Monday, July 7, 2025

Poem: The One Who You Really Just Are


The One Who You Really Just Are

These little ditties here we see
Of radiant times and those dull
To me. I write them here to be
A boon to get me through gloom’s full.

I know their context, or did when
I wrote them so all do make sense,
And some I love, and some I planned
While others are complete nonsense.

That’s how our days go—yes, they do—
Some seemingly so sensible
While others just seem like they go
To realms of nothing memorable.

Hold to those days you can’t quite feel
Because, perhaps, your mind was numb
Or you couldn’t get beneath peals
Of nothingness, your mouth was dumb.

They make the person wholly you
With laughter, joy, tears, and some fears
All rolled into a fount that’s new
Nothing one needs but to be near

The thing that you may not e’en know
But that which makes you who you are
Not who you wish to be but, oh,
The one who you really just are.

February 2024

About This Poem

I don't know what precipitated the writing of this poem, but I like how it presents someone's (mine?) quest for identity. As we age we grow more comfortable in our own skin, accepting that there isn't time to be someone new. Yet we still might not completely know who we are. Self-discovery isn't just a thing of teenagere and young people. While that may be frightening in some ways, for the most part it is, I think, just comforting. My poetry is where I often make self discoveries and this one fully admits that. The photo is a selfie at Niagara Falls, New York. Me out of my element, yet still me. We are who we are, no matter where we are.

 

Wednesday, July 2, 2025

Poem: Dare to Provide


Dare to Provide

When one assumes the position of artist
One must expect the critics to arrive
And notice every stroke and color
Suggesting a hue is improper or
A stroke too broad. They have their preconceived
Notions of what this should be or what that 
Should say to society but you have,
Dear artist, a mind of your own that wants
To say what you’ve said and they should leave it
Alone. Yet, just that they’ve noticed and said
Anything means that your work has been seen.
This, alone, should give you pride that your work
Has fully arrived. Not many will feel
Just what you feel and they might just feel it
And not like it at all so they warn those
Who would feel, not as you but, as they do.
Nor, perhaps, would you want them to, but to
See what you feel, what you project, feelings
Through art weren’t made to protect. Just take pride
That critics will see and present your work
To society who will, in their turn,
Take time to decide the value of what
You feel inside and dare to provide.

February 2024

About This Poem
I don't remember what inspired this poem, but it expresses what I feel about one's own art be it writing, painting, or gardening. That does not mean I don't believe in a good edit, or respected opinion. I just know I've watched many a great movie that was highly criticized in a negative fashion and I couldn't agree less. So, sometimes the artist has to make the final decision on the artwork's release. I chose this picture because I thought something more abstract would best serve the purpose of this poem.
 

Monday, June 30, 2025

Poem: Palm Springs


Palm Springs

They came here some time ago to
Get away from all their fame and
On every street left their names.
They built their homes in the sand,
Mid-Century Modern, the style
Covering up the purple of 
Verbena and bringing here the 
Crowds who now peep through their homes’ gates
Hoping to spy a small castle
And probably surprised at the 
Modesty of flat roofs by pools
In which they’d swim during summer’s
Great heat, yet nothing like the flames
From strangers projecting upon
Them things that could not be true.
I wandered here one spring seeing
Homes of pianists with swimming
Pools shaped like those instruments they’d
Played, or little mail boxes there
Looking like a baby grand and
Thought it somehow strange that they would
Choose to live near farms of date palms
And sand blowing into great dunes
Settling into the bottoms of
Their beautiful blue swimming pools.
But we all have our little quirks
And now those people with their names
On that city’s every lane
Are, I pray, resting in peace from
Things that haunt us all while living.

April 2023

About This Poem

I don't really think this one needs much explanation. The photo is of the house of someone famous (which one I now forget) in Palm Springs.
 

Monday, June 16, 2025

Poem: On Writing Poetry in the Morning


On Writing Poetry in the Morning

I read some poems every day
Hoping for inspiration on what to say,
But sometimes the words just don’t come;
Nothing I say makes sense to anyone.

Emotions may have boiled in the evening
Yet I had no time to write anything.
I read a book before going to bed
To help erase all thoughts within my head.

So here I am in the arms of Aurora
Seeking words hidden beneath my fedora.
But they were stolen by Mr. Sandman
And I’m left with only coffee in hand.

May 2023

About This Poem:

I write poetry every morning when I journal, but sometimes it's just hard. I often rely on what I have read in the morning, or photos on my phone. But sometimes those are little to no help. This poem was written at one of those times. The photograph is from an afternoon walk just west of Potlatch, so you can see bits of town, the trees, and Gold Hill in the background with the sun tinting the clouds. If you don't live here you might think it is a morning shot...

 

Monday, June 9, 2025

Poem: Rejoicing is Satisfaction

 



Rejoicing is Satisfaction

The morning hour now slips away
And I am left wondering what
It is that keeps going here
As my life’s work has found its close—
But was employment really work
Enough to give meaning to life?
Alas, no. What would retirement
Be if work were done? Is the glass
Half empty or half full? That is
The question of one’s satisfaction.
But my cup runs over and so
My abundant life must be shared
In belief, in joy, in living.
What a gift is here that we’ve been 
Given, so how is there despair?
Some days there is sunshine and joy
While others hold rain and its gray
But always remember that that
Is just the sign of the cups flowing
Over, for we have everything
We need. So learn to be content
In all things you have been given.

April 2023

About This Poem
Sometimes, in retirement, I have had to refind my purpose. After having taught for so many years, starting at such a young age, I really had to work to reset myself. Now I tend to fill my time with all the same sorts of things I did while working but from a political standpoint. I'm now more of a cheerleader for libraries, schools, and, to a lesser extent, writers and runners. But I also have my family and that gives purpose to anyone. So this is about being content and finding happiness in that, wherever you're at in life's many stages.

Monday, June 2, 2025

Poem: Red Winged Blackbird


Red Winged Blackbird

It is you, red winged blackbird, trilling
The return of spring as each day longer
Grows and slowly diminishes melting
Snow. You appear in the cattails in the
Marshy creeks or the hawthorn in the gulch.
Snow banks are piled everywhere and 
Yet you sing in the frost of the morning
Not even letting the rain hush your song.
Funny, how I should go plodding along
For all this time oblivious to your
Song that gives hope. So like many others 
I forget to even hear that you have
Returned. So engrossed we are in our dark
Moods of mud and slush and gray, frozen we
Are to the songs o spring and your return
As you blend subtly into all the gloom
Like the raven cawing daily for us
Missing all the bright red tipping the black
And those short trills as the snow melt now fills
The river. You bring the cooing soon of doves
That awaken me in the morning’s cool
And cause me more complaining. Oh fool
I am not to notice you, your friends
And the miracles of life that on us
Descends daily, even in the dull times.
Ravens’ caws, doves’ coos, redwing blackbirds’ trills,
Intricate snowflakes flooding streams, sun, moon,
My cup runs over every day, yet
I think it only half full. Sing on red
Winged blackbird! Life abundant is your song.

April 2023

About This Poem

This poem is about forgetting to be grateful for what we have. I love the sound of the Red Winged Blackbird, but sometimes it just gets forgotten in the shoveling of snow or drear of early spring. That's what happens with so much of our lives: we forget to be grateful for what we have. That Red Winged Blackbird is a subtle reminder to me to be grateful. Life is so much better when you have gratitude. I'm afraid I stole the picture from the internet because I couldn't find any in my own collection.

 

Friday, May 30, 2025

Poem: Let Your Flowers Show

Let Your Flowers Show

Upon these pages strange tales I tell
Of one returning to the north from sun
Endlessly burning the earth to only sand
There in the heat I did sojourn at rest
From the relentless northern snows only
To climb those southern hills to find more snow.
Caught in a quandary of homesickness there
I climbed from the low desert heat to the 
Hills covered in snow and rested in sun
On snowbanks cold. It was there that I found 
A restlessness in my soul so that I
Could not shake wanting to be somewhere else
No matter where I roamed. There cactus grows
Slowly, contemplating rain, satisfied
With only a few drops now and then to 
Quench their thirst and they give thanks with flowers
Maybe once ev’ry other year, toiling
Slowly in desert sun, thankful for
Drops that seldom come from the sky above.
And me? I travel far and wide looking
Always for more, be it water, sun or
Storm. So there on high mountain top in snow
I came to know that while I still may roam
It’s not where I go or where I have been
But what is within that I do know.
For even in desert I can find snow,
And in forests of rain I can be dry
But it’s peace that’s within that will make me
Grow with weathering time and people dear
To me that I can let my flowers show.

April 2023

About This Poem
I was looking at pictures from a trip to Palm Springs and combining thoughts of restlessness with the knowledge that I just need to be content wherever I am. Typically I am content, but sometimes we all get a little stir crazy and need to be reminded to stay grateful and content. That's probably where this came from, but I don't fully remember what caused me to write this particular sentiment. The photo is a blooming cactus from that Palm Springs trip.