I live in an oasis
One formed by the power of electricity
To pump day and night
From The River.
Day and night everyone along its shores
Waters their crops and yards, gardens and fields.
In the few years I’ve lived here
I’ve planted almost 500 trees and shrubs
To transform an old alfalfa field
Into a thicket of greens
Haven for mice and snakes, birds and bees.
Every day I faithfully reroute the irrigation
So that in a week it all gets watered.
If I don’t within just a few weeks
Everything would stop growing
And within just a few months
Everything would be dead.
It’s sobering to realize how tenuous our hold
On a place is.
Without electricity this whole farming valley
Would dry up and wither away.
With electricity, coming in fact from the water itself,
It is an oasis of life, calm and green
Filled with the joy of birds and bees
Humans and their trees.
My own place in it is temporary of course
But someone will come after
To keep the pumps going
Keep the sprinklers flowing
Until they don’t
And this moment in time is forgotten
As all things must be.
(5/5/26)
Witty words keep me sane
A giggle eases, life’s pain
When times are trying
Laugh through the rain
Reroute the grooves
Soften the grain
With faces stiff
A snooty drift
Good humor sees
Life is a gift
Minus a grin
Hard work won’t win
May spot the crowd
But won’t fit in
So when you choose
Smile over frown
You’ll lift the blues
A joyful sound
Liar! You liar! I'm so glad you told me now
'Cause now I have time to turn around and reroute
Now I can sit here and ponder on why it's always me
Why does EVERYBODY I meet - always deceive?
Now ya'll see why I'd so much rather be all alone
Why I'd so much rather be all alone in my little comfort-zone
'Cause that's exactly where I found that I would always be safe
In my zone is where I notice everybody else's mistakes
That's where I sit on my throne - and watch them all just take
That's also the same spot I go to fix my heart when it breaks
I find myself so deeply - a diamond in the rough
'Cause to everyone else - I'll never be enough
Everyone wants to have their cake - and eat it, too
Everyone just wants to take it ALL from you
Nobody ever wants to see anybody come out on top
Nobody can ever just realize they're a$$holes - and just stop
So I wear Skull Candy ear buds - to drown the whole world out
So I can never hear the that comes out everyone's mouth
So I'll simply turn and venture back to my tree house home
Where I'm the best version of myself whenever I'm alone
I travelled back down the road
on which we spent hours together,
incalculable time twisting our fates
like the vine covered walls we’d pass.
I travelled back down the road
with signs pointed toward your home
one way, and mine the other. Straight lines
and green lights sailing us through crossings.
No sunburnt ambers yet. No midway checkpoints.
I've travelled back down that road,
only years later now. The wheat still grows
in the countryside, the laybys still house dust.
That carpark where I solved the mystery of
the flashing dashboard was empty again.
I travelled back down that road,
driving into a past I loved as the present,
never thinking it a counterfeit future.
A fork in the road was drawn on your map only.
I travel back now, down this road, to a friend
who stayed as you left, who consoled as you
hid. Who helped reroute a direction
abandoned, for a different course unplanned.
I will travel along this road to the friend
who made all those journeys worth it.
THIS IS THE REROUTE
THE RUT FOR THE RAM
NOT LIKE A DODGE
WHERE YOU GOT
ALL YOU CAN
THIS IS THE REROUTE
LIKE A YEAR FOR A SCORE
A WANDER NOT REACHING
FOR A HEART TO WANT MORE
THIS IS THE REROUTE
A MOVE FOR A MESS
LIKE A MISS
YET THE SCENE ON
THE TURNPIKE'S
LIKE A VIEW THAT'S
A KISS
THIS IS THE REROUTE
NOT A DRIFT FOR A SEEMS
MORE LIKE A JOKE FOR
A JOURNEY THAT
LEAVES BEHIND DREAMS
THIS IS THE REROUTE
MORE A CAUSE A CONCERN
LIKE DIESEL THAT'S
BURNING IN YOUR HEART
THAT STILL YEARNS
THIS THE REROUTE
A RETURN FOR A REST
FOR THE GUIDE AND
THE GUARANTEE
OF SOMEONE WHO KNEW WHAT
WAS BEST
THIS IS THE REROUTE
THE END FOR A SCORE
THE HEART GETS
THE BEAUTY OF
THE LOVE THAT
WAS MORE
THIS IS MY REROUTE
MY TELL OF NO CARES
THAT SHOULD COST
THAT MY HIGHWAYS
MY BYWAYS WERE NOT
FOR SOMEONE WHO'S LOST
A. E. NELSON
. .MAY 2015.
I Want to live this world amazingly
But the habit of overthinking
Has been making things messy
The what ifs are being overpowered
The big childhood dreams
Are being shattered
It's like living in a time loop
An unstoppable droll
To which I must reroute
The end of senior year is bittersweet.
Most of our assignments are incomplete
Working the bare minimum to pass
Taking each day class by class
Senioritis has been here since third quarter
As the teacher’s patience gets shorter and shorter
The deadline are nearing
But they’re something none of us are hearing
There are more lasts than firsts
And the thought of college is making us burst
As much as we all want to get out
Oh, what I would do to just reroute
through your looking glass
redefine your prospects
reroute all efforts
stay an undiscovered self
reaffirm life's terms within
"The sounds of Earth is the music to my soul"
Birds chirp to wake me in the morn'
as if to detach me from my yawn.
Gratitude overwhelms the gift of today,
for we often pray to live another day.
Nature's most insightful trees
whisper advice beyond our degrees
for as much as we gather wisdom at schools,
nothing compares to Mother Earth's set rules.
I often look forward to the whistling waves,
as I partake in all its games
to throw me in and throw me back out,
until the day demands a reroute.
the sounds of nature are meant to touch us all ~
grace guarantees stillness when it calls.
10 August 2022
'Let Your Muse Be Inspired - R Form' Poetry Contest
Sponsored by Constance La France
R form chosen - Rhyme
RhymeZone, verified
ice bound by solitude
as electricity's comfort sputters in doubt
cold intrudes
from vast blind hours
light's sweet after a week without
power
complete
fine lines reroute
heat
ice bound by solitude
light's sweet after a week without
heat
2/28/21
(the syllable count was verified on howmanysyllables.com)
"turn right in 180 meters"
Turned left,
To feed the occasional
Anxiety.
"Rerouting to your destination."
the elves built a new workshop and yes there’s a but
they didn’t use one-call and their phone lines got cut
isolated up north poor Santa missed some calls
he lost the warranty on his sleigh and an order of soccer balls
he missed the call about Rona and the mandate for a mask
Santa had no P.P.E. just some schnapps in a flask
there was a global pandemic much to his surprise
he was stopped on a rooftop and could only see eyes
he was greeted by a cop in a hazmat suit
Santa was drunk without a mask and had to reroute
they took Rudolph to the Zoo and impounded his sleigh
now Santa is under quarantine for the next fourteen days
Stand up and stand out
Speak up or show out
Witness turned Accomplice
With Silence
Seeking Peace
But met with violence
Will it end will stop
It’s been years maybe not
Marching for centuries
Didn’t deter the deaths or injuries
Of the innocent
Racist malevolence
Prevailed like prejudice
People In high places
Full of hate and envy
Based on races
Time to change this
Systematic racism
Tradition has been tragic
Countless closed caskets
Conservatives won’t admit it
What’s “White Privilege”?
To see real change
takes more than a village
Change has to be global
Like the pandemic
Universal classless
Right to life & liberty
Even if you’re cashless
With no assets
Stand up when there’s doubt
Speak up to reroute
By Great Dae
circling above clouds
trouble’s first inclination
reroute to memphis
wait for hours and hours
making headway - through my book
8/31/2020
.
Being kept penniless was way too much!
Gonna fix my ex's car...
hell, he couldn't do it!
Couldn't find rusted parts...
needle-nose pliers, Phillips,
ratchet, spit, gum...jack.
Hmmmm...reroute spark plugs
thru the injector...
ignition nutrition...ho hum.
Throw out carbuerator...
manifold's too round...
computer don't need this
many circuits...
turning signals' gotta go...
new fuses color the ground blissfully!
Don't you agree, now that you see,
he did the same to me, to me...
I kind of didn't like it.
Oh, and chewing gum shoved
deep inside
that key thingy place...
no spiteful binge!
Just angelic revenge...
.
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