Beauty

. Balderdash? What are these hidden, unseen things? Do angels, demons, float on wings? Such ghostly shapes the full moon brings! __Our modern minds dismiss. Who twists and turns a shooter’s mind? Who ties the rope a rapist binds? Who wields the axe so many grind? __Is it a thing...

. A Birthday Prayer Dear God, a new year has begun, My thirty-fourth of blessèd life. You’ve given children, lovely wife, And lately, happy, newborn son. We have, by your munificence, Enough intelligence and health, Sufficient store of worldly wealth, A humble, city residence. You’ve sent me teachers, priests, and...

. Panchavati, An Introduction by Maithili Sharan Gupt (1886-1964) translated by Paddy Raghunathan The full moon’s mesmerizing rays Appear to skim the lake and sand, As moonlight, fresh, diffuses over Surfaces of sky and land. The earth transmits a joyous pulse From melodies of green grass blades. On cue, the...

. Stand There comes a time to stand for what you know To be the right, whatever be the cost. Then get you up to speak, or do, or go, To fill some gaping breach, though you be tossed From wave to towering wave, while dervish winds Pull sail from...

. Suiseki Rainfall has stopped; it’s the best time for hunting a stone. Drizzle still dampens debris; Trees put forth roots unobtrusively; mosses have grown; Animals leaving their burrows run free— Sodden land quivers, unearthing examples unknown. Seeking encounters fortuitous, off we proceed, Hillsides with streams our most suitable goal,...

. Insomnia Kyrielle The stars above have gone to bed, their quilt of clouds a calming sweep as moonlight strokes their tossing heads: O lord have mercy, let me sleep! Here in this dark I lie awake. The cliff of slumber is so steep I cannot find a path to...

. The Nation’s Heart The Nation’s heart has passed away, A loving grandmother to all. And now it’s for her son we pray Whom Charles the Third we’ll learn to call. But will he fill that vital space Elizabeth has left behind? For peerless was her poise and grace, This...

. Heavy Excess a plea from the human realm I must flee this land where feelings choke, Unrope attachments that were tied in love. Through halting rites of passport checks I grope. My bulky baggage makes my body slope. I’m strapped to grief, this loss, this toss and turn, This...

. Peace For Our Time "I believe it is peace for our time... Go home and get a nice quiet sleep." ---Neville Chamberlain “An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile hoping it will eat him last.” ---Winston Churchill. A triumph, yes, a veritable smash! From Munich I convey peace...

. The Billboard a pantoum It’s propped along the route I roll— A squatting square against the sky, Atop a sturdy metal pole, To tell me what new thing to buy. A squatting square against the sky, It blocks the airy, fluffy clouds, To tell me what new thing to...

. Don't Mess with Texas Gals On My Late Life Wife . Don't mess with my hot Texan. She's Texas born and bred. She does not fool with strangers. She'd rather see them dead. They said when she was born She had fire in her eye, The doctor wouldn't spank...

. My Resignation Be still, my Heart, be stiller than the grave. When consciousness dissolves into the sea, This desperate taste will fade with memory Of nothing, undisturbed by bitter wave. Be still, my Heart, be stiller than the grave. And now deep vices and regrets take hold. The taverns...

. Forever Nine My bare feet merge with weathered, knotty pineAs dripping swimsuit water cools the pier.The day belongs to me, for I am nine,With end of endless summer drawing near. My tanned and sunburnt skin soaks in the sun;My heartbeat hastens with adrenalin;My back foot thrusts me forward as I...

. Graves “Then you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and have you rise from them.” ---Ezekiel 37:13 There was a time indeed when I was dead: Oh: breathing yes, and witty, so I’m told; Yet deep within me wormed a sour dread That...

. Snowfall: Via Negativa “Less is more.” ---Literary Dictum Out on the highway, snow settles in place Covering the tracks the traffic has traced Blotting out edges, disguising the rough Burying the world in heaps of white stuff Obscuring the details of branches rimmed white With down-drifting flakes that fill...

. Independence Day? a rondeau Some dared. Some died. With pluck and pride And guts and grit the brave defied Despotic rule. They stripped the foe Of dominance below a glow Of stars that spangled eventide. With God and gumption on their side, They brawled and bled for kin that cried Beneath...

. Fourth of July Limerick Top left, there’s an oblong that’s blue; add in fifty stars, white in hue. To offset the stars are parallel bars, six white, seven red, straight and true. . . Paul A. Freeman is the author of Rumours of Ophir, a crime novel which was taught...

. America Is Not the Same America is not the same. __I do not recognize it. We all know who should bear the blame, __But still we analyze it. The teachers’ unions and the press _  All share part of the shame. Our legal system is a mess __That functions...

. Evra Our grandma Evra was a trifle difficult. If ever sound advice was needed she’d be there, But quiet, not a word until a person asked, And then she’d give it and you’d better listen ‘cause She never gave it twice—save once, and I’ll get back To that.  Her...

. Adams Mountain I gather in from this high place, my shadow sprawled on shivered stone: Dusk drifts down: autumnal shroud upon the rusk-brown earth below, fall colors fading; chimneys trailing smoke, primordial prayers rising. I see myself as from a far-off orchard, gauged in fading light, a serpent’s view,...

. First Steps in a New World for Toribio Moras, age 14, Vera Cruz, Mexico, 1908 The young Castilian boy set sail, alone, and sought to build a life across the sea. Adrift, so far away, you had no throne, and homeless, you spent nights beneath a tree. Your loyal...

. . This Silence. Foremost among my woes: _This silence as it grows, __My mind fatigued from listening for your voice; Amid the constant buzz, The thought of what once was--- __Your gaping absence overwhelms the noise. . . . . Just Fine_ We’re made of breath and dust And...

. La Campana Ring, grandfather! And ring for liberty. The bell spoke once and, speaking, croaked and cracked. Our gazes bathed its iron in gold hazes As Hebrews treasured tablets their sin split. Its silent iron: I will ring again. We have a problem---witnessed by the crack. The groan of...

. Miracle of the Book Distance was short, but porters would be needed, And sacks were packed with small necessities. I wrapped the Gospel book and then proceeded Along the rowan-bordered road with ease. Only when day and its activities Were done did I seek out the book and find...

. Psalm 23: King David’s Version When I was just a hungry sheep __and I was lonely, lost and scared, You somehow found me, fed me, led me, __showed me just how much You cared. When in the valley with its shadows __that each prophesy my death, Tho’ I hear...

. Darkface at Dusk "Death is swallowed up in victory" ---1 Cor. 15:4 At twilight, as I walked in solitude Along a country lane, unpaved and worn, Past gloomy fields, of springtime’s verdure shorn, My thoughts enshrouded in a solemn mood, I saw across the road, behind some trees, Through...

. Job’s Rant Job 3: 3-10 . May darkness and death’s shadow claim the day When I was sent to bear the curse of earth. May clouds blot out the night that gave me birth And drown it in the densest blackness.  May Malediction blot each brazen ray Of sun...

. This Is the Choice  The gates of hell Closed from within. No one sends us--- We lock ourselves in. . The gates of Heaven Are open and true, Welcoming souls who Choose to walk through. . This is the choice--- One all of us make. God will walk with...

. Green I’m talking green: the greening ground Of spring and springing hope eternal; The spectrum’s hidden light unbound And animation of all that’s vernal; The pulsing new-found energy Of green, intoxicating green, Candescent with viridity. There is no other drug but green. . . The Luxuriance of Leaves What...

. The Gallows The trial was quick, the verdict read: “Guilty as charged,” the foreman said. The judge declared the man would hang, the leader of a robber gang who stabbed the sheriff with a knife, and made a widow of his wife. Appeals denied, his luck now spent, to...

. The Straight-Fishing, Straight-Talking Jiang Ziya Far off in time and place but still on this small globe, By a river with his beard and stick and robe, A sage thought on a kingdom’s end that war might loot And by the river swung an unbent hook to probe. For...

. Distant Thoughts from Nearby I need to turn my dog-ears up __and harken to the quietude ____ignored for many years, __and contemplate my solitude, ____expressing through my tears Incautious songs that made me up. My oldest friends will never know __the thrall of certain moods I wear, ____the many...

. The House on 58th Street for my father Salvatore J. Salemi (1913-2008) The house on 58th Street stood right by A cemetery—Calvary by name. Looking out our windows we could see A high stone wall, hand-fashioned of huge rocks (And to a child’s mind only giants could Have raised...

. The Test The second is like it, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' —Jesus (Matthew 22:39, NASB1995) Is every trial just a self-created test? Perhaps we do not grow until we have been stressed. How do we pass the test, so that we may be blessed? Perhaps we...

. The Number 207: The Road to Nowhere Oh once along the Road to Nowhere That used to be the Uxbridge Road You’d board and pay the tuppenny bus fare And go where milk and honey flowed. For this was then a demi-Eden Where gentlefolk would take their ease. With...

. Anesthesia Where was I for that half an hour or so While somewhere deep inside me they explored? The body’s secrets mine so far outsoared, I’d been sent off someplace I didn’t know. And “sleep” they called it yet somehow a sleep Without the possibility of dream; A waking...

. The Moselle Tranquil meandering alluvion, From Vosges pink sandstone hills it percolates In rillets past rich vines in echelon To cradle villages of varied traits. Saint Castor limns a linear regime, Both slender arms extended fatherlike; The fields behind rise steeply from the stream. New homes? At either end...

. Sonnet When sitting on a swing my cheeks were chilled, I gazed and saw the dawn, a new spring day. I knew those colors soon would fade away, But for a moment, time had slowed and stilled. The sky was cloudless, clear, and it was filled With purples, reds,...

. Commodore Perry Opens Japan On July 8, 1853, on the orders of President Millard Fillmore, Commodore Matthew Perry led four American ships into the harbor at Tokyo Bay, seeking to pierce Japan’s isolation from the western world and establish regular trade and discourse for the first time in over...

. The “Muse” A sailboat, small, unvarnished wood, her sail a swath, a patch, of red fastened by type-9 yo-yo string to a pencil mast and a stick of boom; a sailboat, small, unvarnished wood atop a bookcase, moored abreast an amphora vase wanting Greek wine, sprouting a wilting bouquet...