Nature FreeForm Poem

An endless white desert glares under the noonday sun. A lone cactus rises out of the sand, verdant against the unremarkable background. In the distance, a mountain rises. It breaks the skin of the desert, rising high into the sky. A grey snake suns itself on a gray rock. A scaly lizard crawls across the sand. High above, hanging below the yellow sun, grey vultures circle. One shrieks, letting loose an unearthly call that chills a patchy white owl. The owl quickly retreats into its hole, one of many in the shifting sands. A grey-black rabbit hops to and fro, scanning the ground for any signs of vegetation. It spots a lone dirty shrub, and hops over to its dinner. As its head descends to snatch up the plant, a falcon swoops down and grabs it in its talons. The rabbit’s squeal echoes around the dusty plain. A low rumbling fills the ears of all and sundry, a plane swoops low over the desert, its flashy colors shining brightly against the blue sky. Night fall, a crescent moon rises over the sand. A wash of pale light slowly slides across the sand, an owl hoots. First one scorpion, then another, emerges from a thin crack in another white rock, until a flood of black bodies and scuttling hairy legs pours from the tiny crack. A flurry of activity in this sun-bleached, arid, white world, here at the median of the world.

Nature Poem

A tall stone tower, a monolith rising to slide through the clouds. Rising to greet the first light of dawn as the sun slowly creeps upwards. A twisty path winds around, a snake slowly sliding upwards. Two people, ants on the mountainside, climb ever upwards, green packs larger than their heads weigh them down. One slips and almost falls. A small pebble leaves the path, twirling down into darkness. It lands into a pool, a small splash, barely audible, yet it resonates across the world. Far away, amid concrete towers on concrete hills in a bleak jungle, a young boy awakens, green eyes snapping open in the night. From a pool much like the pebble fell into, a dragonfly rises upward, Blue wings snapping open, to lift itself into the boundless sky, green body glinting in the mist. Two butterflies spin round each other, a never-ending dance in the sky, a pale blue and a fiery red, opposites in this divided world. A swarm of flies hovering over a brine lake suddenly flits away, one coherent whole dissolving into a many-headed beast. A grey lizard sunning itself on a rock, slowly turning a contented green. A catcall in the wild, a flurry of activity as dawn approaches. A flock of parrots flying off into the sunset. Green grass swaying on the wind. Deer bounding over a babbling brook. A seagull flying high above the roaring waves. A bear, huge in its enormity, rears on its hind legs. Everything runs when no-one cries. A pebble rouses the world, and a boulder creates a lullaby to lure all creation back into slumber. And Earth drifts on, in the trackless wastes of the empty void. Slowly turning about a bright star, yellow and gold, lighting up our world.

Pessimistic Poem.

A lone wolf stalked across the rocky outcropping.
She stopped at the edge
of the precipice and howled
at the moon.
Far below her, in a cave on the
bottom of the cliff face, a young boy shudders.
Winter wind bites at his toes,
as it groans in the night air. A grey pallor
overtakes the
face of a friend,
and the stench of death
descends upon the camp. An air of fear
coats the cave, turning the
air to butter and time to molasses
as the second’s inch by.
Soon the flies gather, and maggots writhe
on the hard stone. A
red fox steps
into the cavern, eyes like gemstones.
But a cold wind
has been gathering outside,
and now it rushes in, and the fox darts out.
The wind collides with smoke,
rising embers from the fire. The smoke,
caught in a vortex shapes itself into a death mask.
A leering skull
juts out of the smoke, writhing
on a thin neck. The
smoky apparition descends on the dead man,
and blood drenches the floor,
as death feeds. '
Carrion spatters the ground,
and a young woman screams.
Death has come for his payment.
This man has been
freed from his debt, the debt that all men must pay.
Nothing is immortal; all is ephemeral,
hold tight to time, as it slips from your
fingers like sand. Lost chances,
deadened loves,
still-warm pains,
all drifting down to rest, forgotten, l
ike dust on a top shelf.
Possessions
are an illusion, we own nothing,
nothing is ours, and we are merely borrowers.
Home is a false word,
it is like dust on the wind as we,
with all of our bravado, stumble along to our end,
aware that each step
we take is lethal, yet no one cares,
for life is so much easier. Memory
is untrustworthy,
for our minds are
reflections of ourselves,
and are we not liars?

Ocean Haiku

a blue wave shatters
on a slice of rock sticking
up out of the sea.

Tree Haiku

A petrified tree
stands alone on a barren
chunk of sea-worn rock.

FutureStory

Tom stood in a room larger than the city he had left behind. It rose high above Tom’s head, filled with strange ships and scurrying people. He, along with twenty-two others from the plane were planned to get on the seven-thirty and seven-thirty-five shuttles to the moon colonies. The first shuttle, the seven-thirty shuttle was red and white, and shaped rather like a turtle. The seven-thirty-five shuttle was a monotone black, and shaped like a teardrop. It was sleek and new, shiny and polished to perfection. On the other hand, though, the other shuttle was large, awkward and dented, with grubby windows, and a little burnt at the edges. Over all, Tom would rather have ridden on the seven-thirty-five shuttle, but they had been split in groups of 11, and Tom was in the first group, which would be riding on the seven-thirty shuttle. While on the plane, he had made a new friend, a young girl with an eye patch and a long scar on her cheek. She seemed nice enough, though small for a girl of seven years, who appeared to be only five. Of course, Tom new nothing of this, because he had grown up knowing only two human faces: his and his grandfather’s. As a consequence, he had bad people skills for a ten-year-old.

FutureStory

Tom gasped and doubled his speed, but no matter how fast he ran, the robot always stayed right behind him. He could see the gears inside its head turning, rotating the robot’s head, twisting its eyes in all directions, and turning other gears to make the robot move. Frayed wires hung; limp, sparking, from holes in the robot’s exoskeleton. The Red Crosses’ airplane’s door opened right as Tom reached the plane. He clamored on, but right as the door closed and the plane prepared for takeoff, the robot opened fire. Bullets ricocheted off of the plane’s armor, with only a few bullets piercing through the plating. But it was too late, and the plane took off, heading in the direction of California, where all commercial spaceships left for the moon or Mars.

FutureStory

The next evening, around four thirty in the afternoon, Tom left the apartment building with a single rotting backpack containing all of his worldly possessions, including Rodney the rat. He walked through the city, gazing at the crumbling buildings, all that remained of one of the greatest cities in the USA. For the next half hour, he walked through Chicago, slowly making his way to the edge of the city. As he neared the end of his little jaunt, he heard a clanking. He twisted to look behind him and, there, appearing from around a corner was a humanoid figure. From the waist up, it was a humanoid robot, albeit with four arms, two of which had large blades coming out from their wrists, and a rocket launcher on its shoulder. But from the waist down, it was a tank, without the turret and cannon. Tom screamed, and the robot turned in his direction. “You are not authorized to be in this area.” The robot said in a flat tone. “I will escort you to the city center and wait there for further or-or-or-orders” as it said that final word sparks flew from its metal head. Tom picked up his backpack and ran in the opposite direction from the robot. As he ran, a white and gold airplane with a red cross on its side landed on the uneven ground, about a half-mile away. Tom adjusted his course so he was heading directly at the plane. He turned to look behind him, and found him facing the robot, because it was barely a foot behind him!

Freeform Poem

Fearsome winds,
howling in their fury,
sweep across the lonely plains
of misery,
bringing with them
a plague of
despair,
with a plate of holocaust
and a side
of destruction.

A lonely house stands on a hill
overlooking those
dreadfully boring
plains,
Within, a merry fire blazes,
and a small family
gathers around a
bubbling
pot of joy,
a stew of cheer,
an elixir of hope.

Hope, for a better life
tommorow,
for sunny days
spent playing games in a
green field,
but under the door
creeps a
tendril
of dissent,
unhappiness,
and dangerously
short tempers.

FutureStory

In the year 2029, the world is very different than it is now. Let me give you a brief synopsis: China and Russia have been bought out by a Microsoft/Apple conglomerate. Pakistan and Afghanistan are both ruled by the Taliban and the remaining free counties live in fear of a powerful nuclear strike. America has been reduced to a shadow of its former self. Only the west coast has escaped most of the evils that plague the rest of the states. The world teeters on the brink of a major ecological disaster, and as a consequence both the moon and Mars have been settled and less than an eighth of the human population remains on a slowly dying Earth. Virgin Galactic is unofficially the most powerful entity in our solar system. It controls most of the atmosphere, along with the moon and Mars. This story begins with a young boy living in the ruins of Chicago, in an abandoned apartment building.
Tom sat on a moth-eaten sofa, the only piece of furniture other than the bed left. He sat twiddling with an old radio, trying to get a message out. He lived by himself, in this apartment building. As far as he knew, he was the only remaining human inhabitant left in Chicago. He had lived here for as long as he could remember, with no way to contact the outside world until he found an old police radio in the wreckage of a house a couple of weeks ago, and since then he had tried night and day to get an SOS out to somebody, hopefully a charity group. When he was younger, he had a friend, an older man, who had told him about when the world was bright and hopeful, and then how everything had gone sour. The collapse of the world ecosystem, the self-destruction of many countries, and the decline of the economy, until everyone was virtually broke. He kept twiddling the rusty dials on the radio, when something suddenly happened. Instead of the usual hissing and crackling, a voice, gravely, suddenly appeared. It was saying, “So we have the transport ship ready for takeoff, and once we leave we will collect all of the residents and have them report back here. Then we will load them all on the rocket and… Hey, John, someone’s on this channel. Uhhh… Hello? What do you want?” Tom responded, “ H-Hi. I’m Tom. I live in Chicago.” “Chicago? I thought Chicago was abandoned?” “I guess I’m the only one here. Other than the rats, I mean. I’m only ten years old. Is there any chance that someone could come and get me?” “Of course, little buddy! We are the Red Cross, after all. We help those that need helping. Or something like that… Well, be at the city’s edge on 5 o’clock Thursday evening. We’ll pick you up there.” “Thank you so much!” Tom said.He set down the radio and cheered, his face lit up in a joyous smile. “Did you hear that, Rodney? We’re finally leaving this rotten old place!” He said to a camera-sized rat with crooked whiskers and a runny nose. He hugged the little rat smiling in spite of the smell.