inspiration

Even Song

lillian11 Comments

green tent

Plop
Patter
Ping
Slow steady nocturnal rain
taps on the yellow-green ceiling
of my ancient canvas tent.
Comfort seeps in as I burrow deep
in my cocoon zippered bag,
crisp cold nose, just outside the seam.
Lids shutter slowly as ears perk to listen.
Thoughts float in a cool haze.
A hooting owl sits sheltered
by spring’s green-yellow canopy.
The drip, drop, patter
plops above its feathered head.
Dreaming now,
a moon sliver guides me
to a sleep moment of clarity.
These rain notes are nature’s evensong.
A prayer
for all who sleep in this forested place.

rain-233545_1280

Revised from one of my very first poems written in February, in my first class with Holly Wren Spaulding. Posted so early in March (as Rain Song) , I doubt but five people saw it!
UPDATE:  I am in Alaska, as you read this! Will be posting every other day for two weeks until I return.  Mostly new — poems that is — although I will be rejuvenated (love that word!) even more upon my return to Boston, our city by the sea.

Sea Farers All

lillian9 Comments

Cast your nets wide
let them float o’er time and place.
Savor the brine, its salt upon your lips
antithetical and sometimes complimentary,
to the sweet taste of last night’s wine.

Trail fingers in cool waters
seek star fish and arcing dolphins,
even as sharp-edged crustaceans
fray threads in knotted lines
threaten to disrupt the catch.

Rainbow parrot fish flirt in and out
maneuver through teeming waters.
Beauty thrives, even as leering eel
lurk in darkness, seek their shelter
within life’s disparities.

Sea glass, that human toss-away
tumbled to smooth artifacts
pleasurable to feel, caress, collect.
Dark waters today,
sun kissed tomorrow.

Even the barnacle, crusty and hardened
clings to the worm-holed hull
holds years of secrets in its blight,
another treasure caught
within our thread bare cache.

Tankas* for Earth’s Children

lillian4 Comments

Volcanoes fester
seethe and boil beneath earth’s skin
like red hot anger
held within, spews forth fury
assaults all within its grasp.

Watch how the clouds fly
sometimes dark and threatening
often soft and light
retreat in black moonlit sky
promise always to return.

Oceans between lands
offer pathways to friendship
teem with life for life.
Waves ebb and flow to all shores,
assure life’s cycle anew.

Sun of mother earth,
shines her perpetual light
nurtures all children,
no matter diversity
prejudice vanquished for all.

Listen my children,
the earth shudders in anguish
sees your refusal
to step lightly on her soil.
Embrace your sameness and love.

 

*My June Challenge Poetry Class assignment was to write a poem within constraints, and the next day’s assignment, to write a poem of instruction. This combined the two. A tanka is a genre of classical Japanese poetry that contains 31 syllables, typically in lines of 5-7-5-7-7.