LIGHTER

I drift in the light

of this blue afternoon

I leave my echo

in sliding glare

of reflection

as words swim

in my slippery memoir

Balancing proportions

in my tippy canoe

I stand between

the bow of love

and the stern of illusion

sunshine peels my attention

beyond the horizon

I hide in the muse

in the lens of lovely

my profile hovers

as rain sits on

the surface of a bog

clear autonomy

blurs my stare

Time hesitates

as a glow thickens

my shadow lunges

evaporating edges of my ego

I look at my hands

wet with fire and flash

in the veins of prayer

WHAT NEWFOUNDLAND SAYS 

Crisp clouds trace
Solid locked cliffs
Tumbling towards icebergs
As I walk the edge

Green layers if light
Pasting the path
Crashed by the ocean
Kissed by the puffins

Who am I
To the power here?
To nature that rocks
Screams and rolls

There is a bliss
To heal cracks
In my longing
To understand silence

There is a push
In the windy trails
Scenic laughter
And pure colour calling

Time is cool here
Wrapped in wools
Until we lay down
In the heat of the shores

I return from this trip
Tipping in love
Luminous images
Flipping in my heels

Outside I still hear Newfoundland
Across the sighs of the day
Holding vistas
Inside internal grace

The Sun

The sun tosses a wink
An open pause
I perch to see
Long thin shadows
And cracks of darkness
In the holes of my garden

Nature guides my eye
To the silver leaf maple
The tiny temples of the pine tree
Layers of green branches
Draping the light
For my inner song

I honour the angry bird
The rustle of the tree
The dirty windows
A shiny thought
Or the paint peeling
On my favourite chair

I crave the sun
In a jest of joy
I hold it as laughter
To my senses
And as it fades
My mood wrinkles

It is a twinkle
In our daily dance
around the moon
It is enthusiasm
To my bones
To my breath

WHAT IS POETRY

"Poetry is the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash." Leonard Cohen


Poetry is where we can be ourselves.
Poetry speaks a pure voice.
Poetry is in the details.

I love this quote about poetry by Adrienne Rich  1929- 2012

Adrienne Rich was an American poet, essayist and feminist. She was called "one of the most widely read and influential poets of the second half of the 20th century".
Her first collection of poetry, A Change of World, was selected by the senior poet W. H. Auden for the Yale Series of Younger Poets Award; she went on to write the introduction to the published volume.

She said poetry is "a living language, the core of every language, something that is still spoken, aloud or in the mind, muttered in secret, subversive, reaching around corners, crumpled in  a pocket, performed to a community, read aloud, to the dying, recited by heart, scrated or sprayed on a wall. That kind of language from the heart and the mind. From the gut and the crotch. To claim wider horizons.

A language that made what is true, truer; what is small, bigger; what is silent, heard;what is fleeting, eternal.

The Waves

Cresting
Resting
in a flow
of endless pitch
blue bands of calm
break over the horizon
forming circles
shapes that wiggle in and out
of troughs
mezmorizing
teaching us about
repitition and recovery
how water transfers
and answers
our fears
as we roll into
the energy
if we hear our own rush
in the magnificent pulse
of the ocean
and ourselves

A Cup of Tea

I jump into
a cup of hot water
licking a new leaf
as it sits
inside my belly
I feel "me"
the band of heat
serves thirst
and connects
sips around the world
saliva and flavour
a ritual
as if a belt
loosely holds liquid
a dull warmth
that stares me down
over and over
and coffee
isn't even there

My Buddy

I see purity
Pushing power
In the words
Of my grandchild
She flies with her thoughts
Her imagination
A language
Of joy
A craziness
That freezes our wonder
Cuts emotion
In cookies of love.