The one marked Reverie
I chose, and stepped across and through,
And there detached in boyish ecstasy
I roamed the morning's dew.
Investment's coorway called
To me, as if to say, "How much, kind sir?"
I gave him five, "But are you sure?" he stalled,
"I will ten-fold confer."
Another door named Friend
I found, and with suspicion warily passed,
Unsure of who might be the one to end
My woe, and would it last?
I carried in the trash
Unlike I'd ever thought to do before,
And left behind that bin no hidden cache
Of unused open doors.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #40
To A Waterfowl Stanza
(39) April 3, 2010: Pop
POP
Mayhem carves the brain,
Damage no one tells,
Strappled scars remain,
Stronger grow the spells.
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop, Pop, Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun.
Darkness burning bright,
Pixel studded glare,
Cold returning fright,
Frozen-blooded stare.
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop, Pop, Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun.
Stabbing shackled cries,
Curled within the game,
Raging hackles rise,
Coaxing sin by name.
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop, Pop, Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #39
Novel Verve Form
Mayhem carves the brain,
Damage no one tells,
Strappled scars remain,
Stronger grow the spells.
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop, Pop, Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun.
Darkness burning bright,
Pixel studded glare,
Cold returning fright,
Frozen-blooded stare.
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop, Pop, Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun.
Stabbing shackled cries,
Curled within the game,
Raging hackles rise,
Coaxing sin by name.
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop, Pop, Pop-of-the-gun,
Pop-of-the-gun.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #39
Novel Verve Form
(38) April 2, 2010: China Mae Paisley
CHINA MAE PAISLEY
This is the story of China Mae Paisley who
traded her flute for a bottle of rum.
Went to the harbor to meet a young sailor but
sadly discovered his ship hadn't come.
Sat by the ocean remembering music and
watching the sunset through eyes filled with tears.
Back on the mountain that guarded the harbor
she cried every night for eleven long years.
Loving him ever and only she stayed on her
mountain and honored his memory alone.
Finally determined to sail from the harbor she
gathered her courage to face the unknown.
Found her young sailor asleep on the pier for an
old drunken beggar is what he'd become.
This is the story of China Mae Paisley who
left him her love in a bottle of rum.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #38
Rhyming Couplets
This is the story of China Mae Paisley who
traded her flute for a bottle of rum.
Went to the harbor to meet a young sailor but
sadly discovered his ship hadn't come.
Sat by the ocean remembering music and
watching the sunset through eyes filled with tears.
Back on the mountain that guarded the harbor
she cried every night for eleven long years.
Loving him ever and only she stayed on her
mountain and honored his memory alone.
Finally determined to sail from the harbor she
gathered her courage to face the unknown.
Found her young sailor asleep on the pier for an
old drunken beggar is what he'd become.
This is the story of China Mae Paisley who
left him her love in a bottle of rum.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #38
Rhyming Couplets
Monday, November 8, 2010
(37) April 1, 2010: My Daily Love
MY DAILY LOVE
My daily love, I feel you first before
My eyes have even opened on the day.
Your quiet arm resonds as if to say,
"I'm here with you whatever lies in store
For us; it may be less, it may be more,
Or maybe just enough for one brief day.
I'm here with you, if you'll just lead the way,
And stay the man I breathlessly adore."
I hear your slippered footsteps in the room,
With grace preparing my necessities.
Your presence lifts the lingering midnight gloom,
And rolls me out of bed upon my knees
To thank the Lord for a life so amply blessed.
And of His blessings, you remain the best.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #37
Sonnet
My daily love, I feel you first before
My eyes have even opened on the day.
Your quiet arm resonds as if to say,
"I'm here with you whatever lies in store
For us; it may be less, it may be more,
Or maybe just enough for one brief day.
I'm here with you, if you'll just lead the way,
And stay the man I breathlessly adore."
I hear your slippered footsteps in the room,
With grace preparing my necessities.
Your presence lifts the lingering midnight gloom,
And rolls me out of bed upon my knees
To thank the Lord for a life so amply blessed.
And of His blessings, you remain the best.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #37
Sonnet
(36) March 31, 2010: Bon Fire Place
BON FIRE PLACE
I framed my house with two by fours
And covered them with fur.
I set the windows, hung the doors,
And called myself monsieur.
I built a bon inside the fire,
A fire inside the place,
And all the people called me sire
but laughed behind my face.
The house collapsed in flame and ash,
The people scofffed and said,
"I hope you've got some petty cash,
You're bankrupt in your head."
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #36
Ballad Meter
I framed my house with two by fours
And covered them with fur.
I set the windows, hung the doors,
And called myself monsieur.
I built a bon inside the fire,
A fire inside the place,
And all the people called me sire
but laughed behind my face.
The house collapsed in flame and ash,
The people scofffed and said,
"I hope you've got some petty cash,
You're bankrupt in your head."
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #36
Ballad Meter
(35) March 30, 2010: The Dragon Slayer's Dream
THE DRAGON SLAYER'S DREAM
Over and under and onto the lips of a
cinnamon whisper repeating my name,
Lying in treasure retrieved from the dragon who
ranges no longer with sulfurous flame,
Bathed in the sweetness of feminine wonder and
drunk with the splendor of victory's fame,
Bring me the night with a draft of intoxicants
poured by the hand of a delicate dame.
Mine is the somnolent comfort of warriors who
back from their battles just barely alive,
Bandaged and soothed by remarkable maidens whose
natural endowment has made them revive.
Mine is the knowledge incredibly strange that a
man such as I could endeavor and strive,
Facing the dragon that no one could conquer and
betting by Thunder I'd never survive.
Here in the hall of the heros and saints who by
virtue and might everlastingly stay,
Wreathed in the garlands of demigod glory and
ever with nonor receive what they may,
Nothing forbidden to heighten the senses and
dazzle the mind in euphoria's play,
Leave me to drown in this heaven of incense with
never another behemoth to slay.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #35
Monorhyme
Over and under and onto the lips of a
cinnamon whisper repeating my name,
Lying in treasure retrieved from the dragon who
ranges no longer with sulfurous flame,
Bathed in the sweetness of feminine wonder and
drunk with the splendor of victory's fame,
Bring me the night with a draft of intoxicants
poured by the hand of a delicate dame.
Mine is the somnolent comfort of warriors who
back from their battles just barely alive,
Bandaged and soothed by remarkable maidens whose
natural endowment has made them revive.
Mine is the knowledge incredibly strange that a
man such as I could endeavor and strive,
Facing the dragon that no one could conquer and
betting by Thunder I'd never survive.
Here in the hall of the heros and saints who by
virtue and might everlastingly stay,
Wreathed in the garlands of demigod glory and
ever with nonor receive what they may,
Nothing forbidden to heighten the senses and
dazzle the mind in euphoria's play,
Leave me to drown in this heaven of incense with
never another behemoth to slay.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #35
Monorhyme
(34) March 29, 2010: Spring Fever
SPRING FEVER
Catching spring fever,
patients leave the hospital
cured of winter ills.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #34
Haiku
Catching spring fever,
patients leave the hospital
cured of winter ills.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #34
Haiku
(33) March 28, 2010: Thought
THOUGHT
I used to think that thought
Was thinking now I know it's not.
It's like the spark before
The flash, the click before the roar,
The engine in the tail
Of jets but not the vapor trail.
It's something other than
The thing--the be of what began.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #33
Rhyming Couplets
I used to think that thought
Was thinking now I know it's not.
It's like the spark before
The flash, the click before the roar,
The engine in the tail
Of jets but not the vapor trail.
It's something other than
The thing--the be of what began.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #33
Rhyming Couplets
(32) March 27, 2010: Construction 1: Decorated Radish
CONSTRUCTION 1: DECORATED RADISH
Begin with seven pins and one
round radish washed with rain.
Poke three pins in to simulate
a three-thin-legged stool,
Then find just four equator points
each equidistant round the globe,
then make for it a pedastal
with one fat wooden spool.
And now just jab the radish with
a yellow pencil number two,
a North Pole perpendicular
to the four pins round the girth.
And then impale the pink eraser
head with twenty-four safety pins
as if you're marking off the time
zones on the planet earth.
Now sprinkle half a cup of powered
sugar on your work of are,
and sixteen shakes of cardamon
to add a bit of spice.
And then for one last hip hooray
pluck twelve red petals from a rose,
arrange them like the numbers on
a clock all neat and nice.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #32
Novel Verse Form
Begin with seven pins and one
round radish washed with rain.
Poke three pins in to simulate
a three-thin-legged stool,
Then find just four equator points
each equidistant round the globe,
then make for it a pedastal
with one fat wooden spool.
And now just jab the radish with
a yellow pencil number two,
a North Pole perpendicular
to the four pins round the girth.
And then impale the pink eraser
head with twenty-four safety pins
as if you're marking off the time
zones on the planet earth.
Now sprinkle half a cup of powered
sugar on your work of are,
and sixteen shakes of cardamon
to add a bit of spice.
And then for one last hip hooray
pluck twelve red petals from a rose,
arrange them like the numbers on
a clock all neat and nice.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #32
Novel Verse Form
(31) March 26, 2010: The Pioneertown Motel
THE PIONEERTOWN MOTEL
Adjacent to the highway lost in dust,
Dilapidated remnants of a bygone day,
When horse now bone, and bump-a-long buggy rust,
Careened their saddle sore and breakneck way
From city leave to pleasant country stay,
A fortnight's rest in a higher drier clime
To keepsake memories boxed for future time.
Now here we are come rolling in on wheels
Of air, with power drawn from burning fuel
In purring muscled engines born of steel,
The city networked in through handheld tools
That cure the country of its vagrant rules,
Our instant futures plucked without regard,
And zipped up sweet in a silicon memory card.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #31
Rhyme Royal
Adjacent to the highway lost in dust,
Dilapidated remnants of a bygone day,
When horse now bone, and bump-a-long buggy rust,
Careened their saddle sore and breakneck way
From city leave to pleasant country stay,
A fortnight's rest in a higher drier clime
To keepsake memories boxed for future time.
Now here we are come rolling in on wheels
Of air, with power drawn from burning fuel
In purring muscled engines born of steel,
The city networked in through handheld tools
That cure the country of its vagrant rules,
Our instant futures plucked without regard,
And zipped up sweet in a silicon memory card.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #31
Rhyme Royal
(30) March 25, 2010: Coordinates
COORDINATES
There's X, Y, Z, and then there's T,
The coordinates of time and space.
I think I've finally found my place,
But movement through that fourth degree
Of freedom's got me all perplexed,
I just can't figure what comes next.
There's A, B, C, and then there's I,
The elements of word and act.
I think I've finally learned some tact
But standing here invisibly by
The anonymous man that others see,
I wonder what it means--to be.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #30
Novel Verse Form
There's X, Y, Z, and then there's T,
The coordinates of time and space.
I think I've finally found my place,
But movement through that fourth degree
Of freedom's got me all perplexed,
I just can't figure what comes next.
There's A, B, C, and then there's I,
The elements of word and act.
I think I've finally learned some tact
But standing here invisibly by
The anonymous man that others see,
I wonder what it means--to be.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #30
Novel Verse Form
(29) March 24, 2010: I See The Future
I SEE THE FUTURE
I see the future bathed in naked light,
Her burnished thighs a cure for all disease,
One center folding in from left and right
Reclining in her low slung hover-kite,
Just moments off the surface ocean breeze,
I see the future bathed in naked light.
All powered up and nano-engine tight,
Her gentle net ubiquitous to please,
One center folding in from left and right.
At last the vision made of quiet night,
Her gift of access nullifying keys,
I see the future bathed in naked light.
Her cool fruition framing height on height,
A succulence of expontntial trees,
One center folding in from left and right.
Applaud with shouts her delegates of might
Who spiral love's expandable decrees,
I see the future bathed in naked light,
One center folding in from left and right.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #29
Villanelle
I see the future bathed in naked light,
Her burnished thighs a cure for all disease,
One center folding in from left and right
Reclining in her low slung hover-kite,
Just moments off the surface ocean breeze,
I see the future bathed in naked light.
All powered up and nano-engine tight,
Her gentle net ubiquitous to please,
One center folding in from left and right.
At last the vision made of quiet night,
Her gift of access nullifying keys,
I see the future bathed in naked light.
Her cool fruition framing height on height,
A succulence of expontntial trees,
One center folding in from left and right.
Applaud with shouts her delegates of might
Who spiral love's expandable decrees,
I see the future bathed in naked light,
One center folding in from left and right.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #29
Villanelle
(28) March 23, 2010: The Luminosity Of Lions
THE LUMINOSITY OF LIONS
Isn't it luminous out in the drizzling
wouldn't a dip in the river be grand,
Stripped to the skin in our grinning concupisence
leaping off ledges with feathers in hand?
Under the surface all gleaming deliciously
reason would waver and leggy you'd ride,
Straddled and saddled and coddled I'd catalogue
every exhaustible slip of your slide.
Up for a breath of inspired delirium
gulping the air through a tangle of flesh,
Tossing compassion aside like a lion who
lunges ferociously preying afresh,
Gorging my fever-fed ravenous appetite
taking you every conceivable way,
Lifting you spent and all limpid with ecstasy,
languishing, thirsty, I'd drink your bouquet.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #28
Rhyming Couplets
Isn't it luminous out in the drizzling
wouldn't a dip in the river be grand,
Stripped to the skin in our grinning concupisence
leaping off ledges with feathers in hand?
Under the surface all gleaming deliciously
reason would waver and leggy you'd ride,
Straddled and saddled and coddled I'd catalogue
every exhaustible slip of your slide.
Up for a breath of inspired delirium
gulping the air through a tangle of flesh,
Tossing compassion aside like a lion who
lunges ferociously preying afresh,
Gorging my fever-fed ravenous appetite
taking you every conceivable way,
Lifting you spent and all limpid with ecstasy,
languishing, thirsty, I'd drink your bouquet.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #28
Rhyming Couplets
(27) March 22, 2010: Hiding
HIDING
My rocking horse rocks
when he trots or he canters;
My talking doll talks
when she chats or she banters;
My sock monkey socks
when he boxes ro batters,
But 1-2-3 hide now
it's hiding that matters.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #27
Novel Verse Form
My rocking horse rocks
when he trots or he canters;
My talking doll talks
when she chats or she banters;
My sock monkey socks
when he boxes ro batters,
But 1-2-3 hide now
it's hiding that matters.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #27
Novel Verse Form
(26) March 21, 2010: Time Enough
TIME ENOUGH
There isn't time to wonder
Just when the clap of thunder
Will split your world asunder
And put you six feet under
But time enough to stumble
Onto somthing that won't crumble
And time to take a tumble
In the hay however humble.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #26
Monorhyme
There isn't time to wonder
Just when the clap of thunder
Will split your world asunder
And put you six feet under
But time enough to stumble
Onto somthing that won't crumble
And time to take a tumble
In the hay however humble.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #26
Monorhyme
(25) March 20, 2010: A Sip Of Something Sweet
A SIP OF SOMETHING SWEET
I took a sip of something sweet
Before I'd asked "From whom?"
And suddenly my wheels were feet,
I mean my feet went zoom
Like wheels and raced me out the door
And off the nearest cliff,
And falling fast my arms went, "Roar!"
And turned all rigid stiff.
My nose grew long and pencil quick,
Myelbow-engines fired,
And just like that I threw up sick,
As was, I knew, required.
And then a sonic boom went, "Boom!"
And everything went black.
I must have landed in my room
Because I see I'm back.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #25
Ballad Meter
I took a sip of something sweet
Before I'd asked "From whom?"
And suddenly my wheels were feet,
I mean my feet went zoom
Like wheels and raced me out the door
And off the nearest cliff,
And falling fast my arms went, "Roar!"
And turned all rigid stiff.
My nose grew long and pencil quick,
Myelbow-engines fired,
And just like that I threw up sick,
As was, I knew, required.
And then a sonic boom went, "Boom!"
And everything went black.
I must have landed in my room
Because I see I'm back.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #25
Ballad Meter
Sunday, November 7, 2010
(24) March 19, 2010: Quantum Surfing
QUANTUM SURFING
The ladder leans against the wave,
And climbing up I take my stance,
With arms outstretched in Warrior Two,
Awaiting there my happy chance
To intersect the quantum nave.
I blink along the tipping points
And hold my breath with gasping claw
Though swimming wobble skips askew
Past catalogues of canon law
Where stepping in a voice anoints.
And careful not a think astray
Or look with duty on the scene
I touch the brandished moment new,
Regard the time as non-routine
And leap to catch the curling spray.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #24
Novel Verse Form
The ladder leans against the wave,
And climbing up I take my stance,
With arms outstretched in Warrior Two,
Awaiting there my happy chance
To intersect the quantum nave.
I blink along the tipping points
And hold my breath with gasping claw
Though swimming wobble skips askew
Past catalogues of canon law
Where stepping in a voice anoints.
And careful not a think astray
Or look with duty on the scene
I touch the brandished moment new,
Regard the time as non-routine
And leap to catch the curling spray.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #24
Novel Verse Form
(23) March 18, 2010: Plural Soul
PLURAL SOUL
Double dealing takes its toll,
Two-faced faeries feel the heat,
Siamese twins in espanol,
Offered each they both retreat.
Two-faced faeries feel the heat,
Sliding down the axis pole,
Offered each they both retreat,
Single body, plural soul.
Sliding down the axis pole,
North to south in swift deceit,
Single body, plural soul,
Answers always incomplete.
North to south in swift deceit,
Siamese twins in espanol,
ANswers always incomplete,
Double dealing takes its toll.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #23
Pantoum
Double dealing takes its toll,
Two-faced faeries feel the heat,
Siamese twins in espanol,
Offered each they both retreat.
Two-faced faeries feel the heat,
Sliding down the axis pole,
Offered each they both retreat,
Single body, plural soul.
Sliding down the axis pole,
North to south in swift deceit,
Single body, plural soul,
Answers always incomplete.
North to south in swift deceit,
Siamese twins in espanol,
ANswers always incomplete,
Double dealing takes its toll.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #23
Pantoum
(22) March 17, 2010: The Slope Of The Line
THE SLOPE OF THE LINE
This exit leads me into age,
A corridor of downward slope.
MX plus be is always why
The change of life over time is hope
And gives me self to hang my rope.
I stretch my neck to see the sky,
Remove my gloves to turn the page.
My tear-filled glass of footprints lost,
The columned numbers vetting night,
The set of sums, the longish tail,
Statistically sound but not quite right,
A leap to the left will banish the sight,
And just in case my thoughts derail,
I'll shift my estimates of cost.
For future reference past comes last
And all the dailies circumvent
The absolute value of regret
My pockets empty, money spent,
With small returns on what I've lent
but I can smile if I forget,
And fly I might if I go fast.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #22
Novel Verse Form
This exit leads me into age,
A corridor of downward slope.
MX plus be is always why
The change of life over time is hope
And gives me self to hang my rope.
I stretch my neck to see the sky,
Remove my gloves to turn the page.
My tear-filled glass of footprints lost,
The columned numbers vetting night,
The set of sums, the longish tail,
Statistically sound but not quite right,
A leap to the left will banish the sight,
And just in case my thoughts derail,
I'll shift my estimates of cost.
For future reference past comes last
And all the dailies circumvent
The absolute value of regret
My pockets empty, money spent,
With small returns on what I've lent
but I can smile if I forget,
And fly I might if I go fast.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #22
Novel Verse Form
(21) March 16, 2010: The Digger
THE DIGGER
I dug a tunnel to Kathmandu
Some fourteen thousand grinding miles.
I started from the British Isles
And drove my Digger straight on through.
With diamond-bladed chewing screws
My monstrous Digger bored the hole
While I, with fingertip control,
Divined the path it would pursue.
It all went well until the last
When breaking through Nepali soil
I found Sir Arthur Conan doyle
With Sherlock Holmes, protagonist,
Alive and well detective style
They showed me how I'd missed the mark
By nearly one full minute of arc
And hauled me off without a trial.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #21
In Memoriam Stanza
I dug a tunnel to Kathmandu
Some fourteen thousand grinding miles.
I started from the British Isles
And drove my Digger straight on through.
With diamond-bladed chewing screws
My monstrous Digger bored the hole
While I, with fingertip control,
Divined the path it would pursue.
It all went well until the last
When breaking through Nepali soil
I found Sir Arthur Conan doyle
With Sherlock Holmes, protagonist,
Alive and well detective style
They showed me how I'd missed the mark
By nearly one full minute of arc
And hauled me off without a trial.
D. Edgar Lamp
www.TheDailyPoem.org #21
In Memoriam Stanza
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