Revised-- You Poem 3

Continue on

Continue on trekking little ant,

Carry your crumb to sanctuary.

It’s closer than you think.

Revised-- Imagistic Poems

A Dying fly

On thin wings a fly spins

Like a child’s top

An Icicle

An icicle drips high above

A windshield;

Three feet of sculpted water

Dripping profusely.

Old Christmas Lights

Some bulbs of blinking white hang

Around rusted metal railings.

Two broke.

An Old Sock

Once sky blue, now grayed,

Ankle sock lies; half covered

By new snow.

Revised-- Fatherhood

Fatherhood

I watched as my son leapt,

Arms following the oil-weathered ball

As it coasted in an arch just over my extended reach

Through the slightly misshapen, flaking hoop.

His bright hazel eyes looked up at me (but no so far as before)

Through his thick brown mop of young hair.

An uninhibited smile stretched full, revealing

His boyish dimples, yet a man’s voice,

Cracked with elation, reaches my ears. 

This came sooner than I thought it would

I thought it impossible to be true, but then

I felt the stiffness in my joints as I stared at him,

Hopping in place on fresh, lightly haired knees.

With a heart splitting between joy and sorrow,

I held out the ball to my son, waiting for his grasp.

Game. 

Revised-- Stained

Stained

On this still night, no car is coming or going,

There is only a woman standing on the

Uneven shoulder of this back road.  Larger swells

Of air are tempting to lift her from the spot.

She can only imagine the sound of the impact,

Metal crushing his weaker metal.  The exclamations

Of drivers muffled by highly pressurized air.

As he stood and fell, walked and crawled away from

The twisted remnants of his car, past the faded white line,

What was foremost on his blood-filled mind?

Did he cry out for a miracle as his heart drained into

The asphalt?  Of her waking to the ringing of the phone

In the dark?  Of the children pulling at the ties around their throats?

She will never know.  So here she kneels down,

Running her fingers across the dark red stain;

The sound of her sobs unheard

In the dark expanse all around her. 

Revised You Poem 5

My Boy 

I just want you to know that,

You look good in the Easter suit

Mr. Simmons dressed you in.

I took it from your room yesterday.

Don’t worry, I didn’t move any of your things.

Everything will stay just as you left it.

I know you hate red flowers,

But this rose would look

Beautiful lying against your quiet chest.

Will you wear it for me?

...I’ll always love you,

I hope you knew that.

You Poem 5

My Boy

I just wanted you to know

I like the pleated suit

Your father dressed you in.

I know you really hate red,

But this rose would look

Beautiful against your tranquil chest.

I’ll just leave it and

Go.  Also, I love you.
I just wanted you to know

You Poem 4

Adam

You gave me a job the moment air filled my lungs.

Two at a time they came to me, patiently waiting

With hooked claws, with vivid feathers, with

Dull gray armor, with flicking tails.

The work was good, I enjoyed the work.

What combinations of sounds came into my head!

Panther, hippopotamus, snake, dove.

They received their identities and you led

Them away, looking back to smile at me.

But the animals did pain my heart.

Two always departed from me, side by side;

Two distinct from all around them.

There was none similar to me but you,

And you were much more than me.

I said nothing, you gave me everything after all,

Yet one day I sleep long and deep, and dreamed

Of your very presence inside of me.

I opened my eyes for the first time of many,

To see another, different me, lying by my side.

You made me into us. Side by side we walk, distinct

From all others. I had all, and you gave me more.

Why then would I disobey you, just to taste another fruit?

You Poem 3

Continue on

Continue on little black ant,

Sanctuary’s a mere foot away.

The crushing crumb on your

Skeletal back, your exact duty.

Revised You Poem 1

The Past

See the man hanging lopsided on the back of the closet door?

The metal spikes rip at the flesh of his hands and calloused feet

And the terrible twisted circlet of thorns sending streaks of blood

Are causing that hurt on his acrylic face.

That look is not unfamiliar to you.

If there was a mirror in the closet you would see the lines

Of enduring hopelessness etched on it.

Draw away from the world of tear-streaked mascara

And pray

That tomorrow will be a better day.

Force aside the noises that cuff your ears,

From the wheezing lungs of another hungry man.

Forget your heavy-eyed mother’s rehearsed words

Seeping through the closet doors that work night.

Forgive the painful clench of your arm as your mother

Drags you to your bed,

Your duct-tape patched couch.

Arrive at a wonderful land

As you lay in the twilight.

Soar on the backs of eagles in the spring air.

Step off a sun-bleached rowboat onto an unmapped land.

Glide lazily down a stream away from the stumbling men in the city.

Go now, go now before the light of the picture dies

Beneath the light of your bleary eyes.

Pursue a deep, disconnected sleep,

And pray

That tomorrow will be that better day

You Poem 2

Housekeeping

I’m sorry.

I have not had enough time to scrub away

The muddy paw prints

From the kitchen floor, or repair

The loose board

On the poppy-red deck.

One day when you take over our house,

Take a day to restore every room.

Please do.
A lot of filth can pile up in a day.

You Poem 1

Innocence

Block out the noise that cuffs your ears,

From the wheezing lungs of another hungry man.

Forget your heavy-eyed mother’s rehearsed words

Seeping through the closet door this work night.

Arrive at a wonderful land instead by flickering flashlight.

Ride on the backs of lions in the spring air,

Step off a barnacle-clad dingy onto an unmapped island

Glide down the Mississippi away from the stumbling men on the city.

Fly now, fly far and high before the flashlight dies,

Then close your bleary eyes,

Pursue sleep

And pray;

To the man hanging lopsided on the back of the closet door.

Spikes and thorns causing that hurt on his acrylic face.

Those eyes know your pain.

I beg you.

Draw away from the world of tear-streaked mascara

Of bruise-inflicting men,

Of just trying to make rent.

And pray

That tomorrow will be

A better day.

Revised Narrative Poem

Extracurriculars

In the middle of the room we sat on dented

Suitcases, under the light of a single swinging bulb,

Hanging from the smoke-stained ceiling.

A glinting gun, with a trigger never

Before squeezed, was placed on a torn

Card table, stolen from the local bar.

It was his game, so he grabbed

The cold metal first.  He handled it between his

Sweaty hands as if it was a familiar tool.

We looked on in a haze that matched the heat of

The afternoon as our senior spun the metal cylinder until

It settled on a single chamber with a final click.

Maybe we pleaded as the barrel pressed itself

Into his pale temple, but the unexpected look in his bloodshot

Eyes held us at a distance with their sudden brightness.

Pieces of him were scattered on his oily, dark leather jacket,

And he dropped to the floor at our feet in muffled silence

Amidst the thunderclap and ringing in our ears.

A scene which the newspaper declared “he lost.”

Occasional Poem Draft 1

Calling Hours

We stand in awkward silence,

Wearing our Sunday best. 

Each person sees the family

Fidgeting in front of the closed casket,

And the daughter-less father,

Flanked by his brave wife and now only-child.

There are new creases,

Which fracture his sun-tanned cheeks.

His lips tremble ceaselessly.

His eyes,

Tinged with the redness of sleepless nights,

Frantically flit between the eyes of each hand he grasps.

What are they searching for?    

Not even he knows.

An uninhibited burst of laughter springs

From old acquaintances in the corner. 

We go rigid and examine the father,

Mixtures of emotions swirling around in our own heads,

But his gaze slowly falls to a spot on the tan carpet,

Staring past the individual fibers crushed by hundreds of feet. 

What will I say when the father,

Crumbling where he stands,

Grabs my hand for support?

Villanelle Draft 1

Untitled

Glide past the birds, the clouds, the solemn sky,

Away from bombs, from men, from fears of pain.

You fought for love amidst the dreadful lie.

The dirt conceals the dull look in your eye,

Below the jagged land of which they reign.

Glide past the birds, the clouds, the solemn sky.  

You saw the films of flowing flags on high,

You signed your life, that mark would be your bane.

You fought for love amidst the dreadful lie.

Dear friends run past the tomb and wonder why

The shard resented them with great disdain. 

Glide past the birds, the clouds, the solemn sky.

A post will come and cause your mum to cry.

Your heart, fair maidens never will obtain.

You fought for love amidst the dreadful lie.

You died for land, but this they do deny,

And not for children starving in the rain.

Glide past the birds, the clouds, the solemn sky.

You fought for love amidst the dreadful lie.

Easter Dinner

As the five of them join hands around the small table,

The table feels a little larger than in years’ past.

They slowly chew on honey-glazed ham and laugh at

The little mistakes in each other’s lives,

But each of them steal glances at the dark green folding chair against the wall. 

They see the cold metal frame covered with small indents,

They see the seat cushion threadbare from use,

But they do not retreat into their hearts lined with grief. 

They remember the fruit juice and bread of the morning,

The mutilated corpse brought down from Golgotha,

The words of both god and man rising past the clouds above.

Now they can enjoy their transitory dinner. 

Stained Draft 2

On this ordinary back road, no car is coming or going,
There is only a woman standing on the uneven shoulder of the road. 

She can only imagine the sound of the impact, metal sending him

Through the darkness like an ornate ceramic vase in the hands of a child.

As he stood and fell, walked and crawled away from the twisted remnants of his bike,

What was foremost on the blood-filled and boozed-filled mind?

As his blurry fingers began to squeeze the well-oiled trigger, did he challenge the powers above, 

Or did he justify himself to those who would hear a phone ringing in the silence of the night.

She will never know, but kneels down and runs her fingers across the dark red stain;
Her sobs fading into the depths of the still night

Revised Sonnet Draft 4

Ambrym

Hundreds of feet below its smoke-stained rim,

Lies the shifting magma; a lake of fire.

A lava-filled isle devoid of its peak;

Active long before the Nazarene’s birth.

Everything melts that touches the liquid,

And the edges form densely packed barriers

Bright red and orange claw the pitch black walls

During new, green dawns and foggy, grey dusks.

Yet inhabitants go about their lives.

They watch their children swim in island pools,

And carve five foot faces of their old kin

Out of many rough-barked coconut trees.

Knowing any moment might call for flight

From smoke, from flame, from destruction itself.

Fatherhood

I watched as my son leapt up in the air,

Arms skilfully following the oil-weathered basketball

As it coasted in an arch just over my extended reach

Into the slightly misshapen, flaking hoop.

Game.

His bright hazel eyes looked up at me (but no so far as before)

Through his thick brown mop of young hair.

An uninhibited smile stretched full, revealing his boyish dimples,

But a man’s voice, cracked with elation, reaches my ears. 

I won Dad.

Could this possibly be true, so soon after he was just an idea in our heads?

My wooden joints and sweat-soaked hair seemed to agree.

A smile (maybe as genuine as his) rose to my lips from the depths of my heart

At this man with my eyes, standing on his own for the first time.

Yes, you really did.

American Sonnet Draft 2

Ambrym

A lava-filled isle devoid of its peak;

Active long before the Nazarene’s birth.

Hundreds of feet below its smoke-stained rim,

Lies the shifting magma; a lake of fire.

Everything melts that touches the liquid,

And the edges form densely packed barriers

Bright red and orange claw the pitch black walls

During new, green dawns and foggy, grey dusks.

Yet inhabitants go about their lives.

They watch their children swim in island pools,

And craft archaic artwork on their beds;

Knowing any moment might call for flight

From smoke, from flame, from destruction itself.

More Imagistic Poems

A Dying fly

A fly spins like a child’s top on its thin wings,

Lacking strength to lift an inch off the colorless tile floor.

An Icicle

An icicle drips high above

A running car;

Three feet of pointed glass

Dripping on it.

Old Christmas Lights

Old Christmas lights uncurl, revealing

The rusted metal railing underneath

Their bulbs of blinking white.

An Old Sock

A once sky blue, but

Now grayed, ankle sock lies;

Half-uncovered in the receding snow.

Narrative Poem Assignment

An Accidental Death

In the middle of the room we sat on dented

Suitcases, under the light of a single swinging bulb,

Hanging from the smoke-stained ceiling

A glinting gun, with a trigger never

Before squeezed, was placed on a torn

Card table stolen from the local bar.

It was his game, so he grabbed

The cold metal first.  He handled it between his

Sweaty hands as if it was a familiar tool.

We looked on in a haze that matched the heat of

The afternoon as our senior spun the metal cylinder until

It settled on a single chamber with a final click.

Maybe we pleaded as the barrel pressed itself

Into his pale temple, but the unexpected look in his bloodshot

Eyes held us at a distance with their sudden brightness.

Pieces of him were scattered all over his possessions,

And he dropped to the floor at our feet with a limp thump.

A scene which the newspaper succinctly declared as“he lost.”

The Child in the Corner

In the hanging darkness of the cave,

I was constricted by the rough, blood-stained,

Pine stocks digging into my ankles

Like a leopard clinging to an antelope.

The cave’s entrance was a mere walk in front of me,

Golden strings of light forming a translucent

Curtain that yearned from me to pass through to the scene beyond.

Every recess in my being pulled both my gaze and my will towards that place.

Standing would run the age-sharpened claws through

My leg like an amateur surgeon;

But to bathe my skin in the radiant heat,

I would have happily born the beast’s scars.

But the chain embedded in the wood was clutched fastly

In the bloodless hands of the gaunt child in the corner.

He wrapped his body around the cold grey chain,

Curled up like a shipwreck survivor holding a taught rescue line.

I saw twelve individual spinal vertebrae spreading his skin

Like mountains trying to break through the grey stormclouds.

Seeing its naked form, I stood up and dragged my pets further from

The beckoning light, and sat down next to the quivering leaf.

Then I waited to see if the angel would look up at me. 

The Beauty of the Sun

(For My Love)

A single dandelion stood in the shadows

Of the identical stalks of tall grass.

It remained bent, hiding its colors in

A green shell that seemed closed for far too long.

But the long, graceful fingers of

Sunlight picked through the brilliant

Green stalks to coax the dandelion to

Come closer to its intoxicating presence.

In the audience of its warmth the

Green-capped sprout laid bare its layers

Of gold fabric so long hidden inside a stiff shell.

Where would the dandelion be without the

Light’s consistent touch keeping it naturally

Bent neck pointed towards the Heavens?

It would have withered away into itself,

Were it not for the beauty of the sun.

Short Image poems assignment

A Rusted Light

A rusted light hangs.

Its age is seen clearly in the

Flakes of red as,

Populous as daisies in an open field.

A Microphone Cable

A microphone cable grips tightly to a stand,

Like vines hanging off a Redwood's lowest branch.

A Fat Squirrel 

A fat squirrel rests on his haunches 

Stuffing another nut quickly

Between his expanding cheeks.

Writing Plan

I will write between 11:20 and 11:40 on Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays in Chapel.  I will sketch out some poems, and fish for ideas that I will write in pencil in my small writing notebook. Because the setting is in Chapel, everyone save the speaker is bound by ceremony to be quiet, so my distractions are very minimum.  Also, I can let my musings from things said in Chapel to find a sort of inspiration in my mind.

Lastly, I will write between 1:00 and 1:30 on Saturday and Sunday in my dorm room where it is quite deserted at that time of day.  I will be writing/buffing of rough poem sketches during that time on my laptop to allow easy upload access on more polished drafts.

Week of January 26th

Jesus will be sitting in the chair.

When the anger in my eyes flare,

When the skin of my chin doesn't care,

When the words from my lips scare,

When the roughness of my hands rip and tear,

When my lungs are short on air,

When my body does not compare,

When my feet enter the lair,

When my arms refuse to reach out and care,

When my heart cannot bear,

When my looks aren't fair,

When my mind doesn't dare,

When my tongue dries from wear,

When the glean of my eyes pretend no one is there,

Jesus is still sitting in the chair.

For the Week of January 19th

The Hanging Cross

There in the Dingy Streets of London I saw the Hanging Cross

Though the wall was without all its stones,

And though the vines crept up its rusted hooks,

The Hanging Cross refused to succumb to decay.

Though the wind battered the cross from all sides,

And though the frost separated every passage in its wood,

The Hanging Cross refused to succumb to abuse.

Though the red cloth around its shoulders was long ago torn from it,

And though the reach of some distant war left a gapping pit at its foot,

The Hanging Cross refused to succumb to humanity.

But it would look out over the buzzing streets for as long as it could.

This, the Hanging Cross made understood.

Description Activity Part II

Snowy Night

Snow falls all around.

Snowflakes—both fat and thin—

Their intricately chiseled pattern evident;

Fall lazily to the ground,

            Miming a teenager on a Saturday morn.

Snowflakes gather on the backs of their kin;

Hardly disturbed.

Four tires cut distastefully through the snow,

            But the white coat remains smoothly flat.

A laser’s red beam would shine unobstructed across its settled surface,

            Too perfectly to be random.

Bright snow contrasts starkly with the sky above,

            A blackness seemingly dimensionless.

Hundreds of miles may exist ahead,

            Or the thread-thin veil may rest just outside of reach.

Streetlights outshine all else floating in the darkness;

            Perception errs.

Concentric circles of white move around each light post.

            The presence of the orange lights cause the snow paths to bend away.

Unhurried and steady the pattern flows,

            Mesmerizing to the gleaming eye.

Lights illuminate the sole tree,

            Barren branches curved in unison towards the darkness above.

            

Week of January 12th

When the Hunger is Real

"Pain is fleeting"
This we often hear.
It is a butterfly flying,
Careless on a warm spring breeze.
It is no more on the mind
Than the hungry in a distant land.

When Hunger strikes at home,
And darkness shrinks the heart.
The air is invaded by darkness
And the Butterfly falls under the oppression.
Defenseless, it will lie down forever.

What shall we do then?
Should we not grab the Butterfly through the polluted air?
Should we not place it in a bubble in the epicenter of the darkness?
Should we not show the Pain the beauty in the intricate wings?
The Butterfly must stay afloat,
Or Darkness will always command its domain.

What is Poetry?

Poetry is an extension of us all.  It is the words that we cannot express in prose when we suffer through a tragedy, or when we are trying to pick the pieces of our lives back up again.  It can be a message, a call, from the author to the reader, or simply the expression of the beauty and simplicity of a dandelion at the foot of a Redwood tree. Sometimes it comes from the most raw parts of our soul, or from the rambling thoughts we experience in a 7 a.m. shower.  It can pulse to the beat of our favorite rhythm, or it can be cryptic in its rhythm.  In essence, poetry can not be determined by a prototype. Poetry is a unique look into the world, and into each one of us.

Description Activity

At night in front of the Campus Center

   

     In the campus center parking lot, snow falls all around.  The snowflakes, great fat ones (the kind that if you looked closely you could see the intricately designed pattern in its structure) fall lazily to the ground, like a teenager trying to get up from bed on a Saturday morning.  The snowflakes gather with their kin on the ground. Much of the snow has not been disturbed yet. With only a few indents in the snow from the four tires of some vehicle, there is a seemingly even coat across the ground.  It looks too perfect even to be random.  I would not be surprised if a laser’s light shone unobstructed into the trees across the lot.  The brightness of the snow contrasts starkly with the dark sky.  It is the kind of blackness you see when you look straight down a very long pipe.  While staring you start to lose the sense of how far you are staring.  You know you are staring through hundreds of miles, but at the same time you feel as it might just be a large flat black surface just in front of you.  This error in my perception is due to the streetlamps that shine in the corner of my eyes, blinding me from seeing any faint lights in the steady blackness.  The snow seems to form dozens of concentric circles around each light.  A trick of the eye makes it look as though the snowflakes’ paths actually bend away from some two foot bubble around the slightly orange tinted white light.  The steady pattern of the unhurried snowflakes curving around the indiscernible light is mesmerizing.  Especially with the bare popular tree next to the campus center illuminated.  Its barren branches curve in unison skywards towards the void-less sky in a manner akin to a crowd at an emotionally powerful Christian concert.