Author: lillian

Forsaken

lillian37 Comments

‘Tis a bleeding heart she kneels to touch
twixt garden replete with anemones.

Tears fall, drenching red-lobed blossoms,
whilst silent sobs take leave from half-bent frame.

Loneliness stalks her vulnerability
as sun begins to fade and violet shades the sky.

Fragile moss roses shrink within themselves
having lost the rays of day.

Anguish struck, she sags at the sound
as wrought iron gate clangs shut.

Lover no more, their friendship spent,
mounted, he urges steed to faster speed.

Digs, indeed embeds, his silver spurs
into rippling sweating flanks.

He rushes, nay, he flees from her,
she ripe with unborn child

his seed within her womb.
Hapless garden waiting but to bloom.

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Written for Tuesday Poetics at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets. Sarah hosts today, asking us to consider the language of flowers….a popular craze within the 19th century when writing was how people communicated over distance and time. Within a list she provides, Garden Anemones are equated with “forsaken.”  Trying my hand at a Victorian tone here. 

Come Inside My Haibun

lillian46 Comments

He was an immigrant. A painter. A Swede who arrived at Ellis Island many years ago. I was privileged, as were many, to experience his journey in a most unlikely place. A basement room, in Chicago, Illinois.

Entering that underground space, we stepped onto a ship sailing across the mighty Atlantic. Sky cerulean blue overhead, dipped to meet the horizon, forever brightened by an invisible sun. Gulls hovered above waves rolling with white caps, dabs of paint that never splashed. We sat in the midst of many family celebrations, our chairs backed up against basement walls, as if leaning on Grampa Hallberg’s painted ship rails. A lifeless life preserver hung never-used, drawn not quite round.  It was a room like no other. It was the USS Sweden, frozen in time.

young beaver crosses pond
gathers sticks and stones and spring time mud –
journey revealed in lodge

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It’s Haibun Monday at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets and I’m hosting today – asking everyone to delve into the traditional … and at the same time, take us on a trip into an interior they remember from their past. A room they can recall.

The Haibun must include 2 or 3 tight paragraphs of prose describing the interior (cannot be fiction); followed by a traditional haiku: 5-7-5 or short-long-short in syllabic form; must be about nature; must include a kigo (reference to a season) and a kireji (a cut achieved by a hyphen, ellipsis, or punctuation mark, that shifts to an added insight within the haiku.

Photo: Grampa Hajalmer Hallberg on the left in 1972, two years before his death. He immigrated from Sweden in 1906 at the age of 22. He’s sitting in the basement he painted to remind him of his journey to America on the USS Sweden.

After Many Anniversaries

lillian57 Comments

I have no need for mirrors
or overly affective words.
Aging is reality.
I need not be reminded
of it stealing time
elasticity and
dew-fresh skin.

But you, my love,
wrap me as if in gold,
caress my heart.
You hold my hand
and walk with me,
as if we are young love
now as then.

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Wrapping up our dVerse 7th anniversary week, Frank asks us to write a septet. It can be a single 7-line stanza or a poem with two or more 7-line stanzas. Image is one of my favorite Gustav Klimt works, The Kiss (from Wikipedia Commons). 

Dad, You’re in my Haibun

lillian33 Comments

What is a venial sin? What is the Immaculate Conception? What are the Ten Commandments? What are the seven mortal sins?

As a young child, I had to memorize answers to Catholic Catechism questions before I could make my first holy communion. One of the greatest benefits I gained from my early Catholic education was the ability to memorize. I spouted off those answers quickly and matter-of-factly as my father patiently sat in his big green fake-leather chair, asking the questions. He never went to church – except for mother’s day, Christmas and Easter. Yet he sat patiently, testing me on my catechism questions.

I remember my father as undemonstrative. I don’t remember being hugged or hearing him say, “I love you.” But I understood years later. He showed his love in different ways. For example, listening to me spout off doctrine he didn’t believe. The one answer I parroted, but could never ever understand, and never dared to ask a nun or priest about, was the one that basically told me my father would go to hell because he didn’t believe. No way. He had the patience of Job. He was a good man. And he was my dad.

huge white pelican
rules of gravity be damned –
soars in autumn skies

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The White Pelicans migrate every fall to Florida. With a 9′ wingspan, they are one of the largest birds in North America. And they soar.
Amaya hosts dVerse today, the virtual pub for poets. She asks us to considerthe 7 deadly sins, and/or the 7 virtues. We may consider our relationship to them — or how they affected us at some point in our lives. I’ve written a haibun: 2 or 3 tight paragraphs of prose (must be true), followed by a traditional haiku.
Missing my dad….

Keep Yer Elegy!

lillian57 Comments

Quit yer bitchin’
and scratch where yer itchin’.
However-many years you’ve got,
light more damn candles
and quit yer complainin’.

Quit yer terminable thinkin’
‘bout pushin’ up daisies.
You best be lookin’
to pick ‘em instead.
Water ‘em good and
scratch where yer itchin’.

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Happy 7th year anniversary dVerse! Back from our summer respite, Grace hosts Quadrille Monday, asking us to include the word “itch” or a form of the word in our exactly 44 word poem, sans title. dVerse, the virtual pub for poets, opens at 3 PM Boston time. Come join our anniversary celebration by posting your own quadrille, or just reading the creativity of others. Photo from pixabay.com  

Still He Draws

lillian62 Comments

Mind stalled, synapses off kilter
gait pained by age and atrophy,
he swings a chalk bucket
as we walk our weekly walk.

Stopped to watch scurrying ants
he stoops, putting chalk to sidewalk.
Hopscotch numbers beyond his grasp
he draws a simple sun, one cloud.

Standing, he pats my face
grins at me, then bends again.
Clutching pink chalk, draws a string
attached to one pink balloon.

Chalk tossed aside, he lowers himself
shifts bony frame uncomfortably
until he is perfectly placed,
as if holding that pink string.

Eyes tight shut, he lies still
floating in his muddled mind,
beside the cloud and sun.
And I smile wistfully.

I picture him a young boy
spent from playing tag,
drawing this sidewalk scene
lying down just like this . . .

then jumping up to run away,
an entire life in front of him.
Not bumbling to recognize me,
needing a helping hand.

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My nephew posted this photo of his son quite some time ago on FB. I loved the photo and asked permission to use it some day on my poetry blog. This little boy is a wonderful bright, lively and imaginative child! I went to a place with this poem that I wasn’t expecting.
Posting for OLN (Open Link Night) at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets, where today that famous guy from Sweden, Bjorn, is still revelling in the summer solstice season and Sweden’s advancement in the World Cup! 

the player

lillian1 Comment

scabby knees squat low
agate rolled in sweaty palms
spit for extra luck
cold marbles wait for quick hit
king of the hood at six, shoots

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A tanka (5 lines with the following syllabic pattern: 5-7-5-7-7) written for Misky’s Twiglet #82, “cold marble”. A twiglet is a short phrase meant to inspire writing. Perhaps someday all our children will only shoot marbles.