Ready to Make Friends with Poetry? ⟶
(after Gerard Manley Hopkins) Narrows Bridge, WA, photo by the author Glory be to God for freeway things For vehicles chrome-colored as Airstream and kin For billboards and tires that erstwhile sing Lemony busses, soldiering vans with commuters in. Praise Him all wheels and pavement, …
What does it take to feel alive?Warm sun, a fresh breeze, the breath of God.Peace, quiet, the creak of a floor,chiming of a bell in the distance,the tinkling of a cat’s bell.The fragrance of a morning rose and fresh coffee.The purr of a fan, the taste of a peachthe drone of a bee,the deep in and out…
Botanically speaking, the plant names trip on the tongue with some effort (mine) but once murmured, sound like the tune to an old song I’ve known all my life, the words rolling off in chunks of meaning as I pass by a rainbow of familiar flora – oleander–-pinnate, poisonous, softened by pink and purple eucalyptus–fragrance in crushed wood, leaving the warmth…
We’ve been informed we are flying at 29,000 feet (approximately) above the face of the Earth, suspended (how? by speed, lift and whatnot) like a moving planet jettisoned in a line moving at the speed of sound (light?). Refreshments are served, secured with invisible payments traveling via plastic and magnets swiped by staff standing still as…
A mystery, really–these mute carriers of a collection of qualities known only to humankind. The sway of the valise, a pendulum of skin-covered appendages, the flip of the handbag: back-side, front-side, side-side synchronized while hiking the concrete sun-filled hillsides up to the top~ View Just Ahead. Oblivious to said view in their busy ant kingdom…
orange trees from the orange grove where my husband was raised, Yorba Linda CA. I bless thee, Lord, because I GROW Among thy trees, which in a ROW To thee both fruit and order OW. When thou dost greater judgements SPARE And with thy knife but prune and PARE, Ev’n fruitful trees more fruitful ARE….
A mountain so wide the horizon could not contain it The path rough and boulder-strewn, here a plain, then stumbling again through the dark undergrowth towards the top. We left for this journey in the light— someone keeps stealing it away. Sun rays appear in glimmers through the trees, a flutter here and there Revealing life,…
Words like water poured out reflect my wide world, contained in pieces, paragraphs of pain and power and the past, puzzles to put into place. I long to be known heard, seen, reflected in the pool you hold in your heart showing me the “me” that I am. Instead of a mirror, you hand me…
Overcome by the quaking power of God’s sweet presence Around the shoulders of friend-draped worshippers Across the room to the children raising, praising, lifting small hands Surrounded by incarnations of God in these multi-colored people Next to sweet-voiced sisters and deep-throated men, I’m looking~~eyes up and over and through the windows, past the summer-waving trees…
Feeling the rain come cave-cool air, white and empty but for the breeze. Still water rushing the trees, sleepy birds sitting at rest call out the change while tone on tone chimes echo from far below. The drops fall – spare, invisible, too few. My dry, gray lawn is thirsty and longs for a drenching, healing…