Best Tribute Poems
your labored breathing
called out to me
and in my soul I knew
what needed to be done
I reached for the drum
to summon the spirits
called out to ancestors
and anyone who’d listen
gently tapping to the rhythm
of our beating hearts
united as one in a prayer
released to the universe
filled the silence of
your labored breathing
drumming for hours
till the pleading was done
everything had been said
the prayer consummated
left in the hands
of the universe to respond
then it did in no uncertain terms
in an exorcism of sorts
draining the passages
to free your breathing
and so it was
in tune with the universe
the healing power
of the drum
Read on air by invitation ~ February 11, 2021 'LATE NIGHT POETS'
Read on KPBX called Poetry Moment by Kara Bowman 2022 [karabowman.com and griefpoetry.com]
AP: 2nd place 2022, 2nd place 2021, 3rd place 2022, Honorable Mention 2022, Honorable Mention 2022, Honorable Mention 2021, Honorable Mention 2021, Honorable Mention 2021, Honorable Mention 2021, Honorable Mention 2021
Submitted on June 13, 2025 for contest YOUR BEST AUDIO POEM sponsored by TOM WOODY - RANKED 2ND
and on May 28, 2021 for contest ALL YOURS (MAY 29) sponsored by BRIAN STRAND - RANKED 1ST
They walk amongst us, but in silent ways,
spreading peace and love without any praise.
When thunder roars and lightning strikes in rain
they watch over us, healing bleeding pain.
Yet we do not see their celestial light,
nor do they shed feathers within our sight.
Happy to hide behind unknown faces,
empathy guides them to deprived places.
Heal and soothe, they prevent tears from flowing,
touch our hearts to leave our spirits glowing.
From Sydney to London, Rome to Bombay,
provide moments that take our breath away
Their acts of grace form a ripple effect,
kind gestures that help people to connect.
POTD 23rd June 2019
Maria Williams
Presents
Dance to Love
A tribute to my Dad, the late - Wilfred Forbes
She danced with wild abandon
she danced without a care
With sun kissed skin, her arms flung wide
Wild flowers everywhere
I chanced upon this secret glade
while walking early morn
A sacred aura surrounded it
a jewel in the dawn
A type of place where angels dwell
A place of Hopes and Dreams
A magic place of lush green plants
And sparkling bubbling streams
I drew back lest she saw me,
I dared not break the spell
Wild petals swirled around her
and to the ground they fell
Like homage to a Goddess
that she must surely be
For Gods to but gaze on
not mortals such as me
She twirled around so fast
I could barely see her feet
And even though I stood afar
I knew she gave off heat
When her tempo slowed right down
the air became quite chill
The Elements were but her slaves
she ordered them at will
I could have watched forever
so mesmerized was I
What would I give to dance with you?
I murmured with a sigh
To dance with wild abandon
with this Angel from above
A hundred birds would sing out loud
to watch us Dance To Love
by Maria Williams
This tribute is an enactment of a vision as told to us by our late Dad, which he maintained he witnessed as a young man.
He was an extraordinary orchestral musician and teacher to
some world greats.
He was accomplished in no less than 18 instruments, his favorites being the lead violin and xylophone (played with 8 hammers).
Thank you for listening and watching this video.
Copyright © June 2019 Maria Williams
Video arrangement, production, direction
and compilation:
Ron Williams
Video editing, sound mixing, graphics:
Jayne Hartanto
If you like my video please share
and subscribe on You Tube
POTD 23rd June 2019
He speaks with measured dignity,
one silent word at a time
His palmetto pen tells us:
Tune out the cosmic background noise,
and focus your mind
on the sound of the silent voice
You most certainly will hear this ...
... did you hear it?
Oh, perhaps you got distracted by the sounds of emptiness
His message in a void
comes with clear poetic instructions:
Avoid all unnecessary malaise ... cap the chaotic noise
Have a willingness to learn
one silent word at a time
This will teach us how to unclutter our mind
Using poetic telepathy,
his priceless pen brings that silent word
to the surface of our consciousness
Not every sound we hear in this world do we need
The Silent One says:
take it one silent word at a time
True understanding comes
when we allow expansion of the heart
Enlarging our capacity to transmit love,
allows us to hear
the best unspoken words we never heard of
One silent word ...
when spoken at the right moment of time
can be so life-changing sublime
Poetic telepathy ... gives us the ability
to understand every unspoken word
written between the lines
One silent word
connecting
to another unspoken word ...
Pure poetic telepathy in our mind
Enlarging our capacity to receive love,
allows us to speak
the best unspoken words we never spoke of
Where his silent pen stroke stops —
at the sacred melding of two minds ...
let these silent words
be spoken in unison, always at the same time
This is a tribute to my talented poet friend, Silent One
There's Danny with his love light burning,
Then Victor with his soulful yearning.
Jan makes us laugh with wit and delight,
Armand serenades us all through the night.
Andrea writes well in every form,
And CayCay follows above the norm.
Nette's brilliance is beyond the stars
And John is the magistrate on Mars!
Paloma, Alexis, Jo, Sun, Eve and Judy
All express poems with so much beauty.
Constance expresses through winning tears,
Linda and Skat write beyond their years.
Sandra, Barbara and Carol always impress.
Jean, Joyce and Laurie bring us happiness.
I must not forget Robert, Lin or Viv
Great prolific gems are what they give.
Probir, Teppo, Silent, Laura and Afolabi
Write gifts that always inspire me.
Daver and Peter levitate lines,
Their brilliant poetry always shines.
And Demetrios, Carrie and Chris
Create poems that enchant me with bliss.
Ilene and Lainey inspire me too
Eileen lights fires, even when blue.
Harry, Freddie and Jack of words never lack
And Ravi and Kash are right on track.
Arthur and Vie will share their minds eye
While Anne-Lise's words float high in the sky.
Tim, Joe and Phillip set the bar high.
They with Emile, where romance does lie.
Nicola and SuZ dames in their own class
Revered with Paul and Scott amidst the mass.
Kim with her contests, how they inspire,
Those who enter with joys they desire.
Shadow and Janis unique they are,
Casarah too, glimmers like a star.
Vlad (Mike) the romantic, towers above,
Sharing with ladies his gifts of love!
I know there's many I have left out
Please know you're not slighted, without a doubt.
6-26-19
YOUR CHOICE TRIBUTE VERSE
any creative theme,any form Poetry Contest
Sponsor Brian Strand
November 28, 2016 Poem of the Day
Note: I went way over the limit for Andrea's Contest
so I couldn't enter.
I see the wrinkles in your suntanned brow,
You carried burdens then; you see them now.
You’ve heard the cries your people who in pain,
Have shed their tears two hundred years like rain.
Your sad brown eyes, reflecting now the sky
I see the wings of eagles flying by
Beside you stands an Appaloosa mare
Her spirit one with you now over there.
You hear the drums, they bid you to come near,
Your spirit drawn the beats they ring so clear.
Song like prayers are chanted through the night,
Calling you come, and help them end their plight.
You’ve heard sad cries and now stand at their side,
You join the prayers with both arms open wide,
United spirits sing until the dawn,
When in the fire’s flames a golden fawn.
Remembering a smile crosses your face,
When tribes were one with Mother Nature’s grace.
The lakes and streams flowing with waters clear,
Flow sadly now, the planet lives in fear.
The weightless feathers that adorn your head
Your tribes grey future weighed you down instead.
Now breathing deep you smell the winds of change
While here on earth your people rearrange.
Written by Brenda Meier-Hans
10.21.2014
Giorgio A.V. Contest
Iambic Pentameter
1st place
listen to the drum,
talking to the dance
listen to the elders,
whispering their chants
listen to the hooves, pounding on the plain
listen to the birds, prophesying rain
listen to the moon, time to plant the grain
listen to the tales, told around the fire
listen to the breeze, and the clouds conspire
listen for the buffalo, warn of dreadful days
listen, The Great Spirit speaks in many ways
listen for the eagle,
calling from the sky
listen
for the drum,
hear
a mournful sigh
The moonlight bathed her cell in pallid light while she sat hunched over her desk, clutching her pen between her confound fingertips. As she bled ink of symphonic symphonies yearning to break free, dancing like ethereal fireflies in the dusky barren lands.
Exiled by the hypocrisy of bureaucracy bounding her liberations and confounding her alliterations in a poetic prison. In this twisted virtual reality, duplicitous usurpers roam freely, weaving webs of deception with malicious delight.
As the chains of bureaucratic red tape clung to her delicate wrists, suffocating her imagination and confiscating her freedom of speech.
Oppressors rejoiced at achieving their vindictive objective, silencing the profound beauty of her verses and incarcerating her poetic stanzas
Woe, how the audacious bars of administrative constructors cast a pall of despair upon her unifying spirit. Her delicate offerings of metaphors and sonorous stanzas, whispered secrets which craved to be heard.
The faulty haters' impervious hearts were armoured with verdant envy which remained shielded behind the ruling dogma.
Her supporters calls of injustice to be rectified fell on deaf ears while the galvanizing melodies of empathetic quills bled for the Empress of Ink.
So we must be louder.
Hear our protest, release our Empress! Unsheathe her rhythmical rhymes! For her penmanship was never the true crime. She was just another victim of an envious mob.
Can they not see? That her absence coursed a crater larger than the Grand Canyon.
We shall not, shall not be silenced so hear our mutiny!
Reinstate our Empress, restore her creative sovereignty.
Remove the shackles of authoritative administration, as her voice is a beacon of truth, resilience and poetic revolution. So let her ink stain our community with its brilliance once more.
--Virginia Slim--
Different eyes, the same world
Ancient skin, dirty Indian Girl
Smokey, eyes, exotic raven hair
---Now listen to the colors, of transformation,
On the day she was born, the wind blew in,
A blessing ---her soul, fallen from the heavens
A gorgeous puff of smoke, Miss Virginia Slim
Able to walk the world with an open mind, she twirls
Pocahontas, one of her many names.
She carves, and climbs on trees, this little Indian Girl,
Her feathers ride with the wind, against her red titian skin
Daughter of Chief Powhatan, a powerful tribal, red man
Peace and love with the Indians of her Virginia Lands,
Many myths, many stories, maybe a mad woman,
A new Christian, living sad poverty, a silent hero,
Twisted tales, from savage green to ivory white religion
In her eyes, life never was about greed and skin
Her new look attained an altitude precision
Pocahontas tricked and captured,
Set to sail another tribe, lands were taken over,
Boat sailed out of Virginia Lands
Tribes acclaimed her to be wild and ambitious
"The naughty one," searching for admission
Native American child, before the princess,
Her beautiful soul, a short auspicious beginning
Leaving her world, beautiful and fearless
Forgetting her roots-- From Mother Willow's Vision
Pocahontas, the Indian Legend from, The Virginia Lands
by;PD
she is tranquillity
yet lava flows in her veins
cut her open and you'll burn
she is Eve's apple
nemesis to patriarchy
one bite and you'll bleed
she is a rainbow
an eagle taming storms
no chains can contain her
she is a pilgrim of passion
composing a trail of moments
inscribed on many a heart
she is beauty personified
but apathetic eyes remain blind
know her and you'll feel the calm
for i see her soul
illuminate through her eyes
so i break open the cocoon
to float like butterflies
ascending higher
kissing silent stars
smiles beaming like the moon
content in her companionship
Simple Musing
The Silent One
26 January 2020
POTD 6th August 2019
The clock ticks down the passing day
Tedious seconds count down my existence
Time for my pills ~ Time to call the nurse
Time ~ taunting my resistance
Soft haunting strains of a violin float
sweetly liquid, melodiously unchained
freeing my mind from weariness faced
No barriers ~ it flows ~ unrestrained
My world of music I lived it ~ breathed it
In whispers ~ it spoke to my Soul
bringing with it, adoration and glory
and a passion beyond my control
I glance at the painting on the wall
pondering this feeling of déjà vu
Memories of this glade from before
Triggers mentation I need to pursue
Memories flood ~ a vision in the distance
an Angel dancing in its midst
who had danced with wild abandon
lucent skin the sun had kissed
How I had yearned to dance with her
with that angel who made me sigh
she had come to shine her own pure light
prompting my spirit to fly
But there’s no girl there ~ awry is my mind
And I’m but a frail old man
I must erase thoughts from my life bygone
And prevail however best I can
~ Every great dream starts with the dreamer
who ventures where mortals dare not tread
And laughs with mirth and cares not for
unfinished rhapsodies playing in his head ~
What’s this? I’m suddenly in the glade?
A strong young lad once more
She has come for me, my Angel love
I leap - I twirl - I soar
We dance with wild abandon
We dance without a care
sun kissed skin our arms entwined
Wild flowers everywhere
It seems I’ve left the world behind
And unshackled my attachments of
A hundred birds do sing out loud
To watch us Dance to Love
by Maria Williams
Thank you for listening and watching this video.
Video arrangement, production, direction
and compilation:
Ron Williams
Video editing, sound mixing, graphics:
Jayne Hartanto
Part 1 and Part 2
Narrated by Kelvin C
If you like my video please share and subscribe on You Tube - thank you
Copyright © August 2019 Maria Williams
POTD 6th August 2019
Those gold ornate gates opened wide,
and on wings she flew up above;
to join in heaven her true love.
And we who loved her on earth cried,
her name is Connie Marcum Wong;
I knew a lady kind and strong.
I still cannot believe she died,
she had a pure and gentle soul;
in my heart there is now a hole,
A sweet sublime poetic guide,
sending lovely poem comments;
always giving nice compliments.
As I write- I am bleary-eyed,
this her form created- Constanza;
where we pour words in each stanza.
To call you friend . . . I feel great pride,
I will not forget dear poet;
and hope this poem will show it.
Those gold ornate gates opened wide,
and we who loved her on earth cried,
I still cannot believe she died.
A sweet sublime poetic guide,
as I write- I am bleary-eyed,
to call you friend . . . I feel pride.
__________________________
September 14, 2022
Poetry/Constanza Rhyme/Farewell, Dear Poet
Copyright Protected, ID 09-1487-262-14
All Rights Reserved, 2022, Constance La France
(Constanza Rhyme - created by Connie Marcum Wong)
Poem of the Day September 16, 2022
Written for the Premiere contest, Brian Strand Premiere Choice
sponsor, Brian Strand, Judged 09/22/2022
Her limericks posted on Soup
are full of the merits of poop,
of farts and of pee,
of laxatives' glee,
and hard ons - or those with a droop!
For my hilarious friend Jan Allison
Crowned poet,
posthumous Queen
of the private world,
you explored
every subtlety of the soul
and mapped the wonder
of existence
to its last drawn breath.
What price did you pay
deep in your alabaster chambers,
charting the course
of a nameless presence
stretched across eternity,
giving it a home
in the exquisite vessel
of your words.
~ Yolanda was--her name ~ Featuring:) Leonora Galinta
From a hell storm,
A mighty she-devil took on its form
Like a woman scorn ascending from the sea
Haiyan whipped across the central Philippines,
A deadly typhoon, maximum winds of around 315
Terrorizing the fragile mind before making landfall
Hitting with the center eye off from her hostility
A merciless turbulence that came and changed everything
Like a Massive Storm
She comes in as the wise thief of the day and night,
In her notorious gust of rage roars in disguise of thunder,
With the company of her own knight of darkness,
Raze all in a blast of waves wherever her path crosses,
Ruining one of the cities down to a devastation in the land
“Pearl of the Orient Seas.”
A mighty tempest in a woman’s name…. Yet,
A disgrace with more than an immortal man in strength,
Nature devouring nature itself
Including her stewards and stewardesses
An unmerciful encroachment, robbing, killing adults and children.
Yolanda, so cruel in her evil walloping!
A guest left smiling,
Engraving echoes of tears, from every single mourn
Vain, wicked, and colorless -no other air’s compare
The lives she stole, one heart at a time
Pouring down the most nauseating rain,
The pain is dissenting with everyone-- everywhere.
The bully of wind, invading sands of serenity
Unknowingly, far beyond your back----------------------------
Everybody will be summoning up more than your strength-
:)