Light ebbs and flows like the tides,
brightening one season,
darkening the next,
ever moving,
never gone.
Photo by Chris Barbalis on Unsplash
Light ebbs and flows like the tides,
brightening one season,
darkening the next,
ever moving,
never gone.
Photo by Chris Barbalis on Unsplash
Following “Don’t Worry” by Mary Oliver
Like Martha, many things
make me anxious, take
my mind down the
most unproductive roads, make time
my enemy. But those things, they
require perspective. Take
a breath, and don’t
forget peace conquers worry.
Photo by Dewang Gupta on Unsplash
Every Friday in November’s poetry challenge was dedicated to a different poetic form, giving us an opportunity to stretch ourselves a bit. The first form was the “Golden Shovel,” from Terrance Hayes. For this form, you take a line from a poem you admire. You then use those words, in order, as the end words for each line of your own poem, crediting the author of the original lines in your own work. For more on this form, and to find links to Hayes’ golden shovel and to the poem that inspired his, see here.
It’s time to make the time for art again,
To see the sacrifice as offering.
Adorn the worlds without and worlds within.
Retrace the shapes of joy and suffering
And show them mingled, mangled, and made new
As only your soul can, and it will be
A blessing to yourself and others too,
A testament that truth still sets us free.
You feel your work is meager. It is so.
There are far finer pens and fairer lines.
But e’en the best are flawed, and still they show
The glory of the Lord. They still are signs
Reminding downcast eyes to look ahead
And giving hungry bellies fresh-baked bread.
Photo by Andrik Langfield on Unsplash
This is the first of 30 poems written this past November in response to prompts. In most cases, my poems were untitled, so I just used the prompt as the title.