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Mar 2015 · 886
Eclipsed
Rob Rutledge Mar 2015
Awake once more
Upon moonlit shores,
The eclipse is
Suffocating,

Stood lost in thought
The star light is caught,
In nets of
Captivation.

Tracing lines in the sky
Wondering why,
We're objects of
Subjugation.

All just a lie,
Always a lie that
Justifies vindication
Mar 2015 · 687
Waiting
Rob Rutledge Mar 2015
I am not afraid of death
It's the waiting that's killing me.
Mar 2015 · 643
Raw Spirit
Rob Rutledge Mar 2015
Come sit! Let us set the world to rights!
While basking in the pale Androidian Light,
Lamenting the plights and strife of others,

"Another Whiskey?"

"Well, if it's no bother"

Raw spirit in our hands,
Raw thoughts and naive plans,
Admirable, worthy
Yet all go the way of sand.
Blown across the desert landscape
Captive of the winds command.
Mar 2015 · 10.1k
Wilderness
Rob Rutledge Mar 2015
His hands are scarred,
Face is a mess,
Too long walking
Through the wilderness.
The bears are hungry
Wolves they howl,
The Levy's breaking
All will
Drowns.
Washed away by savage currents
Watching fallen suns go
Down.
Mar 2015 · 1.1k
All the Beasts of Myth
Rob Rutledge Mar 2015
The treeline stands as sentinels,
Offering crowns to the crescent moon.
The rooted column of soldiers
Witness the slender shadow as it grew.
A thumb sized fairy in its hand,
Bent double to whisper tidings
Of human flesh on sacred land.
That which is sacrosanct
Can not so easily be swayed!
As all the beasts of myth and nightmares
Charge on into the fray.

The knight finished taking a **** against the tavern wall,
The last defence of the realm, children and us all.

Well.....

That and trebuchets,

Spears,

Swords.

All the tools of war.

Far beyond the Forrest front
Pride, The Lord of Man
Forges ill thought plans
Lazily playing chess, cavalier
With the lives of pawns.
Thoughtlessly moving pieces with
Trembling blood stained hands.
Mar 2015 · 1.9k
Candlelight
Rob Rutledge Mar 2015
Tiny flame huddled close to fading wick,
A rag doll seized in the fist of a tempest.
Fading quick,
Wax molten in our grip.
Burning, viscous through trembling fingers it slips.
Knuckles crack like the fire in the hearth
Consuming logs uprooted from the earth
Giving birth to each ember on the mantle,
Dancing decay around subdued bowing candles.

Crying white tears upon the silent tables
The evening sneers at hush filled fables.
Horses bray in solemn stables
Dreaming of pastures new,
Wick snuffed out by daylights fingers
Flame made still by the morning dew.
Mar 2015 · 817
Necropolis
Rob Rutledge Mar 2015
We ride in on night winged eagles
Three harbingers of fate.
Circling over the city of the dead
We land awkwardly at the gate.
Trudging through the streets of mist
Treading on cobbled hopes,
Gathering jackets close
We barge through crowds of ghosts.

Three wise men, with nothing much to say.
Gather round in the rain by the side of the Grave.
Bringing the gift of silence,
Golden memories and mirth.
The city takes another back into the earth.
The rain starts to lighten, a feint mist
Over fresh turned turf.
The burden is lightened
The journey back is not so tough.
Even the city of the dead is filled
With towers of love.
Mar 2015 · 2.6k
Globe Trotting
Rob Rutledge Mar 2015
It started in Dublin before I was born
Crossing the Irish Sea to weather a storm.
London called through the wind and rain
Big city lights and a country's flame.
To Manchester then, a city united
At least to outsiders.
But to those within it's somewhat
Divided.

Summers in France.
Dining in Provence
Time in Toulouse
And along the Loire.
But Paris! Paris has that
Je ne sais quoi
Fine wine, fine company
It's a fine philosophy.

A German exchange
in einer stadt namens
Bad Bentheim.

Exposed to a culture
And the work of Rammstein.
A few days in Berlin
A fantastic city with much
History within.

Gondolas in Vienna if only for a day
Sailing down the Danube
Water wants us on our way.
We stay for a while
Within the walls of Budapest,
My first shot of Absinthe
Puts my liver to the test.

No rest for the wicked
That wanderlust I long.
Settled for a while by the lights of
Hong Kong,
A place I felt for a while at peace
High in the Monastery of Lantau's peeks.
I went once and I went again.
When wizened crones speak of golden devils,
Stroking my blonde hair on the streets of
Shenzhen.
I'm fortunate enough to have travelled to some fantastic places. A poor tribute to some of those visited.
Feb 2015 · 888
Quantum
Rob Rutledge Feb 2015
They will tunnel through your heart
Becoming entangled with your soul.
A thousand miles apart,
The one is weaker than the whole.
Feb 2015 · 873
Don't be too hard on them
Rob Rutledge Feb 2015
They are reflections of the world
We inhabit. Mirrored shards
Flung high into the air.
Sharing in all of beautys passion,
Caught in the lensflare of compassion
Bound to the refraction of selfless care.
Compounded with the crux of inaction.
Falling shards are somewhat sharp.

They tend to draw blood.

No fault of their own
For fault implies Blame
Blame implies control.

The arrow does not make the bow
Feb 2015 · 2.8k
Cobalt
Rob Rutledge Feb 2015
Spires silhouette the peaks of cobalt
Mountains. An ancient castle in the sky
Made small by the Jovian night. A
Hundred worlds engulfed within the eye
Reflected in stardrops, quilted by the sigh
Of a species that had lost its wonder.
One last Traveler, the last of her kind,
Dieing on the veranda
Of the fortress she had called her home,
Reaching her scaled hand to the stars
She asks,
"Are we alone?"
Jan 2015 · 587
Musical Chairs (10w)
Rob Rutledge Jan 2015
We're either scrambling for a place
Or playing the music
Jan 2015 · 461
Secret
Rob Rutledge Jan 2015
Tell me a secret,
One you've been keeping
Quiet, still beating
After all these years.
Start at the beginning
Till you find the feelings
That once gave meaning
To all your fears.

Was it the lullaby
Softly sung in the night
That brought a tear
To your eye?
Was it family leaving,
Friend lists depleting,
The child that died
In your arms.

It was never easy,
This world will defeat me
One day at a time.
So did you give up the fight?
At the very first sight
After being blind.
So tell me a secret
One you've been keeping
And one that will make you smile.
Jan 2015 · 667
Exile
Rob Rutledge Jan 2015
If I had but one wish,
I would wish to live forever.
Find the ties of mortal life
Cut quick the binds we sever.
Become a watcher in the mist,
A homeless, timeless clan
Caught in the currents of the rift.
No Steins Gate will be entered
World lines locked from our reach.
Fighting the tides of entropy
Fist, nail and bloodied teeth.
Again and again and again
Unto the breach.
Drowning,
From the pressure of the deep.

And if in that moment we falter
Our power lost to the trees.
Alder, Maple, Ash.
Vines strangling our cities.
Choking on what we were told.
The earth takes us in a headlock
Strangles tight and wont let go.

Its fingers slipped in the nuclear snow
Withered tendril arms, retreating
To where they used to go.
Exiled below
Deep within the darkest reaches
Far from the reach of the human throne.
In the dark it patiently plotted,
Schemed to overthrow.
Jan 2015 · 634
Deus Ex
Rob Rutledge Jan 2015
There is so much anger in their hearts
That it's hard to feel much past
The rage that warms the path they walk.
Fueled by geothermic machinations
From within the mantled core.
The oceans act to sooth,
Calm the troubles of the land.
But their nature is transient
Moving in ways we will never
Understand

While Barking at the moon
Sense obscured by wilting foliage
Covering the clear thinking of the sky.
Clouding the eternal questions
And the sovereignty of the mind
                            Blown free                  
In the
           Slightest of br e e z e s
Where all the thoughts and ideas live,
Alive for a passing moment. Grasped quick
Or gone the way of water
           Lost somewhere out at sea.
Jan 2015 · 961
Bricks and Mortar
Rob Rutledge Jan 2015
This house is no home.
Just bricks and mortar
Cracked paving stones.
The basil plant on the windowsill
Has seen better days.
Leaves wilting alone.

The walls seem closer,
Close enough to stifle the soul.
Spring should be here by now
But winter won't let go.
The picket gate is creaking
Smothered by the weight of snow.
Cold and broken the boiler has
Long packed in.
Frozen
In what resembles rage again.
Dec 2014 · 749
Humbug
Rob Rutledge Dec 2014
Oh it's the most horrible time of the year.
Long working hours, forced festive cheer.
Only made better by copious amounts of beer.
Oh it's the most horrible time of the year.

Merry Christmas to all you fine people on Hello Poetry
It's not really that horrible.
Dec 2014 · 1.1k
Don't Fuck With The Culture
Rob Rutledge Dec 2014
There was control and Excession
A master Use of Weapons.
Inversions without as well as within.
The Culture looking to windward
At the light of a dying war
Played to the tune of a Hydrogen Sonata
What mattered then Matters no more.
Phlebas played his games
All things considered
Yet played them far too well
Against a dark background
The Feersum Endjinn tells
Of better times.
As Algebraists count,
Passing time on the abaci of the mind.
They divine the nature of the heart,
Given up in offering
To the State of the Art.
A poor tribute to my favorite author the late great Iain Banks
Dec 2014 · 466
On a Starry Eve
Rob Rutledge Dec 2014
A sleeping satellite peeks
Over the shoulders of Orion
Late on a clear christmas eve.
Winking at the world below
The light reflects off passing clouds
A slice of silver flows.
Trickling into far cast shadows
Bathed in an incandescent glow.

The moon lays resplendent
The crowning jewel of the sky
Where many a tired traveller
Became lost within her eyes.
Disguising the fire of the sun
Basking in the pale half-light
Untill this night is done.
And
When the moon gives way
To the cold light of day.
The stars are kept at bay.
Hidden out of sight
Furious
At their chains that bind them to the night.
Rob Rutledge Nov 2014
The stratosphere beckoned closer.
Vertigo took its toll.
Soaring higher than we could ever know.
These wings weren't made of wax
They melted all the same.
The ground seemed far once
Now it's as clear as day.
The clouds get out of my way
Their softness is a lie.
Cunning *******
Floating the atmospheric tide.

I have no such luck.

****

I Think I can see my house...

*crunch
Nov 2014 · 520
Hope
Rob Rutledge Nov 2014
I hope that it rains on your wedding day
And that all of the clouds in your sky are Grey.

I hope that what you beg to borrow
Is bent double, broken in sorrow.

I hope that your face is forever blue
Strangled by terrors old and anew.

I hope the promises you speak
Turn to ashes on your tongue.
And that your days are spent in darkness
Exiled from the sun.

This isn't strictly speaking true.
What we loved once we shall love forever too.
Hatred is a passing wind across the sea
What ever river you sail
I hope that you sail at peace
Nov 2014 · 505
Offering
Rob Rutledge Nov 2014
Every gift that I have been given
Shall be lain down upon the road
That leads to you.
An offering of sight,
Eyes left in the dust beside the path.
A sacrifice of silence,
Tongue nailed to the frame of your door.
A pennance to hear,
Ears scattered among the scrubland
Walking unguided into the abyss
Nothing left to miss but fear.
Nov 2014 · 901
Calligraphy
Rob Rutledge Nov 2014
It's strange how this calligraphy
Instills an impression upon your mind.
What's true for me ain't true for all.
We each have our experiences
The meaning that we find.

Our lives aren't ours to abdicate
They belong in all the places that
We seek.
Love will peek
Round the corners of the chairs
We do avoid.
Whispering all our wants and needs
All shy and coy.

Speak them loud or none will hear you.
None will gather all your cloth into the storm.
Until it's yours.
So scream unto the heavans.
Declaring what is yours.
But that is no guarantee
That happiness will fall at your door.
You'll walk the road abandoned
Accompanied by a roar.
Nov 2014 · 548
Reflection
Rob Rutledge Nov 2014
Shouting hoarse
Vocal chords snap
Carried away by the breeze.
Broken meoldys succumb
To the pull of gravity.
Fallen leaves know how
Futile the struggle has become.
Screaming words into a mirror
For the self reflections of one.
Nov 2014 · 2.1k
Stage Fright
Rob Rutledge Nov 2014
The stage is large and daunting
a warning basking under orange lights.
the actor is thrown into the scene
somewhere from off of stage right.
Shrinking from the glare to the night
Transfixed by sight, the first time it's seen.
He has the strangest urge that this is all a Dream.
Wishful thinking
Im afraid.
The cameras were always rolling, the final credits have been made.

The crowd sit in near silence.

"Is this a part of the show?"


"I think they're building suspense!"












Nothing.
Nov 2014 · 374
Untitled
Rob Rutledge Nov 2014
You're never at your worst
Till you're riding in a hearse
First place in a funeral procession.
In the depths of a recession
Death notes write confessions
Of the obsessions of the heart.
Nov 2014 · 830
Dusk
Rob Rutledge Nov 2014
You will know them not from the smiles
And frowns etched upon stoic faces,
But from the virtue of their hearts
Found in all but the darkest of places.
More often then not they reside deep
Within a tepid grey.
Hunting in the twilight between the
Dusk and the day.
Everything in moderation
Yet nothing is in isolation
Moths to the flame we stray.
Bound to the light
Forever fighting to fly away
Oct 2014 · 594
Sweet Silence
Rob Rutledge Oct 2014
How sweet the sound of silence tastes
Like honey dripped from the gates
Of serenity.
In the still we hear the walls of reality
Echoing louder than we could imagine.
In the fathoms of solitude the roar is
Forgotten.
A human diaspora from ourselves
If but for the fleetest of moments,
Trodden upon
By the boots of a thousand souls.
Oct 2014 · 669
Britain
Rob Rutledge Oct 2014
This is Britain
A land of contradiction
United by a Kingdom
Divided by benediction.
There is friction
And there were rivers of blood.
Where lions and tigers and dragons
Would stop and drink, toast to the flood.
All the waters of the Atlantic
Couldn't wash these shores clean
A damming testament of conquest
Atlantis was a dream,
Built on wooden boats
Cast in irons with an empires hopes.
Though the sins of the father are great
The children walk with a sombre gait
Fields of roses
Both
White and Red
Blossom on the hallowed ground of the Dead.
Roman laws and Norman Lords
Drowned out a Celtic cry
A longship silhouetted
Against a bleak obsidian sky.
The hunted become haunted by the ghosts of yore.
Pagan druids scythe mistletoe
As Haleys comet they saw
Around circles of stone for now and Evermore
Oct 2014 · 1.6k
Life is a Library
Rob Rutledge Oct 2014
Life is a library, but
Too many of our pages are blank,
Our words transparent
Forced into dogeared corners.
Not spineless per se,
But visiting a chiropractor regularly.  
Covering our selves in judgments
Worn with both shame and pride.
We tire of the climb and the thinning air
We bookmark the times we falter
And when we shield our eyes from the glare.
Our minds are marked by the epithets
Gifted unto us by others.  
Some arrows fly true to the bone
Others are way off the mark.
And when our final pages have been read,
The book loaned out or discarded
All that remains of us is said
In a line on granite epitaph
The truth of the dead forever guarded.
Sep 2014 · 504
Gravity
Rob Rutledge Sep 2014
There is a pressure on my shoulders,
Behind my eyes and in my bones.
A force beyond my control.
As helpless as a stone
Though in the wind I sway.
Does it hold us back?
Or
Keep us from flying away?
Sep 2014 · 608
One Word Poem
Sep 2014 · 854
Quicksilver
Rob Rutledge Sep 2014
They were the sons of silver,
Softly treading an angels web.
The last ******* of the ghost
Of winter living forever
Or so it was said.

The players of fools,
Though played from afar.
Distant and watchful
Removed from the heart.

Quick you sons of silver,
On you mercury child!
Your heart may be cold
As metal, numb against
The wilds.
Creaking in the tempest
That cries aloud and moans,
Remember you're never alone.

For they were the daughters of diamond,
Cut in the sandstorm of a bedouin desert.
A million years in the making
Forged in the torture of pressure.
Each impeccable, a priceless treasure.
But every diamond starts its life as coal.
The darkest of hearts made from the death of Old.
Aug 2014 · 4.4k
Night Shift
Rob Rutledge Aug 2014
Staying up late, so late it's early
Then dreaming long and far.
"Come on, get up you're missing the sun!"
"Ah! But I see so much more of the stars!"
Aug 2014 · 1.1k
Clothes Line
Rob Rutledge Aug 2014
One solemn clothes line
Battered in the gale.
Drenched and cold and sodden
Forgotten among the rain.

One stubborn clothes peg
That clings triumphant on the line,
Cursing the sky and tempest
As the last sock flies away sublime.
Aug 2014 · 631
Demon
Rob Rutledge Aug 2014
There is a Demon in the street.
I see it crawl from the gutter
Torn shirt, bloodied knees,
A bloodied forehead too.
Now stumbles to a streetlight
A mournful, wretched view.
Its skin is pale of a borderline
Transparent hue.
Storming eyes of blue
Burn to a manic purpose.
A purpose it wished it knew.
But the mind is a master magician
Showing us the world we want to see.
As the Demon reared its head it gazed at its own reflection
Then
  Realized,

  That it was me.
Aug 2014 · 2.1k
Emerald
Rob Rutledge Aug 2014
The rain falls in whispers,
Meanders through the
Cracks in our lives.
The sky claps sardonically
Prophetic, pathetic fallacy
Alive and well.
As time swells and breathes
Solaris flares, coughs and heaves.
Scorched earth, ashen leaves.
The rain is gone but so's
The emerald green.
Aug 2014 · 663
Witness
Rob Rutledge Aug 2014
Every triumph that we forge
And every evil that we lay
Are etched on the quilt of reality
Brought out to the light of day.

There is always a witness,
Even if it's you.
Walls are a sign of something hidden,
Something we wish to be out of view.
But our masonry is shoddy,
Our archers ill prepared.
The walls will fall transparent
As hollow as our flaws that all are aired.
Jul 2014 · 455
Youth
Rob Rutledge Jul 2014
Youth was never about the innocence
Or the ignorance of what lay ahead.
It was never the friendships
Sailing the waves of imagination.
Or releshing the times we were astray and led.

It was certainly never the dreams,
We have those our entire life
Eight hours a day or night
Spent in mind forged make believe.
It was never the plans that were hatched,
Thatched and woven but semi detached
From what it all could mean.

That lack of conscience, the guilt
It all does feed the fire.
And that is youth, a proving ground
Among candles and lanterns, bonfires,
Cities raized to the ground.
Perhaps a grand symphony of light
May, with time and care be made,
The image burned on an iris fades.
Drowned out and forgotten by the
Light of a billion flames.
Jul 2014 · 673
#
Rob Rutledge Jul 2014
#
And all I can think of is waffles
Jul 2014 · 1.6k
Hush
Rob Rutledge Jul 2014
Against a dark background
On this backwater planet,
We are all just hicks and heathens
In the scheme of galactic beings.

Hush,

Don't speak so loud.

It's best to remain hidden,
Out of sight, safe and sound.
Like the lost Amazonian tribe

That rues the day it was found.
Jul 2014 · 952
Entrenched
Rob Rutledge Jul 2014
We worried so much about sticking our head above the parapet,
We forgot the stagnant water underfoot.
We forgot the stages of stalemate
The terror of trench foot.
Jul 2014 · 1.0k
A Game for Gods
Rob Rutledge Jul 2014
Life is a game, yes.
But it is not played by us.
The universe can be found
In a rundown bar on
The outskirts of Olympus.

It is a battered old pool table
Covered with ash and stale beer.
Where once the gods would linger
Laughing long into the evening
Full of mirth and cheer,
While all the time competing
For who would take control.
Cronus versus Zeus
Potting planets into black holes.

Like all good games, die.
The table was forgotten.
The bar decays
The enthusiasm fades
The universe went out of fashion.
But all the while it was rotten
Something grew on the planets
Misbegotten.
A mold unwanton and alone.
The mold was life and the table was rife
With that which the gods shall never know.
Jun 2014 · 1.5k
Here Be Dragons
Rob Rutledge Jun 2014
An eclipse at the end of the world,
Waterfalls unto the unknown,
Navigate the secrets,
Nautical bold.
Here be dragons, or so we're told.
Well then let us burn,
Charred soul.
Not all that shines is gold.
Hold close the rigging
Friction scars our hands once more.
Voyage to unknown lands
Our future lies in the sand.
Both fine yet blown off course.
Jun 2014 · 589
The Stars
Rob Rutledge Jun 2014
When precisely? We're none too sure.
Between the glow of progress
And the clawing of the walls?
Perhaps.
Somewhere along the western shores
We lost the stars of ancient lore
We forgot the lanterns of the sky.
Drowned in artificial days and
The swell of time.
Let these crests fall and fade,
Accustomed to the eye.
Storms of solace, the galaxy
Burns fires of hubris.
Jun 2014 · 947
Hyperion
Rob Rutledge Jun 2014
Tears vermilion reflecting the night,
St Elmo's fire burning bright,
Sea sick sailors pray for the light
Doomed and forgotten nets are dry.
Albatross soars, wings of flight
Guiding the lost with cries of gulls,
Let us laugh at their misfortune,
Schadenfreude
Styx flows too soon,
Gold on each eyelid
The Titans shall have their due.

Hyperion weeps to Neptune's view
As Icarus burns to seas of blue
And the sails catch on,
Enlightened by the
Dawn multifaceted hue.
Scarlet prism gems
Reflect the fallen, truth
Through crimson tinted lens.
Jun 2014 · 454
One more word
Rob Rutledge Jun 2014
What is one more word?
Among the vortex of voices
That fuel the conscious storm.
Above the din and the Socratic
Winds, silence is born not heard.
Jun 2014 · 533
Wanderer
Rob Rutledge Jun 2014
They come then in the fall.
Just before the russet sunrise
Adorned with skies of gold.
They come with gifts
And promises,
Tales round fires to be told.

Some oaths shall be broken
While others shall be sold.
As stars collide and planets fall
The wanderers return,
Gathering up all they have learned
They strike out into the world.
Jun 2014 · 1.6k
Satori
Rob Rutledge Jun 2014
One more chalice of amber
Encrusted with hopes and dreams.
One more sip from the cup of life
To ground what we believe.

One more breath of neon vapor
That lifts us from our knees,
Frees the wrists of shackles
And clears the way to see.

Repeat,

Ad nauseam,

Until the truth is found.
In the depths of depravity
Satori abounds.
A glimpse of nirvana
And all that was lost is found.

For now,

But as the amber nectar turns bitter
The smoke is powdered on our lungs.
The vapor has all gone while
We hiss our words in tongues.
But in the morning when all is said and done
You awake to true satori,
The road to understanding has only just begun.
Rob Rutledge Jun 2014
Spontaneous yet flexible
Confident and malleable.
Able to go with the times
And go with the flow,
Finger on the pulse
Presentations to show.
Laser pointers and
Laser printers
Pressed for time.
Nothings here
But what here's mine.

Climb over colleagues
Through Ivy leagues
And Redbrick universities.
Shadowed by a letter.
A,
B,
C,
D?

"And extra-curricular activities?"
"Literature?"
"Theatre?"
"Ah...well......I see........."

"......Well....there is an opening.......
.....Not great hours I'm afraid.....
.....But the pay is competitive...............
...Beyond the market rate......."

An inward sigh and a signature.
Uniforms and moral aperture.
We do what "must be done"
And whisper other soft lies
While we hide from the Sun.
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