Category Archives: Poetry

Thirsty as Ever

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Last week we were rained on rather thoroughly in Puerto Rico, but only in a welcome, friendly way. That’s how it gets, and stays, so verdant and rich—Rico—there, after all. Other than trying to steer clear of the biggest instant rivers in the roads, the only negative reaction I can say I had to the episode was one of longing for the same thing to happen just a little more often in Texas. Happily, there was a brief, modest rainfall today. But I’m feeling a little greedy, and hoping for more.
Photo: Thunderhead near San JuanSo Rain, Already

Something hanging in the air, like newly laundered sheets

Oppresses breath and dampens souls and irons out the streets;

Humidity flows, deep and wide, ’til birds transform to fish,

Swimming in air as thick as seas, until my fondest wish

Is that a seam should open up the center of the sky

And rain pour down, and I’ll feel, too, so happy I could cry.Photo: Thunderclouds over San Juan

Fear Not, I’m Entirely as Silly as I Seem

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Digital illustrationMission Soon Accomplished

If I should seem suspicious or you think me too reserved

To let my hair down and relax; if I make you unnerved,

Don’t get all nervous and afraid–don’t fall apart and cry–

It’s not your fault that I’m this way: I’m not a super-spy.

There’s nothing wrong or worrisome that you should fear from me;

No problem, nor is there a thing that’s not as it should be–

Unless, of course, you would include on such a list of crimes

That I lie here in wait for you, reciting silly rhymes.

My mission, I confess to you, is simply to drive mad

Each person passing near enough to hear, however bad,

Each silly and ridiculous and impish bit of verse

I can dream up and spout at you; they go from bad to worse.

The only point in all of it, and you can rest assured,

Is that my secret will get out: I’m totally absurd.

 

There’s No Pleasing That Woman

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Digital illustrationSo Crotchety behind Her Crocheting

Does this seem troubling to you? All grans aren’t tiresome, it’s true,

But this old lady nurses ire as if she kept eternal fire

Cooking for gleeful roasting of all who would dare to fall in love,

To be successful, find delight in anything, morning to night,

That is not hers, and hers alone; she glowers as if from the throne

Of Empire, threatening with doom all who would dare challenge the gloom

With which she paints her own worldview; I find her hideous, don’t you?

The only worse soul, I should think, would be my own, if I would sink

To wishing others ill because they weren’t as awful as I was.

Ah, Poor, Ignorant Others

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digital drawing

The Royal We

We wish the world would so improve as to fit with us in our groove,

But while we grandly sit and wait, and yammer and pontificate

On all the failings, all the fuss of people being unlike us,

So stupid and so retrograde as to be differently made

And to espouse another thought than the superb one that we’ve got—

How troublesome! Noses aloft, we deem them worthy to be scoffed

And cringe in horror that they’d dream of doubting that we are supreme—

All ills, in fact, could be foregone if others could be counted on

To shape right up and so improve as to fit into our great groove.

Don’t be So Beastly

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Biting Remarks may be Rewarded in Kind

Do not call me a scaredy cat or other catty names;digital illustration

Don’t have a cow, but I refuse to buy into your gamesdigital illustration

Of calling me bull-headed, big fat cow, a silly goose,digital illustration

Or loosey-goosey, bird-brained, or a dumb sheep. What the deucedigital illustration

Do you think you are doing? For—sheepish as I may be—

I’m not so woolly-minded as your image is of me,

And once you’ve riled me up enough with childishness so tryin’,

I may just turn around and bite you hard, and I ain’t lion.digital illustration

Alive & Well

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photoSing Now & Always

To celebrate at breaking of the dawn

Or close of evening, or the stroke of noon,

There is no sweeter pleasure than a tune

Well sung by everyone, an antiphon

To peace, to sorrow, or to happiness;

No matter what the poetry or text,

It truly matters most that what is next

Is choral concord to renew, redress,

Resound through all the unseen years ahead,

A clarion, an anthem or motet

Grander than any ear has heard as yet,

And run to distant history, a thread

Of melody and harmony so strong

That no one can resist joining in song

Gently into the Night

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digital illustration from a photograph

Reparations

While the quiet of the evening draws its curtain on the noise

Day had clamored ’til its leaving, I will lie in calm and poise,

Gently as a bed of lilies bends in summer’s kindest breeze,

As the cat turns, curling, ’til he’s found his pose of greatest ease;

While the dusk falls, silent, deeper into night, my eyelids close

Heavily…I’m soon a sleeper in the stillest of repose…

Midnight finds me softly dreaming, all the day’s loud clatter gone,

‘Til birds chatter at the streaming light of the approaching dawn

While I lie in silent dozing where no sound comes breaking through,

All that shouted ceases, closing restive lips—and spirits, too,

Slip like shades and never flutter more than deepest sleeping sends

To the surface from the utter place of healing and amends;

I will rest here in the solace and the silence so supreme

It can quiet every call as I lie still and, gently, dream…digital illustration from a photograph

One in a Million

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digital illustration

Homage to Popularity

My Distinction

If I should need some camouflage, should want to truly blend,

I’d better watch my persiflage and learn not to offend

By wearing last week’s trendy style, my hair too short or long,

Or failing, yet, to reconcile which Party’s Right (or wrong)

To run the government; which church is favored most by God,

How not to leave you in the lurch when I have been a clod,

Appalling with my social gaffes, faux pas and frightful fouls;

I may accept I’m built for laughs, but using the wrong towels

Or forks or traffic lanes, That Word in company unfit—

I hope I don’t seem too absurd as-is, but that’s just it:

My imperfections, my unique design as Me, are such

As might make me appear a freak if I am Me too much.

But, truth be told, while I may work to fit in with the rest,

I hope you won’t think me a jerk for liking myself best!

I will blend in, keep pace, behave, up to a point, to please,

But lest you think me fashion’s slave, I think it a dis-ease

To seek conformity and bow to other people’s rules

When I’m quite nifty anyhow, and others may be fools.

digital illustration

Fingerprint Beats Homage

The Last Place on Earth

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digital collageIn Profundum Maris

Deep in the ocean, fathoms far,

Beyond the reach of the brightest star,

In the abyss of the secret sea—

Seemingly past where life could be

Sustained—lies a billowing bed of kelp

That waves in the dark, where sleep, where help,

Where mystical mending music calls

As the tides turn back and the current falls,

As the storms above relent, abate,

Becalm, bring peace—it is not too late

To dive in the depths with delight, embark

On the garden path of the ocean’s dark,

Miraculous beauty, unseen, immense,

Suffusing the soul in every sense,

To lie in the rush as the seas roll by

And think it a joy too fine,

To die…digital collage

The Menace Above

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digital illustration

The Bird Gets the Last Word

You stay down there, and I’ll just sit

Up on my perch, whistle and chirp

And warble ’til you throw a fit

Because I’m being such a twerp—

I’ll flap and flutter, cheep and caw

And drive you right out of your tree

Until you want to break the law

And take a shot or two at me—

But I, no matter how you squirm,

Won’t quit my pestering; so far,

I’m winning, you poor lowly worm,

And soon I’ll also strafe your car.
digital illustration