Getaway
[4/3/2022]

May I just have a place to be?
I am soft and aching.
I would like to dream of doors
To wonder and soul-safety,
Fur and full-throated forest
Or high bright rainbow-flying things.
I’d even take a polished wooden room,
A worn couch and a bowl of Skittles,
Alphabet magnets and narrow book-cases,
Although I know that’s well past.
But all I have is a nest,
A narrow space for me
Between the cat litter and the art desk.
I’m no hatchling now,
And there’s no room to spread a wing.
I’m no cub, and cannot see the moon to howl.
I haven’t even a ticket or a pomegranate seed.

Waking (haiku)
[4/5/2022]

Shadows wander by
In worlds of light and dreaming
Winter turns to Spring

Ode for a Poet
[4/5/2022]

I want to know what you know,
And to know it as clearly.
I want to laugh into the sea reflected in your eyes.
Walk fearlessly between the birds’ surprised wings,
Know what it is the sunshine sings through rain,
And be certain, I am not alone in pain.
Even the stones speak to you of wonder.
I quietly blunder in a muffled world
When everything, everything, everything
Should be calling me to join the dance.
I have lost my rhythm, even while
I watch your heart unfurled.

Cocoon
[4/8/2022]

So. I guess I am hiding today.
My feelings are running away with me.
I would just like some time to be,
But I find that I can’t stay.

Bookbag Magic
[4/8/2022]

Nineteen discrete doors to possibility.
Is it any wonder this bag is so heavy?
It can hold riddles, wonders, a sunflower time-machine,
Shapeshifters and nightmares and attempts to fathom the divine.
Recent voices wander past
With sages who’ve been proven to last.
Some doors are worn and quite well-known
And some are green and newly grown
From some patch of magic forest.
I wait in the hall and rest
And nerve myself for another adventure
Past all watchful eyes and censure.

Kintsugi Friend
[4/9/2022]

Some broken things are caulked with gold
And some find only void.
What will I be?
I have given up pretending I am not among the broken.
I hope only not to break again
Before the healing can begin.
I hope my hopes are more than just a token.
What do you see?
Were you the one some fateful hand deployed
To bind these wounds, or did I make too bold?

Support Systems
[4/9/2022]

What would it take to break a Matilda,
Make a Matilda step on a crack,
Break her mother’s back?
How long can a child live
On books and dreams alone?
If there’s no Miss Honey to give
You hope, no way to make the world atone?

I haven't read Matilda, but I like this. 🙂

I like "what the sunshine sings through the rain". I need to work on my own lyrical language a bit for my prose. I love charming turns of words like "clouds in my coffee" even if it is from a rather strange song. Light Between Worlds enchanted me with this, and rereading Savvy with my son turned up some fun metaphors with a flavor so different yet perfect for the mid-American tall take the author's telling.

Also like the book bag Magic one.Your internal rhymes are interesting too.

I don't feel that I completely understand GetAway but I like the last line muchly.

Changeling is cool too though I have no context. You're doing great Lily.

Thanks so much for all the comments on the poetry so far, Kristi! ^_^

Safety
[4/14/2022]

What is safety, anyway?
Can I hold it in a treasure box,
Or give it away?
I want to hunt it out,
Fashion its facets,
Wrap it in gold paper.
I want to give it to you to savor
Beyond the language of regrets.
Less hopeful whispers, more a joyful shout.
Is there a price high enough to pay?
What is safety, anyway?

New Friend
[4/14/2022]

I didn’t know you from Eve,
But suddenly you’re warm and real and here,
Kind eyes listening to me.
You too have been through breaking pressure,
Sought to find your gold.
Can we draw up a treasure map together?
Or if not, I just welcome a hand to hold.

Holy Week
[4/15/2022]

It does not feel like Holy Week today.
I do not see the death of God at noon,
Nor hear the Tenebrae and know blood’s boon.
Two thousand years are just so far away.
It seems less like the cross, and more like Silent Saturday.

Dr. Hero
[4/16/2022]

Was it worth it, healer,
To break so many?
Did you consider any
Other choice?
Propaganda wheeler, dealer,
You lie with such a gentle voice.
As a student of the mind,
What did you find?
Did you blinker off your eyes
Just so you’d avoid surprises?

Discovery
[4/16/2022]

Hope, and hope again
I hear through my echo,
Echoing backwards into me.
Our fingers touch, and spark,
As we speak and ponder
What it could mean to be free.
What if all the world were hollow?
What if we broke down into the core?
What if we found there a flower blooming,
Luminous-bright on the inner world’s floor.

Warning (haiku)
[4/16/2022]

Do not dare crush me,
Or I will come back poison
Fragrant in your hand.

The Darkest Hour
[4/16/2022]

The Witch, the Devil, the Empire of Rome
Are on the move to slay all hope
And God knows who else is marching.

And it looks as if the Empire wins,
Executes innocence for society’s sins.
And I see where the Devil leers,
And smears out light in soot and tears.
And the Witch has shorn the Lion’s mane
So it never shall be Spring again,
And so the world is mourning.

Just so, the story goes.

Power and evil, fang and knife
Unite to snuff the spark of life,

And the night and stars are watching.
But desperate fingers still may grope
The Way, the Truth, the Door to home.

Labradorite (Haiku)
[4/18/2022]

Dull and slate gray stone
Leaps to bright shimmering life,
Spectrum trapped within.

When I'm not the giver anymore
[4/23/2022]

I wish I could be strong enough
To forge you armor,
To carry your burdens,
To be your pillar.
—
I wish I could hope well enough
To shine like a candle,
To sing like a mockingbird
Outside your window.
—
I wish I could just–
-lend you a tree to climb in so high
You could see every star in the sky.
-creep in the shadows and bare my teeth
At anything threatening from beneath.
-lend you the shelter of my cave
To hide when you’re tired of being brave.
–
But that is too much, it seems, for me.
All I have, all I can give,
Is careful hands
Repairing my own fragility.

Untangling
[4/23/2022]

Delving into recent history
I find
Clues to solve the compound mystery
My mind

I have the puzzle pieces
A stranger’s voice releases
The pattern they are matching
So I can see the plot we’re hatching.

Isn’t it curious?
I tried to conform to a dream
So small and spurious,
And saw stars in a dagger’s gleam.

Birthday Roses
[4/25/2022]

Cut crystal gleams
In diamond latticework
Below deep pink buds and blooms.
Another year is flowering
Among green leaves.
Fully opened joys
Near to ending,
Buds proclaim potential.
You came in on a birthday,
Little bouquet.
Your perfume sings of what could be.

Exploring Together
[4/25/2022]

What is a dance with no partner, you ask?
What is the point of solo waltzing?
What is the tide without her moon,
The honeybee who can’t find her bloom?
—
I say there is value in dancing alone,
For the art, for the form, for the structure and freedom.
And the tide still comes in when the moon isn’t watching,
The bee is as real in the hive as out working.
—
But listen! You say, because you are lonely.
Solo can’t be the only way to dance,
And when the moon is asleep
The tide still doesn’t come in by chance.
The bee can rest, but she’ll still be needing
Another time to go hunting and feeding.
—
Can we reach out long enough to agree
That the world is bigger than you and me?
Solo or coupled, in darkness in moonlight,
Out in the vast meadow wandering…
This world is worth exploring and pondering.

Blood & Answers
mostly Till We Have Faces
[4/26/2022]

Shiver and dodge a broken question,
Facets, angles, sharp and bright.
Try not to lodge rotten suggestion,
Send it back into the night.
–
Ungit calls for sacrifice,
Monster-faced beneath the veil.
“Holiness” must pay a price,
Drawn from far beyond the pale.
–
I will not accept the blight.
None deserves the old contagion.
Shoulder the load beneath the light,
Forge and heal an answered question.