2024 Official DUP Stomp the Prompt Comp

#10

Hands to the Grave

Keep calm on inhale
Hidden, shades curtail, bloodshot eyed deprave
Felt their sinister emotions in braille
And though critics did try best to enslave
We caught them, greyscale, withdrawing to crave
Shred the limiter, our love raised from veil
Your hand to the grave, death naught finisher
Survived to exhale

Heart's dissection, ran deep as strongest roots
Let's breathe again, sun shinning to our fruits

Prompt # 10


Alvarenga Lost at Sea

A two-day fishing trip turned into an misfortune
When two fishermen went out to sea
But a five-day storm drove them severely off course
Losing all communication sent off adrift

Without any supplies the two men had to survive
By eating raw fish, drinking rain water and turtle blood
But after four months one of the fishermen died
And Jose Alvarenga continued ill-fated or culled

And for nine more months the man lost at sea
Drifted across the ocean for over six thousand miles
Away from civilization alone with his thoughts
As if destiny and heaven had put him through this trial

Until one day when he finally spotted a small island
He knew he made it, he knew he had survived
He jumped off the fishing boat and swam to shore
Jose Alvarenga, once lost at sea, came back alive

Prompt # 11

Expect the Unexpected

I always expect the unexpected you see
No matter how ridiculous or stupid it may be
Prepare for the worst and hope for the best
Because planning helps me deal with the stress

I usually have a back-up plan in the back of my mind
Covering my bases so that everything is aligned
Because if things go south I will not be surprised
I’ll be able take the punch just like I exercised

And if the shit hits the fan you know I’m the man
I lean on my skills and wits to deal with the slam
I’ve been burned before like hard lessons learned
I got the scars to prove like medals I’ve earned

Prompt # 12

Everything is Important
(and Nothing is More Important Than Everything)

Given the calculations and parameters I’ve set within time limits and resources
I am lacking in the stimulus and motivation to continue my education
Presently as my overall health and condition has been in a slow decline for years
It is no excuse to place a mental obstacle rendering me to a state of obfuscation

With that in mind, a fear of success has created a parabolical intellectual block
Anticipating a physical exhaustion with a rather unreal anxiety of the unknown
But it lies more in the concern of funding and financing the educational pursuit
While understanding the return of investment is worth the undertaking alone

After running estimates the cost and expense seem overwhelming and intimidating
As other expenditures in the current budget put a stress on objectives and goals
After all, it is only logical to feel a strain with the rising cost of living and inflation
Especially in a nation where political tensions have an effect on family and social roles

Knowing that everything is important and nothing is more important than everything
The pursuit of a second degree means a two-year commitment and persistence
For if I want to continue on a path of self improvement while maintaining a career
I must foresee the light at the end of that tunnel, even if it’s far into the distance

Prompt # 13

Out of Control

I was young
I was angry
I was completely out of control
I had self-loathe and disgust for myself
I was miserable with the path I chose

Unhappiness lead me into depression
And depression into an even darker road
Where ending my life seemed like the only thing to do
But most of all I felt like any day I would simply implode

I lied
I cheated
I screamed
Then everything just went quiet
And when I woke up
I thought everything would be ok
So long as I was being compliant

Not once
Not twice
But three times did I jump into the abyss
Feeling trapped I thought I thought of it all
Only to feel more stagnation in the precipice

It wasn’t until I sought help did I finally understand
Life is a myriad of ups and downs
Of triumphs and defeats
And if I really wanted to change for the better
The choice was up to me
To take full responsibility
Because I’m one who is in control
Of my emotions and response

#3

One For TS, Ezra And The Buk

Pound and Eliot, I despise!
That poison pair I'd love to kick!
They ruined poetry for years!
The gruesome twosome make me sick!

The Waste Land's rubbish, utter tripe!
The Cantos? Well, they're even worse!
I don't think I have ever read
a bigger load of awful verse!

Oh, wait a minute! Yes, I have!
That time I had such rotten luck
to pick up – most unfortunately! –
and read a Charles Bukowski book.

#3

One For Donald Trump

If I were a fluffy cloud
up there in sky so blue,
I'd float along to where you were
and piss down over you;

and could I be a sunny day
all nice and warm and hot,
I would be that sunny day
wherever you were not;

and if I were a lightning bolt
I would then aspire
to flash along to where you live
and set your house on fire;

and could I be a hurricane
not ever I would linger
to blast and blow you off a cliff
you horrible right-winger!

Prompt # 14

Laughs and Smiles

Sometimes the days feel like they’re dragging
And yet when I look in the mirror the years have passed fast
I may not reach the peak of a mountain to fight a dragon
But I know that after I’m gone my verses are going to last

I may not be popular or reach fame in my time
But the rhymes I leave behind can serve a testament
I’m just a simple man striving to find what’s mine
So that my children will one day share in the sentiment

I’m motivated by their laughs and smiles in their faces
Like photographs of these moments engraved in our hearts
These core memories are captured in words and embraces
Knowing my love for them will continue long after I depart

Death By Taxes

Exploiting the need
Setting the cost of this dead end living
In this system, the consumer is the feed
Lives for auction, waged efforts in short changed bidding

Cycles of debt make up bondages of dependency
Desperation to control in this market of captivity

Oppressive price tags and credit scores to earn a right to owe
Qualifying for financial burdens
They own the ground in which we sow

Harvesting more costly endeavors in this death grip for a home
Culture of the illusion of success
Retirement savings for future complication
Affording everyone their ransomed breath
Pseudo political saviors sell hell in the shell of salvation

It rolls down hill from blood on the hands of money marionette ventriloquism
When everyone is puppet to the dreams that hide the nightmare
Ranks of users bully us into formations of submission
Everyone’s got a battle but no one likes to fight fair

Beat into the patterns of a routine heist
Subject to oppressions of direct assault
Getting sized up for coffins in place of paradise
No one is innocent when everyone’s at fault

Voluntarily bought in as advertisers brain-soil through vision cast
Hypnosis of material conveniences trending
Mortgaging the temporal in pursuits that never last
Chasing the means to achieve false summits never ending

Cash out, pushed to the brim
Set the rates at which we’re going bankrupt again
Cut close, just enough to break even for the day
Reoccurring collectors tell us what to pay

Signing on the dotted line when we never had a choice
Conditioned into this script of our society where money talks but no one’s got a voice

Putting words in the mouths of paychecks to fit us into the mold
Saving for freedoms relegated to the generic dreams that we’ve been sold

The house, the spouse, the cars, the modern age
When all of us are props for fabricated smiles posted on a Facebook page

Faking alive to make believe in breathing
When everything is a slow fade, the inevitable means to end
Temporal value worthless in the reaping
Our hearts revealed in every penny that we spend

Caught in the web, twitching on the line
Wings tangled, when all we see is the box we’ve been conditioned to
The limit of the vision is a relative sense of going blind
Losing all we hold too close from a lifetimes point of view

This is a shotgun wedding to conform
When it’s the street or a shelter for pennies on the hour
We all face the torrential downpour of a storm
Married to occupation
A hostage situation
Wasting lives to feed another’s lust for power…

#15

Majority Rules

So very high and mighty
upon your stepping stool
belief you are of greater value
simply because you rule

Born of privilege
of this you cannot ignore
built solely on the backs
of the needy and the poor

Reaping benefits
meant only for a few
thinking you are superior
from an obscured view

You are disadvantaged
no capacity for compassion
pretending you are worthy
based on the clothes you fashion

All that was provided
only makes you weak
lacking skills to discover
the more of which you seek

Greed will be your downfall
knowing not how to survive
without your luxuries
you shall fail to thrive

Society owes no dues
no obligation exists
you will not hold your ground
when the majority resists

Prompt #8

#15

It's Time

We have none to lose
Yet, it slips away

When most kinetic
In jubilant high spirits
It slips between grasp
Like pouring sand

Prying my own hands open
To lose my miser's cloak

At peak's potential
Yet it trudges onward
With seconds saturated
Scraps go to the dogs

Stay vigilant in panning
This eternal river for gold

Some days, perfume
Wisps that float by
Brushing into us
With memories
Like close embraces
Mixed with soft lips

Other days, stenching
A cruel taskmaster
Under whose thumb
We wish to be free

Numbering our days,
Whether count towards escape
Or pass bittersweet tears
Like goodbyes to an old friend
Our eyes reflect our time

Prompt # 15

I GOT KIDS TO FEED!

Ooh that chronograph would look good on my wrist
Though I like it, it’s really a want and not a need
I know I could walk around the office and flaunt it
I have the money for it but dang it I got kids to feed!

I’ve been a hankering to go on a long vacation
Go to Pamplona and run with the bulls in the stampede
But I’m getting a little too old for these shenanigans
I’ve been dreaming of skydiving but I got kids to feed!

Though I’m in a good place as far as income is concerned
There was a point when my family had some tough times
I had to skip a meal or two to have enough to go around
We did ok, even if we had to count nickels and dimes

But I appreciate those hard times because now I feel blessed
We tightened up our budgets and eventually pulled through
And though I live in one of the richest nations in the world
In my town
Hunger and homelessness has become an even bigger issue

I try to live within my means and still enjoy the nice things
Understanding the difference between want and need
I can afford the chronograph but family time is important too
I work hard and laugh a lot even when l got them kids to feed

Zombie Lines

These words fade before the ink dries
When intentions to actions fail to materialize

Fabricating inspiration, reputation embodied in an empty phrase
All the ammunition without the impact, handicaps of shame
The right words without the follow through, the low highs of shallow praise
Wasted potentials relegated to make a name

Play the role and write the script
Saint facades of the linguist hypocrite
Thriving on the uninspired
The taste for silence is acquired

Every word is noise that is love without meaning
When character is lost with integrity’s spine
Inconsistency is self defeating
Confessions and dead apologetics in every zombie line

Penances mean well but fail for follow through
My ugly ways accuse to condemn from a broken point of view

I am not victim when I instigate the consequences
Humility entreating me to abandon my defenses
Writing these letters to fill these pages uninspired
When every word that forges promise makes me out to be a liar

Suicide by secrecy and misplaced priorities on repeat
Save the soul or save the face, witness versus egos bid
Appraised self worth on a scale of self defeat
Would they still love me if they knew all the ugly things I did

Self doubt and judgements laid upon this heart that breaks in the hope of something more
Breathing a test in my longevity of how much of myself I can endure

Forgiveness at the altar on which I throw myself time and time again
Haunted by the my guilt in the phantom of regrets formed of my own sin
I write through the mud to make something more of something uninspired
To find substance in the burn of the ways I play with fire

Set aflame the midnight oils once more
As to lead by or be made an example of
Purity tarnished by the rot that decays me at the core
Versing compositions of self hate and false love

Idol in the mirror, hoisted images of vanity
Excavate the fossil beneath the dirt
Archeological rehashing of identity
Therapy journals from pens dipped in the blood of my own hurt

Violations of boundaries
These convictions I strive to bring to light
Walking in circles orbiting
Shadows eclipse the sun when days are made of night…

#1

Prompt # 16

If it’s Meant to Be

It’s difficult to accept that everything has been predetermined
As if our paths were already chosen and we just fulfill the destiny
And even if midway down the road we change the way it goes
Was the change too already planned just like it was meant to be?

Some are born into poverty but will strive to get out of there
While others with riches and resources decide to be miserable
Some will acquire the drive to change and better their lives
While others leave it to chance staying stagnant and pitiful

The law of attraction can be very real
We attract that what which we focus on
And if we put emphasis on the negative
Then you can bet you’ll always be a pawn

We are our thoughts, our feelings, we are the choices we make
Regardless of whatever the ebb and flow of the universe can be
Whether it’s fated or pre-decided the future is up to us to write it
We attract what we think and that becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy

#16

To Map Out Infinity

Pondering under punctures of the infinity,
Pinholes, the other side twinkling through
Atop my roof, where visits oft add salinity
Tonight, alone, I plan for what I wish I knew
In present, past trends now cease extending
I'm left to wander about, mapping out infinity
Tightroping, I wobble to futures impending
Pray the ground be closer, by such divinity  
Should the rope snap, I fall to path below
Please guide my feet to night's stars aglow