Does innocence skim the oceans, like Shearwaters?
What then of the bleached and bloated drowned
overthrown. overboard, their parched skin dissolving
piecemeal from alabaster bones?
And that taste of salt. A portent? A bloodied cheek?
or rivulets tracking the contours of each face
for all lost souls and every unsought sheep?
Do only blue eyes cry forget me not?
That surely is the poet, fishing for the fanciful!
Did Neruda though drop such questions as Spanish koans ?
I want to know where does blame lie when there is no culprit, no perjurer.
Should we not question when truth must stand before the Grand Inquisitor?
Such devices I’ve discovered in uncovered ruins. Exhumed some.
Did I dig too deep at times?. Bury my head in the sands
of a bygone age, besides a shattered visage? 1
We earthlings, almost always all at sea, losing hope
even before the flare goes up. Wondering when the ending.
Have poets found an antidote, as existential wanderers
flitting from poser to poser, like blithe butterflies?2
- reference to Shelley’s “Ozymandias” ↩︎
- poser not poseur: a problem or question that is difficult to solve or answer: – ↩︎
For Grace’s MTB prompt “Poems of Questions” we are invited to write as such, not just as a list but with with some expansions, without resolutions and having the piquancy of literary devices.
PoetryPix 
Wow, Laura, poetic questions indeed! I love the opening line, and you surprised me with the contrasting ones that followed it, the ‘parched skin dissolving piecemeal from alabaster bones’, and the splash of colour in‘do only blue eyes cry forget me not?’
many thanks Kim – I let the questions lead me down the rabbit hole a bit!
You’re most welcome, Laura. Sometimes the rabbit hole yields the best poems, Lewis Carrol would confer.
I would love to think so in response to the last one. Also I would question too if no one is to blame. Love your thought provoking questions specially this part:
And that taste of salt. A portent? A bloodied cheek?or rivulets tracking the contours of each facefor all lost souls and every unsought sheep?
Thanks Laura!
thank you for the prompt Grace and for your feedback – I’d like to revisit this style in future
“or rivulets tracking the contours of each face
for all lost souls and every unsought sheep?”
I’d like to think the world would be a much better place if there was so much empathy.
we make the world so must try to develop it!