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Patrice Lauren Poem
I remember how I cried
The day my father died.
The doctor laid the blame
When he said that cancer came:
Lymph nodes, lungs,
Philosophy of Carl Jung,
Words of explanation
For everything, no blame,
Too late for shame.
The final service was long.
I tried to be strong.
But the stench of red carnations
Can still fill my imagination,
People’s faces,
Words of the Lord’s graces.
Planted in a peaceful lawn,
For the shell of this world is gone,
Yoked into heavenly bliss.
But, when I think of him
There's so much we missed.
I remember how I’ve sighed,
Thinking of my dad with pride.
I’d sit on his knee
My ear to his chest,listening to him hum,
And he’d give me his pennies for free.
He would mow, I’d sweep,
Then we’d have a snow cone treat.
Poles, bait bucket, tackle box,
Days we spent fishing from piers and docks.
Hair black like Elvis’,
Ears and features like Clark Gable’s,
Loud animated stories
Of his oil company job,
At the dinner table.
Fedora, big pleated trousers,
A pocket watch on a chain,
When I close my eyes
I can see him again.
I look in the mirror and can see his eyes,
Staring back at me in an eternal guise.
He didn’t live on to see me grown,
Missed out conversation on the problems I’ve known.
But his gifts of life,
And his gifts of earthly love
Still ground me on earth,
Angelically guarding and guiding
Like the finest made glove
Existing throughout our human family's
Journey of love.
Copyright © Patrice Lauren | Year Posted 2005
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Patrice Lauren Poem
Cold and damp winter fog
Creeping, seeping, contemptuously
Deepening, ever more heaping,
Invading, pervading my soul.
Like pulling off the freeway,
The "I" now moves at a different speed,
Trapped in a helter skelter tempest.
Slipping past the cool mists of autumn,
Descending further into the depths,
Of the season my soul is despair.
Emotional atmospheric air so full,
Like Santa Claus's gift of toys,
Laden of tortuous mental moisture,
Flooded with the tears
Of my very being this day.
There is no other.
Heart heavy gravity
Weighs, awaiting some opening
To pass for existence.
Thickness of black aura,
Like my head thick in gridlock,
Each breath from this swamp
Swells to quagmire of quicksand,
Smothering, gasping, guttural.
Gutter real, but no eyes
To see beyond the invisible.
Trodden, berated, disheveled,
Full of confusion and frustration.
No answers to conflagrant queries
Until hope open a passage
To sail beyond Dante's levels.
Time in this valley is
Dreary, a depressed desolation.
Copyright © Patrice Lauren | Year Posted 2005
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Patrice Lauren Poem
The trouble with idiot lights,
You see, it’s a problem
That goes, perhaps,
Farther than me.
There's abundant ignorance
That floats in the bog
In a kingdom where machines
Can measure breath’s grog.
More than vast numbers
Aggregating in crime,
There's a feeling that
What is happening.
Somehow, isn't mine.
Big obvious red light, birthed
a message, idiot message on the dash.
Just the observation
Almost made me crash.
The warning, foreboding,
Read simply "check gauges.”
So sitting at the light,
I scanned all the stages
With the sets of information
A car shares on its pages.
I sit, quietly confused,
But the intersection’s raging.
The gas tank wasn't empty,
The oil read fine,
The engine not hot,
Battery volts seemed in line.
Responding to the honks,
I mosey down the road.
The engine’s working fine,
But my head held quite a load,
Of all the problems awaiting
For the idiot who couldn't interpret
The idiot light code.
. . . No problems yet,
A small sigh escapes
But I am mentally set,
Will I fall for the bait?
I would make a sizable bet
That I am sitting
On some universal debt.
Then as I was using
My copier that night,
Beeping techno-barking message,
Really set me to a fright.
A word chain shackled,
Scrolling a last request
"Printer ink low."
Sounds like an open book test.
Try as I might
Following precious words in sight,
Then a new unique message:
"Insert cartridge right."
Just follow instructions?
I’m ready for a fight.
I opened HP's lid
To see what was the matter,
Then came a horrible clacking,
Tic-tic-tic-clicking,
Hardware techno choir prater.
I shut the lid, and said a quick prayer,
Hoping God could save me from taking a dare,
And shooting the damn contraption
Right then and there.
With a web site visit, and many more clicks,
I found a FAQ answer.
My problem would be fixed.
There within the info sheet
Set my big break:
“Think about it, Dummy,
Did you remove the pink tape?”
So now, I sit here, contemplating,
Perhaps, I should consider
Getting out more, and dating.
The odds are better
. . . with two idiots instead of one.
Copyright © Patrice Lauren | Year Posted 2005
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Patrice Lauren Poem
The Friday night pumpkin coach
That delivered you to my door,
Has come to whisk you home again,
To live, live your own life once more.
It could have been a fantasy,
You being here, so close to me.
There was some kind of payment given,
And things felt as good as they used to be.
With silent encumbered emotion,
Northern light-like spectacle reignited.
With only a spark from your tactile passion,
This blind one was once again sighted.
The roller coaster ride
You've taken me on for years
Passed as a gentle bemusement,
Until all became perfectly clear.
Silent still in darkness,
Surrounded in circumference,
Imagination rallies the rockets.
Again, comes surging the tide.
Awash, aghast, transfixed in the cyclone
Living in the moment for me, with you.
Forget what I've learned about purpose,
Remembering how it feels: alive, free, and true.
For twenty-four hours we lived
Just the way we wanted to be.
Transgressions, migrations, destinations,
Past forgetting you showed me
The way to set my soul free.
Whisper to me in the dimness
Of predawn's early plight.
Ignore the stoic stone culprits
Who rob us of illicit delight.
With day comes the light, and robs comfort.
It all feels so wrong by day.
This devilment strongest in moonlight,
With our next rendezvous, a full month away.
Copyright © Patrice Lauren | Year Posted 2005
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Patrice Lauren Poem
Each of us is a warrior:
For earthly survival,
For the Lord of our soul.
What determines the time of service
For each individual warrior?
Conscription? Consumption?
Was this culprit a volunteer?
An honorable discharge
Is really all the old warrior seeks.
In the end the medals and commendations
Don't matter
As iconoclasts, gathering dust at the last.
In the material form they represent
Symbols, of the warrior's human achievement,
Rusting, deteriorating, without a hint
Of what they originally meant.
Value not the icon,
But hold it close to your heart.
It represents the culmination of humanity,
And your memory of it, the most precious part.
Copyright © Patrice Lauren | Year Posted 2005
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Patrice Lauren Poem
It's more than painted over graffiti,
The trouble with our world today.
The problem's mass is sweeping
More like a paint brush,
Used to wash wanton layers,
Time worn colours, away.
Strategic historical scholars, studied to rote,
Besmirch budding Buddhists babies,
Learning to vote by thinking.
What a novel concept!
If people would just pay attention,
The entire world could get smart.
The youth keep shouting louder,
Falling fast, far, and as hard,
As earlier generations did.
They are THE hope of our nation.
Shouting in codes their passions,
Spouting a shiznit with voices hid.
There's something wrong in this country.
It's been simmering in a brew quite a while.
The hippies got old and face graying,
While the youth now do their own thing
With a new fashioned font style.
No lessons learned,
Old leaves not even turned
To compost for human renewal.
Few values passed along the trail
Because values, then,
Weren't the popular thing,
To be in, with it, man.
Can you dig it?
There are 50-odd million Americans
Staying, saying, and swaying,
"We won't let you whitewash us away,
Like grains of sand in a rip tidal bay."
So I'll face every day on my own terms.
The representatives stand for me, too.
One must be true to his conscience
As the rest pigeonhole patriotically
Into immigrant shades of red, white, and blue.
Copyright © Patrice Lauren | Year Posted 2005
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