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John F McCullagh Jan 2012
The first brave buds of spring burst forth
In shades of yellow and green.
They stand sentry at my door
Like fierce mujahedin.
They expel the bear of winter.
They sneer at frightful frost.
I wouldn’t want to be the snowflake
That they chance to come across.
In the seedbed things are stirring,
germinating beneath the sod.
There’s a riotous revolution
that bespeaks the touch of God.
Flowers are like people
They can be kept down just so long.
Then solar warmth will melt the snow
And birds break into song.
The garden trees are setting buds
That soon will dominate the scene.
It is Heaven enough for now
as things bloom and grow and preen.
Better than an Arab spring
Mark Toney Oct 2022
my precious, my love
when will we know that our love
will continue forever?

keep the seedbed moist
sprout, take root, ready to grow …
caring relationships thrive





Mark Toney © 2022

Poetry form: Sedoka - My Sedoka poem is one lover's sincere question, followed by the other lover's discerning answer. The Sedoka is a two-stanza poem, each stanza having three lines, with five syllables on the first line and seven syllables on the second and third lines.
Poetry form: Sedoka - Mark Toney © 2022. All rights reserved.
catherine Jul 2017
When I hear your
soothing voice,
my consciousness
quickly suspends
in the ether.

The weight
of your words
fill me to the brim;
an overflowing madness
and chaos take over
my dilapidated mind  -
you have turned me
into a crazy lunatic.

Today,
as we walked together
you whispered in my ear,
"There's nothing like us
together through the storm."

And my heart
exploded
like fireworks
in the sky.
It spilled
all over the place
like wet paint
on a blank canvas.

Now, I am drifting
towards the seedbed
of our secret insanity,
nothing but the two of us
can ever fathom
completely.

Oh darling,
my clandestine love
is what you will
always be.
We are afraid
As we give you aid
We have the liberty
To maneuver your head
To the extent your are
Deprived a go ahead
To tend
Your  self-development
And self -reliance
Seedbed.

"When money speaks
the truth is silent"
If you want to continue
Our client
Remember you're macilent
So  try not to be violent
Fighting back  with" Though
I'm poor I 'm somebody!"
'Cause, snobbish, we may prefer
This budy from that budy.
Don't be naughty
There is nothing
As such inviolable
Sovereignty.

A budy
That does not
Help  better optimize
Our advantage
Shoddy, could not
Come to the same page.

Note also
We could pull strings
And  to loan givers tell
"When we speak
Wag  your tail!"
To Trump and World Bank///

Pat Ethiopia on the back than stab it in the back

Intolerant of a crushing poverty that bound Ethiopia hand and foot,   the country is dead set on escaping the daunting scenarios its citizens across generations had suffered. Members of this generation too have known the brunt all their lives. Population boom has been exacerbating the problem.
Despite the bounty and plenty the country boasts, for aeon, it was forced to go through the throes of poverty perplexed by its inaction.
The calamity of inclement weather such as droughts and subsequent shortages of food had been souring the country’s fate.
To add an insult to injury, Ethiopia could not get its economy off the ground rocked by internal turmoil that went on unabated fueled by struggle for power and also disturbed by the proxy wars and revolutions exported by those who want to emasculate the country depriving it the power to use its resources like its trans-boundary rivers.
Hence it was coerced to heavily lean on foreign aids, which resulted in dependency syndrome. As such, in molding its fate the country had no option than remain locked in the doldrums of inaction. True to the wisdom-packed saying “Give a man a fish you feed him a day. But teach him how to fish you will feed him the rest of his life!” it was this point international donors were laboring to ram home in lecturing Ethiopia and others. Ethiopia’s developmental ****** to feed itself and illumine the region is in consonance with this silver bullet.
But making 180 degree turn and contravening the aforementioned ideal more often than not they uphold, hypocrites in this set are forcing Ethiopia to compromise its national interest and brush aside its developmental drive simply to cheer up their pet country, depressed out of jealousy as Ethiopia is outstripping it in geopolitical importance. Hypocrites want to support those who sow the seed of terror abroad spoiling fifth columnists in Ethiopia, envisioning socioeconomic take off beyond its perimeter.
“When money speaks the truth remains silent!” runs the adage. That is to say the pauper and the feeble turn vulnerable, when the affluent wield power. This does not work for Ethiopia that never ever compromise its sovereignty even in the face of war inferno.
It is cogent that an enemy of your friend or your handyman is your enemy. With this mentality white supremacist that spare no effort to optimize their advantage are seen trying to twist Ethiopia’s arm “We could underwrite developmental aid to you if and only if you show alacrity to what we blindly dictate to you. There is no room for taking what we say with a grain of salt. If you fall out with our pet country a punitive measure expects you.”
Hypocrites and their pet country also leave no stone unturned to lure the rational minded countries to their side so that they fall out with Ethiopia. The pendulous behavior of the riparian and neighbor country, which was a votary of the truth up to recent times, testifies this disposition.
International donor organizations to which hypocrites attached their apron strings are revoltingly echoing the stance of hypocrites creating pretexts not giving a second thought to the fact that their action could be weighed by the global community as a double standard. Such tail wagging goes a long way in eroding international trust. Here, it is no wonder if one alludes to the true farce of Barban and Jesus. Hang the votary of regional growth and release the exporter of terrorism is the modern version of it.
Such a subtle attack is unfair and unjust. Besides, the donations of hypocrites were meant for mutual objective—maintaining peace in a strategic area of global importance. As such, the negative impact could not be seen as a unilateral one. Where is the picture perfect love of hypocrites to democracy?
GERD is  Ethiopia’s  flagship project that is reminiscent of the victory of Adwa that threw into shambles white supremacy and showcased colored people could square up to any challenge. Is it because of this,  for want of due protection, we are witnessing attacks on our flag in Europe in sharp contrast to the etiquettes of international diplomacy? Crime by omission is no less than crime by commission! The international community must heed this as put it emperor Hailesellasie before League of nations “today it is our turn tomorrow it is yours!”
Averse to the trend international donors wait on Ethiopia hand and foot, the country is harnessing its resources to its and regional benefits. In so doing, generating electricity it is garnering foreign currency. Extrapolation shows that if it presses ahead with this noble task the country could beef up its muscles to the extent of seeing developmental aid as something it could manage without.
Ironic as it may sound, lately the lower riparian countries are inundated by the water of Blue Nile though they were crying foul the first phase of the filling and subsequent filling of the dam could cause a dearth of water in their lands. As a kid cowers imagining a bogeyman, lower riparian countries must not shudder imagining unscientific and farfetched things. Besides their heart tells them Ethiopia is marked for considerateness to others.
Let it be known Ethiopia is not a pushover. It is a standard-bearer of bootstrapping. In cognizance of this fact the rational need to pat it on the back than stab it in the back.  //
what makes a ****, a ****
is the same thing that makes
a flower, a flower
it grows where its seed puts down roots
it blossoms
attracts pollinators
the blossom dies and reseeds itself
and the plant dies

what makes a fungus, a fungus
is the same thing that makes a ****, a ****
or a flower, a flower
the I Am That I Am
creates everything in equal measure
negates judgement of anything as
less than or more than
yet allows personal preferences

a garden has no preferences
is an equal opportunity sanctuary
and a playground for
babies and old folks alike
for animals, trees, grasses, and flowers
and is a seedbed of Love
because
only the naked innocent can live in
Sanctum Sanctorum


c. 2023 Roberta Compton Rainwater
B P Jan 2021
I.
On this day, a quotidian wind may carry the force of anger,
May lash out at the stoic trees which surrender only dying leaves,
An offering of dead letters falling in a farewell dance to meet the earth;
Jagged notes to touch the dust—that surely tell of sterile promises.

II.
No matter the meadow he is still claustrophobic,
For everywhere there is too much of the world at once.
He parts a stalk of corn in a gleaming field
To hear and to remark upon the bees teeming inside,
Which would otherwise rest in the eyelids of wildflowers.
"You know," he thinks to himself, "we would not feast without the bees;
Where there are bees, so there is the cornucopia."
He speaks only to himself.

III.
“It is now 12:00,” the well-dressed man interjects between the widow’s sobs.
“Would you like to take the flowers with you?”
Softly she turns a knuckle to her eye, effacing her tears.
“Yes. Yes, thank you,” she replies in a hushed voice.

—or shall we let bouquets chance the untold tide of darkness,
The cold, unforgiving colossus of night?
By morning they shall have withered completely
In the cool hospice of the soil.
And so we move on.

IV.
The undertaker sweeps beneath the grass and dirt
Not merely bodies, but our heap of hours.
With bodies also go the games and the houses of words we built
And lived in.
Now by landslide they slip into silent coffins.  
Let certain words be backwards-facing windows looking out upon the brink,
That singularity of past and now that ferries our tomorrows
On uncertain streams
Where our worlds do not grow taciturn.

V.
It is now time to leave this place.
It has always been the time; that faceless phantom
That inhabits all things and makes all things sick and wish to die.
It is time.
A child’s eye shines upon you but is eclipsed.
An old friend whispers something like goodbye.
A stranger greets your shell and is amused.
A dark spate of moonlit oceans rises and falls upon a transient seedbed of memory.  
There where you were, so shall you return,
Birthed
And nurtured and loved
And carved and posied and constellated.
Your form swells beyond the human meridian;
Ribbons of color spin about your head, decked in a halo of stars,
And the pulchritudinous lifelike light—
Michael Marchese Dec 2023
Look at us
Blurring the days
In these picture frames
Going our own
Separate ways
Onto sicker brains
Leaves me
Internally
Wretching
To contemplate
Predicated
On the seedbed of doubt
That what happens between us
Would wither without

— The End —