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POEMS BY MEMBERS
PERFECT STAR
Faye Adams
Star of Heaven
come to earth.
Lead us once again
to our Savior's birth.
Speak the language
from God's own lips.
Grant us nectar
in honeyed sips.
Invade our hearts
with revealing light.
Accept our praises
this holy night.
WATTY PIPER MEETS EDWARD G0REY
Steve Penticuff
What were all those good little boys
A is for Albert
deprived of joys
and girls on the other side of the mountain
B is for Buford
face down in a fountain
going to do without the wonderful toys
C is for Clyde
whom addiction destroys
to play with and the good food to eat?
D is for Desmond
swallowing peat
EUPHONY
Dave Gregg
Two words a day, the poet wrote, a mere
pair one at dawn the other at dusk the sun
assisted the artist claimed by her rising and
finally with its set, opening and close every
day and years passed the man aged the
poem grew to great length though none saw
it not one soul until one day late morning the
poet claimed the poem complete and he read
for hours and hours to the gathered crowd but
collapsed from the effort tenderly they carried
him home in the warm glow of a spurned sunset
BURIED TREASURE
Dewell H. Byrd
Sea shells in a rusty can
buried where my carrots grow.
Whose hole, whose secret cache
in the path of my straight row?
He slips away at end of day
lifts his prize to moonless sky,
polished pewter at slack tide,
swears in silence, swears to die,
never tell a single soul.
He draws a map with edges torn,
creased, burned, coffee stained,
salt sprayed, sweaty and worn.
Childhood dreams lift my
spirit,
Carrot boy of long ago.
Now, where did I hide that map?
Crooked carrots in a crooked row.
EQUANIMITY
Laurence W. Thomas
There are no ways to
calculate such contentment.
Rain falls before the grass refuses to grow.
My cupboard reassures me,
and my closet is clothed in comfort.
I lack little beyond my meager need
The world teeters on the brink, a balance
that threatens and thrills without tipping.
A single peony rewards my farmer’s labors,
five yellow irises my time.
My anxieties languish in the shadows of remission.
I look for answers in the easy places:
a day turned golden after rain,
adding new friends, embracing old,
meeting challenges without upsetting
the comfort of routines.
A book I like lies quietly
beside my bed.
I know no enemies nor friends who demand
of me more than I am prepared to supply.
The emptiness of my existence fills me to the brim.
I neither wallow in pleasures nor suffer much.
WHERE ART IS BORN
Harding Stedler
The
grass invites the goats
to graze on museum grounds.
Farmers need to haul them in
and turn them loose
to make the space inviting.
Poets will write iambically
about the transformation,
and painters will commit
the goats to canvas.
I will open curtains,
allowing patrons to look out
on art becoming,
knowing there is space inside
to hang shaggy goats
and to feel the rhythms
of their grazing.
A TOUR DE FORCE
Jean Even
God is love and love flows
through my heart.
Herein I know, He is in me and I'm smart
To learn His ways never to depart.
Even by chance I upset an applecart
To come full circle to a restart.
Even still, His grace He will freely impart.
I'll regain the love of my sweetheart.
Once again, His love flowing from heart to heart
Is shaping a tour de force of art.
POEMS FOR THE NEW YEAR
Pat Laster
Wednesday, New Year’s Eve
a line of brown sparrows waits
a turn at the seeds
warm January
playing badminton
over the swing set
waiting for the bus
the 9-year-old and his mom
lick a frosty leaf
winter sky
on the end of the high branch
a clump of leaves
walking later
this frosty Epiphany
so many blackbirds
watching the news
for possible school closing
nodding, I miss it
white-haired worshiper
intent on the homily
not hearing a word
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THE SOUTHERN
BAPTIST SERENGETI
Heather Lewis
See how the lion-like young
men (learning to be pastors)
Crouch in lectures hunting for a female
Well-suited as a mate (and for procreation).
Similarly, the females of the species (hoping to secure their MRS.
degree)
Stalking the campus to select the male they will “spounce."
SKETCHES OF WINTER
Jennifer Smith
Hard skies of steel
obscuring the sun
Long fingers of ice reaching for the ground
Cold clouds of fog weeping all around.
Dismal, dreary days
Sliding on slick streets of sleet--
Winter weather woes.
Tall trees bowed low like
willows that weep
With puddles of branches around at their feet.
In winter weather one’s
vision is poor
And it’s difficult to see very far ahead.
Sometimes it’s also hard to see
The END
of winter weather.
WE ARE SNOWFLAKES
In
memory of W. A. Bentley
Diane Auser Stefan
Cold
frail and falling
caught in a storm
not of my own making--
snowflaking--
I flutter like a snowflake
And still
I am unique, one of a kind:
beautiful and in the big picture,
short-lived--
like a snowflake
While earthbound
in a blizzardous crowd
or singled out,
I can choose to simply melt away
or to briefly beautify the world
while I can--like a snowflake
WHEN IN THE PRESENCE OF GOD
Henrietta Romman
Wait . . . Wait . . . Wait
. . .
Wait upon the Lord!
When He comes toward you,
His ready arms are there to ease
your pain, to let your fear
depart, to hide you near His
heart this day, slow down
your pace. God’s Full Delight,
His sight, will then protect
you from yourself. Be still!
Instead feel His joy, His
peace, His Grace, His will.
Again I pray, Be Still,
for you are not your own.
God cares.
QUARTERLY CONFERENCE
Pat Durmon
Tick
Tick
Tock.
The half-waked hands
of a walnut clock slowly move
in the office of the *D.O.N.
Talk thickens and ticks on.
The resident of the nursing
home
half-listens as they talk about her
as if she were invisible.
Wonder what she thinks on
while they talk and do not look at her,
as the fly buzzes through the room,
as the talk ticks on and on. . . .
Tick
Tick
Tock.
Talk
Talk
Talk.
_______
* D.O.N. = Director of
Nursing
2009 HAS A BLUE MOON
[THE ALMANAC SAYS SO]
Tania Gray
Each full moon has its own
assigned name;
some make sense, others are quaint or lame.
Old Farmers knows what I now proclaim:
December--full moons two!
They’re “Cold” and “Long Nights.” There’s a nickname--
second full moons are “Blue.”
COUNTING PRESIDENTS
Tom Padgett
1 George Washington, 2 John
Adams,
3 Thomas Jefferson, 4 James Madison--
When I was nine or ten
years old,
my parents gave me a little book
about the presidents of the USA,
one page for each of thirty-two men,
if you counted Grover Cleveland twice.
11 James Knox Polk, 12
Zachary Taylor,
13 Millard Fillmore, 14 Franklin Pierce--
When I memorized the
numbers
and the names of all the presidents,
my parents were very proud of me
and showed me off to their friends
and to the preacher at church.
17 Andrew Johnson, 18
Ulysses S. Grant,
19 Rutherford B. Hayes, 20 James A. Garfield--
Other boys in my grade at
school
learned forty-eight states and capitals,
they played musical instruments,
they made the basketball team,
but not one of them knew the presidents.
29 Warren G. Harding, 30
Calvin Coolidge,
31 Herbert Hoover, 32 Franklin Delano Roosevelt—
Through the years I have
kept up
with the new men holding the job,
useful men who serve me well:
my friends at night count sheep
to get to sleep, but I count presidents.
41 George H.W. Bush, 42
Bill Clinton,
43 George W. Bush, 44 Barak Obama.
VISIT WORKSHOP FOR
AN ASSIGNMENT.
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