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Tatiana Dec 2023
I'm counting roses and the sun's rays
and the leaves on trees that love to sway.
The rings on the stump that have worn away
I'm counting the very days.

I think of lilacs and TV screens
and all the movies from the nineties.
A bug's life turns into an adventurer's dream
Puddles become lakes,
leaves become rafts that the storm drain takes.

Hunting for clovers with four leaves,
Videographer of childhood memories,
Trips to the diner and gumball machines
How lucky to have known the Kodak queen.

Maker of cards and lover of art
no matter the inexperience of the artist.
I never found a clover with four leaves,
but I know I'm so lucky

Dancing, swimming, and jumping on beds.
Dressing up like a princess.
Light of our lives is what you said to me.
You're the brightest star in my memories.

Is it easier in the morning
to talk of days of endless play?
Is it easier after mourning?
I guess it's never the same.
Is it easier in the morning
when the dawn breaks?
Is it easier after mourning
to see that nothing forever stays?

No it ain't.
*Tatiana

My grandma passed away in September. On her birthday. She was 93 years old. This poem is just a glimpse of the memories we shared and that though I knew one day she would pass, I still wasn't expecting it to happen so soon and so quickly.
She was so aware up until the very end. So clear-headed and sharp.
Kitt Sep 2023
Somewhere in town,
a dog licks at the hand of a child.
a man with no shirt plays hacky-sack alone
The stalwart city has come crashing to her knees,
and so against his own he kicks the bag
again and again
as if he could raise the razed ground
with the power of a child's game.

I CRIED
YES I CRIED
and
LOVE TRIUMPHS OVER HATE
and
UNITE.

By a fountain on the curb
men with long hair and guitars sing together,
only strangers before today.
a woman who saw someone
gasping in vain for smokeless breath
inhales deeply from a cigarette.
A saxophone sings out sweet and low,
his melancholy tune sung
for everyone who can only hear
the screams, long gone silent save for in memory,
where they pierce as loud as sirens.

a boy walks to the movies with his mom
and asks her what the sign says.
she reads to him:

“TODAY IS
"A DAY AT THE MOVIES"
ALL MOVIES WILL BE FREE
TODAY.
STOP BY THE
CONCESSION STAND FOR A
COURTESY CUP OF SODA &
POPCORN”

and, baffled, he cannot understand why
a free movie
and a sugary drink
and a tub of popcorn
brings his seamless mother to tears.
9/12/2023

https://youtu.be/g96ccjVGULM?si=m5V7ag8QQw6M4paj
Francie Lynch Jun 2023
One hundred years ago
My Mammy was just three,
The exact same age as me,
When she sailed us across the sea,
All those years ago.

Just lately,  just now,
I said Mammy's Mammy's name out loud.
What was that, I asked.
For sure her name's not been said
For many, many years.
Margaret Duffy
A dog barked.
So I said my mother's:
Mammy
A breeze furled the window sheers.

The dog continued to yelp,
So I said her other names louder:
Brigid...........Nellie

I will keep the wind inside me,
And allow the dogs their day;
Your names will still be called upon,
In stress or tranquility.
The Irish have called their mother "Mammy" since forever.
Nat Lipstadt Apr 2023
Family biz takes us on the Acela train to Washington, D.C.,
a many-hour tour of the Monuments upon the Mall inclus,
never on a prior agenda, despite semi-frequent visitations,
but this time, rose early, in the cool morning, to touch and be touched

She asks if we have time enough for the Vietnam War Memorial,
time enough plentiful, no inkling her purpose was manifold, nay,
woman-fold, relating a story of a first teen boyfriend, they vowed,
to never lose touch, tho they became geographically distanced

On New Year’s day, a promise to each other, to speak on the phone,
they do honor this commitment, he will call, for in your early years,
solemn promises, honor, memories potentialities, galvanize bonds;
first love’s easy camaraderie birth tender promises, kept well-tended!

Till one year, no call comes, and desire, necessitates her to be
the protagonist, only to learn that Gerald, drafted in ‘68,
did not return, his parents inform her, the story told wistfully,
a Ranger locates his name, her reflection strains to reach his letters

Only I see her eyes filling and brimming, the shoulders ever
so slightly sagging and know this moment needs memorializing,
for we shed tears so rarely, that this youthful relationship, now more than threescore extant is why we built this black granite wall


Visit the Jefferson, MLK, Washington’s obelisk, and of course
the author of “of the people, by the people, for the people,”
a humble visage, humanizes his grandiose, white robed presence,
assessing his potential measure of life assassin-shortened, we exclaim

”if only, what might have been!”

but no tears are shed, but for a name of a young man,
taken before his prime, who enabled a girl to taste deep own-self, at an age we barely ken the words revealing our true emotive, or understand the color palette of serious, meanings of how we tick…

she’s easy overcome, I wonder, was she inside feeling, exclaiming,
”if only, what might have been,”
but no words emitted, only tears, that a tissue so softly takes away,
I think who among us, yet sheds sad tears for the days of our youth?

this poem in fufillment of my obligations, witness, memorializer,
arm to be leaned on, carrier of Kleenex, compatriot tear-shedder,
empathetic, sympathetic and recording secretary
that our past, is never truly past,

it is just waiting for a reflection,
resurfacing one more time
on a high polished black
granite slab

<postscript>

black granite mirrors sandblasted refresh cut scars into our consciousness and for some, our conscience, as one who
rarely thinks of and forgets to reflect on the life lottery he won,
back in 1968, so he was not called to serve, exclaiming

”if only, what might have been!
In Memoriam
Gerald Levy
Mayah Seals Dec 2022
Small pebbles crash through ashen skies,
So intricate and divine.
They pitter patter the pane.
Window pane;
Inner pain.
Cracked and spidering;
The sensation remains the same.

Snapping crisp twigs like heartstrings.
Plucking the chords on this beating violin,
A somber sound barrels around  cathedral ceilings,
Dripping melodies in pools at the edges of cold lips.

Victorian grace with hippie peace.
What a hollow sound without the clash of chaos you bring.
Oil and water, emulsified.
Fire and ice, married.
Beautiful chaos, skyward bound.
Earth to ash, burried.
To Sue: much more than Grammy; my teacher, monk, guru, my DaVinci. I will treasure the gift of simply being known by you
Patrick Warner Mar 2022
I'm on my way to luncheon.
It's only down the hall.
But at journeys end the shortest way
Seems the longest road of all.

It's most peculiar.  These old walls
Were decorated plain.
But the fog dissolves to a distant shore,
As an Emerald Calls my name.

I've journeyed through the decades
Where I've heard the Church bells peel,
From the beachhead of June '44
To The factory gates in Theale.

I grew a garden proud and fair,
With a weeping willow tree.
Where my family played in its summer shade,
It still remembers me.

My trips to Ross have long since stopped,
But the earth salutes them still;
With the ghost of a car, on the shortcut
Down the side of Birdlip Hill.

My travelling days are now long gone,
But my family still recall,
That a ship came back from Guernsey
With contraband alcohol

I don't know how they'll judge me,
When my final furlong's run
But an echoing stranger’s voice talks
Of a gentle Gentleman.

I was a handsome charmer, now
I've supped time's cruel pill.
But that glint in my eye, as you pass me by
Is shining from me still.

I learned it from my father,
Snooker was my game
Now friends have all gone home
I’m tired; I've played my final frame.

I'm on my way to luncheon.
A familiar smell wafts by,
The scent of overcooked
Roast beef, the tang of apple pie.

I'm on my way to luncheon,
I drop my frame and fall.
I hear the siren whisper
Of a distant dancer's call.

I'll leave you all in peace now,
But I don't want any tears,
And I don't want any fuss now,
When you toast my passing years.
In Memory of Ben William Warner who would have been 100 on the day of posting
Carlo C Gomez Dec 2021
~
A no-man's land,
ablaze in scarlet

A no-man's land,
the blood and the bones of men

The more who died,
the more they thrived

A no-man's land,
flowered along the banks
from which the dead drank,
to forget their former existence,
when they were singing
in the lulls

A no-man's land,
offering a touch
of Heaven in Hell

~
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