By Scott Bailey © 2014
Decisions taken
Gateways opened, paths chosen
Following hope’s trail
Originally published in A Spring of Dreams
Committed
Poetry
Lush
By Scott Bailey 2017
“That’s proper lush, that is”
And you are in a time and place
While the grammar nazis squirm
Layer upon layer of meaning is conveyed
Language
Being used
For its intended purpose
In response to my daily prompt Language
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Tourist
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Some of us are tourists
Some of us are peddlers
Some just love the night
Some just have the feeling
That all of this is just inside our head
How can we control it?
How do we define it?
Is it in our head?
What if we just follow where we’re led?
On the tourist trail
In response to my daily prompt Tourist
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
The Following
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Time to take
The initiative
Maybe
Or perhaps
Tomorrow
Already too late
It’s gone
When I wasn’t looking
While I thought
And fought
With doubts and fears
Follow on
Follow on
In response to my daily prompt Initiative
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Hunger
By Scott Bailey © 2018
The rumbling of the belly
Is the trap
The bait
Led us down a one-way path
No turning back
And keeps us here
In response to my daily prompt Belly
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Gaping
By Scott Bailey © 2015
Always open, ever weeping
The wound of inequality
But still they slash, cut down their crop
And with contempt they fill their boots
Screaming sights and flashing sounds
Headlines tinged with hate
Keep us poor and keep us scared
Or else eliminate
In response to my daily prompt Boot
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
No Safety
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Child lacking safety
Will grow to fear the wide world
And narrow their mind
In response to my daily prompt Narrow
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Platform
By Scott Bailey © 2018
This is my platform
And the train is leaving
Without me
Never got to say
What I had to say
Ticket in hand
In response to my daily prompt Platform
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Mobius
By Scott Bailey © 2018
My life is thin
Shallow
Two dimensional
No point
No end
Twisted
Mobius
In response to my daily prompt Thin
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Econobox
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Econobox
What a strange, strained word
A small, efficient, no thrills car
Feels like a word
Trying to hard
Like the marketing department
That came up with it
In response to my daily prompt Econobox
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Squat
By Scott Bailey 2017
Diddly Squat
Zilch
Nadda
The amount your beloved
Leaders
Think about your needs
They will bleed us dry
And squeeze us flat
As the weight of their greed
Bears down on us
In response to my daily prompt Flat
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Market
By Scott Bailey © 2014
The free market
It pervades every part of our lives
Every fabric of our society
Why
Why did we choose
To put all the power
Into the hands of the few
Greedy individuals
Powerful because of their greed
Who’s great idea was that?
In response to my daily prompt Market
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
No Return
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Upturned trolleys
And wasted lives
Stilted rivers
Fish choked
Earth poked
To the point
Of submission
We cannot leave
Without causing worse
Now our only hope
Is to turn the tools
To better use
In response to my daily prompt Trolley
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Stressed
By Scott Bailey © 2013
Supposed to relax
From the endless stress of work
The phone doesn’t stop
In response to my daily prompt Work
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Dividend
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Your flesh is the price
Your blood sweat and tears
The dividend you pay
To no one you know
For reasons unknown
But still, you pay it
On and on and on
Until you have nothing left
No legacy
No remembrance
And still
It will not be enough
In response to my daily prompt Dividend
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Criticize
By Scott Bailey © 2017
I can’t criticize
I am too little
Too belittled
I probably can’t
Even spell it
In response to my daily prompt Criticism
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Parachute
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Life
Where every step
Is a leap
Without a parachute
Forget that
At your peril
In response to my daily prompt Parachute
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Deport
By Scott Bailey © 2018
A simple solution
Deport the deporters
Problem solved
In response to my daily prompt Deport
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Common Perception
By Scott Bailey © 2018
We all see it
All perceive the truth
Children in cages
We know what it means
Here come the memes
The outraged status
Rules the day
Governments
ISSUE STATEMENTS
Then
We turn away
Muttering
Up next?
Ovens
Prepare your placards!
Or is all as it appears?
Where is the truth in what we see?
If we cannot believe what we see – we will give up belief.
And there’s the point.
In response to my daily prompt Perceive
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
I Love a Title
By Scott Bailey © 2015
I love a title
My name underneath
The first few paragraphs
The format
The shape
I love beginnings
I love endings
It’s the struggle in between
In response to my daily prompt Love
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Employ
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Employ your words well
To communicate
Not condemn
Listen to all the depths of meaning
Conveyed
Instead of correcting
To shore up
Your sense of superiority
In response to my daily prompt Employ
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
A Quartet of Poems
Where the White Wolves Dance
By Scott Bailey © 2014
A ring of solid light
Hovers just above the ground
Spinning with infinity
Casts glamour all around
This is
Where the white wolves dance
It is said the be the child
Of the seed of forbidden fruit
Born from secret knowledge
Found on a hidden a hidden route
Around it
The white wolves still dance
The colour pulses wild
Blue, silver and pure white
Dragging hearts round and round
Beneath the starlit night
And so
On the white wolves dance
In a time-worn trench, they dance
Circling below the light
So deep the light they cannot see
The circle is out of sight
Yet still
On the white wolves dance
The circle has been burnt
Into their very eyes
So while the dark wolf dreams
And while the dear time flies
Onwards
The white wolves dance.
So high upon their mountain
On an island on a lake
Isolated and secure from
The world they do forsake
This is
Where the white wolves dance
Where the Dark Wolf Dreams
By Scott Bailey © 2014
A deep and dark filled cave
Upon a mountain high
Where no light dares enter
And no echo finds reply
Shallow
The dark wolf dreams
A rumble from within
Deep in the dark wolves throat
The echo of the growl
The terrifying note
Fitfully
The dark wolf dreams
Strong appear the chains
That bind him in his sleep
But stronger still the anger
That grows within him deep
Brooding
The dark wolf dreams
Bitter is the dark wolf’s heart
Long his memory too
Some will be spared his wrath
But they are counted few
Grim
The dark wolf dreams
Terrible his waking hours
Thus the grey wolves grieve
Any heart with secrets dark
Had better rise and leave
Briefly
The dark wolf dreams
So do not be deceived
By the mumbling and the snoring
Born of rage and constriction
Of rending and of roaring
And of waking
The dark wolf dreams
Where the Grey Wolves Grieve
By Scott Bailey © 2014
On a barren plain
Where food and joy are sparse
The desolate packs wander
Watching slow time pass
Here
The grey wolves grieve
With rose stained eyes
Patrolling their border wide
Preserving what is left
Of what they hold inside
It’s why
The grey wolves grieve
They gaze across the delta
To far off distant times
Where game and ease were plenty
Than in these austere climes
And so
The grey wolves grieve
Disgusted by the carnage
Where the red fox roams
On guard for rebel spirits
Keeping safe their homes
Where
The grey wolves grieve
Yet what they seek in earnest
Deep within their hearts
They know is far beyond them
Beyond their stilted arts
Endless
The grey wolves grieve
The packs struggle onwards
Huddled in their gloom
Their hearts so full of anguish
For hope, there is no room
In this land
Where the grey wolves grieve
Where the Red Fox Roams
By Scott Bailey © 2014
The timid beasties scatter
With tiny racing hearts
The scent of blood approaches
The herd all ways it parts
For here
The red fox roams
The scent of fear it rises
And fans the fox’s fire
Into enslaving passion
To raise the killer higher
Thus
The red fox roams
Filled with hate and ire of
Where the white wolves dance
The dance the fox desires
Denied its golden chance
Everywhere
The red fox roams
The world has grown accustomed
To fear of tooth and claw
The world has grown so weary
Of lives lived short and raw
Still
The red fox roams
The timid beasties scatter
Will never make a stand
They’ll not accept the secret
To gain the upper hand
So proud
The red fox roams
No one knows the course
Where the fox’s road is heading
All they see is darkness
The cast of all the spreading
Death
Where the red fox roams
In response to my daily prompt Wolf
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Consumed
By Scott Bailey © 2013
More fucking shopping
I’m consumed by consuming
Working just keeps up
Originally published in A Spring of Dreams
The House of Bailey
By Scott Bailey © 2013
Heart lifts
When I lift him high
Heart skips
With her every kiss
Through darkness and troubled times
Our place has held us
I return with joy
To the walls
My son
My wife
My home
Originally published in A Spring of Dreams
Snake
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Basking in the sun
The snake saw lunch in his mind
Movement brought him back
In response to Colleen’s 2018 Weekly #Tanka Tuesday #Poetry Challenge No. 82 – BELONG & DREAM #SynonymsOnly
A haiku this week. I have inferred the given words rather than use synonyms so breaking the rules a bit. This post was also prompted by the fact that on a country walk yesterday my eldest nearly stood on one of these – an adder – the only venomous snake on these isles. I think it was a juvenile as it was small but definitely a viper rather than a grass snake.
#haiku
Drop
By Scott Bailey © 2018
In the froth and the spray
In the spume and the churn
In the majesty of the mightiest wave
And the receding tide
Shines
A drop of water
A single drop
That one day
Will hold the heart
Of a child
In response to the daily prompt Tide
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Proud Dad
By Scott Bailey © 2013
Hushed concentration
Then with a sudden surprise
His name is written!
Originally published in A Spring of Dreams
Two Years
By Scott Bailey © 2013
Pardon me for interrupting
But that was just a step too far
Not really a sporting move
Two years
Two years you have been playing straight
That is to say
Murdering
But with the proper tools
The ones from our markets
Hardware, hard and solid and paid for
That gas – tut tut – just too far
So hand it over
There’s a good chap
And we will let you
Get back to your war
Originally published in A Spring of Dreams
Jungle
By Scott Bailey © 2006
Buy a jungle man.
Buy a jungle man.
C’mon bring the cash on.
Buy a jungle man.
Quick as you can.
They’re selling like they’re going outta fashion.
A little bit here, a little bit there.
They’re going fast,
Does anyone care!?
Crush a beetle for juice.
Let the cattle herds loose.
See those trees burn.
A bird of bright feather.
Has gone forever.
We ‘aint ever gonna learn.
Where the sun is beaming.
Once life was teeming.
Now all is dust.
While we strive for our goals.
We say to our souls.
Die if you must.
In response to the daily prompt Abrupt
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Swansong
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Swansong
All clap along
As the end approaches
And the triumph lifts us all high
Cheering
In response to Colleen’s 2018 Weekly #Tanka Tuesday #Poetry Challenge No. 82 – The May Day Edition: SING & CELEBRATE #SynonymsOnly
A cinquain this week
#cinquain
Nothing of Note
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Notable
For nothing
Our generation
Afraid of our legacy
Creating
Empty copies
Of the past
Where’s the new?
The optimistic
These days
It only grows
Where the ground
Is composted
With greed
In response to the daily prompt Notable
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Walls
By Scott Bailey © 2013
Yet another wall
How many before we’re home?
Prevaricating
Originally published in A Spring of Dreams
Lunch Hour
Started by Scott Bailey
There were some friends. And a hall. An infinite hall, with marble walls and pillars that stretched forever into the distance.
And there were tables. Row after row after row of tables. On each table was a never-ending supply of a single dish. In that hall, on those tables, there could be found every dish that had ever been imagined, concocted and served up in all of human history.
With a thought you could be sitting before any dish you could think of. Or you could ask your neighbour for a recommendation and try something new. The name of the dish was enough to take you there.
It was time for the friends to eat. They entered and they took their paths through the hall. They commenced their lunch.
As they knew – it was a once only meal.
An hour later they reconvened, look each other in the eyes and assessed their time beneath the infinite arches.
The first spoke.
“I tried as many different tastes as I could. I jumped from table to table and I can honestly say that I know of no one who could have filled their time here with as many different flavours as I. Yet. Now I am here – wonder why? I stand here before you proudly stating the number of meals I have partaken off – yet I wonder why does that matter? Not one was complete. Have I missed the joy of a meal.”
He hung his head, deep in thought and regret. But the second friend spoke.
“You make me wonder. What taste did I miss? I did not try many different meals, For quite soon I found one that I really enjoyed. I sat down and savoured the taste. People around me did the same and we discussed the meal and more besides. I do not regret that – no it was heartwarming – but I wonder at the tastes I missed. Was there a better meal still that I could have savoured with more relish?”
The third friend looked haunted.
“I did not eat. I wanted to try everything but I realised this was not possible, that it was a dream that could only fail. Yet I felt that to just sit down and eat was an insult to the great hospitality and variety that had been laid before us. I fell in with a group of other like-minded people and we were determined to resolve this dilemma with the gifts of reason we have been bestowed with. I have been a fool.”
“You are all fools!” said a fourth friend.
“I knew the way – I understood the correct combination of meals that would allow perfection! I tried to tell you but you would not listen! So many people did not listen! Fools! But there were some and we understand that we have eaten correctly and that we will be rewarded for that. I pity you – you have wasted your lunch hour.”
In response to the daily prompt Partake
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
The Deep Deep Dark
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Beware the lure
The luminescent wonder
Bobbing in the deep
Hypnotic
Drawing you nearer
Snap!
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Thwart
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Dreams
Thwarted
Turn the poet
Sour
Bitter and ale
Are no
Substitute
As they
Slip away
Dreams
In response to the daily prompt Thwart
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Inchoate
By Scott Bailey © 2018
After forty-eight years
My mind is still
Inchoate
Like my rage
When they stop fighting
Maybe I will be complete
In response to the daily prompt Inchoate
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Shoots
In exultation
Shoots arise, reaching skyward
Until sharp blades sweep
In response to COLLEEN’S 2018 #TANKA TUESDAY #POETRY CHALLENGE NO. 78, GROW & HONOR, #SNYNONYMSONLY
Tenuous synonyms for my haiku – again
#haiku
Farewell to Health
By Scott Bailey © 2018
The jewel in our crown
The pride of our nation
Will be sold
To line the pockets
Of liars
In response to the daily prompt Betrayed
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Focus
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Keep them focused
On the trivial
The micro problem
While we steal
Their lives
Away
In response to the daily prompt Micro
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Inefficient
By Scott Bailey © 2018
When politicians
Say
The NHS
Has become
Too inefficient
What they really
Mean is
Caring
But the word
Is to alien
For them
In response to the daily prompt Inefficient
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Swallow
By Scott Bailey © 2016
The wind gives a lift
To swooping swallow on its arc
Hawk has other plans
In response to the daily prompt Swallow
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Enroll
By Scott Bailey © 2018
When
Did I enroll
For
This
To be
An oxen
For the
Faceless farmer
Yoke fitted
Ploughing on
And on
In response to the daily prompt Faceless
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Tsuma (A Katauta)
By Scott Bailey © 2013
Silky dress caress
Swishing – lighting my desire
For your loving touch
Originally published in A Spring of Dreams
Stone and Bronze – #writephoto
For Sue Vincent’s Thursday Photo prompt
Somehow – I missed last weeks prompt completely. I think by Thursday night I had, had enough of the week. This week has not been much better – so I am recycling again. Using one the picture suggested to me.
This is the picture this week.
By Scott Bailey © 2014
They left a legacy written in stone
Plain for all to see
Yet there are less lucid signs
Discovered carefully
Lines that lay across the land
Tales of times gone by
Showing us in hidden ways
To be read by those who try
The tracks we walked long ago
The boundaries of old
A story laid on every hill
And every vale and fold.
And on our tongues and in our tales
Echoes of the past
Holy places beyond the cross
Beyond a gulf so vast
Shapes and forms from ancient times
Still glimpsed within the heart
Of dance and song and tales that burn
And every blessed art
Identical
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Rejecting the crowd
Is the same
Identical
Choice
As following the crowd
In response to the daily prompt Identical
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Is it Me?
By Scott Bailey © 2103
Flesh and bones and genes.
Is that me?
Shirt and tie and jeans
Is that me?
The places I have been.
Is that me?
The words of praise, the blame that cuts
Is that me?
The songs I loved, the books I have read,
The colours I paint, what I like in my bread.
Are these me?
The friends I love and miss,
That is me
The taste of beer and chat,
That is me
The love for my wife and sons,
That is me.
The song bursting in my lungs,
That is me
The stories in my head
That is me
The place where I grew up,
where I was wed,
where one son was named, the other laid to rest
That is me
My dreams that are out of reach
That is me.
Originally published in A Spring of Dreams
Light Falls – #writephoto
For Sue Vincent’s Thursday Photo prompt
At last, I managed something new for this challenge rather than recycling.
This is the picture
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Light falls
Through the ancient arch
How much light
Has fallen
Through the years
Upon
Lovers joined
The dearly departed
Those welcomed with blessings
Of water
The cold
The hungry
The repentant
The angry
The sinners
The light has fallen
Age has won
All those lighted memories
Nothing
Now the vessel
Is emptied
And ruined
Only the ghost
Of the shape
Of constraint
Messy
By Scott Bailey © 2018
Arise
Life is messy
We all know that
And while we crave
Cleanliness and order
We also know
It can be no other way
In response to the daily prompt Messy
#DailyPrompt, #amwriting, #postaday
Wide Water Wash – #writephoto
For Sue Vincent’s Thursday Photo prompt Another old one- it’s been a very long day but when I saw the picture I gain knew I had a perfect poem to go with it.
This is the picture
By Scott Bailey © 2014
Wide, water wash
Grey beneath the early morning mist
Chance sunbeams bounce and sparkle
River banks lost and blurred
Returning to their ancient ways
Unbound from man’s constraint
A gentle reminder of the eventual winner
Water wandering where it will
Free and unordered
Rolling seeping or swelling to the sea
Grasses, shrubs and tree swimming
Mirrored in their sudden still lakes
Expanding
Originally Published in “A Spring of Dreams“.
If Only
By Scott Bailey © 2018
If only I knew
What I know now years ago
My time would have been
Spent in a much better way
Less effort on silly things
In response to COLLEEN’S WEEKLY #TANKA TUESDAY #POETRY CHALLENGE, NO. 73: ENERGY & KNOWLEDGE, #SNYONYMSONLY
#Tanka
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