Thursday, May 25, 2023

Emerald eyes of spring

 

Call me, I have emerald eyes

Watching the pink lilacs blooming

Under the glossy silver sky

Green buds are preening & swooning


Red flowerettes bloom - a marvel

Call me, I have emerald eyes

Brimming with spring steps so cheerful

Without wiles, witchweeds or guises


I scatter seeds, saplings arise

Under the bright sun's long hours

Call me, I have emerald eyes

Tying colorful wildflowers


Gathering pinecones, I pen words

Under maple tree, sweet as pie

This is where I'll be - heeding birds

Calling me with emerald eyes



Posted for dVerse Poets Pub- Poetry Form is Quatern.  Join us when the pub doors open at 3pm EST.   


Tuesday, May 23, 2023

the ArC

 

the spring weather is a contradiction

of hazy sun with a dirty glass sky

smeary, smoggy, soggy but also sparkly

just like myself when I pass by a mirror wall

what you see is blurry & opaque outline

what you don't see is the toil & tedious work

welding myself with heat, friction and iron

when there is no preset or map to follow

there is no certainty that I will be a whole canvas

or even a completed chapter of a novel

but I am making small steps to overcome my addictions

my doubts and yes my contradictions


Note:  poem inspired by Thorvald Hellesen





“Portrait of Mary Alice Eckbo” painted in 1914



Posted for dVerse Poets Pub - An Artist Gets His Due - hosted by Lillian.  Join us when the pub doors open at 3pm EST.  Thank you!

 

 

Tuesday, May 16, 2023

a letter to Ilhan Sami Comak

I bring you the season of tulips

and lilacs from our spring season in Ontario

The smell of lilacs is fresh citrus

A reminder of how beautiful spring is

Outside of your prison bars

For more than 25 years


I come bearing the sounds of robins & bluejays

The sighs from the weeping willow trees

As I open the window 

There's black raven flying above our maple trees

Its powerful wings reaching for the sky

I weep when I think about prison walls & cages

We are meant to fly, unchained

And walk, untied


Not of fear or rage or bitterness

But with gentle voice

I hear you

Above the rumbles of dust storm 

The cry for justice

Between dusk and dawn

You will persevere with your will of steel 


One day, you will be walking free

And writing back to me

How you got lost in the forest

smelling the wildflowers   

with petals bluer than the sky



******

Note about the epistle poem:  

You can read three poems for and poems by Ilhan Sami Comak who has been in a Turkish prison for 27 years. He was arrested as an activist and later became a poet in prison.


Posted for dVerse Poets Pub- Poetics - Uncaging the Poet, with guest host, Paul from Parallax.   Please join us for the theme of justice for those poets behind bars, when the pub doors open at 3pm EST.  

Thursday, May 11, 2023

Just saw

 

I saw what you did

with the trees


Along the road & into the valleys

weaving to the lush forest


I saw what you did 

with the birds, hawks & butterflies


There were other creatures too

whose silence is now deafening when


You cut down that mother tree

with your giant saw, with disdain & lack


of empathy.  Thereafter

we all saw the giant warehouses covering


the landscape as sawdust,

the soft pink sky forever hidden from our eyes-


So don't complain now why

your fruits taste like plastic


And the air is a violent red, itching your lungs

And the land is ash, sinking with every fervered breath 



Just Saw from 

Erick Johansson


Posted for dVerse Poets Pub - OpenLinkNight, hosted by Linda.   Join us when the pub doors open at 3pm EST.

Tuesday, May 9, 2023

while you were sleeping

 

Give me your feverish thoughts

Mothballed & hand-stitched in grey


A cabin, circled by oak trees

The twilight sky on summer's day


Wheat field is warm as amber  

The roar of wind, hoots by owls


I will bottle it up with moss

And set it to sail at midnight


New moon is a goddess 

And stars are glowing fireflies


I watch it adrift on waves

As if time is a standstill, much


Like you, sleeping as a baby

The past clings to you, blanket


Where will the bottle go, I wonder 

There are no maps & shores to keep


Where will it land with no compass

Who will open it with excitement


Whose heart belongs amongst wildflowers

Or with questions, whose mind dwells


On clouds, or maybe it will be

You


Awakening, with eyes of child

You can recall 


Where you had put away 

the pen, that magical pen


Where you drew all your flights with joy

Chorus of birds sang with you all the way





Posted for dVerse Poets Pub - Poetics - Slipping into Surreal Photography with Erik Johannson, hosted by Mish.   Join us for this wonderful prompt starting at 3pm EST.


Monday, May 1, 2023

mapmaker

the orange plumed robin's

belly is heavy 


sitting on twigged nest-

at top of willow tree


black raven shrills ((()))

returning as birds 


to breeding & nurturing

as rain drips-drums-


there is timekeeper 

and mapmaker (somewhere)


as maple trees spring

red-orange flowerets & emerald leaves



Posted for dVerse Poets Pub - Quadrille with given word, MAP by host De Jackson.   This is a 44 word post.   Join us when the pub doors open at 3pm EST.