IN MEMORIAM

How measure the greatness of their contribution?

The laughing boys

The joking boys

The scared, bragging, tearless boys

The little cupfuls of life

Flung above the fields of death

Reeling, whirling globules of light

Tiny spheres of time

Evaporating in the stenchant air

Or spattering upon the thirsty, dirty ground

Lost beneath the blood and rust.

 

One hundred: A thousand?

One hundred thousand?

How many to fill each day’s demanding void?

 

They came, running from their playgrounds,

Still shouting over disappearing shoulders

To laggard game-mates

Boots fitted, belts buckled

They were gone

Long before the calls could end

Or the deeds be done

Or the medals molded.

How measure the greatness of their contribution?

 

#MemorialDay #VeteransDay #SoldiersandPoetry

 

 

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MANY THANKS, Cinquain for a Friend

To one

In whom sweet grace

Has found a place to grow

And flower as she lives, and loves

And gives.

 

#CinquainPoetry #PoetryandThanks #Friendship

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JACK O’LANTERN NIGHT

 

Sometimes still on a moon-gold night

The old dreams wake in the wild-witch light

And lantern-starred, their beaming spy,

Comes riding down the scheming sky

To search me out and knock and knock,

To try again love’s perfect lock;

But only a ghost, a shadow-regret

Slips by that guard to claim me yet.

 

#HalloweenPoetry #Halloween #Jack-O-Lantern #LovePoetry

 

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THERE IS ALWAYS A LOCKED DOOR

There is always that locked door

and something,

or someone

waiting

 

And then there is the sound

of running feet

a glimpse of jeweled slipper

and pointed toe

running, running

down the long corridor

 

There is always that locked door

and the long, long corridor

 

If the key should turn

grinding, screaming

with rust and decay

If, say, the old old bar

of the old old bolt

should lift?

 

But there the nightmare folds

the echoes of running

jewel-shod feet recedes

 

There is always that locked door

     a racing heartbeat

           and breathless flight

.                   in the middle

.                            of the dream-stopped night.

 

#Mystery #NightmareandPoetry #Nightmare

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A MEMORY OF ARIZONA

Sun

Red earth

Sun

Turquoise sky

Sun

Flowers of desert flame

Sun      Sun      Sun

 

When evening comes

Long shadows and silences

Fill canyons

Fall on mountains

And purple hills.

 

#Arizona #ArizonaandPoetry

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