Beauty

. The Small Commission When school yearbooks are thrust forth to be signed, We give out life advice. We speak our mind, And charge our classmates to keep some small vow: “Recall our good times!” “Stay as you are now!” As Christ did with his Great Commission bind His church...

. Brainwashed and Hopeless My old friend is a doctor---very bright, But he just said to me the GOP, Opposed equality and human rights, Here’s how such nonsense likely came to be. Conservatives must not be in his sphere, Or else it wasn’t politics they spoke. So everything he watches,...

. Fire Lurks I recognize, while watching ghastly nightEncircle statesmanship revoltingly,Bright bursts of a spangled pyrotechnic star.America! No star, a land’s lost light.Companions, look and say if you can seeThe common faith that made us what we are. You patriots intrepid, rise and tryTo tell what blasts your households must...

. A Town The difficulty of describing how This town was then, may only be because So little happened there, compared to now, Though what occurred (the bustle and the buzz) Filled every room in each small house and more To overflowing with the acts of people Engaged in vicious...

. My Patchwork Quilt Somewhere within my closet a patchwork quilt rests there; The patches cut by hands and with stitches sewn with care. The colorful creation once placed upon my bed, Provided warmth and comfort for such a sleepy head. Back in the Great Depression; till nineteen fifty-four Farm...

. Becalmed When life is smooth—a gentle breeze On a porch swing—the garden lush. Retirement! Do as I please. Watch leaflets stir—two bluebirds fuss. Gardinia scent—I swing and swoon. My mind is still as a lagoon. I scoop yogurt with my teaspoon. No urge to move—no need to rush. The...

. Street 3/4 On both sides of this street, there are small stores Of groceries, canned food, medicine, and toys. Beside a Hindu shrine whose iron doors Are always fanned, an art school for teen boys Displays its billboard, saying, "Come! Let's learn!" This road I amble through once lay...

. The Lord of His Castle Setting: King Stephen’s siege of Newbury Castle, England during the English civil war known as “The Anarchy.” The year is 1152 A.D. Strategic though this castle is to me I would we had avoided Newbury Where I have been outwitted and outmanned. John Marshall!...

. A Console Table after a Google entry A console table in the entryway __Provides a focus for a guest Inside your home: a welcome, you might say. A strong impression’s vital to convey, __And for this purpose I suggest A console table in the entryway. Style mixed with function...

. Dandelion Dreams ---to Melody, on the occasion of her fifth birthday I see her, through the window, picking flowers. Adrift upon a sea of green, she towers Above the honeybees that hover over The rippling waves of newly blooming clover. She sees the dazzling meadow all around her And...

. The Convert “Uh, Professor, I don’t get it, Why do people choose to read that? Does it just not fit my taste?” She said, “If you really let it, This will sway you. You’ll concede that This has moved your very soul.” So I dug and mined each sentence,...

. It Goes Without Saying "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." ---the Declaration of Independence Self-evident truths were once taught in...

. . Battle Hymn of the Republic The Lord doth come; the grapes of wrath are crushed! Behold His fiery sword of Victory. He heartens those whose voices have been hushed To loudly shout our rage: “We shall be free!” America, rise up! Look to the light. Sing Glory Hallelujah,...

. Miss Jewell’s Suicide ---from a story by George Gissing The chipped and mismatched crockery,Two boiled eggs and tepid tea,A single slice of buttered toastWith marmalade—a dab at most—And oatmeal porridge barely warm:Such is breakfast’s pallid normHere in a low-rent boarding houseWhere lodgers live sans friend or spouse. Miss Jewell...

. . Militant Books Marshaled ranks of silent books Formed on shelves as in brigade, Fill the wooden dusty nooks Waiting for their next parade. Untamed spirits hide inside, Lurking out of watcher’s sight, Feeding off a soldier pride, Waiting for the well-loved fight. Leather armor fading dull, Nameplates wearing...

. Three Views of Venus "When you’ve got a goddess, make good use of her. —local guide, Green Velvet Bedchamber at Houghton Hall, Norfolk “Ah, Mars, my dear, lay down that spear, and wage Love in the tender tenor of our way. Disarm, and let me have the upper hand...

.  Soulmate Your spouse ideally is your best friend,Providing love and laughter end to end,Supporting and enhancing all day through,But still at times your soulmate must be you. . . Ultimate Question Some things are unforeseen, unique, and new,Arising like unprecedented seasons.Which prompts the question as they’re all thought through...

. To the Full Moon Heavenly voyager, you course Across the skies’ infinity--- The calm, serene celestial sea, Which yields before your silent force--- Traversing the shoreless expanse Of unplumbed ultramarine heights--- Or depths?---as countless, sparkling lights Like myriad sea ripples glance. Floating by lazily, you plow The wispy silver...

. The Pink of Gentle Hermione and White of John Paul II The lodger pauses, as he leaves, to gaze At blossoms in the border at the front— The blooms of roses, saintlike pink—appraise Them as a Monday man might dare confront Such sacredness, such pilgrim pink, and try To...

. Savannah Blossoms Blossoms dress the trees __On Southern parkways Where petals glow like silk __If skies are fair, And a busy stir of bees __Within the nectar Allows the hummingbirds __A rightful share. The blossoms do comply __With nature's calling As butterflies approach __In cautious dare, And the artists...

. The Lazarus Effect Until you’re raised, you’ve no idea how dead You were, how long you’d been beyond the scope Of human give and take; how poorly read You were in all the texts of simple hope. And yet somehow you bravely scuffled on, Your faith by grace just...

. Spanish Moss A thicket hides the remnants of a grange, An antebellum place of ghosts and rue--- A gothic ruin---tropical and strange Which even egrets shun. The faintest clue Of why is whispered when the trade wind moans Of shadowed secrets from this voiceless void Of cotton grown from...

. Memento Belli _My father had mementoes of the war; _he kept them in a box above his clothes, _where also hung a uniform he wore _when he was someone in that time ago _till trauma came, caused by the weight he bore from carnage, chaos, unrelenting noise and such—...

. Flamingo The S-curve of that sinuous neck,The stern black tip of that great bill,The blue eye with which we must reck-on like a gaudy monarch’s will. Not Disney’s giddy croquet bird,The one which lolls while Alice triesTo make it mind---a bird absurdUnder the Red Queen’s baleful eyes. Rather a...

. Ora Pro Nobis pray for us The dead die when we living let them die; We breathing clasp to hearts our breathless dead; We pack them fresh-embalmed on icy beds. In silent rooms they speak our names. They cry To us: “Remember me! Remember me!” Ah, Cissy, I remember...

. The Snare Drummer’s Plight The highlight of the evening is Bolero. The snare drummer begins the famous beat, the marrow of the land of the torero. The players, who have sprayed themselves with Deet, ignore the insects swarming in the light or lighting on the scores. The music’s bite...

. A Precious Wife Is Like Fine Wine A precious wife is like fine wine, made mellow with the years, Aged in a barrel made of smiles and laughter, sighs and tears. Though time may etch its lines upon her once unfurrowed face, Time’s passage makes her well-refined in every...

. . Five Rose Poems by Rainer Maria Rilke translated by Alan Orsborn . The Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926), writing in both German and French, penned 24 French poems about roses that were published posthumously in 1927 as Les Roses. The American composer Morten Lauridsen (b. 1943) selected...

. A Sonnet for My Son on Father’s Day You coo her name in buoyant notes of joy Then watch her toddle, tickled by her grin. She spies the bug-eyed crab---her leggy toy In Daddy’s hands all set to twirl and spin--- To scuttle on the floor beneath her gaze....

. A Sonnet ---for my father, an avid gardener and feeder of wildlife, who recently underwent hip surgery No one shall intervene this afternoon. The well fed squirrel squats upon his branch; The chipmunk chills within his rocky room; Both stare expectantly, their faces blanch To see their lord emerge...

. The Doctor An expert in each area, this man's The doctor for all things in disrepair— Tea kettles, doorknobs, hafts, electric fans... His fingers soothe their maladies and wear. No institute or training course as such Has seasoned him; he learned by merely seeing My grandfather at work, imbibing...

. Distant Thunder Oppressive heat in heavy air; Oppressive light from summer skies; White clouds glow with a garish glare, __Menacing as they rise; Oppressive stillness reigns: no breeze Rustles the leafy, drooping boughs, And only rarely from the trees __A lazy chirp resounds. Then through the silence, faint at...

. Meeting Xu Zhimo by Margaret Coats Three Chinese girls behind me in the line Escape King’s College Chapel evensong; They show a phone, ask where, at once decline Sought-after seats, to rush away headlong. They’re seeking the poetic presence of Not Milton, not Wordsworth, but Xu Zhimo who wrote...

. Cape Canaveral’s Pioneers Asleep I wonder if the lights across lagoon Waves, little though they are, the lights and waves, Portend some goodness underneath the moon Like new moon light on marble architraves. The houses on the shores send out their light. Canaveral’s lagoon holds little dreams Much smaller...

. The Universal Horoscope and Zodiac Twelve figures in the blazoned zodiac Set by the gods in their unchanging track Spin in a regulated, yearly round Until an infant’s primal, wailing sound Puts an end to labor’s strained dilation. Transparencies of detail, implication Refract to a single jewel: this hour,...

. Winter into Spring Sonnet The garbage dump outside the town is white as winter’s snowfall claims the castoff chair from autumn’s cluttered leavings, hid from sight in drifts, the broken dinette set left there for rats to nest below, before degrees had dropped too low to stay when there...

. Admonition It is a form of madness To long for days of yore. And bitter is the sadness O'er those who've gone before. Now we, ourselves, must wander The dark Stygian shore And cross the river yonder, But cross not anymore. So, treat each other kindly, Our days be...

. Poetry Is Warfare A poem is the writer’s battle pleaAgainst asceticism’s barren call.Truth and beauty (air that poets breathe)Needn’t acquiesce to Adam’s fall.A poem with its structure, verse and rhyme,Artistic language and clandestine senseIs no old-fashioned claustrophobic crime.Formal verse is part of the advanceOf a culture that will grow...

. Today My Brown Sedan Is Two Today, my brown sedan is two, But I behave as if it's twenty, So freezing by a showroom's door, I scan the models—new; aplenty. And busy with an old dollop Of mud, there goes my niece of seven. I wonder how she finds...

. To a Cicada So, welcome back, you ancient thing! Some time ago, your tribe took wing; But here you are again, my friend, These summer nights with me to spend. Some may have thought you'd left for good, But you've come back---I knew you would!--- To comfort aching hearts...