Gnarled fingers hold
Gently
The dog-eared photos of youth
Shingled eyes search repeatedly
Among shades of white and ash
Wavering hope yields
Regret for memories lost, trampled
Underneath
Rote recollections
Snapped
This snap shot is…this…me?
The drive that lasted for 4 hours and the wait that was longer
The deep, abandoned, rolling to tears laughter of children
The wraith like memories of ripping wrapping paper
The twinkling lights and flashing fancies from yuletide strands
The raising of the tree
The ritual prayer of our token cleric
The feast marked by odd dishes and common routines
The retelling of stories, forty days and forty nights worth of heritage
The settling into familiar seats and sighs
The late comers and early deportees
The insertion of Tab A into Slot B
The luxurious and the sorted
The games and the game with both having scores and winners
The holidays
I feel the poetry that is within
This
Moment of our
Entwining
The manner in which
We
Fold upon each other
Petals
Retreating into
Nightly
Comforts, securities held
As
Shields against the other
Side
While outside beasts and pacing
Devourers
Of words and dogma shout
Misguided
Voices that speak harshly
In
Proper punctuation and orderly belief
Transgressing
Breaking the stems of poppies
While posturing
Pompously
Crushing the delicacy of
Us
Thus releasing the cries
Of our beautiful
Poesy
(this piece was inspired by some raw poetry over at The Naked Light. Thank you Nevine!)
Green - stop
Red - go
We know that’s wrong
From learning
Thinking, believing
We have vast signs
Signals to stop us
To
Yield to others
Blinking permission
To
Move forward in our assigned time
And way
So
Why am I stuck
Frozen
Brakes locked
In trepidation
Of the moving forward of me?
If we can arrange the world’s traffic
Paths
Our road
Ways
So simply with blinking lights and orange
Barrels
Signaling our assigned courses
Why has no one provided
Neatly aligned cones
For knowing
The growing
Older, old,
The waning
Of
Me?
Hear it read - here:
.
Distract me
Please
Forgo the ego
Forbid self-consciousness
Do not ask me to be aware of
Myself or you or the meaning of our actions
Distract me
Let me be lost in the intensity
Of this moment
Fraught with games
Fierce technologies
Let me flounder in shallow
Humor
Crass comments
And crude divisions
Distract me
Please
Flaunt superficial contact
Fuel the facades
The projections of me
I want to be lost
For now
Adore
The me
I want you to see
yes
for the scars that remain after the battered soul heals
for the ongoing hemorrhage of injurious hope
for the fears arising from tortures too ghastly to be mentioned
for the pit of despair where rests stagnant laughter, mired in decay...
for these pieces of the poet's being... there must be poetry
for in the words of the verse, hammered out on life's iron keys
i often find relief and sometimes
in moments of purest grace
are discovered
wonderful questions.
(the poet knows this. true?)
We have
Essential
Moments of mandatory misery
Grasping, tugging emotions
Un-liked, ignored emoticons
The puffed-green faces of ourselves
Dot
The landscape and portraits of
Screens
Screaming at, about, into
The refined, together
Socially happy selves
That we would be, should be
If we abide broadcasted expectations
Joyful, complete, happy, helpful
Free…
We are not
Not always
These naught moments
Remind us
With beautiful
Misery
Hear it read here...
Pumpkins are orange
Always snarling
Ghosts wear striped sheets
Cut-out eyes, shuffling feet
Witches with green faces
Dotting our neighborhood places
Yard tombstones teeter
Launching creatures
Glow sticks and flashlights
Dance in the streets
Doorbells ringing
And parental ghouls singing
Trick or Treat!
(Note: In the first line, have we solved the eternal poetic question: what rhymes with orange?)
Red House Talking*
standing
heat scared twisted tin
metal remains of the shelter of generations
once marking the boundary between security, sky
and seasons' harsh torments of ice and wind
once shielding mother and child and keeping
home hearth’s warmth within
now
sentinel timbers stand charred
remnants of hard taught lessons
essential knowing of words and deed
those shadows of learning that walk with us stand undaunted
proclaiming our way through life's course
holding us to right of way
pane-less windows black and lost
tell of now absent eyes peering outward
watching for familiar faces and tracing memories
in winter’s vapor smudged glass and speaking again
of curtains drawn tightly muffling
the magic giggles of life long love and randy youth
now
the boundaries of roof and wall
yield openly, freeing lives long bound here
as prolific gaps grasp not even nature's transient breeze
but only to have it dance delightfully
through
resting on mind, heart and dream
then leave wafting on
free.
(written following a visit to Levering Orchard, Va.)
words on my screen
tokens of life well lived
speaking of actions
attitudes
options
for living
words of your journey
signs
revealing and peeling
back me to me to thrive
live
choose
growing
words launched into timeless space
afloat in e-land
wandering
seeking you until
they
come home and sink deep
settling
inward discord
recording new
words of you
my friend
Imagine when
My commute is
Through smiles and open skies
Driven on feet over side walks
And
Skinny tires rolled
By strong legs
Byway of bike lanes
To my work and my city and my common
Humanity is
Inhaled
In
Rhythm
Excellently
With
You
NOTE: A special nod to Winston-Salem's own Imagination Installations for prompting me to write this!
There is always much more.
In each combination
a savoring nuance blended from that moment's ingredients
Do you hear that... that unknown laugh?
It makes me smile.
Who is that?
Even in the mundane, methodical rhythm of talking
we stumble
on the euphoria
of an additional smile
an amalgamation of chemical strokes and spiritual caresses
as if we should have been here all along.
There seems to be more, always.
More to know, feel, grasp, share...
God is such a flirt.
The last cicada sings
Into the crisp fall air
A final proclamation of
Fall’s end, winter’s era
Leaves cling
To branches high
Not one wants
To surrender and die
A father dreams
Of his son’s flight
But silence returns
From youth's seasoned night
Seasons change
Seasons go
Seasons remain
Ever so slow
Summer leaves
To find its fall
The stillness breaks
Upon us all – we fall
The last cicada sings
The final tear drops
We are cold
We are small
A baby cries
Her first breath of life
Mother’s arms are broken
An infant will live in strife
Seasons change
Seasons go
Seasons remain
Ever so slow
Sometimes we must burrow
Deep into earth
Waiting there, searching
For the matter of our birth
Remembering when we can
That as this begins
We can endure as
The last cicada sings
Seasons change
Seasons go
Seasons remain
Ever so slow
The last cicada sings
Into the crisp fall air
A final proclamation of
Fall’s end, winter’s era
in between
dusk and flickering candles.
sensations of
in between
baked cookie caresses from a plate of crumbs
in between
a leaf falling upward, riding on the breeze of summer's heat rising
in between
silent breath of your voice pausing between thoughts and measured words
in between
the end and the beginning
the alpha and the omega
the dream and the hope
there for a moment
in between