Belated Words

Write On!

Tag: poem

  • Going out of Living Sale!

    I’ll stick that sign at the end of the drive

    Monitoring any respond…spying through

    Cracks at the sides of shades, now drawn,

    Which, unlike my neighbors’, were raised

    Night and day in defiance of hidden lives.

     

    Must I place items neatly on slackly shelves

    Or will the sign itself be enough to summon

    What I am seeking….and what am I craving;

    A grimace, a laugh, a Jehovah’s Witness tract;

    A splintered door jamb and feet rushing in?

     

    What would adorn a shelf, entice another,

    That they would not already have, though,

    Perhaps, deny?  My truths, though clean,

    Sparkling spirals to me are likely idiocy

    To them as theirs to me.  The sign is enough.

  • grackles swarm the trees

     

     

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    Once again, delightful squeaking swarms the trees,
    celebrating en masse, here to there; chucked down
    by some suspect deity who, for whatever reason,
    laments or teases my petering out; my “it is what it is”

    Rescued, again, by one with a scratching voice;
    compelling a lifting of chin, a prying away of eyes
    from ground, from monitored, measured steps;
    I search the canopy for Joy: There! She lingers!

  • greed

    Perhaps, I am too quick to call it Greed:
                        this yearning for an accumulation,
this lust of Mine! self-gratification,
                        a trophy case crammed with coin, 
heads (metaphorical and otherwise),
                        ivory trinkets carved of banned tusk,
Likes, notches on the bedpost 
                        (that shows my age!) Firepower!
The rich give, but not without accolades, 
                         plaques for display and….receipts.
Nature demands self-interest 
                         if we are to survive, but studies show:
the poor give more than the rich;
                          percentage wise, of course!
(that could be Fake News)
                         One thing to me, another thing to you.
What of a heart soothed by Riches lure
                          more than thanks of those in need?
Perhaps, I am too quick to call it greed;
                          one thing to me, another thing to you.

  • Witness

    The leaves are gone.  Wind rejoices in
Their leaving for their dance betrays;
Painting hints of body on his shame.

Shoulders cringe under iced breath
ravaging this frigid, emptying street.
Chimes to the right sing winds intent,

To flee this memory, falling behind,
To allow us to lie in a contrived bliss
Like those wreaths on those graves.
    The leaves are gone.  Wind rejoiced in
their leaving for their dance betrayed:
painting hints of body on his shame.

A witness of this carnage, he whirled
in helplessness, sharing horrid chaos
with us despite our hands over our ears.

Shoulders cringe beneath iced-breath
ravaging this frigid, manicured yard.
Chimes to the right sing winds intent

to flee this memory, fall far away,
to lie in a contrived complacency like
these plastic wreaths on these graves.

  • Bird

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    Speckle/breasted thrasher chucks the one-eye;

    tschuck!…tschuck!…tschuck! he warns and scolds

    perceived encroaching.  Sorry, I mumble at his cry.

    How did I reach this instant, this soul plateau,

     

    accepting censure from an ill-mannered bird….

    his chirps articulate, more true than mine;

    their spring pure unlike my struggling words

    failing to fathom their season, their place in time?

  • Gossamer Chain

    Clinking gossamer of phantom links

    Weak as will, strong as adoration,

    Binds us One from our separate shores,

     

    At times, dangling to currents tumult,

    Jerking, teasing a tangled bereavement.

    But, at times, tensing to beams of bliss.

  • Plastic Flowers

    Gaia reveals the truth, at times,

    Not subtly, but rocking….tumbling

    What we deem rock and tumble proof.

    That flora in that window box,

    So bright and white and red; erect

    Despite this freeze? Distance deceives

    Our naive hearts and eyes effortlessly.

    Scent would have squealed; revealed the fib.

    Too high the price a sniff demands?

    We “hem and haw” and she larks.

    Our claims of dominion, our crow,

    As meaningless as plastic blooms.

  • Haiku: poetic license

    poetic license….

    flung to lime pond scum…“There frog!” 

    Nonrefundable! 

  • Haiku: Thief

     Honeybees…. zing…zing

    Divining pure sustenance

    I take it from them!

  • Haiku: dream

     

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    Winters harsh dream gone…

    yet…seeping residue…angst

    path on cracked blue ice.