Poetry

The Muses we understand from Part 1 of this article are the daughters of the future and the past, and more specifically of memory, light, truth and beauty; they are essential for the ‘good life’, and we...

What Rumor, What Word? On the featured photo above What rumor, what word, O Cloud from the sea? Cumulus, Nimbus: what sayest thou to me? But human and man; the simplest I be, And found ruminating,...

  Riddle Two Now give these lines a gander Be you bold enough to try Find fun, full-fashioned candor Take care. Some smart cells may fry On this surface so smooth In perfect timing we...

  In a secluded forest glade, Where sunlight shines and shadows fade, The faeries come to dance and play Upon a bright warm summer’s day. Light are their footsteps, quick their feet On...

By Joshua Philipp The Italian poet Dante Alighieri is best known for his journey into hell, purgatory, and heaven which he told of in his "Divine Comedy." But before he took that journey, he took a very...

27 November 1976: Fort Eustis, Virginia By Usa W. Celebride It is an autumn Saturday. I sit amidst the scree, of dry, brown, crackly leaves, against the rough bark of a tree. The Sun casts out long...

Sonnet XLIV. The Finding Let not this grief across her face invade, Dear God! Thou madest these my one true care! Not Egypt, where we hid Him and He played, Could fade her brightness with its desert...

  Déja Do you remember when a piece of art Held truth or meaning in its oil or stone— And beauty even?  Paintings would impart Aesthetic truth and not just some sweet tone Of glowing like a...

Post your poetry on the recent terrorist attacks in England in the comments section at the end of this post.   The Light of New Hope By Connie Phillips I. Bombings, beheadings, bizarre wanton...

By Sandeep Kumar Mishra There are two things that came to my mind when I read the book Hare Krishna by Mahathi: First, in this modern era in which every person thinks himself a poet, the shape, size and...

  Taking a Gambol A rabbit’s life’s a gambol, A fortunate existence; Giving time enough to spare For frolics in the bramble, Bunny-hops from here to there, Some chewing for subsistence. But...

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Funny Food Poetry Contest, including Judges Michael Curtis, Lorna Davis, William Ruleman, James Sale, and Bruce Dale Wise. We had quite a number of people...

The tears of a nation are shared by us all, We stand with those countries whom terror befalls; The innocent taken, destroyed by the vile, Their heinous objectives we can’t reconcile, Or count them as...

I Think I Like You Better Now I think I like you better now; it’s been a little while Since first you took my breath away with just a passing smile. When love was fresh and new and fast, before life took...

The Flowers Upon a morning stroll serene Across many young floral gardens Greeting me on those fields of green Was the red rose who all love pardons. The humming bird about it flutters The bees its...

Penelope’s Postscript Uncounted days, wrung dry of tears— Lost wanderers do not return: So much for the departed years. Heap up my mangled hopes and fears, Leave Ithaka to mock and spurn Uncounted...

Tipton County, Tennessee, 1917 My great-grandfather cut down huge black oaks Whose stumps his two young sons helped him uproot, Each some Yggdrasil yielding to the strokes Of manic axes in their mad...

Ephemeral Constant With hued music, beautified page. His spheres were thinner than gossamer, Only to beauty, did Keats defer. Was omni-sensory, ahead of his age, Gifted synesthete; few could...

By Joseph Charles MacKenzie James Sale, whom I happen to consider England’s best on the subject, states: “To write poetry with any degree of power, and to create true beauty without which the effort is...

  Sonnet IV. Edward the Confessor Edward, the Cross no more on England’s shores Thy people blesses. The light of faith is gone. From stolen thrones the foes of Christ wage wars Against thy...

Dying Muse Not everyone will survive The muse has sung her last song The end is about to arrive It has been following us all along The forest is groaning in pain She sheltered her creatures with...

Click here to read Part I. Montague (That afternoon, on the outskirts of Verona, at a Club, getting in an afternoon’s worth of pheasant shooting, having needed to get out of town and “think about...

We are pleased to announce the release of a new publication from The Society of Classical Poets titled How to Write Classical Poetry, which features a guide to common poetry forms, brief essays on the...

  Mine eyes beheld your beauty, My thoughts remember how, Your loveliness I cherish, Where ever you are now, And in my heart I know you, Always to be near, Because your vision glories, My...

  “She vanished to the wood,” they said. “Forget her—that strange and sickly child.” A child? Your face was no more childish than mine. And yet not a proper prospect. The Queen defiled my...

If I had words grating and crude enough That really could describe this horrid hole Supporting the converging weight of hell … Canto XXXII, Dante If only we could but we can’t Release some souls...

  Justice,  Equity  and  Compassion  in  Human  Relations In realms of Humankind’s relations, Justice rules as queen & from her crown, the powers Compassion & Equity descend to Earth...

Two Mourning Doves Friendship on the promenade? I know to some it may sound odd but there above, two mourning doves in the weeping willow tree! They share their grief and find relief in the bonds that...

We live in a post-modernist world and its values are everywhere around us; and everywhere these values are almost largely unexamined, and because we have little to contrast our present state with we fail to...

  There was a man who owned a yacht. His name was Dan when it was hot he brought his clan on board a lot to get a tan. When it was not, “So what!” _____________So rot got into Dan and...

(The BBC story here for reference) If I were burdened with a lover who Looked crooked like this woman (woman?), I Would go as twisted as Picasso.  Blue Lips, though, are what I’d paint to help me...

Baby boomers are aging Sometimes, dementia takes hold It isn’t a pleasant thing But happens as folks get old Personalities might change This can cause consternation When someone starts acting...

By Joshua Philipp The Japanese creation story begins in a time of primordial chaos, and from this the god Izanagi and the goddess Izanami emerge to create the Japanese islands. This is the first tale in The...

  Could the dandelion be excused for not being a rose, If its effort to grow was much greater; If it labored and toiled Through unfavorable soil, And bloomed just a little bit later? Would its...

  Golden Opposite of Grave Beauty The Buddhist, Yuezun, saw light like gold Above the blistering sands.  The desert blight Of Taklamakan gained no stranglehold On shimmering beauty.  There above...

Degrees of Light She squinted, watching circling gulls Fly overhead; small rhythmic waves Slapped steadily upon ship hulls. Brown crabs dashed out from wet sand caves Evading hungry birds; dried...

ADULT AWARDS   1st Place – $500 Josh Lefkowitz, “A Poem of Fact” 2nd Place – $250 Kathleen Hellen, “Everyday Halloween” 3rd Place – $150 Lorna Davis, “Buyer’s...

  Heaven Smiles for Falun Gong O you who stand so strong through wind and rain, So like those statues lasting through the years, Impervious to time’s assaults and pain, Unfazed by human doubts and...

  A Sonnet for the Sonnet-Maker You know the beats and rhythms, the iamb Which pulses like a crippled-legged walk; You, with the force of one who said, “I am That I am,” in iambs you will...

Jutting out of a mountain their stone faces peer out with their notice crucified in stone. Crafted to demand a nation’s reverence visitors would mediate and atone. But who can expect more than...