while it is still April
i will sing to you
of color and flight
and everything green
and growing.
+
i will sing
of crashing clouds
that thunder and splash
raining life upon
earth’s knowing.
+
while it is still April
i will sing of sun
and opening buds
through which the wind
comes blowing.
+
and in the end,
i will sing of hope
and love undying
which from His tomb
are flowing.
– – –
April is National Poetry Month and, interestingly, while I was dreaming up this post, its title became the prompt for the poem. I welcome posts of any original poems you might wish to share in the comments, “while it is still April”.
A priceless thing... 
Nice, Mary! Very nice.
Poetry do not flow easily from my “innards”. You could probably explain the ‘whys’ of that better than I can…but if I come up with something I will most gladly share!
Sorry…does not….!
Hi Paula,
Nice to hear from you. It is fine, of course, if you do not post a poem. But do not be too quick to assume that one isn’t waiting to be born within you…
I would like to suggest that poetry doesn’t have to “flow” – sometimes it is jagged and bumpy. Nor is it always (or often) easy. Poems can appear in our minds suddenly complete – or they can be mined from our souls over a period of days or weeks.
If you are not accustomed to writing poetry, it is likely that you are critical of any attempts you make. This often occurs because we expect ourselves to write “good” poetry and think that anything other than that is not worth doing.
And “good” poetry is what we see poets write and our attempts seem so feeble. So give yourself permission to write a “bad” poem. Play with words. Let yourself express something. And share it only if you want to. 🙂
Happy National Poetry Month to all!
Those birds are sending notes
Again to the new day. I hear hope
In their songs, and excitement–
The same feelings I imagine
Rippled in the air when God
first thought of a tree, and birds
Of all kinds to put there for the world
To watch and listen for each day
That could be as new as this April
morning. Thank you, God, for each
unimportant thing that comes like breath,
Like wings, all day long — Love’s songs.
Bravo! Thanks, Al.
“for each unimportant thing that comes like breath, like wings, all day long” (I know I broke your line, but only out of laziness…) I love this part especially.
Thank, Mary. Actually it reads, and should be read, that way–smoothly. (And now that I hear it again, it’s my favorite too.) It’s where the poem was meant to go, I think. But maybe it needed the circuitous trip to arrive there. And an invitation, which you so aptly and beautifully provided. Let’stand keep traveling, and singing, even after we pass April by!
Thank you Mary and Albert! I love poetry and I try to red at least one poem a day.
Here’s a poem that I read recently and especially liked.
The Body
By Marianne Boruch
has its little hobbies. The lung
likes its air best after supper,
goes deeper there to trade up
for oxygen, give everything else
away. (And before supper, yes,
during too, but there’s
something about evening, that
slow breath of the day noticed: oh good,
still coming, still going … ) As for
bones—femur, spine,
the tribe of them in there—they harden
with use. The body would like
a small mile or two. Thank you.
It would like it on a bike
or a run. Or in the water. Blue.
And food. A habit that involves
a larger circumference where a garden’s
involved, beer is brewed, cows
wake the farmer with their fullness,
a field surrenders its wheat, and wheat
understands I will be crushed
into flour and starry-dust
the whole room, the baker
sweating, opening a window
to acknowledge such remarkable
confetti. And the brain,
locked in its strange
dual citizenship, idles there in the body,
neatly terraced and landscaped.
Or left to ruin, such a brain,
wild roses growing
next to the sea. The body is
gracious about that. Oh, their
scent sometimes. Their
tangle. In truth, in secret,
the first thing
in morning the eye longs to see.
Thank you, Learning…
This is a fascinating poem that I may need to read several times.
Nice poems from all.
To learning . . . — I read “The Body” three times, taking a break in between. I’m getting used to her “different” style: rambling, chatty, surprising in parts, apparently disconnected in a grammatical sense, a mind making lists of impressions, imagining the body as something separate, alive in its own right. The image of an undisciplined brain as “wild roses growing / next to the sea” is quite striking, and the body is OK with that picture, in fact rather likes its romantic appeal — the mind (or imagination) as free spirit maybe?
But I don’t see the connection yet with April’s last days. Interesting poem in its own right though, and perhaps the title/prompt is more general than I had though.I can see indirect references to spring (biking, swimming, gardening, cows ready to give birth or release milk, maybe even the wild roses) so probably it fits (if that’s important).
Anyway, I enjoyed it’s challenges.
Al, great comments on the poem. Just to clarify, my invitation to post poems was not intended to limit writers to the springtime theme.
So you reluctant poets…post away!
Mary and Al – Glad you liked The Body. To be honest, I chose it almost at random from among poems that I like. You may want to read it out loud, if you haven’t already. You should also read your own poems out loud. Poetry is supposed to be read out loud. That is why I love The Grail translation of the Psalms. It was written to be read out loud,
Yes, I agree – reading poetry aloud is very worthwhile. I often read my own poems aloud when I am editing because the rhythm becomes more apparent and may not “sound” as I had intended. I also record some of my poems, trying to capture my preferred reading of them. They do not always come out the same!
I just did a read-aloud with The Body and found that I liked it more when I read it aloud. Its rambling style was leading my eyes to want to skip over it quickly. When I read such poems aloud, I am forced to take in every word and play with its cadence and rhythm – in other words, to enter it more deeply.
The Wall
By Laura Kasischke
One night from the other side
of a motel wall made of nothing but
sawdust and pink stuff, I
listened as a man cried
to someone on the telephone
that all he wanted
to do before he died
was to come home.
“I want to come home!”
That night a man cried
until I was ankle-deep in sleep,
and then up to my neck, wading
like a swimmer
or like a suicide
through the waves
of him crying
and into the deep
as icebergs cracked into halves,
as jellyfish, like thoughts, were
passed secretly between people.
And the seaweed, like
the sinuous soft green hair
of certain beauty queens,
washed up by the sea.
Except that we
were in Utah, and one of us
was weeping
while the other one
was sleeping, with
nothing but a thin, dry
wall between us.
Thanks, Learning…
Wonderful (sad) imagery in this poem. Have you written anything of your own? (No pressure, just wondering, given your appreciation of interesting poems.)
Yes, I have tried to write poetry, No, I have never written anything I would be willing to share.
Understood. Each in their own time. Or rather, in God’s time.