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  Aug 2018 Scarlet McCall
Paul Hansford
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This lived-in face has seen the years go by
at such a wild and unforgiving pace.
My powers are weak, though my aims may be high,
and troubles are all bound to leave their trace.


And while I always feel the need to brace
myself against life's storms, I know that I
can never win. Death always plays his ace.
This lived-in face has seen the years go by.

It's little help to know the rules apply
to every member of the human race.
Dark clouds are growing in my evening sky
at such a wild and unforgiving pace.

In this vast universe I have my place,
but can my thoughts outlast me when I die?
or speak to those in other time or space?
My powers are weak, though my aims may be high.

Yet while dark thoughts of gloom may multiply,
to let them win would be a sad disgrace,
though many things may make me want to cry,
and troubles are all bound to leave their trace.

Yes, my mortality I must embrace,
not waste my time in always asking why,
or fearing not to do things just in case."
I'll dry those tears. There's no point to deny
this lived-in face.
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If you looked up the rules for this form, you wouldn't find them telling you to repeat the first half-line in a way that rhymes with anything, but since my first one, where it came out that way by accident, I do them like this, and it's only a little more difficult.
It is dangerous for a poet who is lyrically inclined
To even think a word like orange should be included in a rhyme.
Although it’s fruit is succulent and it’s juice is sweet,
The word is something of a loner, one whose
Rhyme you’ll never meet.
It is borrowed from the Sanskrit whose lands gave us the fruit  
Any cunning linguist will confirm I speak the truth.
Orange  from the Sanskrit word  Naranga.
  Aug 2018 Scarlet McCall
Misty Meadows
This plan right here is foolproof.
Ima kick back under a cool roof,
With my eyes closed and my
Blunt packed.
So there's no room
For my family to talk smack.
And I'm a real friend,
But I'm lonely.
I gotta let this warm food
Hold me.

Because who else will?
That's a good question.
All my trauma has taught me
Lessons.
And the best one
That I've learned yet,
Is there's no freedom
If you ain't hurt yet.

And maybe I'm a little
Biased.
But you'd be too,
If right behind your eyelids,
Were eyes that
Seen such violence--
That you begged to become quite
Blinded.

Because this ****'s real,
But your dreams ain't.
Eat your meals three times
On a green plate.
It reminds you
To be a cheapskate.
You need full pockets
To dine on lean steak.

I done told them,
And I done warned you,
That all of America is scorned too.
The politicians and the
Potheads.
Your family tree looks more
Like a cobweb.

Your addiction is the way
You numb pain.
Your ***, your drugs, your
Slot games.
You hate it, but you hate this
Life more.
You pray? Do you pray to the
Right Lord?

Do you force yourself,
Just like me?
Don't feel bad. Inside we're
All just dying.
If you know, you know
By all accounts he’s had a lifelong case of OCD.
“Donald was a disruptive tyke”- his teachers all agree.
He was not much of a scholar but, as a youth, excelled in sports.
As a builder and developer he was often seen in  Courts.

When it comes to matters of the heart, he sadly is no wiser
He loves them and he leaves them. He’s a noted womanizer.
Oh, he pays them for their trouble; that much I will allow.
Still he’s never had compunction over breaking wedding vows.

Now he is our President and making noise on Trade.
If he doesn’t get his way beware his twitterverse tirade.
He's paying  farmers Billions  to forgo their tillage.


Hillary was wrong- It takes a child to raze a village.
From a clever bon mot from my Facebook amigo Maryann Kelly
Will you meet me at the river,
where the waters lap the sand?
We can find a place to sit, since,
I'll be far too tired to stand.

You made it there before I did,
so many long years ago.
Along my way I lost the path,
without you here, the way to show.

I wandered, lost, once you were gone,
somewhere amidst hurt and denial.
Before I realized I was lost,
I'd been that way for quite a while.

I've tried to find that old, green path,
but signs of it are out of sight-
as if the daylight never shone,
and you carried the only light.

But I know where the river runs,
and I will get there, by and by-
if I must carve my own, new path,
I know I can, if I but try.

So find a little shady spot,
where we can sit and pass the time.
We'll catch up on the days we lost,
and laugh at life's unending rhyme.

Until the specters fade from sight,
we'll count no moment there a loss.
Then hold my hand, as I descend
to Judgment's waters, there to cross.
Scarlet McCall May 2018
I am lost in the forest;
show me the path.
I’m exposed on the mountain;
take me from the storm’s wrath.
I’m on the side of the road--
don’t let bad guys stop.
I’m a prisoner at home,
waiting for you to get a cop.
The whirlwind surrounds me;
be my eye in the storm.
Take me out of the blizzard
to your home safe and warm.
Children adopted by the wrong people, and so many others who need help.
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