This week I attended a seminar and luncheon to hear about the latest research in motor neurone disease (ALS) - and this poem was the result.........

        A Love Poem

This is our Nana's photo -

"Chris and Sue, Pretty Beach, 1952."

I see two little girls swimming

A shark net stretches before them

Hinting at dangers to come?

I'm facing the sun

Squinting my eyes

Sucking in the heat.

Kicking my legs

Splashing freely

Feeling the joy

Laughing, happy.

But you -

Not facing the sun

Your head is turned

Gazing at me

Feeling the joy

Laughing, happy.

Years later

On your sick bed

You say to the man

Who will become my husband

"Even when I'm dying,

Chris can make me laugh."

When others laugh

At something I've said or done

I want you to know

You are with me still

As close as your butterly kisses

A flutter of eyelashes on my cheek.

I miss you, my sister Sue.

Beautiful, PP. I have dabbled in poetry since grade school and have a few written but they're rather personal (written for my wife mostly and not sure she'd want them going public). Have always wanted to do something more pastoral/philosophical in the vein of Horace's Odes but never really tried. I'll see if I can come up with something for this thread over the weekend.

Mendalla

While teaching OAC English students, one of the assignments in our Comedy/Tragedy study was to have the students write a poem.  We would evaluate each others so I re-typed the poems and left names off.  Every year I would slip in a poem I had written to see what my students thought of it.....comments were always interesting...some good, some not so good but it was a fun exercise.  I used to enjoy writing poetry, mostly free verse, but don't know if this old brain has anything creative left in it. 

Gecko, then allow me to be your teacher for this thread....

Write a poem of your love for the creatures of the sea.

As an English teacher, you may be able to assist me.

Are there any "rules" for free verse poetry?

Mendalla, I'd welcome a poem from you.

As an aside, it's so much easier to discuss religion, than write from the heart, isn't it?

Which is a shame, as so much of the Bible reads like poetry...........

THOUGHTS

I used to believe it was me…

that I dreamt them up

all on my own, but I don’t:

thoughts form themselves in me.

Memories gather, laughter-linked,

jostling like boys with a ball

to tell their lies and tales and truths.

The unforgotten, the odd,

the unrehearsed, the new,

even the wearied obsolete…

like oils, their extracts merge:

all the gathered tinctures,

distillates of instants gone

and long, loitering moments

Words, faces, places loved,

musics of mood and emotion

stir each other to simmering flows.

And they just form…

those fragments mingle,

merge, elide, expand…

and then begin to breathe.

Contradictions bound by paradox

rehearse harmonies… and these

birth ideas as form, as fancy.

Some gel, some rise, some glint

some unspin as vortices,

rippling in my blending bowl,

and set like bedded rock.

But always into shadow

flits a form too fast to follow.

This must be my soul: the jolly joiner

of my past and present so tomorrow

will seem real to me while, in fact,

it’s the imaginary me that’s made

strangely real to tomorrow.

         — Mike Paterson

Here's an old but true one (from New Zealand days):

ENLIGHTENMENT

Summer hayshine afternoon…

stagger-stiff from slinging bales

the boy is sent to get the cows,

rolling, gentle, heaving things,

sweeter scented than the hay…

turning to close a gate, his bare foot

shocked

startles him with the feel

of fresh cow manure

and overcomes him with its goodness.

The wood of the gate is alive in his hands

the grass swims like emerald fish

the smells become a carnival

that embraces the fat ambling clouds

high, high on their blue pastures.

Both feet now, toes working the dung

the boy tastes transcendence

for the first time in his life.

But his father, laughing, says:

“Shit, Robert. You’re covered in shit.”

      — Mike Paterson

I loved these!  Actually, Mike, I felt every line of your last one.

I used to write poems when I was younger and sifting the chaff from the gems in my days.  I'm lazy now and crack off limericks for friends and family special moments.  Cheap and hilarious.  I might have a thoughtful poem in me, still, so if the discipline can be mustered...I'll be back. 

I'll enjoy reading yours!

I'm impressed, Mike.....

It's good to read from someone who has a licence, whilst I'm still on my learner's permit...

Keep 'em coming!

That last poem took me back to the days in the bush when I, as a child, had to take a billycan to the dairy for our milk.

C'mon Penny, if I can have a go, anyone can.......

I'd love a poem from you.

A sort of Advent reflection:

In answer to the angels’ song…

When we go seeking beauty everywhere…
when curiosity dashes fears of difference…
when gratitude sweeps greed aside…
when justice stays the hand of power…
when love erases grudge and hate …
when compassion melts the ice of need…

Then each day, dawn by dawn,
we’ll awake in joy’s embrace
to the delights we'll find
in harmonies of  trust
and colloquies of joy…

C'mon Pilgrim: ANOTHER POEM FROM YOU… please???

Very uplifting poem, Mike - a wonderful recipe on how to live life......

I'll have another go when a subject comes to me from somewhere in the back paddock of my mind.........

(Methinks this is turning into an Antipodean thread, perhaps Canucks are more cautious about revealing their inner selves?)

Betta get out the back paddock then, luv, and scare up a few roos!  Get the buggers hopping around and the words'll kinda boing around too… straight up!

Dunno about the Canucks… duuno what they do for roos around here.

Deer come close, I imagine, in terms of ecological niche but they don't hop. Rabbits are a bit small, though I recall seeing a wallaby in a zoo once that wasn't much bigger than some of the bunnies in my neighbourhood. Bunnies are scarier, too.

Just realized that there's some of my poetry on my blog. It's a meditation for a church service but rather poetic.

http://www.wondercafe.ca/blogs/mendalla/think-river

Mendalla

Thanks, Mendalla: that's beautiful… rivers are wonderful and I'm just realising how wonderful: we moved in August to a place very close to one. I love listening to it… it has a different song almost every day.

A Moment

sky the colour of an untuned channel

hints of lemon coloured light ekeing through

She's wearing nice snowgolem earrings

lurching toward her to congratulate, her eyes widen and she backs off with her walker--your mom's death playoff beard, probably--

then walks away, muttering "bah humbug"

in the trees, various cousins wing and play in the warm winter eddies

You're home

You always have been

Inanna, your poem gave me goosebumps......

Loved the imagery and a powerful ending - "You're home You always have been".

Mendalla,

Living on an island surrounded by oceans - and yet being the driest of continents, the subject of water is never far from an Aussies thoughts. Well done!

As a novice poet, already I can see from the poems here that I need to learn more control in my work.......

It'a a balance isn't it - between conveying raw emotion and using words that suggest rather than tell?

(Or maybe I should continue in getting in touch with the raw emotion -and then -once expressed - rewrite the poem after say, six months have lapsed?)

That's a poem

The service I wrote that for was actually part of my never to be completed (well, maybe to be completed) series on the four elements. Needless to say, it was the one on Water. Air is the other one I've done. Still have Fire and Earth to go but I'm not doing any preaching right now so not sure if I'll ever get to them.

Mendalla

Mendalla-that River Poem was great!

I am enjoying everyones poetry so much. Mike you always are so eloquent with words, I swear I learn new words everyday from your poems and even your posts are sometimes pure poetry.

Pilgrims Progress, I related to your poem so much....beautiful!

Mendella I remember when you were posting about speaking on the four elements in your church and searching for a song. Your words are amazing.

Sooooo, Pilgrims, here is my attempt at poetry.  I wish I knew how to do free verse as you call it, but I tend to always want to find words that rhyme....which I think causes any poetry I write to be rather unpolished and obviously amateur.

Oh well....I tried right?

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

                                                          SORRY

The love in my life has cut me loose,

no longer

wants to take my abuse.

I treated her fine,

in my own mind,

but she complained

I treated her bad

and said I forgot

all that we had.

Maybe I am a little mean,

I take, she gives

or so it seems.

Sometimes she cries

and puts on a show.

What she wants,

I really don't know.

It frustrates her,

when we don't talk

and I'm content,

with what I've got.

Years ago I treated her fine,

not really sure when I crossed the line.

Is this what they mean when they

say,

love is blind?

I used to feel with great delight,

a glorious love,

an endless night.

But now she says,

that she can't breathe,

Tells me I've forced her,

on her knees.

I'm sick of the begging,

I'm sick of the pleas.

I must admit,

she's becoming a bore,

an attention seeking,

little whore.

I hear her groans,

like she's giving birth,

she says that she's dying,

and I don't value her worth,

She's the love of my life,

and I call her

EARTH

One more.....then i'll stop, promise.....

Truth

I dug my way to China once,

only to find someone had been there before.

I thought I'd be the first,

but no,

there was a door.

I knew it couldn't be a thing,

that built itself,

it must be made.

I walked on through,

and to my delight.

Someone changed the dark to light.

Where did it lead,

I never knew,

I only knew that I walked through.

and found myself on the other side,

of life and death,

an eerie room

with no emotions

or doom or gloom.

I turned around

and started back.

No handles soon

prevented that.

I walked and walked

and soon arrived.

in China.

A land of dreams and seekers,

where every answer has a question.

Hanging on the wall in my study is an old clock my father gave me. It doesn't work any more, so I set the hands at permanent midnight. Underneath it I pinned a poem to go with it:

LAST MIDNIGHT

My clock struck twelve,

And then no more.

My clock got stuck,

Permanently,

Last midnight.

Zero hour

And

Twenty-four hour

Forever.

No bell tolls for the free.

Oh, goody - two more brave souls!

What I'm noticing already is that we each have our own poetry style -not only do we choose a subject matter that is close to our hearts, but we express it in our unique way.......

waterfall, you express so much emotion in so few words. I loved your friendship poem!

The subject of troubled friendships is something common to most of us. I'm surprised it's not written more about..........

I feel your conflict about this friendship in the lines -

she's becoming a bore

an attention seeking, little whore

and -

She's the love of my life

and I call her

EARTH.

Just curious, was writing it cathartic in any way?

Arminius,

What a grim reminder that there'll come a day for all of us when our clock's get stuck. (dead parrot time). Excellent use of metaphor.

(I've a feeling that I'll think of your poem when I change the clocks when daylight saving next begins!)

Here's one I wrote a little while ago about a childhood memory: it's around that time of year again, when the citrus fruit are ripening in New Zealand:

Marmalade…

I remember the cool white wall

wetted by the moisturizing haze,

the sweet, heady, glistening,

breath-taking tang of citrus

… the beads of condensation

that rolled down the steamed window

from the simmering molten gold

bubbling, roiling, slow-boiling

in the big pan on the stove; 

the sugar-glazed wooden spoon

perched on its heron-like holder…

I remember sucking my finger

having drawn it across a saucer

dripped with thickening syrup

to test its setting…

and the way it’s surface

crimped and clouded, skin-like, as it cooled.

I remember shiny cellophane jam covers

waiting, afloat in a bowl of water

and rubber bands and hot jam jars

… and the old, scarred, juice-puddled

wooden cutting board where

mounds of sunshine fruit

had been sliced to chunks and shreds

with none of their magic dimmed.

And I remember my mother.

Here is an insight that struck me when I walked along the shore of Kal Lake, contemplating Mike's question about the meaning of life.

TAKING YES FOR AN ANSWER

I went down to the lake, and asked myself,

What is the meaning of life?

No answer, except

Water lapping at the sandy beach,

And sea gulls circling in the air.

And, suddenly,

In the shrill crying of the gulls,

And the soft splashing of the waves,

I heard the answer.

This is a poem from my youth, when I apprenticed with my father as a blacksmith.

THE CRUCIBLE

My father was a village blacksmith,

And I his apprentice.

With his hand hammer

He  struck the leading blows,

And I followed his lead

With heavier blows of my sledge hammer.

Often, we took a piece of cold, hard steel,

Heated it to malleable whiteness,

And, blow by blow,

With sparks flying,

Forged it into a new form,

And, sizzling and steaming,

Quenched the new form in the water trough.

A rainy day in Sydney - just the weather for turning thoughts into poetry...........

I notice Mike and Arminius have been revisitng childhood memories - and so have I.

                Grandfather

Skipping along the beach

Trying to keep up

Our tiny legs on either side of you

Our hands in yours

Two dinghies off the stern.

Darting to the water's edge

Sinking in soft sand

Looking for shells

That carry the sound of the sea.

A cigarette dangling

In the corner of your mouth

(How do you speak, and keep it there?)

You smell of coconut oil

(my own South Sea island).

Once you found some seaweed

And placed it with your fisherman's hands

Around our tiny waists.

"My two little pagan princesses", you said.

Soon the seaweed stank,

But the skirts stayed on

Till they floated away

Reclaimed by the outgoing tide.

But you had once been away to war.....

The ship that brought you home

Left in it's wake

No place for vulnerability to surface.

You read me "The Raven"

And when the black bird came tap, tapping, outside the door

I begged you to stop.

You said,

"it's a tough world out there lass,

Best toughen up."

The princess has since gone to the tower of youth

The pagan remains

Collecting shells,

Listening to the sea.

But, you were right about that raven

When I least expect it

It comes, tap, tapping at my door.

That is deeply moving, Grim: beautiful and very "felt"!

This is something I was inspired to by the way prime numbers spread themselves out but keep coming: somehow something like life… and itr makes the poem endless too…

anyway:

PRIMES

(2)
a question… a moment’s unplanned
lightly fanned curiosity:

(3)
the key that opens every lock
to  a myriad magic doors
and sets ablaze their inner vaults:

(5)
prisms and mirrors and windows,
energies’ lenses and filters,
— splitting, reflecting, refracting,
bending, enlarging, reducing,
modulating life’s depth of field…

(7)
and not just light but spectra too
of every sort and sense and hope
of touch and wit and sound and smell
— the voiced and all those fluid things
that cannot ever be confined
in dungeons built of little words.
Giddied certainties slump and fall.

(11)
It’s for imagination’s sake
our neurons make their connections:
to distill the truth of be-ing
from touch and word and vivid dream.
It’s always the wonder that counts:
each new question blows off the dross
and molten truth too hot to touch
roils its new tides to furthest shores
this and that side of the rainbow.
Like firefly flights in summer fields —
adventure calls, and calls again…

13, 17, 19, 23, 29, 31…

Here is my one contribution to the world of poetry. One day I felt inspired (true) and the words appeared in my head and so I wrote them down and published them on my blog on April 27 of this year. It's called "Today I Will Be Adam" - a call (in my mind at least) to always be in awe of the creation around us.

Wow!

It's a delight — brilliant! — to find poetry flowering all around in this thread.

Steven,

From now on you will be Adam to me.

Like you, I find a God experience is about feeling connected with all that is........

It's interesting to see the men contributing most here.......

Perhaps their emotions are trained to be kept under wraps more by our cultural experience than women?  And poetry is a gentle way of eeking out emotion?

As for me - I'm just too emotional anyway.

We men are sensitive creatures - in a brutish sort of way. (belch, scratch)

No scratching whilst you're naked, Adam!  (That would be too much - even for an Aussie.

Inspiring poem, Steven!

Now everyone will want to be Adam—or Eve? (This poem equally applies to Eve, I hope :-)

TO THE GODDESS AT THE GATE

Goddess at the gate

To heaven,

Or to hell?

Does she know

Where to go?

Does she know well:

To shun her heaven is her hell?

Valkyrie,

At the gate to Valhall,

Why do you not enter?

Are you afraid?

Or, perhaps, waiting

For your White Knight?

Her White Knight came,

Odin the Poet,

His right eye blind,

His left eye radiating clarity.

Hand in hand, they went,

Odin and Valkyrie

Into Valhall;

Adam and Eve,

Back in The Garden,

Reversing The Fall;

God and Goddess,

In the mystical Land of Avalon.

keep up the poetry, folks -- this is all fair dinkum stuff!

Maybe we'll get enough poems for a wondercafe anthology?

IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE WORD

In the Womb of the World was the Word,

The Word was Odin,

Odin was Poet.

Arminius,

I see you have an interest in Norse mythology.

(Like me, there is a touch of the pagan in you.)

When you read other mythology, it suggests that Christianity itself has a mythical quality..........

The Wondercafe anthology is a slim volume at present - but, given time and inspiration, it may grow.............

Getting mythic…

This comes from a revelation to me by a Maori elder whose wairua (spirit) I greatly respect (he is dead now) about my "manaia"/"kaitiaki" — the closest quick parallel I can think of being a 'guardian angel'/'spirit kin'), together with some powerful, beautiful memories I have of diving in New Zealand waters when I was younger:

MAKO

My soul she is a mako
she slides through saphire seas
she sinks in darkest stillness
and soars to smash the sun
Horizons all step back for her
and reefs sink low in the surf.
Her beauty cleaves the rising wave
her strength embraces oceans
I sense the centre of her longing,
I smell the sea wrack in my dreams.
Her hunger's always to move on
... tides on shore to currents deep
spin always outwards into more
their stillness is their motion
their motion never ends, and
that is where she finds her own…
My mako waits to take me home
— she only knows the way.
 

And I like doing little "bits", like:

APPROACH

The less I listen
The noisier it gets.
 

CUP OF TEA

Fragile lips kiss
frail bone china
as another
heart takes hold
of the willow pattern’s
sad, sad story.
 

SILLY REALLY

It’s as silly to expect two people to agree
as it is to expect everyone to agree

… don’t you agree?

DEATH

The air clears…
like crystal or
like someone poised
on the very moment
of beginning
to say something
very important…

DAY JOBS

Oh, the sighs, the shit and fatigue of it
… keeping the corporation’s
castles in the air.
 

THE MAN IN THE FUR COAT SAID IT

“Schoenberg?
ver-ry
A-musik,
No?”

REVOLUTION

For God’s sake
don’t Shoot!
… until you see
the whites
of their
collars!
 

ECONOMICS 101

Consumerism
Is never enough

THE TROUBLE WITH OBJECTIVITY

What others see
… you get.

Hi Mike, I like your short poems.

ULTIMATE SHORT POEM

I am.

-God

Hi PP: Here is a Christian poem, expressing Christian mythology and belief, even the meaning of Christmas.

THE SECOND COMING

When humankind was desperate and forlorn,

A server and preserver then was born,

A saviour, compassionate and kind,

To heal, and liberate, the human mind.

He was "The Chosen One," so we have heard,

The Chosen One? What hides behind that word?

And who has chosen him? We need to know!

How did he come about? Where did he go?

We humans, through God's mighty voice

Did we receive His godly gift of choice.

The gift of choice, when we become its user,

Will make us into chosen and the chooser.

That great, Arminius. I find it very hard to write "Christian" stuff because so many of the words I reach for have become so charged with baggage that I mostly find diminishes and and even contradicts the experience.

I REALLY loved these!   It's interesting how thought provoking a few words can be.

Thanks, Waterfall!