water
shapeless and mute
brings all within its milieu
transcending the differences
shaped by dry bigotries
Categories:
bigotries, water,
Form: Verse
("July 7 - Hot and Blue", 2024, original encaustic)
Turning to Become
As they say, humans are like onions,
Densely layered and prone to making others cry.
But I think a better metaphor is Earth herself,
After all the Good Book tells us
We are created in God’s image.
At the surface all is sweetness and light,
The abundant fruits of survival’s tricky game,
While just below tectonic plates drift to a darker rhythm
Leading to all sorts of uncontrollable forces,
And at the core, something unknown,
But pure and original nonetheless.
So with us, we show our best at the surface,
While just below swell the barely repressed tides
Of biases and bigotries, passions and poisons.
And at our core the mysterious essence abides,
Pure but powerful,
The clear light of primordial awareness
For lack of a better, poetic term.
Each of us is such a complex world,
The micro expressing the macro,
Each of us challenged with being ourselves
And getting along with others.
From cradle to grave Life is the constant,
While we the change
The world is turning to become.
(7/10/24)
Categories:
bigotries, earth, extended metaphor, psychological,
Form: Narrative
Juneteenth
June...back in nineteen-fifty eight, just sixty years ago,
Unknown to me, nine hundred miles away in the mid-South,
Never did I think of anything that would foreshadow...
Equal rights for me...denied to people of black color.
The waiting rooms and restrooms, solely marked as black or white:
Extremes prevailed with front and back seats taken on a bus;
Enjoying drinks from water fountains...marked, which one was right.
Nothing at home prepared me for those bigotries and 'hates'
That shocked me then, just newly married, moving with my spouse.
How could this be...in this, our land of free...United States?
Sandra M. Haight
~2nd Place~
Contest: Juneteenth
Sponsor: Edward Ibeh
Judged: 07/15/2018
Juneteenth, also known as Juneteenth Independence Day or Freedom Day, is an American holiday that commemorates the June 19, 1865, announcement of the abolition of slavery in the U.S. state of Texas, and more generally the emancipation of enslaved African-Americans throughout the former Confederacy of the southern United States. Ref. Wikipedia
Categories:
bigotries, discrimination,
Form: Acrostic
Doctor Martin Luther King Junior
a black man from Atlanta, Georgia.
An activist and visionary
he spoke against racial injustice.
This Nobel Prize-winning man of peace
preached tolerance and non-violence.
Challenging bigotries and hatred
he marched against discrimination.
He struck a match against ignorance,
lighting liberty's torch for freedom.
And boldly opposed segregation,
standing up to white America.
His public-speaking abilities
both enraged his foes and won him friends.
And government bigots denounced him
as a dangerous agitator.
A pacifist, he shared his dream of
whites and blacks united in friendship.
Unshackled from the past, free at last,
"thank The Lord All Mighty, free at last."
His light refused to be extinguished
when James Earl Ray shot him in Memphis.
And now his life is celebrated
each year, on Martin Luther King day.
(Blank Verse)
11/14/2017
Categories:
bigotries, america, character, courage, destiny,
Form: Blank verse
People tend to analyze what they do;
Hoping to discover just who they are.
It's one way to see our species anew,
Little groups that we study from afar.
Often, we fault those of low intellect,
So easily led by egos and pride.
Old bigotries are immune to neglect;
Paradoxically, they haven't yet died.
High ideals are subjected to fraud,
Insomuch as our motives seem spiky.
Zealots and prophets oft interject God
into Mankind's vulnerable psyche.
Nothing is as critical as id is,
Giving Man a sense of all that is His.
Categories:
bigotries, deep, fate, feelings, humanity,
Form: Acrostic