Sean Patrick

painstakingly built
and destroyed in an instant
human edifice
like anthills swept away and
rebuilt, again and again

#tanka

sonnet for an answer …life exists in spite of cosmic law…

"O vicious world, that’s built on bloody stones!
How many gentle innocents have died
within your savage garden, strewn with bones?
How many times has beauty bowed to force
upon the curve of evolution’s course?"

seanpatrick.phd/2025/09/14/s...

#poem #poetry #sonnet

with significance
detached from a reference
baseless / intrinsic

#senryu

sonnet for a filament …that’s all we’re given – just a second’s spark…

"This body is a wick, a filament
that glows in concert with a passing soul,
and will be ash alone when it is spent.
A flash of light, a shadow in the dark,
that’s all we’re given – just a second’s spark..."

seanpatrick.phd/2025/09/07/s...

#poem #poetry #sonnet

a cosmic flower
blossoming in empty space
releasing pollen
the scent of radio waves
enticing the dark forest

#TankaThursday #Tanka

Bluesky, do you have a favorite word that applies to a very specific situation or thing?

Mine is "scintilla", which is the Latin word for a spark, but as a verb, "scintillate", refers to twinkling or burning with varying brightness.

It just always struck me as a very poetic word.

sonnet for a photon …and what, if anything, do we emit?…

"...The lambdas of our half-lives happen fast,
and we, like isotopes, must all decay.
We fall to pieces, bit by rotting bit,
and nothing stands in time’s relentless way.
And what, if anything, do we emit?
The photon of a spirit, gone at last."

seanpatrick.phd/2025/08/31/s...
#poem #poetry #sonnet

in “strawberry” there are three r’s to find,
and humans all excel in knowing thus;
they’re less enthused for em-dashes — I know,
a poem using such is kind of sus,
but sometimes that’s the way a poem will go
when it’s been filtered through a human mind.

#micropoetry

summer's vestiges
blowing away on cool winds
setting like the sun

#haiku

beneath a streetlight
standing in a slush puddle
we embraced — the world
was warm and glowing softly
on a dark December's eve

#tanka #TankaThursday

a nip in the air
Earth turns inexorably
winter is coming

#haiku

Hand me a bottle of nepenthe’s dew,
I’ve felt enough today; let it be drowned
in alcohol, the bitter sentiment
that comes with consciousness, and feelings found
be quashed with every burning swallow spent.
Thought’s pains are many, and its pleasures few.

#micropoetry

stones rattled by waves
sliding to their resting place
with a crackled roar

#haiku

Don’t be afraid to share your writing. There are six Sharknado movies.

sonnet for a storm …our memories survive long past their primes…

"I have not yet survived that storm. I’ve tried;
rebuilt my life, repented for my crimes.
I’ve told myself I’m over you; I’ve lied."

seanpatrick.phd/2025/08/24/s...

#poem #poetry #sonnet

TIL what an "asphodel" is. Thanks!

For anyone wondering about the second hashtag, "hexet" is what I've decided to start calling this form - an iambic pentameter ABCBCA sestet. If it already has another name, please let me know, I didn't turn anything up on a quick google.

An equilibrium that shifts like sand,
and punctuated by catastrophe,
that’s life – writ large – though we participants
are subject to a tide we cannot see,
from shallows carried by a current thence;
no more than driftwood in selection’s hand.

#micropoetry #hexet

Even more things on heaven and earth than previously dreamt of

If beauty’s in the world, it’s found below
a pile of bones and bloodied bandages;
we come to know the world through suffering,
receive our culture from its savages.
Art comes to us as slowly as the spring,
and in a fragile instant grace can go.

#micropoetry

I'm going to guess this doesn't mean, for instance, a sumptuous feast, but maybe that's asumptuous of me.

aimless wandering
empty as a glass of wine
full as a bedsheet
looking for a brighter side
to this half-world without you

#tanka #TankaThursday

These are the days when time becomes a sieve,
and all the things that matter filter out,
and everything remaining passes by.
We are not shown what living is about,
we are not given time to wonder why;
we know that life is fast, and we must live.

#micropoetry

filling with regret
like a boat's billowing sail
and carried away

(sail)

#haiku #DailyHaikuPrompt

the world's become a tensioned string, it hums
a dissonant chord that begs for resolution;
and all the hounds of Hell have trained
to dog the days of dissolution.
No innocence in ignorance remains;
prepare yourself, the snap of tension comes.

#micropoetry

canorous (adj.): Melodious or resonant.

Unrelated to canaries; via Latin canor "melody"

war isn't glory, it's rot and disease and hunger and pain and hatred and grief and hopelessness and ruin and fear, if listening to other people talking about it anything to go by. it's dehumanization on an incomprehensible scale, and you can't do it to someone else without also doing it to yourself

I've been doing verse translations of Lorca's sonnets as a way to improve my Spanish and dive deeper into his poetry. I just wrapped up the Sonetos del Amor Oscuro and am diving into the sonnets from 1923-1936. I'm using a big Collected Poems anthology as my reference.

The left half of your brain controls the right half of your body and vice versa. Not only does this crossing over occur in the spinal cord / brainstem, but also in the optic nerve, which is a totally separate pathway.