Carla Marie: Favorites

May 2013 Carla Marie

Nikki Giovanni

I'm not lonely
sleeping all alone
you think i'm scared
but i'm a big girl
i don't cry or anything

I have a great
big bed to roll around
in and lots of space
and i don't dream
bad dreams like i used
to have that you
were leaving me
anymore

Now that you're gone
i don't dream
and no matter
what you think
i'm not lonely
sleeping
all alone

May 2013 Carla Marie

Poetry

May 2013 Carla Marie

Nikki Giovanni

Poetry

poetry is motion graceful
as a fawn
gentle as a teardrop
strong like the eye
finding peace in a crowded room
we poets tend to think
our words are golden
though emotion speaks too
loudly to be defined
by silence
sometimes after midnight or just before
the dawn
we sit typewriter in hand
pulling loneliness around us
forgetting our lovers or children
who are sleeping
ignoring the weary wariness
of our own logic
to compose a poem
no one understands it
it never says "love me" for poets are
beyond love
it never says "accept me" for poems seek not
acceptance but controversy
it only says "i am" and therefore
i concede that you are too

a poem is pure energy
horizontally contained
between the mind
of the poet and the ear of the reader
if it does not sing discard the ear
for poetry is song
if it does not delight discard
the heart for poetry is joy
if it does not inform then close
off the brain for it is dead
if it cannot heed the insistent message
that life is precious

which is all we poets
wrapped in our loneliness
are trying to say

May 2013 Carla Marie

Walking Down Park

May 2013 Carla Marie

Nikki Giovanni

Walking Down Park

walking down park
amsterdam
or columbus do you ever stop
to think what it looked like
before it was an avenue
did you ever stop to think
what you walked
before you rode
subways to the stock
exchange (we can’t be on
the stock exchange
we are the stock
exchanged)

did you ever maybe wonder
what grass was like before
they rolled it
into a ball and called
it central park
where syphilitic dogs
and their two-legged tubercular
masters fertilize
the corners and side-walks
ever want to know what would happen
if your life could be fertilized
by a love thought
from a loved one
who loves you

ever look south
on a clear day and not see
time’s squares but see
tall Birch trees with sycamores
touching hands
and see gazelles running playfully
after the lions
ever hear the antelope bark
from the third floor apartment

ever, did you ever, sit down
and wonder about what freedom’s freedom
would bring
it’s so easy to be free
you start by loving yourself
then those who look like you
all else will come
naturally

ever wonder why
so much asphalt was laid
in so little space
probably so we would forget
the Iroquois, Algonquin
and Mohicans who could caress
the earth

ever think what Harlem would be
like if our herbs and roots and elephant ears
grew sending
a cacophony of sound to us
the parrot parroting black is beautiful black is beautiful
owls sending out whooooo’s making love ...
and me and you just sitting in the sun trying
to find a way to get a banana tree from one of the monkeys
koala bears in the trees laughing at our listlessness

ever think its possible
for us to be
happy

Nikki Giovanni, “Walking Down Park” from The Selected Poems of Nikki Giovanni. Copyright © 1996 by Nikki Giovanni.

May 2013 Carla Marie

Must Get to Rome

May 2013 Carla Marie

Folorunsho Obalugemo

Must Get to Rome

In some destiny vessel sails.
Bound on a mission success to see:--
Ignore prejudice and travesty
Of critics' judgments, whether it fails
Or nay. Though my ship should wreck,
Let not my faith in Christ roam
Aimlessly on the high sea of tempestuous
Life; for I, like Paul, must get to Rome.

May 2013 Carla Marie

I know why the caged bird sings

May 2013 Carla Marie

Maya Angelou

I know why the caged bird sings

A free bird leaps on the back
Of the wind and floats downstream
Till the current ends and dips his wing
In the orange suns rays
And dares to claim the sky.

But a BIRD that stalks down his narrow cage
Can seldom see through his bars of rage
His wings are clipped and his feet are tied
So he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with a fearful trill
Of things unknown but longed for still
And his tune is heard on the distant hill for
The caged bird sings of freedom.

The free bird thinks of another breeze
And the trade winds soft through
The sighing trees
And the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright
Lawn and he names the sky his own.

But a caged BIRD stands on the grave of dreams
His shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
His wings are clipped and his feet are tied
So he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings with
A fearful trill of things unknown
But longed for still and his
Tune is heard on the distant hill
For the caged bird sings of freedom.

May 2013 Carla Marie

i am well again, trust me on this

May 2013 Carla Marie

raðljóst

i am well again, trust me on this

why is it that
when i am finally
good
and honest
and earnest
and ambitious
and happy
the people begin
to worry?

Mother, I am trying to be the perfect daughter you so dearly deserve.
Honest.
No tricks whatsoever. I want to clean the kitchen because when it is nice and tidy I feel good for what I have accomplished. I want to put flowers in the windowsill and by where you do your puzzles because I know you wish you could spend the whole day outside with them. I want to organize the books on gardening on your shelves because one day I want to read them and I know I should do something nice with them if I am going to have that pleasure. I want to **** the garden outside because I want to be able to grow plants for our family and I want to grow the plants because I know we will all enjoy eating them. I want to clean my room a little late into the night because it helps me think and I feel content when I see that my floor is not dusty and my plants are healthy and my clothes are hung up in a row. I want to pick up after Aiden in the recreation room because I know how it feels to be young and in a hurry to do anything but chores. I want to stack up the DVDs in the cabinet because they look appealing that way and I hope our family gets together to watch some of the older films we used to love. I want to detangled all the cords by the computer because I know it´s frustrating when you're trying to figure out which is which and why–doesn't–this–one–work? I want to put all the scrap papers into the recycling because I know you gave up on getting people to reuse them and they'll be ashes if I don't lift a finger.

I want to do these things because they benefit everyone.
I want to be the kind of person that helps a family,
The kind that helps a community,
The kind that helps the world.
And it starts here in the home.

I love you.

May 2013 Carla Marie

Thank You

May 2013 Carla Marie

The Anonymous Joker

Thank You

A tired looking lady
With eyebags
Crumpled, wrinkled clothes
That are too big for her
Disguise whatever
Little curves remain
Her eyes
Dull
Black

She is drenched
Striding inside
Without a care
Like she belongs
In her shabby, shabby clothes
With her hair
A complete mess

She is soaked through and through
The thunder roars again
Muted due to the glass and steel walls
She walks in
A tiny spark
A flash of something
In her dull, dull eyes

People gossip
About perhaps an affair
A failed marriage
A mental breakdown
For one of those reasons
Maybe all of them

Generally, she comes
In the subway
Very particular
About umbrellas too
Today, she carries none
Little Miss Particular

She walks into
The manager's office
A letter neatly typed out
Black and white
Shielded by her brown
Worn coat
Three sizes too big

She has been working
For seven years at the firm
She puts it on the table
Says a polite, 'Thank you,
But I cannot do this anymore.'

And, she is out
Onto the streets
Her eyes
Still dull
A lady with crazy hair
The rain pelts down
As she disappears
Into the fog

I hope she found
What she was looking for