Long Lanham Poems
Long Lanham Poems. Below are the most popular long Lanham by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Lanham poems by poem length and keyword.
My heart is like a swollen stream,
a current strong and swift,
beside which banks the mountain giants
their rugged forms uplift.
My heart is like a wilderness,
a darkening wood, a desert sand,
a tempest on a heaving sea,
a blizzard in a frozen land.
My heart is like the deep of night,
the pearling of a dawn in May,
a quiet pool, the winsome strain
a song bird sings at break of day.
My heart is like volcano fire,
seething terror at the core,
an open mouth, a vast desire
forever hungry, craving more.
My heart is like a gentle rain,
the greening of a field in spring,
a sighing breeze through tender leaves,
a butterfly on glistening wing.
My heart is like a somber dirge
in sorrow's lonely, minor key,
a gripping ache, a widening void,
a vacillating mystery.
How shall I ever meet myself,
elusive stranger, face to face,
when I must search a universe
where each thought holds a hiding place?
© 1987, Faye Lanham Gibson
She bore five sons, strong young men,
all volunteered way back then;
the youngest lied about his age
so he could join, engage
the enemies of freedom's band,
threatening the peace our land
holds precious. They said good-bye
to fight on land, sea, in sky.
Part of the greatest generation,
they fought the Axis federation.
Many brave men did not return,
their grieving families left to yearn,
longing to find, to know one spot
that is for them a sacred plot.
Thousands of graves were never marked
save in a mother's or wife's heart.
Somehow my grandmother's boys were spared;
death did not take them unprepared.
Safely home came all five sons;
the job complete, the war was won.
But, it's never done for those who fight,
the horrors in their minds recite
round and round for scores of years:
price exacted of our volunteers.
Copyright, July 6, 2014
Faye Lanham Gibson
I have grown old and twisted with all my living;
my limbs gnarled and arthritic,
my skin rough, sometimes peeling,
turning dark beneath the sun.
Bunions and corns decorate my feet.
What a life I have lived!
In my youth, young natives sat on tender grasses at my feet;
i sheltered them in coolness,
i listened to their vows of love.
Months later, they returned to me holding the joy of new life.
I rocked their papoose in my arms,
the wind sighing lullabies through my evergreen hair
making the silver moss, hanging on my tresses, sway.
I saw them leave before the growing strength of new settlers,
weeping as they walked away from this beloved land.
A wealthy man settled the grounds where I spread my roots;
I grew and wrapped my arms around the home he built.
I was young then, strong and full of vigor;
I was the watchman at the door.
I enjoyed many years with the family,
playing with the children,
giving shade and shelter.
Early one morning, the sounds of war disturbed my sleep;
all day the battle raged.
Cannon balls ripped through my flesh;
I heard the anguished screams.
When the sun set,
the ground beneath my feet was littered
with the broken bodies of men,
dead and dying,
soldiers uniformed in both blue and gray.
Our beautiful home was nearly destroyed,
our land ravaged.
If men could only learn, as I know,
to respect and care for one another.
As time passed, my limbs healed,
through scarred, just as my heart is scarred.
Generations have come and gone,
each one passing close to my heart in fleeting succession,
but I live on.
Age shows on my body, yet I cling more tightly,
stretching deep into the ground, sucking the earth's sweet nourishment.
My arms droop low, hanging heavy with sad and happy memories.
I do not want to leave this dear, fair earth,
the tears of heaven fall,
trickling down,
bathing me in dewy sadness.
A thousand years is not enough.
Copyright, August 22, 2015
Faye Lanham Gibson
I have a fear of drowning in deep waters, dark and cold;
I dream the waves are parted revealing Death's threshold.
I wonder, trembling in my bed, if another life I've known;
is there a body beneath the sea, dissolved, bone of my bone?
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
We boarded the Titanic, her maiden voyage from the shore,
just the two of us together, me and my husband Isidore.
Grandly cradled on the ocean within the ship of dreams,
unaware an ice tower waited in the frigid, black extremes.
Roast squab and French ice creams, champagne and caviar
were the first class luxuries, sailing on beneath the stars.
Near midnight the vessel shuddered as though wounded in the heart;
we waited captain's orders to load the lifeboats, disembark.
"Women first!" the crew commanded; older men could also go,
but Isidore would not depart, the truest gentleman I know.
He entreated me to leave the ship, but like Ruth of long ago,
I replied, "We've lived together many years. Where you go, I go."
We faced Death as we faced life, companions to the end . . .
climbing the staircase to heaven, hand in hand with my best friend.
The story of Isidore and Ida Strauss is true; they were first class passengers on the Titanic. Isidore was co-owner of Macy's. My connection to Ida is fiction.
The grand staircase on the Titanic was called "the staircase to Heaven."
Faye Lanham Gibson
Copyright, June 22, 2014
I seek to love You for Yourself,
not for the profit I will gain;
if prison walls are all I know,
my love should grow and never wane.
Within myself I have not strength
to love You, Lord, the way I ought;
but if I yield my all to Thee
then You can do what I could not.
I love You, Lord, no more than I
love those who closely share my life;
and if at them I take offense
or pleasure find in any strife,
I have not learned to love at all.
So often I have failed the test
when most I thought I really loved;
Lord, I would learn Your way is best.
I must have You! Oh, more and more,
I need Your presence in my heart;
I cannot have too much of You!
It seems I've just begun to start
to know the fullness of Your life.
Your way of love is far too high
for my poor heart to comprehend.
I need Your love; my love must die.
So love Yourself, my God, through me,
and may my life a channel be
where love in rivers, calm and clear,
Flows on in true simplicity.
Cut deep the gorge within my heart;
the stony contents wear away.
let fountains of Your love and joy
burst forth and brighten someone's way.
Faye Lanham Gibson
Copyright, 1987
There were tears on my face as I
sat with back to you on the boat,
my soul writhing in anguish,
burning pain rising in my throat.
Who wants to fish away from home
when she just laid her little boy
beneath the dank, dark, heavy ground?
No fish of size would bring me joy
should it attack my tempting bait.
You did not understand, though you
loved each of us--both him and me;
he was not flesh of your flesh. True
it is, I was angry...angry
at you for wanting me to go.
You thought this trip would do me good,
but fishing is your thing, you know.
There were burning tears on my face,
as I sat trying to forgive you;
God helped me and for love I did,
the love that gives all lives value.
No bitterness can be allowed
to cause his memory to dim.
Those tears have wafted on the wind,
blending with love to write a hymn
that sings in sunshine or in rain,
across the miles, across the years:
I find forgiveness easier
since my sad heart was washed by tears.
Copyright, Faye Lanham Gibson
May 21, 2014
I walk away because I love you so;
I go because I long too much to stay
beside you, O, my love, from day to day,
to watch with you from dawn to sunset's glow.
I would my love did round about you flow--
that all your kindnesses I might repay--
as freely as a river toward the bay,
that I might lose myself in you and show
how truly I do love you. Within thee
I find much deeper, richer grows my soul;
I am not lost in losing all. Empty
would I be, lost in you beyond control;
for there I find my peace, my surety,
kept safe within the ocean of your soul.
Faye Lanham Gibson
Copyright, 1987
Already the leaves are staining red,
Blood, too thin, seeps through taut skin,
Capillaries weak walled and weeping;
Dying Summer bows proud head,
Emptied of green glory;
Filled, fiery cauldrons blaze red-orange,
Golden flamed tongues glowing.
How harsh that she must fly
Into the great beyond,
Jettisoned like a human soul
Killed before its time.
Letting go, whether fast or slow,
Makes no variance in the pain;
Numbingly, it strikes the heart
Over and over again.
Passionate, she would linger,
Queenly in her floral gown,
Regaled for stunning splendor;
Sympathy never his approach,
Time beats a strong percussive stroke
Unstoppable, dispensed in quick cadence.
Valiantly she struggles, clinging,
While wild winds hew each leaf down;
Xylogenous lichen sparsely veils
Yearning limbs laid vulnerable and bare:
Zephyrus and Chloris frolic there no more.
Note: Zephyrus, the gentle god and personification
of the west wind, the bringer of light spring and
summer breezes in Greek mythology; he abducted
and fathered children with the goddess Chloris and
gave her the domain of flowers.
Xylogenous - living on or in wood
Copyright, August 15, 2014
Faye Lanham Gibson
They sat beside each other
in a classroom long ago;
he says he had a crush on her,
she says she did not know.
Now their footsteps softly echo
in the hallways where they walked;
school house walls, were they not silent,
would divulge the words they talked.
Old bully Time, pushing , shoving,
maneuvering our lives along;
once looking back, we wonder . . .
was this the right choice or the wrong?
Yesterday. he did not speak a word,
silence-- struck dumb by boyish fears;
he went his way, she went her own-
counting twinned rosaries of tears.
Faye Lanham Gibson
Copyright, 4-20-2014
I find your face within a crowded room
and wait to catch your look, knowing fully
love will leap all space drawing me to thee,
to your heart. Like a babe within the womb
I am sheltered, safe from threats that loom
upon my daily horizon. Swiftly
your love does reach unseen, enfolding me,
rebuking all the loneliness and gloom.
Thus we stand while between the babble grows,
and all around us flies the noisy din.
You are so near to me, yet no one knows.
The words that your heart speaks I hear within;
in silence, deep, your love about me flows.
I go; you, only, know where I have been.
© 1987, Faye Lanham Gibson