The Poetry Marathon

Looking forward to participating in my second marathon (and my first full marathon). I’m stocking up on caffeine and snacks, and looking forward to the pressure of working to a new deadline every hour of the marathon.

Best of luck to all of us!

You bring to mind

the flowers that blossom
so rarely, but
thrive in the desert

Day to day
week to week
they grow,
low to the ground
thorny and unnoticed

but when the rains come

they bloom, grow,
stand tall and proud

a feast of color
vibrant and alive
earth’s dull ochre
covered in a gown of life

so it is when I
see you, being loved
being cherished for the
treasure and gift
that you are

your smile like desert sun
reflecting from a piece of
crystal, blinding and beautiful

you deserve so much more
than you have been given
and the world is better
when you feel joy

Look, Poetry is Hard

Sometimes, you need to take a mulligan.
Face it, not everything is going to be golden.

This one definitely isn’t.

Now is the time

We must organize,
collaborate, work together

Set aside the small things –
our common ground is
this new fight against
fascism, racism, sexism –
against hate and fear
and control

Are you with me?

I remember the good old days

It was so much better than you
kids today get – we could eat all
the lead paint chips we wanted,
breathe in particulate-laden air,
throw our garbage anywhere we
wanted.

And the fights! I remember this
one time, when Jimmy Hawkins
punched a kid in the head
and knocked out two teeth.
Yeah, the kid got brain damage,
but still, it was a hell of a fight.

If we broke the rules at school,
we got hit. We learned pretty quick
not to get caught – we made sure
we tattled on the kid with
brain damage, because it was
funny to listen to him cry
after getting paddled for
something he didn’t remember
doing.

So, yeah, the good old days.

They sure were good.

Thoughts Of Unrest

You scream, “Revolution!” at the top of your lungs
Have you lived through one?

Do you understand what it will do
to your life, the lives of others?
Have you really thought it through?

Neighbor against neighbor, house to house
Betrayals and recriminations, trials and executions

The horrors of Guernica, Robespierre’s September massacres,
The proscriptions of Marius and Sulla,

All of this bloody, horrible potential, and still
You scream, “Revolution!” at the top of your lungs

Neighbor against neighbor, house to house
You eagerly anticipate the carnage,
Lips wet and slightly parted, breathing heavily

I am afraid that perhaps you have thought too much
Of what revolution will bring, and you await it too eagerly

A gigan is a 16-line poem, divided into 7 stanzas as follows: couplet, tercet, couplet, couplet, couplet, tercet, couplet. The first and eleventh lines are the same, and the sixth and twelfth are also repeats.

i wonder sometimes

if there is that one True Love
for each of us, the one person
that is perfect and right,
if i should devote myself
to that search, and if so,
how on earth would I know them?

no, i think, on the whole,
the odds tell me that if that
person, the perfect one,
did or does or will exist,

they could have been born
and died long ago, or be yet
unborn, or be where i will
never be able to go.

so i will content myself
with what I have, which
is good, good enough,
and wander no more

The cicada nymph slowly climbs

along the branch, inch by
laborious inch. It has taken most
of the afternoon, and as the sun
begins to set, it stops

“Is it resting?” I wonder to myself,
then I see it shiver and crack

And slowly, painfully, it
emerges – wings wet and
furled, shell soft and white

Ever so slowly, wings unroll
carapace hardens and
becomes glittering green

Until, as the stars rise above,
it spreads its wings and flies away

“Godspeed, little friend,” I whisper,
as I finish packing the last box
of my past and prepare to rest

Tomorrow, I begin a new life
without you in it

I remember

the taste of your lipstick
on the rim of your wineglass

The smell of your hands
lingering on the pages
of the hardback you left
unfinished by the bed

Sunflower yellow dress
hanging in the space left
when you packed your
bags and departed

Someday soon,
this will all go out to the pavement

But not yet, I think I will
pretend this is temporary
a little longer

I’m not saying we don’t learn

as a species. But for fuck’s sake,
look around at what we’ve made,
and tell me we’re any better than
our grandparents in any way beyond
the superficialities.

Yes, we live in an age of wonders –
we can get to the other side of the planet
in mere hours, and communicate to
the antipodes in seconds. We have
walked on the Moon, sent robots
to Mars, so many other glorious deeds.

But, at our hearts, we are the same
as those people a century past and
shouldn’t be so smug. It’s not that we
can’t learn so much as that we
refuse to.