Beauty

Winter Smoke Winter smoke and little houses Drawing blinds against the dark The cold, the crying wind Against a stark White moon Winter smoke. Wispy phantoms Casting a ghostly veil Of patterned,...

Dawn on the Shore An hour before the dawn of day, I walked beside the tranquil bay, Along the sandy shore. The air was still. The wind had ceased. The planet Venus hung in the east, In the west the...

  Your spirit’s eyes, now opened, see The timeless steps of stone ahead... Old debts weigh down your weakened knee, Each step, a human burden’s shed. While slogging up the sacred...

Game Over With my friend P. Modernity, We played a game of strategy. Sipping our hot cups of coffee, We spoke over a game of chess. Most of our chat was mere bs, But then the game turned...

Rare Dreams I'm looking through the window of a plane in which I've never been, nor ever will; staring beyond a wing that is not there into a sky I've never seen nor care to see again; above clouds...

Danger: Helping Is Forbidden By Aw "Curbside" Lee It's been a month since he's been seen— the Chinese advocate of civil rights— Li Heping. Two, believed to be police, came to his door on the 10th of...

Night and Moonlight What more can be said about the full moon that hasn’t already been said before? The queen of tides, now glaring at the shore, sits on her throne as if midnight were noon; a...

  A trail it stumbled on a door, A doubled one, upon a floor, Some fellow just as you and me, Approached the portal now we see, And unobtrusive might have been, Except he’d shed, down to the...

The Backwards Romantic “Most of those once common occasions for poetry seem embarrassingly old fashioned now that piped-in tunes and hand-held devices provide the background music for life’s journey.”...

Arizona Midnight Strewn across the vault of ink, Runes and constellations link- ing platinum silver fiery space Unfathomed grace, untiring place. Stare until the nod of head There until the plod to...

Haiku of Righteous Thought Inspired by Dafa Karma turned virtue Evil eliminated Virtue travels home Foe falls defeated Demon laughter quieted Perpetual peace Heaven earth conjoin Restoring...

  The moon, surrounded by gray lands with floating hills and cliffs of clouds, Spreads fields of light that fade away upon the drifting misty shrouds. The lonely park in stillness waits, its blooming...

  Octave By Erisbawdle Cue There's always something going wrong the pessimistic person thinks. One moment one is going strong and then one's on the blink...and blinks. There's always something...

Why did lyric poetry die? ‘Cause caterpillars cannot fly And no longer morph to butterflies Pegasus now has lost his wings To logic, not to lyric, clings Concerned solely with words’ meanings Can...

  The sorrows of many pulls upon heart strings To accomp'ny angelic voices that sing Voices so sweet but pain too intense to soothe Roads traveled so rough only time's sands can smooth No chariot...

The Tears of the Gods An ancient fable tells of how the gods rose from the main Of azure deep of Ocean and all Being they surveyed How Sun he warmed the stones, how the vibrant verdure swayed How tawny...

I. Again the darkling moon is new this night, and cold deserted seas in lunar sleep lay fasting and far from the waxing light; as bright Apollo* flails the unknown deep beyond the threshold of our...

  Heritage, not Hate Today I watched a group of people wait To see an emblem steeped in hate removed From its unmerited, yet hallowed place - Today we traded racist lies for truth. Today I watched...

 To a Brother in Paris Like Sun in the woods, or a cold Summer rain, Would trouble make goods, and loss create gain. Then bound to a Lady, and allied to Bro, With the grace of God found, wherever you...

Upon seeing "Louis XV of France as a Child" painted by Hyacinthe Rigaud at the Metropolitan Museum of Art   O 'tis the beauty of the art of France To reflect regal majesty in paint, To show the...

Originally written in Chinese and appearing on Minghui.org.   Straight, dignified and unpolluted by the polluted world; They are determined to reach upwards, step by step; Quiet and humble, bamboo...

Your steps, unequal, hasten, departing from the race Where dust’s all that’s awarded, where just the fit survive, Pursuing trifles, anguished, forgetful of life’s grace. The farther from this...

Tanka By Ue "Bird Claws" Ee In dim morning light, attracting mates, warning males, dawn's choir's singing— liquid-silver jingling— nature's alarm clock...ringing.   On a Piece of Johannes...

Creativity Requires a Cave (an Apology for Form and Rhyme) IMAGINE Gretzky “trapped” behind the crease; or Pelé, deking, swarmed before the net; Odysseus before he dons the fleece; or Jordan, bodied,...

Winterberry disrupts the frozen curse. My vision's charmed by tiny blobs of red Between fine-toothed leaves, above a thick bed Of snow that baits low branches to immerse In mounds, but they refute its...

The Inward Light Be proof against the eye and ear And every sense that stultifies The inward light, supreme, austere, The keenly sharp, the keenly clear, That by the lucent beam it darts Illuminates the...

The Cherry Blooms in Central Park In Central Park the cherries now Are hung with blooms along the slough, And stand around the reservoir, Pink and white Spring avatars. Now of my three-score years and...

  How Long the Night Anonymous Old English Lyric, circa early 13th century AD Loose translation by Michael R. Burch It is pleasant, indeed, while the summer lasts with the mild pheasants' song...

Submerged in blinding red and blue at dawn, I climb the barren fields to find between the gentle tides of crying clouds, where spawn the highest peak of world in mist unseen. I leap across the steps...

Bay from Berkeley Slate blue blustered inland sea Water from the rivers be Sea of salt and rain ashore Many waters, oceans roar. Slate green gusted inland sea Berkeley roof, fraternity Rising sun to...

  Through sandy, muddy, rocky creek, Silted, crudded, hard to speak, My heart was heavy, worn, and cramped, I needed someplace I could camp. Nature spoke, I took the chance To venture out with...

The First Day of Spring The first day of spring started rainy and cold, But new greens were sprouting, defiant and bold, And daffodils nodded their bright heads of gold, To make the day not quite as...

  Lines Composed in the Adirondack Mountains THERE’S a little town nestled in the hills, with an old house I call by that town's name; with husks of flies in the chipped window-sills, a metal...

"Orange Persimmons" is a Haiku. "Released" is an American Cinquain, and "Forever Wearing White" is a Tanka about how the Falun Dafa are being tortured and buried in snow at re-education facilities in...

As I was flying high and looking down    the lonely regent of my tiny crown in one-dimension’s cold and breath-thin air    anxiously intent on prey down there I’d had...

  The Goddess I. Black breeze On white foam hands Held high, lifting freedom: Shinning fast Her people’s torch in His eyes. II. Thunder Rolling on dawn-- Tanks over Her hands...

I dreamt I saw him in the queue, A friend I thought had long since died; But we embraced so warmly then; It seemed a dream we’d been apart. And looking at him, then I knew Some different spirit was...

  Salazar Sneed Salazar Sneed was a man of great need Who traded holey shoes for a pocket of beads. With the beads he then went to the market and bought A pancake pan that was cast iron...

  One Summer Day An allusion to Beethoven While walking through the woods one summer day, he glanced along a river, clear and bright, saw bubbling notes like dappled fish at play, and dashed them...

  The River Wye Your stroll beside the stream has stayed with me, Has left me in my loneliness with strength Enough to face the world, to somehow see Within its depth and width and wandering...