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Best Poems Written by Rose Whelan

Below are the all-time best Rose Whelan poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Rose Whelan Poem

Riddle - Oil Spill

Dark and foreboding, I float upon a wave; the life I touch most often dies.
Some from the poison in each kiss I gave; my burning fumes can blind their eyes.
Others I seek out with viscous tendrils; suffocate, smother, I steal their breath,
Pour sticky darkness into their gills; wash them ashore on a sea of death.
On Pelicans, otters and seals I prey; hold them tight in my tarry embrace,
On nearby beaches by the thousands they lay; shivering, wretched in their dying place. 
If you light me on fire, toxic smoke fills the sky; now let me ask you, what am I?

Details | Rose Whelan Poem

Imagination Versus Knowledge

At first there was nothing in the very distant past,
Then bang! There was everything, a universe so vast;
All splendid and magnificent,  terrifying and mundane.
But before we knew all this, before we could explain,

About giant, burning, swirling gas balls,
And dark vortexes that swallow worlds,
Before we knew what made the light,
Our ancestors named the stars at night.

Polaris, leiðarstjarna, Sea Star, the Great Northlode,
not 424 or 308, not numbers and codes,
But the tail of a dog, the little bear's story,
The explorer's hopeful guide towards glory.

The heavens were filled with loved ones now gone,
With archers and lions, heroes and swans.
Every star had a story long before we knew
Their weight, their size, their age, their hue.

Without imagination, would the sky draw our gaze?
Would we ever see the Northern lights, its colors all ablaze?
We can feel the ground, we know it's there,
But we have to imagine the sky and the air.

Looking up, we watch the birds in awe,
Their graceful glides and swooping soar.
We are not birds; we know we cannot fly,
But imagination makes us ask "What if we try?"

So  Leonardo draws a helicopter from imagination's sight;
The Wright brothers undertake the first plane flight,
Blimps and hot air balloons take to the sky,
and now man experiences how it feels to fly.

Every scientist already knows,
Without imagination no great idea grows.
From that first humble wheel to the latest Lamborghini,
From the first hot meal to the finest shrimp linguini.

From flickering candles to a bright electric light,
From using feathered quills, to keyboards when we write,
From burning wood and coal, to nuclear fission,
From dreaming of the moon to our first manned mission...

Knowledge helps us build a ladder, but can only go so far;
It takes imagination to reach for the stars.

Details | Rose Whelan Poem

The Tanker's Final Journey

Ominous clouds cluster on the horizon,
Immense waves smash over the deck,
Lashing! Crashing!  Punishing!  Pounding!
Screeching metal as the hull bursts open,
Pouring its jet black cargo
Into the frothing, raging ocean.
Lightning flashes, illuminates a tragedy;
Liquid death spills from its broken heart.

Details | Rose Whelan Poem

A Child's View

We went to the beach, but it was different. 
The sand was black and sticky. The smell made my eyes water and my throat burn.
I wanted to go home, but then I saw him. 
At first I thought he was just a rock - a big, black, sticky, smelly rock. 
But then he shivered.
I showed my mom. She gasped. "That's a seal" she told me.
I think she was crying.
We fetched my red wagon. The seal was very heavy. 
Mom said be careful, he might bite!
But the seal was too tired and sick to lift his head.
We took him to the Sea Life center. We made a strange parade; 
A mother, a kid and a filthy red wagon.
The lady inside looked tired. Her sweater was crumpled and her blouse was buttoned wrong. 
She used warm water and dish soap to clean him. She said he was covered in oil.
 It would take a very long time to make him better.
Every day I came back to visit. At first he was too sick to notice me. 
When he breathed it made a barking, rasping sound. 
The lady said the oil had burned his lungs. 
Slowly he began to look more like a seal and less like a dirty rock. 
One day I came and he was swimming in a small pool. 
I asked the lady if we would take him back to the sea now - I had my little red wagon. 
She looked sad and shook her head. 
He could never go home.

Details | Rose Whelan Poem

Her

I see her every day;  I don't always like her,
but sometimes I think I want to be her.
Not today...  bags droop under her tired blue eyes
from studying all night
on the test that decides  her future.
Today she is not what she was yesterday,
hiding herself under all that foundation.
Maybe a goth, maybe a nerd, 
Maybe one of the In crowd.
Unsure of  her true self, always dreaming of tomorrow.

Who is the old woman that stands here,
Frail and stooped as though shrunken by time?
Crinkled blue eyes that beam with amusement,
A wonderful adventure written  in every wrinkle.
Her  smile is permanently etched in her cheeks,
Each wild gray hair on her head a sign that she lived.
No more worries about what tomorrow will bring,
She surrounds herself with reminders of her past
and the stories that she tells to her grandchildren.

Only I know her secret pleasures and thoughts,
Only I know how she still feels 17 inside.
I have seen her every day of my life,
that confused child, this content old woman
is me.