Each petal of this rose
Has a tale to tell—
Each as different as those related
By witnesses of a scene or a life.
There will be stories of youth
Breaking from within the greened womb
And of the fading and weight of age;
Legends of the buffetings of fate,
Of visitors from afar, of marauders
Seeking the rose’s treasures
And sharing their own stories
Of hunger, danger and duty,
Each leaving behind
In the wreckage they had wrought
Grains of dust from far off places
Which carved imprints of their histories
In hidden, vulnerable places.
This rose will surely describe
Hot days thick with heady perfume
Cool nights when fragrance,
Merely teased the air,
Odes of glory, elegies of woe,
(perhaps an idyll of dreams?)
But strongest of all
The lyric joy of life.
If only we could hear
The separate voices
Or read the messages
Written in the flesh,
We might finally know why
This rose came to be lying here,
Abandoned and alone,
On the cooling wetness of sand
As the late afternoon tide rolls in.
AUTHOR NOTES
GLASS RAIN—the poetry by Margaret Roxby
“BEGINNING” is included this week for National I Am In Control Day, March 30.
The poet sent this poem to her Round Robin poet friends with the following note:
Note to Round Robin: “A long one, and “heavy”–? But, this is all I have at present.”
REFRACTIONS—a poem by Robert Roxby
“HORN OF AFRICA” is included this week as a nod to March 25, United Nations Slavery Remembrance Day, though the author did not have slavery in mind when he wrote this poem. Rather he wrote in reaction to race-related violence in South Africa. The poem first appeared in his collected poems, Reflections on a Lifetime.
THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS—the poetry of Kathleen Roxby
“SAY NO” is included this week for National I Am In Control Day, March 30.
#unitednationsslaveryremembranceday
#nationaliamincontrolday
SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
Readers who write in response to one of the prompts listed each month in Splintered Glass, may see their work presented here on the last week of that month. Though poems are preferred, short prose work will also be considered for publication.
Guidelines for submission:
SPLINTERS FOR MARCH 2024
THE GODS WEEP
When the Gods are saddened
By dissolute actions of men,
They shed copious tears
To mask the air, to green the Earth,
Carry away an array of trash.
Now and then they cover the Earth
With a blanket of snow
To remind them once again
How beautiful the Earth was
Before Man came along.
WHEN VALHALLA FAILS
The dying die
A thousand lonely corpses lie
On the bitter earth.
Goddess, come down
From the spacious halls
On a charger, come down
Where warrior falls
Ride, come down
The lighted halls
Take these soldiers to rest
To Valhalla’s walls.
But this is a raving, a fever, a dream
Valhalla’s myth, like the rest.
They’ll not come for the noble
The honored and blest.
They rot in the damp.
Die in the dust
Their bodies are still
And their weapons rust.
THE SAGA OF A ROSE
Each petal of this rose
Has a tale to tell—
Each as different as those related
By witnesses of a scene or a life.
There will be stories of youth
Breaking from within the greened womb
And of the fading and weight of age;
Legends of the buffetings of fate,
Of visitors from afar, of marauders
Seeking the rose’s treasures
And sharing their own stories
Of hunger, danger and duty,
Each leaving behind
In the wreckage they had wrought
Grains of dust from far off places
Which carved imprints of their histories
In hidden, vulnerable places.
This rose will surely describe
Hot days thick with heady perfume
Cool nights when fragrance,
Merely teased the air,
Odes of glory, elegies of woe,
(perhaps an idyll of dreams?)
But strongest of all
The lyric joy of life.
If only we could hear
The separate voices
Or read the messages
Written in the flesh,
We might finally know why
This rose came to be lying here,
Abandoned and alone,
On the cooling wetness of sand
As the late afternoon tide rolls in.
AUTHOR NOTES
GLASS RAIN—the poetry by Margaret Roxby
“WHEN VALHALLA FAILS” is included this week for National Supreme Sacrifice, Mar 18. This poem had no title, the website manager supplied this title. It is important to know the author had friends and family members who did not survive WW2, and others who fought in the Korean Action and in Viet Nam whose battlefields splashed onto screens across the nation nightly.
REFRACTIONS—a poem by Robert Roxby
“THE GODS WEEP” is included this week for World Rewilding Day, March 20. The poem first appeared in the author’s collection Reflections on a Lifetime.
THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS—the poetry of Kathleen Roxby
“THE SAGA OF A ROSE” is included this week for March 20, World Storytelling Day. The poem was inspired by a photograph described in the ending of the poem.
#worldrewildingday
#worldstorytellingday
#nationalsupremesacrificeday
SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
Readers who write in response to one of the prompts listed each month in Splintered Glass, may see their work presented here on the last week of that month. Though poems are preferred, short prose work will also be considered for publication.
Guidelines for submission:
SPLINTERS FOR MARCH 2024
A PHOENIX IN THE GARDEN
Ripped from its mother plant
Thrust into unprepared clay-rich soil
The geranium persisted,
Grew without nurture.
But its blooms were few
And nearly hidden
Among its own leaves—
Brief flares of red-orange fire
Within a green surround
Spreading broad leaves
Over the garden corner edging
Onto converging paths.
Ruthlessly cut back
For passing feet,
The geranium compensated
Growing tall, high above
Its neighboring plants.
More blooms appeared
Some bursting upward
As if to touch the sky,
Then the storm came
Whipping the trees
From side to side
Before the rain descended
Like Niagara escaped from capture,
Followed by the pitiless
Pelting of ice pellets….
When the morning sun shone
Down on that garden corner
The geranium lay sprawled
Once more across the paths.
Yet its once skyward blooms
Shot their fire still
Defiant and strong
With a promise to rise again
In fire to reach the sky.