DEAR EUGENE

Guest poet, Chloe Gilbert

Chloe rode on a train from Southern Virginia to Northern Pennsylvania, recently. One of the passengers, a kindly old gentleman sitting across the aisle, caught Chloe's imagination. She said he wore a bow tie and had the kindest face. They never spoke, but Chloe felt that he was someone special - she even felt a certain kinship toward him. Then, just as she garnered enough courage to make conversation at a stop in D.C., he stood up and departed the train.

We have all wondered about strangers that have traveled with us on trains, buses, planes....we come up with life scenarios for them. It is a poet's past time. Right?

This poem was churned from Chloe's thoughts, while traveling on the train.

DEAR EUGENE

I can’t help
but sneak a peak;
What spell have you
cast over me?

At a glace, to have felt so meek -

From your unintended presence,
I cannot break free.

Have you traveled far?
Could it be that you
are wondering as well,

If my story is just as spectacular

As your story in my mind dwells?


Inside, mindless masses hurry in a blunder,

As the world beside us both passes,

Creating even more magic and wonder -
Empowering my will to leap and ask.

Alas! You are now escaping this
Metal monster and leaving me behind.

Thank you sweet stranger
Whom I will never forget,
For leaving me soft and kind.

THIS VAGUE FEELING

A vague feeling
has arisen in me,
with no real meaning
that I can think of -
and apart from any idea
I might have had recently,
but truly affecting and moving,
as with any other vision in life.


It prompts my mind to toil -
all thoughts tendrilling upwards
and outwards, trying to catch
somewhere - and take hold.


My mind fills with
some moonlit view
of barefoot wanderings,
and a distribution of figs
to the sick and dying –
their sweet, sticky lips
encrusted and tasting
of nothing but blood.


An odor of turpentine emits
from some dark alleyway,
where doors are open to show
dimly lit rooms divided by
unfinished canvasses,
wet with paint and going
white with mildew.


And there is not
an infinite number
of stars in the sky,
only a few large ones,
spinning and shining -
like dying martyrs,
and like living lovers,
eking out their incredible
days of pleasure and pain.


This vague feeling…
This stab in my heart.

MORNING HOUR

MORNING HOUR


what warbler’s watery
trilling could ever entice
me from this sovereign light
and lure me into the shadowy
world of a mysterious thicket -


where each wary step is
infused with whispered
petitions and every sharp
thorn brings forth visible

and agonizing stigmata

First Day of School

When I was a senior in high school, I think I missed the bus about 10 times a month. Dad had to drive me to school. Looking back now, I'm glad I missed it so much, because I had that precious one-on-one time with my dad, but - I digress.

Karen www.keepingsecrets-karen.blogspot.com is driving the Poetry Bus this week to school! So, I promised her I would try to be on time.

Oh, so many ways one could go with this, but I wanted to have FUN - since that was the way in which it was presented by our bus driver. I did write a poem for Karen about our WVTech days, but want to keep that for later in September, since it is a little more obscure. I hardly ever rhyme my verse and I really love to. So, with a jaunty wave out of the bus window, here I go...


FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL


School bell rings.
Grab your things.
Run to the gate.
Don’t be late!


Heart’s thumping.
Brain’s pumping.
Children weeping.
Mothers leaping.


Summer’s over.
Goodbye, Rover.
Hello fall,
And hallowed hall.


Find a chair.
Fix your hair.
Smile at friends,
Or just pretend.


Shiny shoes.
Pencils (number twos).
Heavy books.
Learning nooks.


Favorite teachers.
Some are creatures.
Principal’s tall.
Vice is small.


School lunches.
Hate them bunches.
PB&J,
Makes my day.


Dismissal Bell.
School’s swell.
Maybe, then,
I’ll go again!

FOR CHLOE

I wrote this for my granddaughter, Chloe, who turned twenty years old this month. A few days after her birthday celebration with all the family, we had a little picnic at Bowman's Creek - just the two of us - chicken salad, homemade pickles, peaches, iced tea with limes. We had the place to ourselves that day. We had a good time sitting there by the water - talking about the past, wondering about the future. Chloe tells me the most interesting things, too. She amazes me, really. She has always lived away from us, but comes to stay here in the summer. So, our relationship is a special one. We have to pack a lot into those few weeks! While watching her wade out into the creek, singing to the fish - this poem was already forming. Oh, and Bowman's Creek is a place where we have always gone. We used to swim in the cold currents years ago and ride the "rapids" in an inner tube. I would take the kids all summer long, before the pool. We used to have big family picnics there, too. (Oh, those halcyon days of years ago.) I guess this seems like a big intro for a short poem, but - as you all know, I am all about brevity in my poetry...I try to say a lot in as few words as possible. Hopefully, it has worked here.

FOR CHLOE


The time of water is over
and most of our sun is gone -
wrapped in a filmy gauze
left over from our days of
sweet and soft iridescence.


But before that –
her skin had reflected water,
as she waded up to her knees
in the cold swirling creek,
singing to the fishes that hid
among the mossy ledges, imploring
them to eat bread from her hands.


And there, by the huge sycamores
that rose up mottled around us,
I felt like time had reeled back
and we were the universe again,
and we were the ancient mystery
that we had always been.

SUICIDE

How much more
pain could you have
shown us –
pins holding your
brain in place,
as your fingers
separated fact
from fiction.


He hung like a robe
on the back of the
bathroom door -
nonchalant and dead,
you liked to say.


You claim that you
died, too, that night.
Are you sure
you weren't born –
pushed out of the hard
cold womb of anguish?

THE FOX

It’s always about the light,
or the dissolution of shadows
and shade that makes it so.


Like the brightness
in the corner of the woods -
filtering down into the fields,


where standing amid the night
blossoms and summer grasses,
the unexpected fox shows himself


and his sweet vulnerability,
never realizing the small
disturbance he has become.