Excerpts from: Unfinished
Theses are samples of my Poetry from my Poetry book Unfinished
By Madelyn D. Worden
11/2/17
Wings of Cloth
Felt,
soft and graceful in the hues
of purples and pinks,
Covering supporting
wires.
Dancing little feet spinning in small circles.
Mimicking clumsily in ballet slippers,
those turns of professionals.
It’s blinding,
the flashes from the crowded and
colored stage lights.
“Look!” they cooed,
“Look at those little butterflies!”
We dip and weave,
spinning with teeth-filled smiles
for the scrapbook pages.
We were the leads.
Flitting and fluttering on the sung praises of the audience.
Our giggles played the beat to a chorus of glimmering jingles
of the bells bound to our wrists and ankles.
The forgotten ladybugs, crickets, and bees hummed to the tune of the scene. Stepping to the side for the fragile wings
to have space.
The teacher's fingers chimed in the scene
off the old wood of the grand piano.
We took the spotlight,
Though
one butterfly
wanted to be
an
ant.
10/24/17
The Wild West's Anger
It was there;
In my mind's eye, leading me to the spot like fool’s gold,
a false promise.
It’s never where I think it is.
I go to the main places it usually hides from me:
In the desert sands of dust bunnies.
Nothing,
In the ravines of the towers of text.
Nothing,
In the tall grass of lazy messes.
Nothing.
I ask the sheriff for help in the search,
Stumbling and scavenging around the plain for what I lost.
Until wondering takes us up to the entrance of an abandoned mine.
We look down the adit, poorly lit corridors, and dug out tunnels of rock surround us,
while the sheriff's anger rises.
Boiling and hissing, till the high sound of a kettle
could be challenged for its pitch.
“What a mess!” the sheriff growls
As she looked through the coal-dusted winze.
She sighs,
My mother found my Algebra II textbook
“It was in the mess you call a closet!”
11/7/17
River’s hand
A river;
daughter of the rain
and a friend of the road.
The one who is a traveler
to the great ocean.
Flowers turn and rise in the sun
alongside her,
in hopes they could
go with the flow
and be a dancer on
the shimmering surface.
The deliverer is the river,
for the ones who choose its narrow, curving ways as their path.
Saving hours as boats tower and become gliders.
Giving the water waves
as the smoother surface of the
horizon ebbing into the view of those who take
the child of the Rain’s Hand.
12/7/17
Seasonal cloud watcher
Clouds float and fleet through the air, quietly
I lie there looking up at the evening blue
The colors blend in a haze, sweetly
The grass grows slowly around me as my thoughts run quickly
Flowers bud in my veins; wild, bright, and tangled as they grew
Clouds float and fleet through the air, quietly
The rain rolls and ebbs in the sky threateningly
Water flows from above, staining rivers on my face like a tattoo
The colors blend in a haze, sweetly
Leaves of gold and brown glide down gently
Flitting through my hair as the ice winds blew
Clouds float and fleet through the air, quietly
A white snowflake drifted downward to freeze the earth entirely
Cold crystals form in my eyes, causing them to shine like dew
The colors blend in a haze, sweetly
The cold runs away as the sun blazes happily
I row with the light to my feet, making my shadows grow and move
Clouds float and fleet through the air; quietly
The colors blend in a haze; sweetly
12/16/17
Humorous
Humor is not my forte.
I’m as funny as a drunk greek
stumbling in to a catholic wedding,
grabbing the wedding china
smashing them to the ground
with a confident shout,
“Chuppah!”
And like a drunk, the only reason I’m ever funny,
is when I don’t try to be.
I end up pulling the joke so paper thin
that when I try to add logic
or explain why I think its funny
it ends up sounding like
rubbing styrofoam together;
Quite annoying.
I could add way more word plays or jokes
or any thing in the holarity spectrum,
but I should really stop when I’m ahead.
Because if I keep this up
this would be beyond humorous.
1/4/18
Listening To Roses
In my mind, there is a
garden.
Beyond the gates are my feelings;
My flowers.
Blooming and withering away with each visit,
each thought.
I enter the garden, my mind with clippers.
Shaping and pruning flowers in order.
But what if I lose those clippers?
I have.
Flowers and vines grow and spring out
to show my thoughts to those who care for such things.
But who would want to watch an introvert?
Why would they?
To watch with the knowledge that someone's emotions are breaking out;
That someone's heart is eating itself.
A lot of people.
People who love to pluck and pull at the “oh so pretty” floral display.
By 'pretty,' I see the term 'entertaining' to be more appropriate.
Because no matter what perspective you view,
it will always be yours.
Your day, your life, your feelings.
Your garden.
Your mind.
When did the show about me turn into your autobiography about your problems?
Who do you compare someone to?
Yourself.
“My struggle”, “it's hard for me”, “this is hard for-ah
Slow down
Stop the loops of me’s and I’s
Unzoom your mind.
I am aware that it's hard to “walk in someone else's shoes”
Especially if they have the wrong shoe size.
But boats or teacups aside;
Everyone is different.
Be it looks, experiences, or even thoughts.
You can’t just put on empathetic genius goggles and be
So understanding all at once.
It’s not a “I can see clearly now” by Johnny Nash moment.
The world is complex, and some might see it as an uphill battle from beginning to end,
But I, for one, know the world around us like the meaning of getting a bouquet of mixed roses:
“I don’t know what my feelings are yet, but I sure do like you enough to send roses.”
11/16/17
Oak Ponies
The trees
turn to horses
swaying their necks with winds
children climb to their saddles fast
wonder years
11/16/17
Loudness soft
Loudest
yelling gleeful
the radio cranked up
words blurred and drummed but one voice was clear
soft noise
12/17/17
Letting Go
Dreams;
What are thought’s rights to claim to be a dream?
What ID or credentials?
Is it that it was a waking or a sleeping thought
or the so-called fancy of the thinker.
Whose own words in their mind will blur into mere…
A couple of flowers, a bright flow,
growing in the clean blue of water.
What were we thinking about before?
Does it matter?
It’s gone like the pretty petals in fall,
it has broken off like a lost puzzle piece.
To watch another idea be forced or sprung in its place,
cut to fill the hole left, and how it takes…
Fork?
What kind?
A kitchen or a road
Does it matter?
No.
Do you want it to matter?
What? Why'd it stop? Oh, the thought has been derailed and cramped back into the subconsciousness.
The blanks of the empty thoughts are silky and quiet.
Maybe it is a dream.
Maybe only when your thoughts drop down
To silence,
Dropping like the sound of rain from your mind's eye
Till you finally fall asleep, happy that it did not come to the pain
of you take sleeping meds.
But the more the merrier, says the darkness, taking over the unity of a stilling mind.
?/?/17
Forgotten palace
The blooming idle of the vineyard
Swayed in the winds of the west,
Swirling past the far out gondolas
Stranded in the graveyard of misplaced dreams.
The palace is placed in a clove of shields.
Held in place like a jewel on an engagement ring.
Tied down to the sea like a leaf on a stream.
Disappearing in the light and from view.