My Poems

These are the poems I shared at open mic tonight. I am working on a second book of poems, for publication, and this will be the lead in poem.

My Poems

I am not a prolific poet,
Each poem is a labor of love
Each is like a child to me
Wondering from the conception
Will it be born perfect
Or will it be like me, flawed and imperfect.
Some say the pain is in holding
The poem inside until they can
Put the words in print and read them out loud.
For me the pain is baring myself naked,
Letting my feelings stand defenseless
Before you to be embraced or rejected.
Each word, each line, each stanza,
Struggles to be born.
Inside the words are soft and hushed,
But in black ink on white paper
They are stark and vulnerable at once.
Now they are no longer images
Hiding, snuggled in my thoughts,
But words, real words representing
What hides innermost in me
And I am not ready yet to expose
Myself, to stand naked before you,
There are some things that should
Remain private, remain mine alone.
They are my treasures, my gems,
They are my alms, my gifts,
To hold close and cherish
And share when the time is right.
These are my children,
My labors of love,
These are my poems.

This is the poem I wrote to welcome in 2007.

Happy New Year?

A new year has dawned
And I can only wonder
What have we done to
Change the world for the better?

Have we accomplished peace?
Ended hunger? Ended hatred?
Or did we once again
Leave a bloodstained legacy?

The year ended and another
Began leaving us immersed
In what was and
What we hope will be.

Now we must each
Look into our hearts
Into our souls to find
A new promise of hope.

Did we learn our lesson
As the sun lay dying?
The bitter cold of life
Stilling us from moving forward.

Perhaps we should not wish
Such futile words as
Happy New Year when
No hope endures within.

Are they more than cheap wishes?
Or a substitute for the truth?
Are they merely nice words
We speak hoping they’ll come true?

Yes, a new year has begun,
And we will pay the price for hope,
With lives lost and dreams destroyed
My country tis of the sweet land of liberty

Of thee we sing poised on the future
Imprisoned by the past
The years turn with hypnotic grace,
We wait to see what fate will bring.

Love Means Nothing

As a young girl reading
The romance novels found
Hidden under my mothers
Bed or on the closet shelf

I thought love must be
Found through ribbons
Pulled from hair too
Tightly pulled back

Or ripped bodices
When rough manly
Hands turned your anger
Into a passionate kiss

That later you would
Try to pretend didn’t happen
Because after all he was
The villain in the story.

And you the poor young
Heroine who in the end
Would triumph over defeat
And win the love of a

Gallant and true gentleman.
Of course, later you would
Find the one you reviled
Was the lord of the manor

And you would feel betrayed
That he had led you on,
In the end though he would
Prevail and win your heart

While you protested your love
For him but then you
You and he would embrace
And walk off into the sunset together.

But, as I grew older I understood
Those were the fantasies of
Frustrated housewives who dreamt
Of bare-chested heroes rescuing them.
From their lives of boredom
And that in reality love is
Nothing more than caring, giving
Accepting that no one is perfect

That love is not violent,
Has nothing to do with money,
Bare chests, ribbons,
Or ripped bodices.

The reality is that real love is
Often not fair or returned
But still worth the effort to
Pursue and cherish when found.

And to fill in some time while Karleigh worked on getting the individual line poem together I read the following - a bit strange but...

Cat Dreams

In my dream or state of dream
The cats lead me to a strange,
Dark abandoned place where
Lions and rhinos live behind

A fence of barbed wire and chain
There is no escape up the wall
Of stone and I stand and face
Them head on – eye to eye

They back down and move
To let me see the secret that
They guard so loyally
A secret that ought not be shared.

I am tired, travel weary,
Worn from exhausted flight,
Wanting only for the dream to end
And peaceful sleep to come to me.

But the secret waits and I must see
With eyes that will not lie
I approach them ever closer
Fearing not their horn and claws

Soon it will be mine to hold
To share or keep as see fit
With excitement I move closer still
Anticipating the knowledge held

Secret within their strange domain.
But as I am within range of owning
This secret held so dear
The alarm awakens me and pulls

Me into an awakened state
Where stark reality awaits.
There is no secret waiting,
No magical light does shine.

Just the cats sitting, staring,
Demanding to be fed,
Wanting me to either pet them
Or get my butt up out of bed!