poetry – Page 118 – One Woman's Quest

Unwanted

Like a wanted woman,
I hide in public places

One step ahead of recognition,
ignoring friendly gestures,
leaving confusion in my wake

I’m tired of this game,
the pretence – long only
to turn myself in

tear away the mask
and announce
my presence

but I’m afraid –
could lose it all –
career, reputation

all for a crime I did not commit.

Oh wait…I already did –
just like a wanted woman…

(Image from personal collection. My images, some with poetry are now available through Society6. I’d love it if you’d check us out and leave feedback.)

Did you know that life would come to this?
Flattened memories pressed between wax,
the essence of our efforts forgotten, the dreams,
so carefully construed, lost. You leaned toward
the conventional, and I was ever the sentimentalist
and yet we ended up in the same place – shadow
selves standing at the banks of our disheveled lives,
survivors, nonetheless, tokens of a past riddled
with so many lies, so much heartbreak, we are
ghost sisters, haunted, hunting, unable to step
away – drawn in, pulling apart – all that remains.

Windy

Winds here are unchained –
no fear of stagnation –
learning to tether myself
to uncertainty – relying
on instinct to pull through.

Oh Woe, Oh Why?

Why must I suffer acne still?
What trick of fate, whose wily will?
I am too far over the hill,
refuse to take a teenage pill,
must be this state of chronic ill.

(A funny ditty for Dark Side Of the Moon’s Whyquain challenge. I might have taken liberties with the form, but it was fun to write.)

Skyward

Even weeds reach for the sky,
as if heaven holds a secret,
as if liberation lies in the stars
and the day’s passage into night
is a promise – I reach for the sky
with my prayers, with my wishes,
am no more enlightened than a weed.

Sleeping Alone

Sleeping alone
with so much intrusion –

child born of good intentions
awash in a trail of barricades

I cope, cook up breezes, strike
wet ground – stuff myself to satiate

the onslaught, ground rapidly shifting –
Earth Mother exerting presence –

too stubborn, I turn away, look for
God but my cup keeps moving –

I am unreachable, charmed by
a broken tale, aimless, oppositional

overwhelmed – cry out but absence
holds no listeners – need adhesive

to fix this urgency – a peerless torrent –
if only I could simply these wounds

find a stopgap – emotion overflows,
exerts turmoil, sorrow replaying

sleep offers no repair, alone,
tormented by the issue at hand.

(Every so often, I revisit old poems and revise. Sleeping Alone first appeared here in December of 2017, when I was still in the throes of severe illness. I’ve come along way and it’s good to look back and see the progress. I am also linking this up to my weekly challenge, reaching.)

Do

Ancient song of Eden, our nature,
as above – light to watch for –

my summer, withering,
her insect breeze vined

would come there and have
harmony – beautifully fresh

in prairie lake,
air vivid.

(Fridays are for Magnetic Poetry. Play along online.)

Age’s Rant

What if days were berries
growing bright, whose sumptuous
juices blossomed only in Summer?

How sad it would be –
such limitations, disrespectful
of the creator to surmise
an inevitability of dormancy –

I will not believe it!
Our days are like seasons –
motivations and movement
fluctuating, weaving into
a tapestry of greater glory

There is no single season
of bloom – even berries resurrect.

Invisible Forces

What ideology is this –
the feminine clothed in conservatism,
carting creatures whose nature is wild –
are we to believe women, too, are tractable,
or that girls should aspire to control
their beastly selves, become pets
for mass consumerism?

Glances say it all –
the inability to face the authors
of this myth – subdued by shame,
powerlessness, or conditioned politeness –
do not be fooled; there is more to this story –
it may be invisible, we may all pretend
it does not exist, or downplay its significance –
but one day, rage will have its say.

(Written for the dVerse pub, hosted tonight by Merril, with the theme: invisible. My poem is a reaction to the featured image, offered up as a prompt by Willow Poetry for her weekly challenge: What Do You See?)

Rapture

It’s odd, this gift of solitude. Perched beside the canal that runs behind our site, I affirm my connection to the earth, give thanks for this place and moment, and acknowledge that I am a part of all that surrounds me. The late afternoon sun casts a glow on the foliage across the way lighting up the mirror-still water with vibrant reflections.

Two winters ago, I was fighting to breathe as temperatures dropped below zero. Trapped inside my home by impassible walkways, I was desperately trying to stave off depression. It’s hard to be hopeful when isolation is imposed.

“There are no absolutes in life,” a professor once told me, and I think of that now – how just when we think our sentence has been handed down and sealed, an opening appears. I have been most fortunate. I savour each moment this current state of solitude offers.

Heron’s watchful stride
invites reflection, respect –
winter’s solitude.

(Kim is hosting in the dVerse pub tonight with solitude being the prompt for our haibun.)

Category: poetry