Tag Archives: Poem

I Got My…

01 Sunday Sep 2019

Posted by in Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry

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Headshot -- Bill Watkins

I got my eyes from my mom,
she got hers from Scandinavian
Winters and endless days unseen
between songs, Viking memories
and Celtic dreams.

I got my soul from pain, rap music
and jazz from Dad and the strange
winds in life that turn Welsh into
“American,” stolen land and the
sin of slavery to work it.

A black nanny raised me, as one
raised Dad, his dad I’m sure
the same, in the deep south
still awaiting freedom and the
return of Native people—

whose gold was wisdom and love for
the land.  Unfortunately the
British and Spanish crowns, among
others sought metal and cash only,
skipped that which could

have been truly brought back
to save them more than even
great bible messages!

I got my humor from God
as I understand God, at the time
I prayed for one it was the
Judeo-Christian kind, biblical
certainly, then add to it some
Alcoholics Anonymous truth
and flavor, Al-Anon for the
family members or friends
of drunks.

I got poetry from the same
source a year before in 1995,
started to tell the truth,
has led me to more and more
until I now demand it from myself
and others.

I got some wisdom, as I spoke
of before—from the Native
American chiefs, who lived close
to and with the land.  They were
one with the Earth, listened and
knew how to live here.

Harmony and song, between us
and our lives;

the poetry of birth, landing, leaving—
dreaming and living those dreams.

The vision, inspiration—being
true to our callings;

Yell the truth with me, “We
Stole Land.”

***

I got my injuries from mistakes,
what hurts me most teaches
and challenges, the game so
fair it seems unfair!

I got to go, soon to remove
myself from Native American
land, I got my plan from the
conscience I got, when I
got sober and started to work
the twelve steps.

I got some peace listening to
the Tao Te Ching; Bibles and gospels
of nature, trying the impossible
task of capturing truth in words,
paper and ink, computer screens
and social media posts…

I’ll be saying this with a sigh,
as Frost said, somewhere ages and
ages—you know…

I got my song for the day, and
it’s been good, a day is life, karma
play, working no longer alone but
for the Great Spirit, the inkless god.

I’d rather be a poor original than
a fancy, loud, flying fraud

The Talgarth Panther

22 Monday Jul 2019

Posted by in Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry, Talgarth

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Panther1

Blessings of God,
The earth listening,
Waiting for our hand.

We visit the pool and
Running lake not as guests
But as a friend.

The petal within,
A flower in dirt out
Of us, rocks to sun,

Pebbles rolling out of day,
Across oceans where
Grass seemed greener.

Ay, but the emerald lied;
A Talgarth panther told
The fib of “other…”

And we chased a green
Never better than under
Our feet at birth.

We could span the globe
And never improve
The weather of true hearts

Blooming where planted.

Emoji Kiss

24 Sunday Feb 2019

Posted by in Forgiveness, Love, Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry

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Emoji Kiss

We are forgiven the moment
we ask for it;

but we cannot be relieved of
burden, until

we admit the problem.

We stole land in the fifteenth,
sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries because our weapons
were harder and bigger,

because we had a book we loved
and could justify stealing gold
and land with the idea that
bringing brown, naked, natural
people our book would surely
save their lives.

Hell is what you make of it,
heaven, too!

Sometimes there’s nothing left
to do in life on stolen land but
to do!

Kiss your enemy, invite them back
to the table.

Ask forgiveness, admit our faults
today!

Kiss your wife or friend when
the two of you have a bad day.

“Change your stars,” like William
did in that weird, anachronistic
movie with knights and Queen
music!

Slap the CIA an emoji kiss,
and forgive mass murder and lies;

no one I know tries to do wrong;
they at least try to find the right
book to their crimes justify.

The Spirit World

16 Saturday Feb 2019

Posted by in Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry, Spirit, Spiritual

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Sacred1

Shhh.

Hold your tongue, they say,
and we listen as far as our cells
report it’s good;

gong go the seasons, one, two,
three and four—gone when the
dance ends.

Come, friends.  Let’s see if there
is a surprise with me at the
beginning,

you’re free to disagree with
anything, the country is the
world, the

world a word and words, like
Borges said, are fictions, Lao
Tzu warning

against the false Tao, but then
he wrote eighty-one poems
anyway!  Come,

read to me some poem, some
Longfellow-like lullaby to truth
in rhyme, meter

or free to decorate a page or
brains, the imaginary road to
realms near,

far, wondering what we are, until
we unite in song.  This is not
surprising, so…

We trek on, and on, and on until
there is a fact in the grass, the
sweetest dream

known by labor, Robert Frost failing
as farmer as his pen and types did
succeed.

Truth is a beautiful weed.

There—we may have surprised in
that one!  Up goes the crowd,
as the Olympian

crosses the threshold where pain
becomes a second wind; he or she
reaching

to a higher place as they round
the final corner!  Look at him go,
women

on the rise, coming to the top,
restrictions fall being good to
us all;

those in control will not be someday,
so they hold and hold and hold
‘long as they can.

Truth dawns after the rain in colors,
the drench like a fire in reverse
getting us wet

and cleared of doubt.

We cannot deny the facts, now,
Donald, Ricky, Bobby and Mike;
if you do,

tell her you like.  God or Higher
Power, or Native Great Spirit,
this morning shower—

be with us, fill us with the dream
that is a co-opted walk, a lonely
trail joined by shadows until
real.

There’s another surprise, the wind
bringing change which is the hope
over pain.

We let all seasons pass until at
one with the difference, we egg on
diversity

in the sunshine that was the sad
storm of previous clouds, blocks
and ignorance.

We cannot know until we know,
which is why an appeal to spirit
works.

If reading and unsure, stop now.
Shhh.  Pray.

There you are.

“A Sunset” by Katherine Mansfield

13 Wednesday Feb 2019

Posted by in Katherine Mansfield, New Zealand, Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry

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Sunset6

A BEAM of light was shaken out of the sky
On to the brimming tide, and there it lay,
Palely tossing like a creature condemned to die
who has loved the bright day.

Ah, who are these that wing through the shadowy air?
She cries, in agony.  Are they coming for me?
The big waves croon to her:  Hush now!  There, now,
there!  There is nothing to see.

But her white arms lift to cover her shining head,
And she presses close to the waves to make herself small.
On their listless knees the beam of light lies dead,
And the birds of shadow fall.

***

(Courtesy, The Society of Authors–Literary Representative of the Estate of Katherine Mansfield)

Pain

11 Monday Feb 2019

Posted by in Loss, Pain, Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry

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Pain3

You thought you had something
you did not; your expectations
not met.

Part-abuse, part-my fault for
residing too close to the truth,
you find that if praying on a thing
not omnipotent and perfect,
there’s a decent chance of failure

by nature of Newton’s laws,
entropy and a tendency for all
things to fail.

A rainbow awaits rain’s end,
and similarly with pain.

There is a shelf-life to pain,
an end game not too far from
“this too shall pass.”

It may be that the expectation
was at fault for the loss, and
it was all in a plan to make us
prepare better for next time.

Everything happens for a reason,
they always say from a place of
comfort—

but they’re right.

Dancing on a Star

05 Tuesday Feb 2019

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Stars1

How we wonder, standing, sitting
even dancing on Earth—

about our place, why, and who we are.

I think we’re moving pretty fast,
words chosen almost arbitrary
to describe the true Tao which cannot
be spoken, Borges admonishing the
effort getting paid to write them…

Law writes down what philosophically
or by a vote seems right.

We clap our hands like LeBron James
and the powder flies so high I think
it reaches the stars;

I am awake by word definitions, but
primarily through five senses un-named.

Mom is pleasant but is not a person;
she defines love as I chase LeBron’s
powder off the screen and out my door,
up above the clouds in that dream where
you can fly.

Mom has them, too!

I dream of heat, think Earth is Star-like
in a wind so powerful all is upheld
in Einstein’s space fabric, the listening-
challenged harping on Newton’s
laws and limits saying that’s where most
of the work gets done.

Then Lao Tzu busts in cavalier and sharp
pushing away accolades like Bill Wilson
of AA, everybody vulnerable to the right
punch in the gut, usually coming from
attractive female advance—

the sperm must swim somewhere,
so why not with me on LeBron’s star
so far away until the lava bursts
and all around me is a dance of death—

rebirth to flowers on the mountainside
after the lightning strikes.

So chargy is life, dancing on a star!

Turn into Pain

31 Thursday Jan 2019

Posted by in Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry, Spiritual

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peacejesus3

Be Quiet.

You may be the next Useful Idiot
God uses to spread joy through
pain; wake up asleep, go back
to bed again!

Shhh!

Eat cake for breakfast, if you can
get away with it, smile now
before the wind changes, bringing
Poppins, Toppins, love…

Then crash, the constant in life
of course being change, the wind’s
at it again!

Did you know, little boys, that your
body changes a lot?  When a teen,
you’ll hear that from lots of folk,
but beware a second change at
thirty!!!

What you thought was firm suddenly
doth sag, you can’t believe your luck,
the fate of getting old is not just
for those with white hair it starts
sooner, long after the thrill is
gone life traveling on said the
Cougar, do you know how to camp?

I love you, friends, and I tell you this:
Stop all motion to help a baby, child
or new flower stand.

Do not offend a young person, Jesus
warned us about God’s angels that
bear God’s face—imagine that,
that might be pain!!!

Turn into it now, learn how
to master it!  The moment is gold—
the moment you master life
and growing old,

by admitting its pain, accepting it,
sitting or standing with a Higher
Power and your cards in the game…

It’s not the fun you have but the
pain you endure serving others and
even that voice inside challenging you
that counts to fight, fight, fight.

God give us the courage to stand
up like a U.S. Marine on a dime,
forget ourselves a moment and
be a part of this great thing called

Life.

“Why Am I Here?” by SK Rolle

28 Monday Jan 2019

Posted by in African American, Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry

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To remind you
of the suffering
of the innocent child
misused

To remind you
of the promise
of Yusuf Hawkins
unfulfilled

Reminding you
Of Emmett Till
forgotten

young unwitting warriors
to remind you
of four girls
swaddled
in unheralded graves

Of forsaken lots
of infant trees cut in stride

Toward the dream
unrealized

young blood reddening
Alabama clay
Mississippi mud
New York streets

Young hearts stilled in mid-beat
tender memories waiting fertile

tragic martyrs shining

african1

“A Poem that Ends in Love” by S.K. Rolle

28 Monday Jan 2019

Posted by in African American, Poem, Poems, Poesia, Poetic Blog, Poetry, SK Rolle

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creation4

I am a black poet

I claim Nikki Giovanni
4 albums, gospel choirs,
ego-tripping all

Invictus
Out of the night
that covers me…

I claim the church
black and white
Holy Ghost and Methodist

I’ve got to claim
The Bible

Genesis
And Psalms

Solomon
And Revelations

I claim the music
Jesus and Porgy

I claim Sunday
And all the mornings
that come

I claim the drummers
And the singers
The rhythm setters
And the beat keepers

The footstompers
And the handclappers

The signifiers
And the silent criers

Both my grandmothers
And my mother

And Miss Hicks and
Miss Ruffin

I claim the Slab Town
Convention
Arriving on the Pea Vine Line

I claim Paul Robeson

And James Weldon Johnson

I claim Paul Lawrence Dunbar
I claim Langston Hughes

I claim Maya
And Gwendolyn
And Lucille
And Sonia

I’m claiming the fact
And the fiction

I’m claiming
The Color Purple
This Blue Body
And the Bluest Eye

The two Toni’s
And the two Walkers

For My People, Everywhere

Baldwin
Nina Simone

‘Cause they all
Made me come in
From the void

Into the universe of hues
Into the dreamed whirl

I’ve got to claim
The heavens

I’ve got to claim
The trees

The maples and the oaks
The spreading chestnut
The weeping willow

And
Water

Oh my, water
Magic elixir

And
Birds

No way one could begin to name
The flock the feather

And light

And hate

And love

I claim love