December, 2013

Deniers deny…

POSTED IN contemporary poetry December 7, 2013

 

 

Deniers deny…

Deniers deny what they don’t understand
Believers believe what they do.
Whatever you do, whatever you say
Never confuse the two.

Those who believe what they don’t understand
Or deny what they truly believe
Are caught in a spot without any hope
Of anything new to receive.

 

 

 

 

Raymond Joy

In Your Heart

POSTED IN classic poetry December 6, 2013

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Your Heart
 
He was so proud of his little girl
It was her very first day of school
He walked with her to school that day
And she held his hand all the way
They walked together quiet and sad
A little girl and her loving dad
Into the school her father led
But he almost cried when she said
Daddy, Daddy please don’t go
Don’t leave me here all alone
I’ll miss you if you go away
And I might need you, can’t you stay
Little Daughter please don’t cry
You’ll be okay so dry your eyes
You have our memories in your heart
We’re together though we’re apart

He sat up front on her wedding day
And cried as his daughter walked away
Later that night he watched her dance
He sat there waiting for his chance
The band started to play their song
Father and daughter danced along
She looked at him and saw a tear
Then leaned and whispered in his ear
Daddy, Daddy I have to go
I hate to leave you all alone
I’ll miss you when I go away
But if you need me then I’ll stay
Little Daughter I’ll be just fine
I’ll love you always you are mine
I have our memories in my heart
We’re together though we’re apart

She came in his room and kissed his head
Then sat next to his hospital bed
He took her hand and held it tight
And wished he had the strength to fight
They sat together quiet and sad
A daughter and her dying dad
He saw the tears she tried to hide
She looked at him and then she cried
Daddy, Daddy please don’t go
Don’t leave me here all alone
I’ll miss you when you go away
I still need you, you have to stay
Little Daughter I love you so
I want to stay but have to go
I’ll always be here in your heart
We’re together though we’re apart
 

 
Thomas S. Carver

Molten Thoughts

POSTED IN contemporary poetry December 6, 2013

Walkabout

POSTED IN contemporary poetry December 6, 2013

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Walkabout

I went walkabout
and you died.

I was on the other side of the world.

I cried my tears into the ocean.
Ached with grief
as I swam in crystal-blue water
and marvelled at the beauty
of the Barrier Reef.

I set a place for you
at the table that evening,
and talked to you
as if you were there with me.

You were there with me.

You rediscovered your wings
and rode on the wind
to join me
in that red and gold land
of songlines and spirits.

Your soul-self
lighter than a feather.

Our mother-daughter differences
effaced in the blink of an eye.

As I walked in the
footprints of the ancestors,
you followed me.

Whispered in my ear
as I sat saddened on the beach.

Your freedom was my consolation.

I went walkabout
and you died.

You and I planned it that way,
I guess.

 

 

Copyright © 2010 Annette Gartland

Saint Louis Lesson

POSTED IN contemporary poetry December 6, 2013

Saint Louis Lesson

Yesterday the puddle pooled its chilly molecules.
I watched it grow as former snow flowed
below the lawn to where mud offered cupped embrace
then rendered reformed crystals a softer, more reflective glaze.

By today the tiny pond projected tall pines,
invited fat robins and frisky squirrels to drink and bathe;
their stone bath and hung feeders shrugged in tired ice.
I thought I saw a spring thing happen here.

But I am from where tropics mumble nature’s metaphors,
grumble from space edge clouds and lurking swamps,
where warm and warmer dull distinction.
By afternoon another snow ended the lesson.

 

 

 

 

 

Rick Eyerdam

Without Words

POSTED IN contemporary poetry December 5, 2013

Gringo

POSTED IN contemporary poetry December 1, 2013

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gringo

Wetback. Fence-jumper. My father’s heart fists
with its yearly dying as he recalls his hired hand—
a Hispanic—burying
our tractor to its axle in a soup of snowmelt
to men who, every morning,
sit half-mooned around the greasy spoon’s table,
lifting Styrofoam cups to sunburnt lips:
hardscrabble farmers—chassis grease
gloving their hands, prove rumors
of neighbors’ gone
belly-up, face down, neighbors fenced-in
by stars. And I’m ten years old, impossibly here,
spit and image of men I’m warned to call sir,
men who’ve bottle-fed
my younger sister as tenderly as their own
daughters and they’re cursing, cursing.
It’s goddamn the weather, goddamn the busted baler,
goddamn the combine’s clutch chewed to shit
then one of the men says I would have shot
the little beaner right where he stood.
Everyone laughs.
I laugh too, although I don’t
know what spick means, beaner,
only that my father is coughing, which means
one more year, two if he’s golden,
which is nothing
to cemetery soil, the patience of the open grave.
The others stay, careless in conversation,
as if their voices were enough
to keep their small, Sunday god
from deafness. Years later, I’d land summer work
at Iowa Beef Packers pressure washing
gore from stalls, as undocumented men worked
blades, quick as flies, on the bloodletting line.
When I ask Eduardo how, lace-deep in rarefied blood,
he could open the soft machines
of bulls with a razor knife, cut away flesh
easy as a winter jacket, he presses his thumb
and index finger together like locust wings
and rubs, which means money,
which means everything.
Not surprising when Eduardo
says his younger sister, unable to speak a lick
of English, would show me her naked chest
for twenty dollars after work,
says she’d already lifted her skirt
for half the slaughterhouse
gringos. She, dressed like a Salvation
Army mannequin, led me behind the dumpsters,
unsnapped a dozen iridescent buttons,
and it was done—that fast.
Afterwards only the graceless,
shopworn cups eclipsed her breasts
that, just moments before, I’d admired
as slow fire, as her necessity’s waning gift.
She’ll never know how I once opened a book
of poems over my father’s headstone
in the blue hour and began to read the words
which sounded more like a prayer
than any prayer, as soil’s sickening
labor turned his body
deftly as erratic stone, his blood greening
blades of cemetery fescue.

 

 

 

 

 

Brandon Courtney

Ziua Nationala A Romaniei

POSTED IN classic poetry December 1, 2013

Doina

De la Nistru pân’ la Tisa
Tot Românul plânsu-mi-s-a
Ca nu mai poate strabate
De-atâta strainatate.
Din Hotin si pân’ la Mare
Vin Muscalii de-a calare,
De la Mare la Hotin
Mereu calea ne-o atin;
Din Boian la Vatra Dornii
Au umplut omida cornii
Si strainul te tot paste,
De nu te mai poti cunoaste.
Sus la munte, jos la vale
Si-au facut dusmanii cale;
Din Satmar pâna ‘n Sacele
Numai vaduri ca acele.
Vai de biet Român saracul,
Indarat tot da ca racul,
Nici îi merge, nici se ‘ndeamna,
Nici îi este toamna toamna,
Nici e vara vara lui
Si-i strain în tara lui.
Dela Turnu ‘n Dorohoiu
Curg dusmanii în puhoiu
Si s-aseaza pe la noi;
Si cum vin cu drum de fier,
Toate cântecele pier,
Sboara paserile toate
De neagra strainatate.
Numai umbra spinului
La usa crestinului.
Isi desbraca tara sânul,
Codrul – frate cu Românul
De secure se tot pleaca
Si isvoarele îi seaca
Sarac în tara saraca!
Cine-au îndragit strainii
Mânca-i-ar inima cânii,
Mânca-i-ar casa pustia
Si neamul nemernicia.
Stefane, Maria Ta,
Tu la Putna nu mai sta,
Las’ Arhimandritului
Toata grija schitului,
Lasa grija Sfintilor
In sama parintilor,
Clopotele sa le traga
Ziua ‘ntreaga, noaptea ‘ntreaga,
Doar s-a ‘ndura Dumnezeu
Ca sa-ti mântui neamul tau!
Tu te ‘nalta din mormânt
Sa te-aud din corn sunând
Si Moldova adunând.
De-i suna din corn odata,
Ai s-aduni Moldova toata,
De-i suna de doua ori
Iti vin codri ‘n ajutor,
De-i suna a treia oara
Toti dusmanii or sa piara
Din hotara în hotara,
Indragi-i-ar ciorile
Si spânzuratorile!
Cine ne-au dus Jidanii
Nu mai vaza zi cu anii
Ci sa-i scoata ochii corbii
Sa ramâe ‘n drum cu orbii
Cine ne-au adus pe Greci
N’ar mai putrezi în veci
Cine ne-au adus Muscalii
Prapadi-l-ar focul jalei
Sa-l arza sa-l dogoreasca
Neamul sa i-l prapadeasca
Cine tine cu strainii
Mânca-i-ar inima cânii
Mânca-i-ar casa pustia
Si neamul nemernicia

 

 

 

Mihai Eminescu

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