"longfellow" poems
the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls
are unbeautiful and have comfortable minds
(also,with the church’s protestant blessings
daughters,unscented shapeless spirited)
they believe in Christ and Longfellow,both dead,
are invariably interested in so many things—
at the present writing one still finds
delighted fingers knitting for the is it Poles?
perhaps. While permanent faces coyly bandy
scandal of Mrs. N and Professor D
….the Cambridge ladies do not care, above
Cambridge if sometimes in its box of
sky lavender and cornerless,the
moon rattles like a fragment of angry candy
7.8k
~
June 2023
HP Poet: Patty Mager
Country: USA
Question 1: Welcome to the HP Spotlight, Patty. Please tell us about your background?
Patty M: "I was born an only child in a 3 generation household. I loved books, and playing imaginary games, and chasing my mom with really long nightcrawlers, my Grandpa raised in a washtub. I was a banker, and a financial banker for many years. I quit to do hospice for my Dad when he was to go into hospice. My husband had heart problems and my little Mom eventually got Cancer. So I nursed and loved them all. My Dad for a year, the others over an 8-year period. I saw the transition of each and the way each handled their ending, and I was there for them all. I consider that a special blessing."
Question 2: How long have you been writing poetry, and for how long have you been a member of Hello Poetry?
Patty M: "I always wrote, but I found a poetry site 20 years ago, and began to write seriously. I've been published in many anthologies both in the US and abroad. I was nominated for the coveted Pushcart Prize twice and I once had a three-page spread in our local newspaper. I came to HP in 2014 and I love this special place with amazingly wonderful poets who have become really great friends."
Question 3: What inspires you? (In other words, how does poetry happen for you).
Patty M: "Sometimes poems seem to write themselves, almost like automatic writing."
Question 4: What does poetry mean to you?
Patty M: "Poetry is spiritual, and a lifesaving rope that carries me through both good and the horrible times of my life."
Question 5: Who are your favorite poets?
Patty M: "My favorite Poets are: Sylvia Plath, Neruda, Billy Collins, Maya Angelou, Poe, Ginsberg, Anne Sexton, and Longfellow."
Question 6: What other interests do you have?
Patty M: "I love to cook, do crossword puzzles, read, and play card games like canasta, and spider solitaire. Being with family is my heaven."
Carlo C. Gomez: “Thank you so much for allowing me to interview you, dear Patty! I learned a great deal about you!”
Patty M: "Thank again Carlo. Thanks so much for all your help and kindness."
Thank you everyone here at HP for taking the time to read this. We hope you enjoyed getting to know Patty a little bit better. I indeed did. It is our wish that these spotlights are helping everyone to further discover and appreciate their fellow poets. – Carlo C. Gomez (aka Mr. Timetable)
We will post Spotlight #5 in July!
~
Jun 1, 2023
Jun 1, 2023 at 5:56 PM UTC
At the door on summer evenings
Sat the little Hiawatha;
Heard the whispering pine-trees,
Heard the lapping of the water,
Sounds of music, words of wonder;
"Minne-wawa!" said the pine-trees,
"Mudway-aushka!" said the water.
Saw the fire fly, Wah-wah-taysee,
Flitting through the dusk of evening,
With the twinkle of its candle
Lighting up the brakes and bushes,
And he sang the song of children,
Sang the song Nokomis taught him:
"Wah-wah-taysee, little firefly,
Little, flitting, white-fire insect,
Little, dancing, white-fire creature,
Light me with your little candle,
Ere upon my bed I lay me,
Ere in sleep I close my eyelids!"
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Mar 30, 2013
Mar 30, 2013 at 10:55 PM UTC
Read Shakespeare and Milton and all of the rest
Keats, Coleridge and Wordsworth are some of the best
Read Ted Hughes and Sylvia, Motion, Duffy
They say what I want to say better than me
Read Homer and Ovid, Basho and Su Shi
Chaucer and Boccaccio they've stood the test
Read Donne, Spenser, Marlowe, Jonson and Raleigh
Read Shakespeare and Milton and all of the rest
Read Swift, Pope, Blake, Tennyson, and Rossetti
The two Barrett Brownings are of interest
For feelings romantic as true as can be
Keats, Coleridge and Wordsworth are some of the best
Read Larkin and Betjeman if you're depressed
Read Wendy Cope to enjoy all of life's zest
Yes please don't think I despise modernity
Read Ted Hughes and Sylvia, Motion, Duffy
And how about all those I haven't addressed
Yeats, Auden, Joyce, Longfellow, Poe and Shelley
And all of the others I'm bound to have missed
They say what I want to say better than me
But what of the poet, with poets obessed?
In prose I am prolix, in speech stuttery:
So where will you find my emotions expressed?
On MySpace, on Twitter, read my poetry
It says what I want to say
Oct 7, 2009
Oct 7, 2009 at 11:12 AM UTC
*Sonnet is love
sonnet is rhyme'
metaphorical pattern dove
so much sublime....
Popular with poets new
the Elizabethans too
their mistresses so few
used it to woo.....
John Donne, his life
catching the spirit of the Jacobean age
his need to express his love for his wife,
Anne, backstage......
Expression of religious passion
and simply reflections of death
The Victorians fashion
and so many more breath.....
Elizabeth Barrett Browning,
the Rossettis, so blue
and George Meredith were around
were so new.....
American poets noted
Longfellow, expounded
E. A. Robinson, devoted
Elinor Wylie, and Edna St. Vincent Millay, astounded....
Sonnets make us sing
makes us laugh
cry with saving grace brings
universal themes of love mon behalf.....
Keep writing those sonnets
all you wonderful and many more
poets, keep wearing your bonnets
that we all adore...*
Debbie
Jun 18, 2015
Jun 18, 2015 at 1:26 PM UTC
*"Though the mills
Of God grind slowly;
Yet they grind exceeding small;
Though with patience
He stands waiting,
With exactness grinds He all."
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow*.
The Mill
The grueling weight
of happenstance,
A millstone for to grind,
It deflates the ego
And shows us
Where we're blind,
It renders flesh a ruin
Obliterates the mind,
We leave our idols desolate
Leave the ties that bind.
Under painful hardship
We release the very things
Which put us in the circumstance
And caused the suffering
We leave behind our craving
For wealth and diamond rings
Everything exalted
All exalted above God...
That means EVERYTHING
Whatever you adore
On this temporal earth
Whatever gives you pleasure
In which you find worth
These very things will shackle you!
You'll find out they're not free.
They are just the Golden Calf
Of base idolatry.
But the millstone slowly purges
Turning hour by hour
Turning the wheat kernels
Into useful flour.
And so I am refined
As I surely must
Put to naught my flesh
Make powder all my lusts
For I am as ashes
for I am as dust.
SS (C) 8/23/2017
Aug 24, 2017
Aug 24, 2017 at 1:43 AM UTC
I taught her how to handle a
Pellet gun tonight.
Now her eye is black from the
Scope, her fake fingernails chipped
From loading,
And the pine tree nearly stripped from
Cones outside my
Livingroom window, where our
Jägermeister
Cups made little rings on my
Brother's Longfellow hardback
Copy.
The night sky is bright blue this
Time of year in Norway.
Sun never really sets.
I looked up at the brightests spots
Beyond the moon, as she took aim
And fired with a subtle
Psstkh.
"So close," she whispered at the
Unwounded summer evening,
And I smelled her lavender hair
And all the warm outsides
As I thought of satellites and
Discoveries, and how moments
Such as this one would
Always matter
More.
Jul 17, 2015
Jul 17, 2015 at 5:52 PM UTC
The poet in me
Can disappear
I’m a combo short
Without his ear
A pretender’s left
And here comes panic
Without my Muse
I get quite frantic
And chaos crowds
The remaining source
Where I’m a knight
Without a horse
A wordsmith here
Unqualified
To pick my brain
Just pushed aside
Robotic words
Will cross my page
The day grows dark
On life’s old stage
Longfellow looks down
Laughter booming
At the tripe I write
So non consuming
My ego falls
My pride goes limp
And one hung low
Is no Chinese ****
So I send prayers
From my antenna
To reach my Muse
My lost breadwinner
How could one think
Him but a myth
I lost my flow
I lost my pith
Oh here he comes
With lines exact
I'm me again
My Muse is back
Jan 5, 2011
Jan 5, 2011 at 2:49 PM UTC
On the box of Midwest Butter,
in the verdant dairy pastures,
sat the smiling Indian maiden,
daughter of her tribe, the maiden.
Holding forth a golden offering;
from the box her yellow treasure
for the yet unbuttered buyer.
Gently her sweet knees protruded
from her humble beaded buckskin,
from her beaded buckskin garment
each supported by a letter;
full twin globes upon an altar.
As mammalians, when they’re nursing
seek the rounded gifts of nature
while their hands, abreast and lifted
grasping, find the source of plenty,
swallow fast that milky manna
swallow down that flowing liquid
with a smile upon their features,
so my soul rejoiced to meet her
in the grasslands of a daydream
in the pastures of my daydream,
holding forth divine recurrence:
gift within a gift forever
churning, and imploding inwards
infinite, receding backwards
into endless Indian maidens
spreading myth upon my table
on my toast upon my table
till her tribe returns in glory…
(etc, etc... with apologies to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)
Sep 10, 2015
Sep 10, 2015 at 9:32 PM UTC
Sonnet is love
sonnet is rhyme'
metaphorical pattern
so much sublime
Popular with poets
the Elizabethans too
used it to woo
their mistresses so few
John Donne,
catching the spirit of the Jacobean age
his need to express his love for his wife,
Anne
Expression of religious passion
and simply reflections of death
The Victorians
and so many more
Elizabeth Barrett Browning,
the Rossettis,
and George Meredith
were so new
American poets noted
Longfellow,
E. A. Robinson,
Elinor Wylie, and Edna St. Vincent Millay.
Sonnets make us sing
makes us laugh
cry with saving grace
universal themes of love ....
Keep writing those sonnets
all you wonderful
poets
that we all adore...
As Rupal says,
Wordsworth too..
Debbie Brooks- 2014
Sep 29, 2014
Sep 29, 2014 at 1:12 AM UTC
(Morning Poetry with Lola)
Wednesday started with a cold, cold morning.
i wrapped myself with a thick blanket,
hid my "popsicle toes,".....seeking warmth
from recollections that played in my mind
like pleasant, joyful summer, music.
when my kids were toddlers,
i started them off with, "all things bright and
beautiful, all creatures great and small..."
but, as they grew a little older, my mother,
she woke them up each morning with,
"o captain, my captain,
our fearful trip is done..."
and then, tomorrow, we would hear,
" i shot an arrow into the air
it fell to earth...i knew not where,"
the next morning, my mother's feature could be,
"of course, i love my country,
the land in which i live,"
some days we would hear reruns....but,
the week would never be complete, without
her most favored one....which, she delivered
with a valiant voice, while pounding her chest:
"...i am the master of my fate;
i am the captain of my soul!"
my kids rubbed-open their eyes in awe,
as they listened to their lola..'til they were done
with their morning rituals.
their lola kept a copy of longfellow's evangeline
but she didn't live long enough
to share it with her five great-granddaughters.
God knows...my late mother knows, i did my part,
to open the eyes...and minds of these girls,
to waken THAT awareness in them, that would
make them see, and feel...the beauty of poetry.
not everyone realizes the importance,
the necessity.....of poetry,
that life itself...........is poetry,
that, when you're a poet,
and when you're deep into it,
........you cannot just let go
for, it clings to your heart and soul,
it is like,
your second skin
...................
it's a hard habit
to break.
..................
............
the older girls read poetry...and mythology, as well,
a mix of classic and contemporary,
......but they and i, have added thoreau,
dylan thomas, teasedale, and many more
names to their lola's most favored
longfellow, henney, and whitman.
.................
.......
Sally
Copyright December 7, 2017
rrab
Dec 14, 2017
Dec 14, 2017 at 9:37 AM UTC
Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things things are not what they seem.
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.
In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act, - act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o'erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time; -
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
My favorite poem
Jan 1, 2015
Jan 1, 2015 at 12:23 AM UTC
121 to 140 of 3251 Poets
«5678»Viewsshow detailshide detailsSort by
Michael Fried
There are no poems by this poet on our website.
Julia de Burgos
There are no poems by this poet on our website.
Keith Waldrop (b. 1932)
Shipwreck in Haven, Part Four
“Majesty”
Susan Hahn
Anthem
Alice Lyons
Developers
The Boom and After the Boom
Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer
Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking
Kazim Ali (b. 1971)
Ramadan
Speech
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882)
Aftermath
Hymn to the Night
Sharon Olds (b. 1942)
I Could Not Tell
Chamber Thicket
Billy Collins (b. 1941)
Silence
Reading an Anthology of Chinese Poems of the Sung Dynasty, I Pause To Admire the Length and Clarity of Their Titles
Corina Copp
There are no poems by this poet on our website.
Dorothea Grossman (1937–2012)
I have to tell you
For Allen Ginsberg
Bridget Lowe
There are no poems by this poet on our website.
Diane Burns
There are no poems by this poet on our website.
Beth Brant
There are no poems by this poet on our website.
Terrance Hayes (b. 1971)
Stick Elegy
Cocktails with Orpheus
Ann Taylor (1782–1866)
The Baby's Dance
The Cut
Chrystos
There are no poems by this poet on our website.
Amit Majmudar (b. 1979)
The Miscarriage
Instructions to an Artisan
Linda Rodriguez
There are no poems by this poet on our website.
«5678»
Mar 13, 2014
Mar 13, 2014 at 8:59 PM UTC
What The Heart Of The Young Man Said To The Psalmist.
Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.
In the world’s broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act,— act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o’erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 1807—1882~
Dec 20, 2012
Dec 20, 2012 at 4:33 PM UTC
*though the mills of God grind slowly
yet they grind exceeding small
though with patience
he stands waiting
with exactness grinds he all.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow*
for the wicked there's comeuppance
yes, for plagiarist and troll
it may not be in present tense
but evil has its toll
for the greedy human tyrant
for the fat politico
the rich are as a vagrant
trudging through the snow
****** Pol *** Stalin
Napoleon's Waterloo
in disgrace and fallen
into hell's external stew
the world is a millstone
it grinds fine, or so it's said
born here crying and alone
finally we're dead
don't envy the deceiver
or those who perpetrate
they'll be the receiver
meet poetic Fate
God has a sense of humor
those who blot society
may end up with a tumor
in the end will not be free
those who think they're "first"?
pity the poor fools
they're actually cursed
to be the devil's tools
there's no skating through this life
they will all be doomed
the scepter is a poison knife
the coffer is a TOMB.
SoulSurvivor
(C) 11/23/2015
Nov 23, 2015
Nov 23, 2015 at 10:53 AM UTC
**"Love...
It comes,—the beautiful, the free,
The crown of all humanity,—
In silence and alone
To seek the elected one."** Wadsworth Longfellow
<>
forgive me, Henry,
for tampering with thy perfect,
these words provoke
a restless, hard earned, smouldering and enflaming,
imperfected, unasked, unsought,
yearning
to explain, share, complete, abbreviate, lengthen and explicate,
my version, my coloration,
my coronation,
from the end of ceaseless, repetitive waves of wanting
completion
forty years in the desert,
four hundred year in ******* in Egyptian exile,
boul
der chained, uphill climber,
amazes me even now, how
did I desire to breathe,
arose to contemplate, perplexed,
why was I placed on this star,
skin branded dissatisfied, a human being,
unratified, unconstituted
just another love song, just another poem,
certainly no better, and surely worse,
than the thousands of thousands that preceded,
and the thousand more that will come by
nightfall
surrender - I cannot surpass
what lies below
acknowledge respectfully,
the luckless, the loveless
despair can dissipate, as hard to believe,
as hard as the unendurable, I counsel not
hard patience,
instead,
awake forever impatient, irresolutely
hardy and ravenous,
for what will come your way,
when I cannot say,
but this I know,
you are an elected, selected one, and
**It comes,—the beautiful, the free,
The crown of all humanity,—
In silence and alone
To seek the elected one**
8:21am Aug. 27, 2016
<>
Aug 27, 2016
Aug 27, 2016 at 8:24 AM UTC
#*‘Tis but the flapping of the sail,
And not a rent made by the gale*!
H. W. Longfellow
When bureaucrats, with obfuscation
monotone in data-speak
and mumble to their mutinous nation,
bloodless vessels spring a leak.
Scan in vain the rolling breakers;
leadership is out to sea.
Overscripted undertakers
claim to speak for you and me…
The Ship of State, adrift, becalmed
floats on; a most ill-fated craft.
The body politic, unembalmed
begins to ripen fore and aft.
The crew, grown callous to the rot
and numbed by such expediency
with one last desperate cannon shot
forsake all hope of mutiny.
While computers spit statistics,
crewmen spread the expectant word;
(no more trust in mere ballistics…
hope delayed is hope transferred.)
“Make ready to abandon ship !
The captain’s just a talking head.
Lower the lifeboat, let her rip –
before, like him, we end up dead…”
The Ship of State is rent with breaches
data-leakage, data driven –
the lifeboat flounders, coral-riven
seeking distant wave-washed beaches.
Sep 12, 2015
Sep 12, 2015 at 11:13 PM UTC
Silently one by one,
in the infinite meadows of
heaven,
blossomed the lovely stars,
the forget-me-nots
of the angels
Nov 7, 2013
Nov 7, 2013 at 1:18 AM UTC
"Though the mills
Of God grind slowly;
Yet they grind exceeding small;
Though with patience
He stands waiting,
With exactness grinds He all."
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
The Mill
The grueling weight
of happenstance,
A millstone for to grind,
It deflates the ego
And shows us
Where we're blind,
It renders flesh a ruin
Obliterates the mind,
We leave our idols desolate
Leave the ties that bind.
Under painful hardship
We release the very things
Which put us in the circumstance
And caused the suffering
We leave behind our craving
For wealth and diamond rings
Everything exalted
All exalted above God...
That means EVERYTHING
Whatever you adore
On this temporal earth
Whatever gives you pleasure
In which you find worth
These very things will shackle you!
You'll find out they're not free.
They are just the Golden Calf
Of base idolatry.
But the millstone slowly purges
Turning hour by hour
Turning the wheat kernels
Into useful flour.
And so I am refined
As I surely must
Put to naught my flesh
Make powder all my lusts
For I am as ashes
for I am as dust.
Write of Passage aka
SoulSurvivor
8/23/2017
Mar 23, 2022
Mar 23, 2022 at 6:43 AM UTC
books of poetry sit
dusty on my shelf
written by Neruda,
Hughes,
and assorted
others
but another being
sits there
too
it is Bukowski
his seven or so books
in my ownership
slouched in the corner
singing drunken
tunes
so, yes,
this is another
poem about my
second father
but it’s less about him,
and more about the others,
those books of poesy
I could never finish
sure,
I’ll read the first
section,
maybe half
of them,
maybe all but
the last
little
bit,
but never the whole
book,
cover to
cover.
I don’t know why,
money down the
drain really,
and yet,
I don’t regret
it
maybe I’m not cultured,
slumming with henry
and his gang of profanity
and depression,
to appreciate how and
what
they’re writing
but when I go back,
after reading the poems
for a little bit before
bed,
I find that I can go to
sleep when I put down
the works of Longfellow
or Cummings.
but when I finally silence
Bukowski,
all I can do is write
until my hands bleed so
much it hurts,
or my mind works to exhaustion
while my body falls to
shambles
Jan 30, 2011
Jan 30, 2011 at 6:43 AM UTC
Suddenly the dark clouds appeared!
A cry of disbelief!
A cry of despair!
The agony of a heart breaking!
The mind clouded over
Relentlessly trying to push the pain away!
"Breathe! Breathe!
Remember to breathe! ...."
He said to himself, "Remember it is just a rainy day. "
He continued to breathe for years and years
Reminding himself,
"We all have reasons we grieve."
Until one day he realized there was a purpose.
"It was the lessons of the grief
That opened his heart to understanding."
It is here where fellowship began to bloom
Opening the door to something much deeper....
Longfellow, I stood still!
During all of "The Rainy Day" days.
Fully opened and allowed the tears and memories to flow...
And the lotus flower of the heart opened
One at a time
Petal by petal
He looked up into the top of the Tree of Life
The Dove came
Hopping down it's branches
Singing to him - a song
Dropping the fruit of wisdom
One fruit at a time!
Into his heart.
Hearts rejoice!
Hearts full of laughter!
Heart's still longing
Yet comforted
With Love!
Feb 24, 2021
Feb 24, 2021 at 4:04 PM UTC
"A Psalm of Life" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882)
What the heart of the young man said to the Psalmist
Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each tomorrow
Find us farther than today.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.
In the world’s broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!A_Psalm_of_Life
Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act,—act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o’erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;—
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
Oct 2, 2018
Oct 2, 2018 at 5:23 PM UTC
On wintry nights the mariners sing
Of tales such as these
The sound of a fair maid crying
Carried on November’s breeze
On moonless nights along the shore
Where plaintive surf does sigh
A chill will set in the bones of those
Who hear her mournful cry
Beware good men who ride the waves
Should you hear young maiden fair
Set a new course for open sea
Lest frigid death find you there
She drifts alone on storm frothed waves
Icicle tears form round her eyes
Her frigid embrace a sailor’s death
When winters wrath fills the skies
Alas fair maid of the Hesperus
Her spirit a slave to the wretched sea
The deep no kind of resting place
For a beauty such as thee
Beware good men who ride the waves
Should you hear young maiden fair
Set a new course for open sea
Lest frigid death find you there
TL Boehm 2007
dedicated to Longfellow...
Oct 8, 2014
Oct 8, 2014 at 11:16 AM UTC
I cannot resist your wriggle
your movement wrestles me awake
from my routine slumbering lumbering day
your breath
your wind are my oxygen
telling me I’m alive
you move from heart to fingers
and dance on the floor
of this keyboard
with your partner
pen on the smooth flat surface of paper.
It is more vital to write my heart
to write write write as I MUST
than to obey some poetry manual
or imitate Longfellow, Rumi, or Frost
or any other.
Writing your movement is like breathing
I cannot go long without it
you impel me to this place
this oasis
this pure land
these tropics
where I let you speak
and have your way with me,
you my magnificent muse.
Jan 8, 2021
Jan 8, 2021 at 10:20 AM UTC