Tainted Lines

When endings lack strength
Or beginnings clarity,
When the middle is a jumble
Without form or parity,
When the rhyme is crooked,
And the meter uncouth,
When consonance fails,
The diction gone south,
Alliteration acting up,
The repetition stale,
Every word a painful stab
Strategies to no avail,
Decoupled couplets over
Dismembered haikus,
Still-stilted sonnets,
Callow cinquains to lose,
Lines after lines from
Poor to even worse,
But find yourself solace
Within free (uni)verse!

Not so tainted? Ah well; optimism is sweetest in moderation. So be it.

The Watcher

A distant ray breaks through the mist,

A sweep of dust on empty air,

Embracing arms of black come forth,

To welcome the uninvited there.

The welcome mat is rife with rock,

Spotlight-lit, a navy black,

Untrodden crags beneath come forth,

From every wave, a jutting crack.

Yet above it all a soothing light,

From tiny star: colossal glare,

A prayer of the nighttime rite,

Or a searching, sifting stare.

The shadows enter one by one,

To open sea they bid farewell,

And one by one, like weary moths,

Are swallowed by the dancing swell.

A darkness both literal and tonal, both external and internal, from both the above and the below, searching, sifting, dancing...