The natural world continues to create beauty, even if only within my mind on cold wintry days with snow flurries slowing the garden’s awakening. This nation will awaken. The ranks of the woke will increase. Blue-bliss will overcome blood-red. Our nation will flourish again with diverse gardens to delight every sense, and remind us of the endless possibilities of a free people, One Nation out of Many. Let this painting give you hope and bring you a measure of peace today.
Altars of sacrifice are all around.
Candles of prayer light the ground.
Darkness recedes under great duress.
Lawyers are in full-court press.
Evil lurks and lunges until we despair;
its laughter and cheers rend the air.
Turbulent times make us all too aware
how humans carry a heavy load of fear,
how ready we are to disappear
before we lose heart
and break apart.
We are tempted to remain abed
and close our eyes against the dread
of monsters who long played dead
and hid under rocks, yet lived in our heads.
We live lives of useless malcontent
ready to blame the innocent
for acts of contrition that belong
not to the weak, but, to the strong.
Unable to admit we could be wrong,
we allow the liars to string us along.
We vote them in to replace our lost pride.
We set all reason and facts aside.
We wear red hats with slogans to hide
a weakness too fearful to abide.
When will such depravity end?
What harm done in the interim?
Soft exhales out in metered prose.
Screams trapped within a calm pose.
This is how every morning begins.
Candles relit on altars within.
Resistance alights again and again.
Another hour, another day, and then?
Grey days may appear
to cloud freedoms, far and near.
Don’t give in to fear.
Think as Spring draws near
of all that you hold most dear.
Peace and beauty shall appear.
Hope is in the soil beneath our feet
Ready to grow seeds in the lengthening days
Until beautiful souls flower and fill our needs.
Like lichen I cling
to foundational rocks, loose.
Democracy lost.
Filed under POETRY
It has always been
understood and too often
forgotten. Spring comes.
Yesterday I fell
by the wayside
where hopelessness dwells.
The journey upward felt
like a forced retreat,
no longer a climb
on confident feet
to reach the summit
where love presides,
where ego lives above false pride.
Instead, the slope had become slippery
and I,
and I,
and I
fell to my knees
my hopes subsided.
There is no time for this
I have decided.
I may slip again
and all my hopes fail
but, I will stay on freedom’s trail.
The climb ahead
becomes more rugged.
And I become stronger
the longer
I climb.
And I,
And I,
and I
will always go up
where skies are blue,
to reach others
willing to climb
up
from the other side.
This I promise myself
and I promise you.
All I want
is to avoid
my own thoughts
lately clothed in fear
so pronounced
they bring me to tears.
It finally must be said
anger fades to grief
when death brazenly nears.
Watching a beloved die,
clutching the hand,
wiping the brow,
for perhaps the last time
applies to nations.
I watch my beloved country
whose solemn vow
has always been protect and defend
all those living within
the boundaries of an idea in place
to open freedom’s gates
to all equally, within its small space.
I hold my nation’s heart and soul
with trembling hands
and shortened breath.
In painful realization
that so many countrymen
in this amazing nation
fear not, nor mourn with me
the loss of our democracy.
Friends and family alike
smirk and snarl in true delight
the unleashed dogs of fear and fright
which rip apart all we have built
without a trace of grief nor guilt.
They break my heart
as they tear our world apart.
Future refuses to talk.
She holds her cards close.
No expression crosses her face.
Her fierce calm holds us in place.
We gamble our fortunes, our lives,
within her unfathomable space.
Withholding breath we wait
to discover our curious fate.
“Play the cards you have,”
she says,“before it is too late.”
The game here now will last until
each card has been played.
Holding onto cards
means new presents are delayed.
The young know this better
than their elders do.
The young play with greater abandon,
unconscious of the heavy stakes
that keep my eyes open all night through,
awake, until light from a new day
through the closed blinds seeps through.
A new day.
A new game.
Time to play.
Future cuts the cards.
No time to waste.
Vote!
Filed under POETRY
MERRY CHRISTMAS 2024
Hope is the deep breath needed to sing Carols
heralding Jesus’ birth.
Hope is the breath first breathed into all living things.
Hope is the breath that softens
the hard contours of defended hearts.
Hope is the breath that soothes
the rough edges of fearful minds.
Hope is the breath that animates
the graceful move to gift our very selves.
Hope is the breath that lifts
the blindness of hateful eyes heavenward.
Hope is the breath that challenges
the world to dream of peaceful, new beginnings.
Hope is the breath that stores
the strength needed for moments when courage is needed.
Hope is the breath that brightens and enlightens
the darkness within each breathless soul.
Christmas is a time for deep breaths filled
with hope to face another moment, day, month, year.
Keep breathing is all that is required to fill
the world with Hope.
Each breath keeps Hope alive.
Merry Christmas with every breath taken
deeper in every way, every day
during the Jubilee Year of Hope.
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Filed under COMMENTARY, POETRY
Tagged as breathe, christmas, courage, deep breathing, faith, good vs. evil, hope, Jubilee Year of Hope, opposition, poetry, Pope Francis, UNITY, war and peace