Best Paths Poems
The best paths move forward.
Don't waste your time looking back.
The things you've said, the things you've done,
Can never be brought back.
Don't waste the little time we have,
On anger or regret.
Just accept what we can't change,
Make peace and pay back debts.
Each new day is a fresh, new start.
Just learn from past mistakes.
No one's perfect, no not one,
Decide this day will be great.
Look up, have hope, move forward.
Let no one hold you back.
Do what you know is best for you,
And cut yourself some slack.
Sometimes there's no one to pick you up,
When you have had a fall;
But God helps those who help themselves,
When their back is against the wall.
Someone thinks so highly of you,
And knows what you can do,
The best friend you will ever have,
That friend, My Dear, is You.
The cemetery was fresh and vivid green
when we took our bikes down the paths of it -
past stones and trees and mausoleums and grass as far as we could see,
carefree on that muggy summer afternoon,
perspiration glistening on our arms and on our faces
as we sought to stay on the shady side of each well-traveled lane.
Instinctively we followed Dale, our older red-haired fun-loving brother,
turning here and there; it didn’t matter. We had no destination,
no gravesites of friends or relatives to visit.
Sometimes we would spot an interesting tombstone,
jump off our bikes and take a closer look at it.
We were just kids, out of school for summer with no real obligations.
Our lives were a clean slate, not like the worn and broken headstones
we spotted sometimes on the cemetery’s edge, the older area’s grave stones
whose names were hard to read and dates went as far back as the 1800’s.
Those were emblems of an ancient past for us.
It was 1965! We were the modern generation and the future loomed
as large for us
as those many squared city blocks the cemetery measured.
Flash forward two decades to 1984. I was married with two small kids
and back in my hometown; things around me seeming so much smaller,
and the future loomed not quite so large ahead of me this time.
Most of my sisters were married but leading separate lives in different states.
We all had pressing obligations, so our reunion could not be a long one.
No longer were my sisters and I carefree, and we were not riding bikes.
We rode in cars that followed one another in a line;
the cemetery was cold and dismal grey that December day
as we gathered around the unearthed sod,
staring, unbelieving, into the giant hole that was to be the final resting place
for the brother whom we’d once followed so gleefully
along the shady paths of vivid green
"Paint in silence”
“The Weight of Temp”
Colour your canvas and spill your Art
shake and awaken many a heart
Untether your soul
from your whole
escape mundane and time
and let your brush rhyme
Have Man radiate
pour oil colours on his trait
Carve his seized dreams
and his insight of flowing streams
Let me read his cry of birth
and see the drops of tears on earth
A valiant core, the shell is worn
could not be broken, though torn
You display a challenging stand
behind a back forced to bend
*****
Radiant and on the wane
Bliss and pain
Loss and gain
A Life to hail
Trodden paths not in vain
Shall we complain?!
*****
Alienated and empty
but oozing out Faith and Beauty
Once hailing many a dawn
now only dusk to look on
Of resistance, endurance and devotion
bow in dignity to God’s laws of creation.
https://images.app.goo.gl/VvcUK547YBxBkN9n7
Besma
August 6th, 2021
Rest yourself here where water lies calm
still, you could fly
to perch on tempestuous cloudy bank
perhaps to remain
safety a foreign ideal you’ve rarely felt
for you, comfort seems to come with upheaval
still, you could stay
in the quest to find who you might be
perhaps to entrust
that you are enough and worthy too
for I recall where your viridity began
still, life gives trials
People to test next to those to emulate
perhaps you’ll select
where you won’t go or who you can’t be
The Paths We Choose
by Edmund Siejka
When I was a young writer
I read all the greats
Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Yeats, James Joyce
And so on
I could write like them I said
So I felt good about myself
And wrote a play
In the heat of August, 1976.
Beating the lines on an old portable typewriter,
Rubber mat placed under its steel frame,
To keep from annoying the neighbors
But the walls in the East Village were thin
And next door guessed
What are you doing writing a novel?
She asked
I kept typing
And the rejections piled up
It was then I realized that I was attempting the near impossible
So I stopped.
Something came over me
I started writing again in 1992
Two unpublished novels
And inevitably
The mailman would trudge up the front steps
Lips pursed in a tight, thin line
Rejections coming in like a winter storm
I poured over each one trying to decipher their true meaning
But it was no use.
I wrote a poem in 2009
To my surprise it was accepted
Followed by an email from the editor
Requesting more of my “stuff”.
Someone recommended that I give a reading
At a local library
Start small they advised.
And so I found myself
In a crowded room of poets and strangers
When my name was finally called
I approached the podium
Determined and focused.
After reading my piece
I searched
The audience for their reaction
Waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Once upon a stranger,
a girl — a well-intentioned woman —
walked with an open soul,
her eyes silvered with withheld sighs.
Behind that quiet gaze,
a seraphic smile concealed its sorrow,
gleaming through daydreams,
as folk songs whispered of her tender defiance.
Once upon a moment,
I heard soft whispers fade —
inside a bus on a starry August night.
She rose to glimpse the world once more,
hope glimmering heavy in her eyes,
half in joy, half in fear.
Once upon what it seemed,
the empty streets turned mirrors —
cold storefronts, dim alleys.
By night she stumbled through silence,
by day she wore her wounds as armor,
wandering through the city’s dense forest
of unaccompanied paths.
An unchained soul, yet caged
by society’s ugly parodies —
cells built from shame and duty.
She pondered the dreams reality killed
as she passed through shanty streets,
escorted by echoes of laughter now gone.
Once again her hope returned:
to fill the void with beauty,
to rise above the dimmed faces of her class.
Her dreams, still burning,
to rekindle the lonely, to build what she was denied —
a quiet joy that glowed against despair.
Once upon a loop of forever after,
lamentations deepened.
Between forced vows and a fractured home,
she lived a life too succinct —
raped, abused, unseen.
Darkness grew familiar,
a slow descent into thoughts unspoken.
And her world took its turn —
the light grew distant,
and she folded into herself,
too late for prayers or wishing wells.
Once upon a stolen dream.
Once upon a neglected childhood.
Once upon a trembling womanhood.
Once upon time, and time again.
A bowed head,
seeking shelter from the tempest —
and as she lies on her five-foot mat,
deep in sleep where dreams unfold,
the queen rises once again,
seraphic and free
in her ultimate paradise.
Avenues of life
Even Cul de Sacs return
Seek, follow their path!
.
There's
a path
that
leads to
heavenly
realms where
God
and His
glory dwell.
A narrow path
that few will
choose. But
wide
is the
path and
easy
that
leads to
hell.
6/6/15
The form I used here is called a "Waltz Wave"
We walk down
forgotten paths
on the way to
eternity
Ancient stone structures
line the path
We feel the weight
of the years
on our shoulders
We experience a sense
of deja - vu momentarily
Surely we have walked this road before
But no, we soon realize
we soon realize we have never gone
before
and that it is the way we must go
and that we must hurry for we have a date
with destiny
sprinted by the love of lust
firmly walked by those who trust
breathed upon by warm desire
moments spent beside the fire
plotted out with marked restraint
fallen to by swoon and faint
gazed upon with starry eyes
muddy from heartbroken cries
baptized by a single tear
never trod by those who fear
timid, shy, reluctant feet
mindful of the stones we meet
stumbled on by reckless feet
softened where two lovers meet
blind to any right or wrong
lost within a lover’s song
blind to where the path will lead
lost to travel paths of need
With timid steps and a trembling heart
I walked through verdant barren paths.
Toward a rusty gate it took my feet
Into a garden of roses among the weeds.
Carmine flowers, dripping in blood
Wrung my heart in pain of fear.
They caught me from every side
With their lithe and sharp thorny fingers.
Raveled in clutches of copious wines
Turning and twisting I struggled to escape.
Evening shades pirouetting ghosts
Trapped in light tracing fiery faces.
Pouring perspiration pooled my feet
Shedding grappling thoughts I decided to run.
Back to the sinuous path,
Away from the puzzle of life,
Till I reached the black bricked wall,
Beyond it I lost my memories,
Maze of mind closing behind me.
First Place in Maze - 10 Word Challenge Poetry Contest sponsored by A Dear Heart
My head is twisted and
confused, there are paths to
ignore and paths to choose.
I sit within and contemplate,
for I cannot go back on my
chosen fate.
Some I must run and others I
crawl, a few I must pause,
before I trip and fall.
I cannot close my eyes in fear,
only with my heart can I hear.
I move to the left and look to
the right, my mind is a maze
with no end in sight.
I can't be too hasty and I can't
be too slow, each step is a
choice, my rhythm and flow.
I shan't forget my biggest
hurdle, each path has its own
confusing riddle.
Whichever I choose to lead or
ignore, affects myself and those
in my core.
There is only one beginning, so I
can't go astray, but the end is
limitless and so I must pray.
I pray for guidance and for
faith, I pray I keep my strength
and wait.
I pray I choose the right path
for me, and hope its best for all
to see.
I pray for choices I've already
made, I pray for decisions I've
yet to say.
I pray to the heavens that the
life I live, is a blazing path of
love to give.
Here I walk alone down a distant shore,
Watching the sunset, as clouds drift away,
With the hopes that our paths will cross once more.
My mind feels empty and my nerves feel sore,
Wishing to meet again some other day,
Here I walk alone down a distant shore.
Recalling how my heart sank to the floor,
Not knowing exactly what I should say,
With the hopes that our paths will cross once more.
You turned away, and then walked out the door,
Even after I had begged you to stay,
Here I walk alone down a distant shore.
I keep walking, my tears begin to pour,
Wondering what sort of price I must pay,
With the hopes that our paths will cross once more.
I remember promises we once swore,
And yet, you are not here with me today.
Here I walk alone down a distant shore,
With the hopes that our paths will cross once more.
© 2020
coming through the fog on the road leading somewhere are lights on the path
12/25/2019
You could have ripped out my eyes
You could have plucked at my heart strings
I’d have let you do all these things
Because you were worthy
You were my Queen
You were my ally
We were coalescing
Until our paths diverted
Down different routes
But I just want to say
I still think about you
No hard feelings
And no regrets
I wish you all my love
I wish you all the best
I don’t ever think ill find
Anyone like you
But I keep an open mind
And open eyes as well
Because what the future holds
We can never tell
But I wish you well
And I hope you find
Just what you’re looking for.