As I rise,
The moon falls
The wind settles
The lake follows
The sand shimmers
The earth softens
The stars dampen and
The buildings brighten,
A tree houses
A bird swooshes
A flower opens
A fish swims
A weed dances
A squirrel eats and
A duck dips,
A man hurries to work
A woman runs on the boardwalk
A grandfather grabs the paper
A boy hides from me
A girl giggles on the swings
A bell ushers kids away and\
A bike lane grows heavy,
This place,
So full with life
Racks the minutes, hours, days, years,
Peacefully, quietly, beautifully--
Existing with incredible happenings;
Splendors and revelations,
Dark funerals and ‘happy birthdays’,
Joyous jubilations and lonely mornings,
Yellow hellos and red goodbyes,
Tired people and busy minds.
Perpetual, like that grandfather clock in the apartment with the too-thin walls;
As unchanging as the oak tree outside of the tiny bungalow on the corner street by the beach.
And as I set and rise everyday to do the same 24-hour shift,
I do not complain about the similar views, or the boring minutes,
I do not crave the hours in darkness,
I accept the unthanked labor—
I watch.
I listen.
I exist.
Categories:
unthanked, 11th grade, beautiful, environment,
Form: Free verse
Seasoned homeless men in olive-green and black
camouflage jackets,
whisker-stubbled faces,
fatigued eyes once of youth's brightness.
They not too long ago raised their hand to
swear the oath,
in the shelter kitchen are many bustling
volunteers.
Brewed creamy coffee warms the grateful
men's throats.
The Catholic church across the city street tolls,
it's resounding bells in chilled autumnal air,
a knell of hope.
Honeycomb paper turkey decorations on the
center of long cafeteria tables.
A hurting truth about America, our country,
is our homeless veterans.
They served, they suffer.
A Thanksgiving for the exhausted-
and, often, unthanked. ~
Categories:
unthanked, 7th grade, 8th grade,
Form: Free verse
(In the 17th century, when thinkers
were first getting to grips with gravity,
they named it "kindly inclining".)
Seeds adrift on water
coalesce:
fueled by affinity,
they form a community.
Last pearls of wine
combine:
electing against space,
they cling to the curve of the glass.
Berries stain the fingers
that rupture them,
their plasma clasping the hand,
rather than leave unthanked.
We scraps of matter
are emboli,
swimming in Not-Being.
An impulse in the void
coagulates our Something.
Swathes of stellar gas contorting,
slab on slab of basalt pressing,
horses on the hill cavorting,
algae in the swell fluorescing,
ospreys on a rock face nestling,
children tumbling and wrestling,
matter moves to matter.
We are starstuff all,
and motion is our purpose.
We are aided on our journey
by the steady pull
of starlight.
Categories:
unthanked, science,
Form: Rhyme
Do you ever feel so joyous
in your own ripple of being
Blissful thoughts in coyness
around your cycle of thinking
Words are a colorful brightness
animated
in laughing amidst a meaning
Then people become envious
Their behavior invokes reeling
Being treated as ordinary
A spray to be used vocally
Showing one track vulgarity
Envious of intelligent reality
Doing them unthanked favors
they wouldn't really believe
Thinking you can't be all together
Fragments of their egos deceived
Ignoring their jest of behavior
Is the sign of your sweet relief
Inebriating the chalk eraser
of their misguided belief
Cloaking intelligence is a favor
Used on those who need reprieve
Categories:
unthanked, imagination, inspiration,
Form: Free verse