My friend comes through and talks to me,
With their stuck nails being all I can see.
Instead of listening further,
I get my wrench and try to loosen the nails,
Trying to make them no longer be a problem.
However, what I couldn’t see,
Was that my wrench was damaging the nails,
The ones in my friend,
And they were only getting tighter in their flesh.
I reflect on my wrench, and I feel it’s broken.
But when I reflect some more, I realize it’s not broken.
Wrenches aren’t able to get nails out.
They would’ve asked for my nail puller if they wanted me to do that.
Even then, the pain of the nail would still be there from the force.
If I listened more to my friend, and stopped putting fixing their problems up to me,
Maybe the nails would’ve actually come a bit looser less forcefully,
And this, because I love them, I wish I could see.
Jesus, the incarnate, told parables to his people.
Like the poets, figurative language, he cleverly used.
Pharisees and Sadducees showed as though they were legal.
At the law of love of Jesus, yet, like Gnus, they're confused.
Were Pharisees and Sadducees like children in the street?
They weren't simple, immaculate, sensitive, and thoughtful.
In them, hatred for the counsel of God had been complete.
They were arrogant, aggressive, cowardly, and spiteful.
They were pipers, who wished the poor to dance to their tunes.
They wished the lowly to live like mourners at funerals.
Theologies and philosophies, they thought, were there boons.
In their mental equipoise, yet, they were mere juveniles.
Though Jesus mocked them, molding them was his mere intention.
As flesh needs blood, they're in need of divine intervention.
They call me the poetic master
a genius storyteller
writing poetry
channels the inner Frankenstein in me
with a simple press of a key
in each rhyme and stanza:
I can craft a lucid love story
into a dynamic Romeo and Juliet tale!
I can craft a smooth nature poem
into an oil painting of figurative language!
I can craft a facile poem of Bahamian nationalism
into a rejuvenated national anthem!
I can craft a plain tribute to persons I admire
like producing life like clones from rented samples of their DNA !
I can even craft a vague comedic poem
into a skit on Saturday Night Live !
This mind looks for a picture,
thinking of mental image
as well as the deep structure
of figurative language.
Note: This form is called Tanaga, a traditional short Filipino poem which is only a quatrain, having 7 syllables in each line. The rhyming schemes may be aaaa, aabb, abab or abba.
Easter of the Resurrection of Christ
Protestants were supposedly persecuted
for their faith,
so they left England.
In America they annihilated Natives
and in their protest
they abandoned Christ
for Rabbit and the egg hunt,
as if rabbits were egg-laying.
They are falsifying the history
and falsifying reality,
distorting figurative language
and rhetorical figures.
Translated from Georgian into English by Manana Matiashvili
All that figurative language
I’ve acquired from you:
“Life is tough”,
“Sweet is the soul”,
“Sky’s the limit”,
“Truth will out”.
“Knowledge is power”,
“Weep and you weep alone”,
One can be “all at sea” sometimes,
“The heart of man is like waters of the well”,
“Guest is sent from God”,
“Let go and let God”…
And so on… and so many sayings
Am collating now into poems
And stitching stories…
But seems as if Alazani River
Has washed them out
And taken all the words.
Three years passed,
Hence our roles have changed,
I play the same games, mostly “housing”…
Just now am standing jammed
At juncture of the ground and sky,
Hesitating to choose direction, it means,
I have no idea to blow warmth up
Or to blow down…
Who will play with me with shifted roles?
The games named: “schooling”,
“housing” and “motherhood“?
Genres: life, family, sad, personality
A small kernel, a tiny seed,
drifts into a fertile mind,
floated by inspiring muse,
sometimes angry, sometimes kind.
In furrows richly watered
ideas imbed, softening;
anticipated, cracking shell,
swift burst at kernel's opening.
Pale greening shoots, sprouting branch,
vining leaves garner images,
sparkling similes, metaphors,
figurative language usage.
Minutes, hours, days may pass,
creative imagination increased;
the flower forms, then ripened fruit--
cycle complete, a poem released.
Copyright, August 10, 2014
Faye Lanham Gibson