Beauty

  The Pilgrimage to Heaven Beneath the shadows whence no light embarks On paths renounced by most intrepid men; There,...

  Commie Carcinomas When least expected they arrive, an avant garde of hordes wielding a deadly pestilence like slashing, bloody...

As forecast now the sound of her arriving… That distant rumble from the driveway heard; A nearer clap, as though...

Of course, I like to see rainbows, But my heart hasn’t leapt for one; I’ve not wandered like a cloud...

Meritocracy When the Left tries to cow us and trammel our prowess ____We resort to a stiff upper lip, Well...

Sonnet VI from Sonnets for Elizabeth Consider how the bards of old had sung Before their numbers vanished with the years,...

The Mausoleum, Dumfries His crypt sealed by stones made by mother earth, A soft voice: This is where Robert Burns...

  Within my gardens soul abounds, A spirit stirring neath the ground, Aroused by secret depths that found, Concealed, inspired,...

. . Boast of the Poplar My common green I turn to gold, As Summer’s steaming, burning hold is broke,...

  ~ Dedicated to Falun Gong practitioners facing persecution in China Brutality meets decency and then What happens?  Hardness softens,...

On Formal Slavery (to a Nation of Free Verse) For there are those that call us slaves.  How poor and...

  What is my body that was never mine, That, fevered, it should waste below the deck? I rise, instead,...

  Basics Tonight I paint flowers on my tablet. I wanted to write about deeper things like God and love...

  "A man’s as old as he’s feeling …" ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge “If the body frees the mind in...

  Productivity Lately a feeling's been making me twitch, The Creator in me has too long sat bewitched. Too idle...

by Jane Blanchard Beatrice, Dante Alighieri’s second guide in La Divina Commedia (The Divine Comedy), makes her literary debut in...

“Carlotta Capuccino , ‘Plato’s Ion and the Ethics of Praise,’ takes the . . . view that poetry deploys ‘groundless...

  Incarnation I: Ego Mater Pulchrae Dilectionis I blossom forth delights on fruitful vine; My grapes are opulent and fair,...

  Not Every Morning Not every morning is as this one, calm excitement for a future brought by change, so...

  Re-visiting Dante “For Dante it was a strict rule not to rhyme the word ‘Christ’ with any other word...

  Sonnet by Joachim du Bellay (1522-1560) / Translation by Morgan Downs   If all our life is no more...

Walk with me, though both of us May wonder where we go. Talk with me, explore, discuss The things we...

Beneath Brambles A villanelle Beneath the tangled brambles, look around. Vines creeping, smothering, create the dark. A trillium insists her...

Requiem for September (or/ November Is Upon Us) Withering leaves Dying grasses Autumn is here Time Passes Gray skies Chilly...

By Joseph Charles MacKenzie, for the Society of Classical Poets Born in 1939 Samuel Gilliland attended the ancient Dreghorn School...

  Cagney's Last Curtain Call Words shape my lips, words that I shall borrow, Pre-dawn, the sun, yet to fully...

Youths for Prophets, Without Sin As youths for prophets steer a course, Towards our futures of remorse, We forge a...

  'Twas so much more on that morn before fall that we all came to mourn as it fell As...

Urban Butterfly What business have you here, In acrid air, to strain Through jagged glass and steel On a cracked...

The Sea My sleeping spirit wakes As the town’s vespers Climb the stairless sky And the sea whispers. The rushing...

Cicada and Mantis You are known to us by your choral song, The clicks and buzzes of an insect throng....

  The bark came off the trunks before the leaves had dropped— the freeze sped up, the shade enlarged, the...

  Poet's Note: "Back when I was eighteen years old, things were sort of grim with the Vietnam War and...

Poetry before Writing “Greece down through the fifth century has aptly been described as a ‘song culture’.” ~ Michael Schmidt...

  Let us raise statues to the Prince of Peace: __Cain’s monuments are powerless to bind __Our hearts in summer’s...

Poetry, as we have discussed in earlier parts of this article series, depends upon the Muses and accessing the deeper...

Proem In rhyming, timing is everything. Rhymes in wrong places make awkward spaces. A rhyme in rhyming knows more than...

Higher Purpose Is there any higher purpose As they walk with faces down? Are they sure of destination As they...

Passing of the Seasons When snow has melted, chill has gone, and winter turns to spring, The tender buds grow...

Nesting Season Little sleep. The night heat did not relent. You startle me up as day breaks over the tent...