Awaken, a poem by Adam White, poet

Her hair winds slowly with deliberate allure,
Fanning out in the gale to beckon me onwards,
While errant strands rear up to strike with venom fangs.

Her lower half flickers to my tired, addled mind.
All at once she has the long legs of a goddess,
The hooves of a goat, the scaled length of a snake.

Her eyes are glass, seeing out. Never letting in.
She is my queen; my Hecate of the dark place,
Waking the devil so, at long last, I might see.

* * *

Folly. Bloodied knuckles sting. They itch and bother.
The haze ascends and fury, late my lonely field,
Has stranded me among these bleached and broken bones.

She lies prone, smiling, unwound in her iron skin,
Her hunger bred in the trail of devastation
Created by lost hours rampaging and red.

Ardor to be satiated at my own will,
And she is a wave that breaks on my jagged rocks.
You wake the devil, and the devil has to eat.

* * *

Morning, and memory is as blood matted furs
Wrapped around frosted flesh, all marked with open wounds,
That weep her warm poison down flanks and thighs and chest.

Her shell empty, shattered, and fickle, she has left,
To find some new iron maiden to occupy,
That she might walk upon the filthy earth again.

My hands, such as they are, will not wash clean enough,
Her stain; their stains are all over my copper skin,
And the waking devil will not fit in his box.


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A Better Heart, a sonnet by Adam White, poet

Better the heart that does not beat at all,
Than one that beats and bleeds for fickle love,
Whose wild attentions swing and glide and fall,
Like blind funambulists at play above.
Such barbs of cruelty spill from perfect lips,
That do not know the taste of contrite word,
And so resentment forms from grains and drips,
Compounded by the blame so oft inferred.
How dry the earth we walk when on this path,
Bereft of life and joy and kinder things;
And wishful are the thoughts we choose to have
While every moment hurts and burns and stings.
Better the heart that does not beat at all,
Free of the warmth that has me so enthralled.

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Hate, a haiku by Adam White, poet

Hot beneath my flesh,
Happy fingers writhe and twist.
I'm filled with such hate.


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Red Umbrella, a poem by Adam White, poet

Bright red,
The umbrella.
This bright day
Not intercepted by
Such common thought,
Opting to make him a parasol
Where a sun hat might suffice.


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The Broken Back, a poem by Adam White, poet

And there she was,
Resting on the precipice,
My broken backed beauty,
The stuffing slashed from her seats.

My poor lady,
Her burned out husk invaded;
Stolen away, raped and burned,
And left face down in a river.

She'd drowned.

I'd wept for her.
Knees were grass stained for the trek,
The same amble of the lost
We all sometimes walk alone.

Then I returned.
To find her gone, reclaimed
By the city, the river,
That all at once broke her down.

I cried.

To feel her curves,
That rough leather, cold metal,
Steady, assuring voice
I would never hear again.

And so I raged!
Death to my great enemy,
Though invisible to me.
Then I dreamt that it was true.

That's all.

What more to do?
She lays as scrap, broken backed,
In some depository,
Buried with her dead brothers,

And I live on,
Rusting and cracking for her,
Rolling downhill on flat tyres,
But never quite off the road.


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Tattered King on a Brick Road, a Lovecraft and Baum inspired poem by Adam White, poet

Well worn, the bricks aren't solid colour,
Their standard terracotta insides show,
Hinting at many dark, obsessive hours
Spent painting yellow the miles long road.

Who laid out your chaotic cobblestones,
Your impossible looking layout,
Bending thoughts away from a need to rest,
Casting the surrounding beauty in doubt.

After all, there is nothing but this road,
This winding way through hills and growling woods,
Whose path must not be left; Can not be left,
'Til an end that must be reached for ill or good.

In the distance, I see the tower
And all that lies between us on the way.
I see the man; the tattered, bandaged man,
With his paper crown and skin stained grey.

I see the puddles of rusty rain,
Set to stain these worn white shoes ruby red.
I see him crouched, brush in hand, stroking the bricks
'Til he would deem every yellowed stone repaired.


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The Night - My Foe, The Dawn - My Enemy, a poem by Adam White, poet

With crossed ankles, I lie mostly at peace,
Though night defeats me.
My mind only daring to allow sleep
When that sneaky sun,
Crawling on his fat belly like an ant,
Creeps through the cracks
At the sides of our basement bedroom blinds.

The cat, as busy as she always is,
Pads and claws and runs,
Gracing me with a swift, midnight presence,
And then kneads the dough,
Burying deep her newly sharp talons,
Tempered just for me,
In to the quilt and the small of my back.

The walls sway in the breeze. The doors all creak.
Small lights bother me.
But, oh, the sun, that long unwelcome friend,
Like sand in my eyes,
Bags full, weighing down the lids with promise,
And a shine-filled smile,
That addictive quality of its own.

Her heavy breathing is punctuation;
A sweet period,
Filling me with guilt for all my failings
As a sleepless man.
Feet poke out from under the warm bedding.
The cool breeze comfort
Will bite hard at my quest-worn anklebones.

At last, here comes that swollen morning star,
Here to make you stir,
And rob me of my patient consciousness,
As well as your face.
Wasted hours regretfully lost to sleep.
The night brings defeat,
And coming dawn burns out the heart of me.


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Seed of Destruction, a Lovecraft inspired poem by Adam White, poet

On my laurels in this awful place of death,
Destiny enquires what I intend,
And should hear clearly as I gladly respond
"To hell with all you chose to predestine."
She listens not, directs my attention
To the right, the north, the open, starry skies,
Where the wind smells strong of all the rotting things
That have presided long beneath its open eyes.

Watch my hope erode from that great gaze.
How I raise my fist, my crimson hand,
To unlock them from their vast and creaking chains,
To hone their teeth upon the bones of man.
I must resist the urging of my blood,
Which screams for me to bend beneath its will,
That will of mine to be a weaker man
And dedicate myself to powers ill.

But fate is not my master. Never was.
I tear my freedom from her iron curls,
And, blood or not, I do the better thing,
And burn this horrid place right off the world.
The pop of covert tendrils fills my heart,
Beside the screams of dreadful, hidden beings.
The fire cleans, the flame doth purify,
And my salvation rides on blazing wings.

The north still calls, from horrid polar black;
Those deepest seas where evil things reside.
They wait for me to free them from their moors,
Will my hand to ache 'til I dare oblige.
But never will I heed their bleating hails,
Those empty hearted goats who wait beyond.
I'd better serve by crafting my own fate,
A poison kiss to send my spirit on.

Like this? Read my ever popular poem "Cthulhu" by CLICKING HERE.
How about something not horror related. Read my latest poem "The Night - My Foe, The Dawn - My Enemy" by CLICKING HERE.


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Cthulhu - a H.P. Lovecraft inspired poem by Adam White, poet

To kick off a month of Lovecraft inspired poetry, here is a poem about everybody's favourite Ancient One.

"That is not dead which can eternal lie
And with strange aeons, even death may die."
H.P. Lovecraft
"A mountain walked or stumbled."
H.P. Lovecraft

I awaken tossed in bracing foam,
It's subtle fingers turn my stomach's walls.
I cling to what remains of my lost home,
It's cradling bed and soft and silent halls.
On driftwood should my tale so sudden end,
Soaked and drowning, lone upon this sea.
So distant is my liberation sent,
The shape of some dark island calling me.

The hours pass but fill me with some hope,
That shore's salvation ever closing now,
The hand of madness loosed from 'round my throat,
Some God's embrace would guide my vessel's prow.
Though not a faithful man I must consent,
No other explanation crossed my mind,
Why the island would, despite the winds dissent
Blow my sail away from where it lies.

Though clogged with joy, my mind was soon to fill
With memories of frequent dreams heinous.
The vision of a mountain that had spilled
From an ocean body that was much like this.
No, not a mountain, nor a thing of flesh,
Or any tissue I could understand.
A writhing face of feelers, forming fresh
It's body bulbous, tentacled and grand.

At last, I knew the horror stalking me,
The waves crashed by, the sea conveyed my boat,
As fast as nature could attentively,
But on tides of death the horrid thing encroached,
And reared from deep amongst the crashing waves,
On leathered wings that tore its body from
The veil that hides a dimension that raves
In broken sanity long lost and gone.

It's name, it filled my head and I awoke,
My bed, my room, my prison in this world,
With scattered pillows, sheets all freshly soaked
With seawater in which I'd crashed and whirled.
Such knowledge long has scarred my waking days,
Those awful words my mind won't stop screaming
That in his ancient house at R'lyeh,
Vast, dead Cthulhu waits always dreaming.

If you haven't read any Lovecraft, I would recommend this story to get you started. The link is for Amazon.ca and as you can see, super cheap but if you're in the US, UK or anywhere else, go to their site instead.



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Inconsequential, a poem by Adam White, poet

Four walls always, white wash tormenting me.
Ignore the silence and the ache in me.
I wished to be invisible once.
Never thought I'd wished for this.

Skin is draining, paler than ever now.
I feel like living, but I'm forgetting how.
Days more empty, nights more restless.
The lack of movement aging me.

Watch the action, inconsequential man.
My weak limbs and long atrophied hands,
Reach out for some sense of meaning.
Wasted ages feel like days.

Time is worthless. My time attests to that.
How I amount up to nothing.
Heart still beats but only barely,
Lungs still breathe but just dead air.

Your lives go on, but mine won't shift at all
My world inconsequential.
I am nothing, save for memory,
Stories that I tell myself.

Stagnant water, grateful eternity.
Pining for worthless action.
I'm the winter, cold and lifeless,
Like thawing snow, I'm fading fast.


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