24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
Blackbird, dark, ancient muse
Singing the song my soul has forgotten
In the still twilight
The graves of the things I’ve buried away
Dead things I’ve hidden away
Of these you sing, my faithful friend
Night-mares turned to lullabies
Take these melodies of misery
These hymns of hurt
Broken pieces in 3/4 time
Wings clipped to haunting arias
And mend them all
Learn to sing a new song
To make me whole so I may
Fly away with you
He sits on the fence
perched like a bird
His head turns crazily
at each new sound
He teases the dog
on the other side
Prancing and whipping
his orange tail
If he falls over
he will be in trouble
He thinks he’s a tiger
my kitten Tigger
If I look hard enough
I see you
striding along the path
your denim shorts and white shirt
striking among a sea
of walkers.
As your pace quickens,
I fall behind
till you come back around.
I toy with a stone
watch the crows
flapping about.
The early birds eats the worm,
isn’t that what you told me?
Coming back to where I was, or am now,
waiting for you to come around
and call out,
I wonder if your skies
are just as blue
or as colourless, or grey
or as smog-ridden
on a winter’s day?
Does the bougainvillea
sweep the pond,
do cold morning drafts
rustle your thoughts?
Early birds and all that jazz, you used to say.
I wonder who is eating the worm.
Seek light in every situation
Hold your head high and be who you are
Imagination is a beautiful & amazing asset
Never lose your sparkle
Each day is new; start fresh & make the most of it
Big sky mind
My grandson says god isn’t real.
I say we can’t prove god is or isn’t.
Somehow this leads to meditation
which is about Buddhism, GiGi.
Not exactly, I respond.
Anyone can meditate.
You don’t have to be Buddhist.
He thinks. But I think Dad is.
I nod my head. Your dad
your uncle & I are all kind of
Buddhist, I tell him.
Somehow this leads
to Big Sky Mind.
See the sky outside?
He nods.
See the clouds?
Thin wisps of cirrhus
feather the blue.
Are they always there?
He shakes his head.
No, I tell him: sometimes
the sun shines. Sometimes
it rains.
But what about the sky?
Is it always there?
He looks at me:
this is a hard question.
And yes, we agree:
the sky is always there.
That, I tell him,
is Buddhism. Clouds
are like thoughts –
they come and go.
But the sky and the mind?
They’re always there.
Even if we don’t know about god,
we know about the sky.
No one had, so why would she? She wouldn’t, she couldn’t, she shouldn’t.
A high school graduate in her family, unheard of.
Pride? No, disdain.
A hero. No, an outcast.
Something to live for or something to die for.
She kept those thoughts in her head as she went through commencement without any family members present.
She kept those thoughts in her head as she walked through the front door and was asked where she had been?
She kept those thoughts in her head as she slipped into the bathtub holding her diploma in one hand and a razor blade in the other.
Mitch Brown
Hr 9
All that glitters
Not all the glitter is gold they say, then though it may be true
There are things those that glitter, but only just for you
Gold will get you far in life, if that’s the life you seek
But gold can make you brittle, and it can make you weak
But things that cause your eyes to glitter
Are more precious then the treasure
A life well spent with merriment
Is more than gold can measure
The Book I picked from the shelf is “The Participatory Mind” by Henryk Skolimowsky
The last line is:
In the grandeur that it requires”
Poem
Words when came were divine
the first and the last of the Lord will be
Of good best pure and kind
Of teaching in lines of rhyme
in softness of sound and stress
of intonation and incline
Grand is the language that will be
form of poems and poetry
writers will write and write
let it be in grand form,in the
grandeur that it requires to be.
Meandering out at the park
Wondering where do I start
Shifting from side to side
Listening to the evening tide
Blissful moments of the
Strike to take a nose dive
Life’s and sifted
Around the hive
Dreams of distant lands
To cross the floor
Almost give up
Was knocked at the door
Pains of terror
Halo of thoughts
Singing sweet songs
Of melodies so true.
Copyright © 2021 Roxann Lawrence (Poetessrock)
Late night conversation
Sitting on your couch
Nothing out of the ordinary
Just two friends
Enjoying each other’s company
I looked at you and something
Stirred inside of me
I took in your face
Your smile, your laugh
Your entire being
You turned to me
Your dark eyes staring
Without hesitation
Without reservation
I pressed my lips to yours
You didn’t move
Didn’t push away
Half a second dragged
Into eternity
The world was heaven
As quickly as it happened
I came back to myself
I realized exactly
What I had done
And pulled away
Another eternal second
As I took in your face again
Your smile replaced by confusion
Your laugh now silent
Your whole body frozen
My cheeks flush in embarrassment
I stammer out an apology
As quickly as I’d kissed you
I was on my feet
And running away
It was an impulse
A split second decision
I hadn’t planned it
I didn’t even know
I wanted to do it
A split second
And everything
Has changed