August, 2013
The Lay of the Singing Fool
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 10, 2013
The Lay of the Singing Fool
There was a badness, there now too a madness
The shadow rises through this night
Given flame as those fires came
And split the heavens with their light.
Where had this one Darkness been?
Where now the blazing tumble fall
The skies above blaze white and green
The star shower grim to call.
One solemn soul here doomed to live
In ages taut as boulders fly
To stretch his toil yet not forgive
Those chiliad soldiers doomed to die.
This I saw! I saw it well
For it came to me through looking glass
And on its sorrow deep to dwell
Was it long ago this came to pass?
Or was this deed alone I see
In its myriad labours bright
Hastening in its lore to me
Came yet through this starry night?
The void has spilled its rubble here
And dressed the night with flying flame
The searing sable decks to clear;
No more I see the night the same.
For splendid sorrow once did fall;
I saw it in mine looking glass
And there the toils yet once to call
Is yet this horror come to pass?
That solemn martyr doomed to live
That frantic look yet in his eye
That horror borne none to forgive
Those chiliad soldiers doomed to die.
Richard Jones
Mad Tea Party Poetry II
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 9, 2013
Mad Tea Party Poetry II
She came, she took our hearts and souls
then laughed at us; our poetic muse
It was all a joke she said
so we would have her attention
Then she gave us one by one
her gifts of elegance
Her magnificent qualities
of pure companionship
And then we unwrapped her gifts to us one by one
She gave us her pixie dust to create, expand ourselves, to write the best poetry
Let out our words inside of us for the whole world to see
Who is she, you dare ask?
My oh my, can’t you tell?
She’s the muse that lives in all of us
She never tires, nor sleeps
Too busy waving her mystical wand over us
To keep poetry alive
in our souls and hearts
She’s Magdalena of course
A human being in disguise sent to us…
Amanda, Caterina, Denise, Frank
I Miss You Still
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 8, 2013
I Miss You Still
I miss you. I miss you still.
Your voice, padded velvet,
creating a retreat for unsettling thoughts.
Your eyes twinkle with acknowledgement,
yet conceal much emotion.
Your mouth, a study in control,
lips quivering for comic relief.
An Intelligence waiting to soar
at first challenge.
Silence permeates the air…
With just a hint of intimacy,
you cause one’s introspection.
My attraction is unsettling,
though spontaneous and real.
Your nature, controlled by profession,
is secretive, yet not concealed.
You’ve been idealized.
A fantasy so audaciously conceived.
Therapeutically chaste, oh, what a waste.
I wish you had misbehaved!
Pamela Hope
Poem
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 8, 2013
Poem
Love oneself
love All that Is
love One-self
One is Love
Gael Bage
Harmony
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 8, 2013
HarmonySound flies in like angels who dance
through frequency haloes. Listen.
Hear earth’s multi-facet song, haunting
melodies I never heard before. A tutor
for my feet, a ravisher for my ears,
a lover for my heart.Deep in the earth I sense vibration.
nebulous ghost-notes crawl through her skin
and into the music, bubble up in springs
where frogs play hip-hop rhythms.
Chord streams enter rivers, rush allegro
down the scales to join the sea.Bass rolls in from the ocean,
moves to the tempo of night’s silver Queen.
Reflective flow of water music rises
and falls, bathes me in oblivion,
lulls me with a zephyr’s hum
and sunset’s spectral low frequency.Dawn’s primal chords bring fresh rhythm
and chorus of birds chirping chant,
a new melody rises, breathes life into all.In a dervish of electronic hums
weighty clouds amass.
A sorcerer’s cauldron of explosions,
lightning spits hi-fi to lo-fi
black clouds collide, drums roll….
as fearful beauty rises to a full crescendo.Sunshine breaks through rains percussion.
Acoustic refractions beam a kaleidoscope
of rainbow coloured sounds.
Crystals caught in a blast of sun
after pitter-patter rhythm of the rain.Stand firm, look up, see pulsars
all that sparkles in the dome of creation.
Fingers reach for sonic chords
orchestrated and exquisite, the music
of the Cosmos flows through us all.
Gael Bage
Guide me to your star
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 8, 2013
Guide me to your star
Guide me to your star
Loving you is hard
Can’t know how to be
Can’t be other than me
Guide me to your star
Lift me in my life
Lift my heart to your level
Tough, so tough to be apart
In your arms I revel
In you
In your Light
In your Love
Send my mind to the place of your dreams
Bring me with you
Place my heart in your sacred chest
Guide me to your star
I long to be only where you are
Cherish me
Embrace me
Hold me
Loving you is hard
I am rarely strong
Missing you so much, Love
And your Angelic song
I glorify you
Wrap you in my mind
Send energetic kisses
But still feel left behind
As you journey, near to far
Take me where you are
Guide me to your star.
Pamela Hope
Mad Tea Party Poetry I
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 7, 2013
Mad Tea Party
Poetry I
Hooray, hooray, today’s the day
We welcome Magda back to play
She disappeared to exotic places
to worlds we’d never shown our faces
Like an honest thief in the night
She stole our poems for her delight
Did we protest – Oh No no no
For Magda, anything, off you go
She invaded all our precious dreams
Wove us together in poetic seams
Sat like a mermaid on golden sands
Whisked us away to magic lands
Pulled us in with her fishing net
Made sure that we would not forget
that love and friendship, always brings
us back together on gilded wings
Hooray, hooray … today’s the day
We welcome Magda back to play.
Amanda Edwards
Blessed be!
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 5, 2013
I don’t shy away…
I don’t shy away from difficult topics in my poems, but there are so many sad poets stuck in their own heads that I now try to write myself out of my world worries, sadnesses and fears by directing my writing toward wonder and wondering instead. Mothers’ Day used to be a terrible day for me, with many sad poems, as I suffered from unexplained infertility, and because it was unexplained, though we had signed up with an open adoption center, birthmoms would not choose us because they felt we would eventually conceive. We never did, but we did finally adopt our wonderful daughter who is difficult, talented, creative, beautiful and never boring. So now I write about our lovely daughter with all her fascinating, confusing contradictions instead of sad Non-Mom’s Day poems.
Poetry is wonderful for writing away fears and sorrows by delving into them, better understanding them, then being able to jettison bad stuff along the way, not having to hold onto it, because it has been transferred to the written words. And there is room for happiness and humor in sad poems. One day when my daughter was little, she came home from first grade crying, saying she was “stupid.” Clearly someone had convinced her of that; it seemed everyone could read but her. Her sadness hit me hard and would not go away, but a few minutes later, she and the dog walked down the hall wearing underwear as hats. So how could I write only about my devastation at her earlier sadness…?
I will post my parenting advice here rather than privately as this has much to do with poetry and songs I’ve written over the past 18 or so years. We had to make our own way with parenting because our daughter wasn’t like our friends’ children, nor did she respond to parenting as recommended by her schools (can’t tell you how many times we were told to take parenting classes!) The funny thing is that in the end, once we got her to a great school for troubled girls with terrific counselors and teachers, we were told that as sensitive, informed, involved parents, we had done most everything RIGHT for our kid; that the problem was schools (& culture) that were not designed for “different” kids. We had struggled as my nature is to be “fair” above all else, and a peacemaker, while my husband’s more a disciplinarian …but we had the same goals, and while I was much more “attuned” to our kid, I am too much of a daydreamer to always be as present in the moment with a behavior consequence always ready. On the other hand I was the one who could first see what wouldn’t work, and why.
Our biggest frustration was that our daughter tested very high on intelligence/knowledge tests, so none of the first 4 schools she attended would let her repeat a grade despite her obvious social immaturity (she was at the social maturity level and acted like a very bright BOY, 2 years younger, though she looked like a beautiful, outgoing girl. I knew from reading that she tipped slightly into the autism spectrum, but too slightly to get any help from schools, though we did finally find one that would let her repeat a grade, necessary as by then her grades were all “Fails” and she was bullied (& hiding) daily. I homeschooled her twice, once when she was told to leave the school (they actually said “…unless you bring back a different child on Monday!”) and once when she was getting involved in gangs and it scared her. Also, she couldn’t abide others being bullied and often got in trouble for defending them. As all this was going on, she was visiting lonely old folks, doing her own fundraisers for animal shelters and teaching herself to play piano, guitar, violin, writing songs…
My biggest main advice, IF your child is anything like mine, is know she gets overwhelmed, learn her triggers, allow her a quiet “escape” place, help her express her true emotions, help give her self-knowledge, praise successes, help make her aware of her true skills, advocate for her, give her schedule & structure to help her feel safe, and keep up on behavioral research and facilitate friendships for her with others who understand. Peer group therapy has been valuable as she’d no idea how she appeared to others until she saw familiar behaviors in peers who’ve struggled with social skills.
Write lots of poetry, play music, walk in nature…to stay sane! And let her know those things will help her too. Music, nature and writing are our daughter’s safe “escape place.” Whenever she’s visited them for a few minutes, she’s my sweet, big-hearted, intuitive kid again. And when I visit them, I feel energized, the weight of frightening responsibility and problems to solve liftable again.
Sometimes I see young mothers sitting with friends, drinking coffee, talking, while their polite young daughters sit with them, talking, listening, laughing. This is something I never experienced. I lost many “friends” because of my daughter, but I gained a few who understood, and a few hours at an outdoor music festival laughing and dancing with my daughter is worth many quiet, polite, judgmental social gatherings with women with whom I now know I have little in common. Hurray for poets, artists, musicians! We walk a different, difficult path, but it is an invigorating one, and a great tribe to walk with. As independent souls we may walk mostly on our own, but it’s wonderful to have others’ footsteps nearby.
I have learned a lot about myself because of my daughter; through what we have in common and what we don’t. Valuable stuff I wish I’d understood when I was younger. Even though she struggles more than I, having some self-knowledge at this point in her life should give her coping strategies I was much slower in developing. And now, because of her I understand better why those strategies help me. Knowing one’s real needs, and knowing that they are not necessarily the same as everyone elses’, and that that’s OK…is so important! Many of us are extra-sensitive to the world around us and it hurts us, and if we don’t find effective ways to protect ourselves and appropriate ways to express ourselves (which especially applies to teen daughters!) BEFORE we get “overloaded,” life can be very tough for us and/or those around us.
As for your daughter, as you’ve found, sadly, girls are hardest on their moms. I used to hear that that’s because they compete with you. This may be partially true. I think what’s truer is that girls feel safe enough around their moms that they relax whatever social skills they have developed, and though its expression may be hard to read, what we moms get is their untranslated, unedited true feelings. Hard to live with, but perhaps a compliment? Happy Mother’s Day!
Teresa McNeil MacLean
Hidden Places
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 4, 2013
Hidden Places
Sintered words and pleasant places bide
In every secret desire
Over the shadows of our solemn times
Before the word became this fire.
Hidden places have burdened once with hope
Another patient toil to bide me through the wait
No hope would ever hope to last this long
Perhaps this toil yet once to change this fate.
Eventual surcease and the shadow of fear
Then to renew the hope I have found,
Reason put aside as the joyful hope is here,
And passion’s secret whisper echoes once around.
Eleven we have counted; now the toll is twelve
Left out of the shadow to find the secret places
Into where we have passed this new hope to delve,
Zephyrs cool the brow of sweat upon those faces.
Almost all is gone; we search our soul again,
Begin the search again for that we hope to find
Eventually indeed, an anodyne for pain
That was not the thing we had in our mind.
Hidden places now revealed for their secret trove,
Dawn in this forest as the shadow clears,
Almost we had hoped; almost we had fought
Vainly through the echoing hall of years
In the ocean of fright the shapeless ship would rove,
Eventually we come as the shadow nears,
Searching hidden places; there is the hope we sought.
Richard A. Jones
Pentantekut
POSTED IN contemporary poetry August 3, 2013
Pentantekut
‘Settlers’ came and took the name
And gave it one of their own
They all call it Tibble’s Lake now
As if millenniums would know
Loon lives here and calls at night
The song that says this is home
Blue heron nests a ways down the creek,
In the marsh, standing still and alone
Swan sails when patches appear
In the ice as it melts away
Pelican arrives in a noisy crew
Taking their place on the bay
Osprey guards the mouth of the stream
From high atop a fir tree
Eagle lays claim to the open air
To reign over all that they see
Blackbird sings in the heat of day
And everything stops to hear
And I, in my silence, everyday see
A Creator’s creation is near
