Best Erie Poems
I owe so much to you
When you pulled at me,
Tugged me from my toiling,
When I was crouched low,
In the kitchen, blurry choke of tears
I saw the outline of your peninsula
Etched in florescent blue in my mind
A little red star on a map
Such a hard drive (for me and the Ford)
But I, swept into the arms of that gentle house,
Saw a clearing in the nettles, one that I could pass through
And those turned to violets that kissed me as I was waking up
And going to bed, listening to the healing black wind
Through the many cracked windows
Presque Isle with her flags and sea glass
The promise of going to Canada
Turning my head to look at the lake, that dark lake
Itself enigmatic- a sea but not a sea
I think about that, brush the snowy sand from my palms
Yes, in a way,
That could be me
If you look closely, you will see
the masterpiece Winter painted
along mighty Erie’s shore
in the darkness, well into the early morning light.
You will see his fondness for delicate shades of gray,
How one by one he bends and sheaths the tall ornamental grass
in rounded silvery whiteness, and
how he paints ripply footprints at the water’s edge.
If you look closely, you will see
the fluttering gulls in the distance,
Seemingly small, yet not insignificant,
Every detail a pixel of life.
There’s more, if you look closer,
If you’re willing to brazen the biting wind,
Like the pile of jagged sticks, and mossy green rocks from summer,
Now a single creamy white ice sculpture.
And if you hold your eyes and heart wide open,
you can read the painter’s signature
written in the battleship gray sky—
December
It's midnight on the Erie Canal,
And I'm alone,
Going home,
Wood Creaks,
I seek,
Something,
To bring,
Peace,
Unrealistically black sky,
And it's quiet,
Too quiet,
No cliche' intended,
No sound to me is candid,
Upon this water,
As I mutter,
Words that reassure,
My destination has not found me,
And though my fear has not yet bound me,
My nerves are shot,
But fear is not,
An option yet for me,
I must stay strong,
It won't be long,
Uncertain though,
But all I know,
Is that it's midnight on the Erie Canal,
And I'm alone, going home.
In golden dawn of day
Fish the color of lake and sky
Swam Lake Erie wide in eye.
Twenty thousand years past
Fins chased by glaciers:
Blue pike survived
Until too many waves of our breed
Swept them from the lake
With taint and nets of greed
In a hundred years-long dusk.
Too much like Sandburg’s Buffalo Dusk
The Blue pike and their fishermen are gone:
Too much chased from ice to nets
To gray smoke dusk,
Black empty night –
The Blue pike and the men who saw them
Gone.
Standing on the edge of a cliff
toking a smooth fat spliff
waiting to catch sight of a skiff
Floating it's way on by
Watching the majestic girl soar
no longer a beast of lore
wish for increasingly more
She passes a look on the fly
Brown with white head and tail
power that will never fail
enchanting how she sets sail
Makes me start to cry
Bounding stag hidden by ivied hoods
sneaky 'lil squirrel dashing with his goods
amber kits darting through the boxwoods
Violet western sun in the sky
The Erie Lackawanna.
Was a friendly mamma!
The friendly service route.
Ran across the Southern Tier of New York.
Then across the Susquehanna.
Choo Choo went the train.
Down along the lower part of the state.
The great flood of 72...
Caused a bankrupt attitude, to date.
Now the tracks, they lay at rest.
Silencing all..by whos rails they quest..
Railroad Poem By Kim Robin Edwards
Copyright 2009,2014..
All rights reserved..
The house wasn't much to look at,
Although it was grand in its day.
But we never got tired of visiting,
Or seeing the family on Sunday.
The floors were old and creaky,
The walls were strong and tall.
The yard was ever the smallest,
Yet, we still found a way to play ball.
The clock in the kitchen kept pendulum time,
Its gentle gongs...as the hours were to go.
The louder sounds of plinking from the front room,
As we toyed with the keys of the old piano.
The sweet aromas from the bakery next door,
Wafter over us in the air.
Always reminding one of that pleasant place,
Filled with cakes and cookies and eclairs.
We didn't understand the words,
That our Grandparents often were to say.
The polish banter among our parents,
The adults kept their secrets from us that way.
Our Moms were helping Grandma in the kitchen,
Our Dads on the porch playing cards.
We ran our own little games outside,
More noise and laughter from the yard.
Only the memories now remain.
And sometimes after a day of aching hands and weary feet,
My mind turns to those happy childhood days,
As I remember the times spent...on Erie Street.
The house wasn't much to look at,
Although it was grand in its day.
But we never got tired of visiting,
Or seeing the family on Sunday.
The floors were old and creaky,
The walls were strong and tall.
The yard was ever the smallest,
Yet, we still found a way to play ball.
The clock in the kitchen kept pendulum time,
Its gentle gongs...as the hours were to go.
The louder sounds were of plinking from the front room,
As we banged the keys of the old piano.
The sweet aromas from the bakery next door,
Wafted over us, and the neighborhood in the air.
Always reminding one of that pleasant place,
Filled with caked and cookies and eclairs.
We didn't understand the words,
That our grandparents' were to say.
That "Polish" banter between them and our parents,
Have kept their secrets even today.
While our moms were helping Grandma in the kitchen,
Our dad were on the porch playing cards.
As for us...we ran our little games,
More and more noise from the yard.
Only memories now remain,
And sometimes after a day of aching hands and weary feet,
My mind turns to those more pleasant days,
As I remember the times, spent on Erie Street.
For my friends in Erie, PA.
If you've found this poem, congratulations. You've just solved my most intricate social puzzle to date. As your reward, you now have access to all my angsty works of "art" (dare I call it that) from my teenage years. You also have all my more recent "I'm bored and alone" poems from the past couple years. You'll notice a steep decline in those, for notable reasons.
Congratulations. Let the roasting begin.
Around 2004,
my family and I started
going on vacations to Erie
twice a summer.
Accompanying us on these excursions
were the Jenkinses--
family friends who were more like actual family.
In addition to our typical week at the beach,
they joined us for a sneak peek weekend
earlier in the summer
where we stayed at a hotel by the airport.
We'd sit on the lawn,
watching planes,
us kids running around,
the adults drinking beer.
The outside pool was
our home.
Cole & I would jump into
the deep end ad infinitum,
never ceasing to find the utmost joy
in so simple an act.
He commented on the blonde
strands of hair on my head,
I lied and said that was my natural color--
just wanted to be blonde.
But now the hotel is relegated only to memory;
the long, entrance hallway;
breakfast area where I burnt my mouth
by sipping hot chocolate
through a straw,
like a dumbass,
in 2005.
When Hugh and Ron got drunk together
and pissed a lake of mighty size,
their eery neighbor also spilled it
and let his eery waters rise.
By far superior was another
with depths of thirteen hundred feet.
His superiority was awesome
which Hugh, Ron, Eery couldn’t beat.
Below them lay Ontario Lago,
a bloke whose name is not much fun
because no matter how I turn it
I can’t create a lakey pun.
ERIE LOVE
Erie yet ever so beautiful
Your love runs through me
Captured is my mind you see
My heart so readily-plentiful
8/26/18
Written words by James Edward Lee Sr.©2018
I write to the minds of naive
Honors of boring bathe
Less understanding than homage
Exactly exceptions students
Lackey of Britain
None request competent understanding
For my illusive quill, as Elizabethian
Mastering forms above fragile die
Pleasing peasants groveling
Yes again I am thus of betters
Swelling satisfaction
American Irish Jazz Women
Nubility afar
Daring silence
Squandered Scottish flem
Welfare is costly to my crown
To see the earthly resentment
Of Ireland
In her American
Per chase of the heart
Down to lent
Repent in sayings before
Ashed inscription
Told
Without reply she walks in a sun
Fide et Amore, Italia
Aetheistic concealed brevity
Reluctant canvas of poetry
Projection of a middle path
Project re deck
Stacks end racks
Build out change
Sisters of in mate position
Split same lunch run ons
AUTUMN
Dusk sets in.
Cool breeze filters through stones on the pier.
Distant lights of the city glare, opposed
By a sun of scarlet and orange
Disappearing through waves
Beckoned by the sand.
Trees nearly naked stand as soldiers
Behind the shore guarding the water
And its unending journey,
Moving only in rhythm with the wind.
Light gently fades
Dimming the horizon to nothingness.
WINTER
Frozen patterns of beauty
Scrawled as nature’s marking.
Crisp leaves of cold
Standing watch over a hardened lake.
Blanketing layers of ice
Coat the shore, silent save for the wind.
A setting sun gives of itself
The last warmth of the day,
A dying time as dark sets in,
Leaving cold bitterness, it drops
Below the horizon,
Chilling the flesh of the Village.
SPRING
Sunset casts its narrow ray across the water.
On the far horizon, the top of a sail slightly seen
With each swell of the waves then disappearing again.
Storm breeze chills at the touch of skin.
Violently waves approach
Battering rocks on the pier.
Breaking high,
Surf mists couples as they watch
Feeling water cling to their clothes.
SUMMER
Sun sets in the west
Where children yearn for their freedom.
Shadows resist the streetlamp’s glow,
Drawing insects in the haze.
Warm and damp, silence shades the town.
Liquor bottles replace the nourishment of mother’s milk,
Graduate potions for the poisonous dark,
Where the children congregate
Awaiting the weekend’s potential.
END OF SUMMER
Help me bring our boat ashore
And stow away the sails.
You’ve shown me trust in a human heart,
And taught how friends can share their warmth,
If only for a little while.
I don’t wish these days to end,
But different dreams we’ve drawn in the sand
And carved in these stoic cliff walls.
We must now follow our separate paths.
Summer’s over, it’s time to part
And return this ship to pier.
Huntington Beach Sunset first published in High Tide Still Heart: Collection of Shells, Solitude & Ocean Rhythm, Blue Crystal Literary Magazine, 2026, all rights reserved. ISBN 106727832X