Poetry

My Poetry...

I have attempted to write poetry at various times throughout my life. I do not suffer from the illusion that I am a true poet, but often it is possible to say things in poetry and verse that just don't work any other way. With that in mind, I have tried, using this unique medium, to say some things important to me.

There is additional poetry on my blog under the Poetry category.
       

The Question
Copyright 2001

There are many things that I could have been
Many things that I could yet be
Yet one thing lies beyond my keen
God, what would you have of me

The Writer's Decalogue
Fashioned in the style of the Ten Commandments
Copyright 1994

I. Thou shalt be true to thy subject and have no false paths before thy reader.

II. Thou shalt not make thy story, thy efforts, thy ability or anything of thine an object of worship.

III. Thou shalt not lift up thy reader's hopes in vain.

IV. Thou shalt remember the time the Lord has given the to write and keep it holy.

V. Thou shalt honor thy characters and give them their due so that thy words may be plentious in the story the Lord has given thee.

VI. Thou shalt not kill the gift the Lord has given thee with neglect.

VII. Thou shalt not lust after another's characters or another's stories and leave thy story fallow in thy heart.

VIII. Thou shalt not steal the plot, story or characters of another.

IX. Thou shalt not critique thy neighbor's work falsely.

X. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's success, their stories, their characters, their style or anything of thy neighbor's.

A Grief Observed 
Copyright 1993-2002

Underneath the pain of death
Beyond the shock of loss
For those left to stay behind
Lie boundaries yet uncrossed

We sit in empty corridors
With hearts severely broken
Echoing within our mind
Hearing words unspoken

To bar the ache of our distress
We wall around the pain
Woven within our very soul
The anguish yet remains

Can anyone heal the hurt within
And remove the deadly thorn?
Impotent, themselves not whole
Are those of Adam born

The answer some say is close at hand
Within the sacred rhyme
Able to touch the suffering core
Across the span of time

God does see the needful things
And feels our deep distress
Granting from his bounteous store
Love that offers rest

From the tools of cross and blood
God makes for us a way
To drain the gulf of pain that hurts
To the core of our every day 

The only thing required of us
Is to let our struggles cease
And He will fill the place that waits
With life and love and peace

Dry, the inward desert moans
Leeching life from my very bones
Hope, a deserter, abandoned all
What use, depression, worm and gall

Pain, in squated residence
Oppression, void of resistence
Life, a thread unraveling quick
Against the dreams now grown sick

Light, blinding thru crusted eyes
Piercing gloom, transforming sighs
No you can't... unwanted breech
What gives you the right to reach

Beyond, searching pits for cast off hope
I resist yet yield, wondering the scope
Who could look, even want to see
What I have hidden even from me

Only you, knowing rushes in
Why me, I don't comprehend
Love, soaring in the dregs of doom
Fetters broken, cleansing the wound

Who but you, no one dare touch
What now to do, there is too much
Famine, now feast, I will explode
Oh God, Oh God, you bear the load

It sprang into being at the moment when
He spoke the word for time to begin

Time marked the moment of fateful choice
Leaving man no reason to rejoice

Time marched but seemed often delayed
Other times it just raced away

Time surveyed as the epics passed
As hearts were lifted and hopes were crashed

Then words were spoken and time was hushed
Wondrous things that can't be rushed

A gentle girl in a difficult time
Listened to the miraculous rhyme

Time for decisions when plans were changed
Yet God had everything neatly arranged

So when at last the time came 'round
'Twas the time when the Lord came down

Then time ran out for the traveling pair
Who spent the night in a donkey's lair

But time enough for a baby's birth
The arrival time of the King of Earth

Time for shepherds passing the night
To hear the song and see the sight

Time for joy while the earth held hands
Time for travelers from distant lands

Quiet times in a family's care
Secret times, first here then there

Before its time a miracle made
Wine for a wedding in need of aid

Time for teaching and healing the sick
But the light burned down to the glowing wick

Time passed by and went its way
To the lonely hill, the appointed day

So time looked forward and time looked back
To the lonely body stretched upon the rack

The time for choosing had come at last
The center of time held solid and fast

The Rock of Ages placed in the grave
To arrive in time for all to save

Three days passed through times portal
Proving Him to be no mere mortal

Fifty days like a moment fled
Came the time of the disciple's dread

Time to rise and ascend above
Time to send the Holy Dove

This poem was part of the writings for April 13, 2002 when I was developing some thoughts on nexus points and the decisions that have to be made there

This poem came from the mid-life search for the meaning of your life and the possibilities it holds. However, the question is what does God want me to be and have I heard His opinion?

When I finally started seriously writing fiction, I played around with the idea that writers should have commandments to follow that focused on their temptations.

Initially written in 1993 for a friend who had lost her young son suddenly and unexpectedly, I have made a number of changes to it since then.

Over the years it has been offered to friends who have lost loved ones.

Written during a difficult period in my life, this poem expresses God breaking through the resistance to open my life to new possibilities