Written, August 1, 2026 (My 87th Birthday)
For The Contest, “The Pensive Poet”
Sponsor: Constance La France ~ 1st Place
"The Past and Present show the score;
unknown if the Future will hold more."
__by Poet
There comes a time when future seems to fade,
since space for that is limited by age,
and pensive thoughts about it are oft laid
aside in cherishing each former stage.
Reviewing both the present and the past
brings thankfulness for what was then and now,
as memories rebuild thoughts meant to last
and current time will add to them somehow.
I pause to think about and honor this-
the was and is, I cannot ask for more.
Some sadness too, but mostly there was bliss
which splashed upon my past and present shore.
My future will unfold what's meant to be.
For now, my past and present have blessed me.
Silence is the protective barrier of thoughtful consideration.
Reviewing, deducing, and choosing thoughts to turn into verbal interaction .
Inevitably impacting ones’ life’s direction
Churning wisdom, perspective, hindsight and discretion;
once silence turns to sound;
A choice has been made,
A sound has been found .
Directional foundation laid
Course chosen, path paved :
Silence is the predecessor of ones
verbal human communication .
To win struggle in the face of peace
Is to the bow of poignant silence amidst emergency
Pledge for warm glowing reviewing tease
In darken pulse to ripple effective insurgency
Teach my lineaments to lament not
Either in cool cruelty or noisy discernment
Teach, oh teach me to be prudent and no hot
Either in comfort zone or in heart's troubled interment
Let the atmosphere whispers of her sigh
Whenever moon is late to appear up high
Let the men play with your hair and makeup
Whenever the phone isn't of any tracking blowup
Teach my lineaments be able bodied
As the night checks morning
so candied
Why is conception creating
and death destruction?
If one was to reverse this order of life
would it be obtuse or astute?
Reviewing descending order
will examine this construction,
looking further into the truth.
If life started just after death
born an old body and failing health.
As years retreated
old bones became more limber,
each day that passed to become stronger.
Year by year would go by
bringing youth and vigor never to die.
Then would come childhood then infancy
and finally back in the womb.
Then from here it comes full circle
back to the tomb.
Before conception and after death
brings us all to the same rest.
So we see our answer
to our initial question.
Death and conception
both creating and destruction.
The origin of life and death
spawning from the same mother.
An everlasting ceaseless cycle
like no other.
O the spring!
What a beautiful story
In the vassal forests,
In the black eyes
From Lucille, from Camille,
What a beautiful story
On the trails
From Montana, ,
O the spring!
Could I love
Susan or Marion?
What a beautiful story
About reviewing
Flower the primroses.
The sky is a slow bruise of amethyst and rose,
the sun, a tired king, bleeds gold across the land,
paint the western fronts of the city by the bay
a million dying lamps before the swarthy rise.
I am a cruise ship returning to its harbor,
while another ship sails filled with the day’s spent wind.
My every footstep sounds more like tiny pebbles,
like being dropped on the quiet of the asphalt
the echo of my journey home is astounding
Streetlights and shy fireflies wait to see who’ll glow first,
start their weak pulse, as if unsure the day is done
My thoughts fading like the lamp carried by my mind,
while reviewing the day's encounters like phantoms.
Each house exhales the scent of a tasty dinner,
a warm, domestic breath into the cooling air.
The moon, a pale coin, is tossed into the worn blue,
and the first star is a pinprick of forgiveness.
My own body knows this liturgy of descent,
the knee-jerk turn of the foot, soft exhale, tale’s rest.
I am not just walking up, I am unspooling,
bit of a loose thread of my former self, reeled back,
into the arresting arms of the spool of night.
At least the canoers are gone
And the old couple of duck feeders
The geese are reviewing the V formation
Young’uns still practicing take offs and landings
Swans are still strutting about the pond
The coyotes are calling audibles at dusk
Turtles quietly sequestering themselves
Dusk is quieter now
The hum of insect wings silenced
No bullfrog echoes ripple the pond
The sting of November lurks in the woods
An old Muskrat sighs
He knows his laugher is reflexive,
often inauthentic,
a need to agree or
a way to paint clowns on speech bubbles.
Overused words, trite meaningless words
are tossed back and forth.
It's a conversation, a convention or
a blank-firing discussion.
"I must be going."
Words hang like luminous finger bones.
Later reviewing in his mind
what had been said,
witty ripostes are invented,
inserted.
Finer points of fine points honed.
He shuffles magnetic phrases
on a whiteboard between his eyes.
He begins to cough - a yak spasm.
His only remedy
is to keep talking to himself
as if the other person were still listening.
Had a drag with Sydney Pollocks face a few times over the last year reviewing my recital
New York Paint?
Ego
Can one compose I, Me, Mine and Myself?
Are you unpretentious hanging on to your
Ego?
Dualistic personalities is it the beast? A seeker
of pure pleasures? Guilty until proven innocent
Amongst your peers.
Digging in the dirt is it the devil inside ?
Animal instincts reviewing the situation at hand
Sends chills up and down one's spine.
Complexities of the human personalities conflicts
between the I'd, Ego and Super egos
At times we all experience days overcast,
but from beyond many clouds some good often comes.
Perhaps recalling things deep entombed in our past,
is what's causing our day to seem filled with the glums.
Let reviewing past actions become your teacher,
we must learn from our past mistakes and then move on.
Mistakes are common but can’t be the main feature,
after a quick critique file them under bygone.
You flounce
as if you were an ostrich fan
all fluffed up on the page
waving at posterity.
I nibble at your chicken livers,
occasionally
swing from your bell-ringing images
that dare to delight me,
but you peck at words too much
and those long pauses
when you take a bow
are tedious.
Sorry to see that you are dead,
when you were alive
reviewing your work
was a lot easier,
now I have to praise you
just to show I care.
Past Is A Teacher
Miracle Man
1/5/2025
In reviewing our past life,
which we cannot rearrange.
Let it become our instructor,
on habits we must change.
Our past can be a good instructor,
“It’s been there, done that.”,
By ignoring its teachings,
more of what’s past is begat.
I sit in class with my thoughts on blast,
The paper in front is one of the last
I fidget with my pencil and remain outcast
And act oblivious to the obvious task.
The teacher walks around, reviewing each kid;
I remain unphased, and continue to stay hid
The teacher walks past, along the floor grid
I don’t peep a sound as my thoughts start a bid.
I cannot do this task that has been handed to me,
When my thoughts won’t stop bothering me
It pains me that they live rent free,
And I really wish I could be set free.
I look at the work that is undone,
I cannot finish now or it will be numb
However later on it will be done
Only when I do not feel this unfun.
Pause before action and after action pause,
reviewing first the play of cause and effect,
double checking whether it obeys love’s laws,
doing at all times, as conscience does direct
and if this be our practice, in time heart thaws,
erasing from our soul, vibrations suspect.
Thus with an open heart and an unclenched fist,
invoking grace, we’re by Divine Mother kissed.
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