Yokes Poems

The Stalker's Still Life Stare

The rose won’t pose, won't stay its will,
It knows it can’t be forced to stay still.
It sneaks movements between brush strokes,
Breaking free of the painter's staring yokes.

The lemon makes faces with bitter pride,
It hides its shyness with a snide slide.
Each subject plays a veiled charade,
As each freeze-frame is displayed.

The painter grabs what time would spill,
To capture one moment with all their skill.
Not knowing their aim can't be fulfilled.
For life is too fluid and free-willed.

Just after each moment is painted.
The scene is already old and outdated.
For nothing posed stays that way for long.
It shifts with each glance, and moves on.

National Poetry Month

Word choices: Nouns - Yoke, Heart
                     Verbs  - Eclipse, Erase
                     Adjectives - Tender, Cold


Carrying yokes on their necks
To erase the hereditary poverty 
That eclipsed them for so long, 
With strong will in their hearts,
Hiding pain under tender smile,
Struggling together day and night, 
Indifferent to heat and cold,
Minding not hunger and slumber,
Our grandparents and parents,
The backbones of our family,
Burning their lives like candles,
Taught us an invaluable lesson -
“In the midst of darkness, light persists!”


2nd place

Time Is Running Out

Right and wrong are human concepts, and like
night and day, it's clear what sets them apart.
Fight or flight, warps my outlook and clouds my
Sight, for I stop listening to my heart.

My world is changing so negatively,
I now fear what tomorrow may bring.
Sky-high prices fuel inflation while
sly grifters promote bitcoins, memes, and bling.

Folks are tethered to smartphones that feel like
yokes around their necks, keeping them online.
Hoax or not, climate change is happening,
oak and elm are being replaced by pine.

Crime and anxiety are starting to
climb, and everyone's filled with dread and fear.
I'm afraid that the world is primed for war,
time is fast running out; that much seems clear.

My Bloody Valentine

Dawn of deific passion
A beacon of divine compassion
Who, to set the sweethearts free
From the yokes of the crown head's decree
Kept the flames of the loving hearts alive
With a credo that true love should always thrive
To true sacrificial love, he sowed a seed.
His body was broken, and blood was shed for this deed.
On young hearts that struggle with a life of love
He showers blessings from above.
As this day has its roots in him
Though in seas of whims, we swim
Let's not forget Valentine, a saint so fine.
This day, my Bloody Valentine...

Descent And Ascent

My hilly paths are full of pits, and my trails turn and twist.
My life and destiny have contracted clandestine tryst.
As there are dams blocking rivers that flow flawlessly
Unknown hurdles put pauses to life rather lawlessly.

Brick by brick how cautiously I construct my dream castle!
How a storm pulls it down as though it's a hut on the hill!
Exploring, inventing, and enlightening, I move on.
Towards absurd spells of death, my mortal being is drawn

Inner aches, like yokes, weigh me when I let go of my worries.
Pains and grieves, like traumas, bring in tumultuous flurries.
Soul passes through deserts of spiritual emptiness.
Pilgrimages of perfection become pride-filled pettiness.

With my descents and falls, I, a weakling, come to my Lord
He lifts me from dust and takes me to his heavenly abode.
As a vulture that gains its youthfulness, I take new birth.
Dark nights of my soul end and bright days lead to endless mirth.

D'vine Comedy

Vines it were stole Adam’s joys;
thorns and thistles figured large.
Now, machines and even toys
fail to start, won’t hold a charge.

Oft harangued by so much ache,
pleasure’s fleeting, progress stalls. 
Scarce we fix, another breaks;
endless toil stems from the fall.

Come thou, Father, make all right;
help us in this life we plea.
Burdens easy, yokes are light
when we find our rest in Thee.

Taxman

In the land that I was born
there is a man who takes from the sun,
he takes from the moon, from the earth's womb,
he takes from the sweat on your brow
and the bread from your mouth.

He calls himself the Taxman,
the collector of duties,
he hardly builds any roads
nor bring bread to your table,
but takes from your hunger,
and your thirst,
and your pain.

He taxes the laughter of children,
he taxes the weeping of mothers,
he taxes on buried,
and the newborn laced in swaddling clothes.

What has he given in return?
Silence, iron bars,
and the rattling sound of chains
under the weight of yokes unseen
that we are all forced to wear.

And so I ask, O Tax Collector,
under what rock have you hidden the sun?
Where has the harvest of our labors gone?
What have you done for the people
that toil in open fields
and sing songs of forgotten hope?

THE EGG SAID

The egg said 
To the pancake
I’m healthier than
You are, my colors are
Bright and beautiful
Sometimes I even have 
Double yokes inside and 
My best friend is crispy bacon

MARKED

She stood at the lectern
Teaching from restoration
Yet, not one audience member
Could deny her infection
...damaged

Tattooed from face to feet
Living, sobriety from drugs
No matter his freedom
He's always just a thug
...recovering

Pockmarked as a teen
She can still hear their jokes
Yelling across campus
Forever binding her with yokes
...weighing

They gather in the courtyard
Demanding for relief
Clothes clinging to frail bodies
Walking with the constant grief
...marked

Oh wholey soul
How far you have come
But no matter the progress
The absence of all you have done
...remains

................MARKED

Written by Trudy Schrader on 04-26-2024

Peppers and Eggs

Jodie Foster is frying peppers and eggs ~ it is late and her legs
ache as she scrambles the yokes, sautés jalapenos.
Today a jerk again compared her to the movie star ~a life she
never wanted keeps invading her reality, even though she was
born earlier, people consider her the fraud; the fake, the
`knock-off.'

Not for the first time she imagines changing her name, but always
there is a fear of not being compared to anything at all.

There is a loud noise upstairs. She freezes, she recalls
the movie -`Panic Room.' She runs to her downstairs closet,
bolting the door behind her. Footsteps descend - it is Jodie Foster
in her role as Agent Starling. Jodie has a gun and is seeking
her rapist from a previous movie.

Scripts are merging. The Jodi who cooks peppers and eggs
understands why she has always avoided cliffhangers - suspense
thrillers. She cries softly in the dark as she clutches
a Dollar Store spatula, a utensil that will never work
as well as a real branded weapon.

Unscratched Itch

Like uncared unfulfilled wishes creeping to the fore
Irresistible! Impossible, yet? Dilemmatic?
Shy about removing the robe that might reveal the core 
Could the cut be covered with the costliest cosmetic?

Disgruntled, like a lion brooding over a lost prey
This itch turns into karma leading to endless rebirth 
It becomes the root of my yokes on which I have no say
Expect I dare to scratch till stern stillness surrounds the girth.

Uprooting the weeds, forever, might be the best solution 
Could we pluck out the plants because they trouble a little?
Rubbing with a hard surface might be a substitution.
Though commonality amidst these acts is mere brittle 

If thirst, physical or spiritual, is timely quenched 
The fulfillment of the heart will never be wrenched.

Comparisons

Jodie Foster is frying peppers and eggs
~ it is late and her legs ache
as she scrambles the yokes, sautés jalapenos.

Today a jerk once again
compared her to the movie star.

Not for the first time
she considers changing her name.

A loud noise upstairs. She freezes,
she recalls the movie: Panic Room,
runs to her downstairs closet,
bolting the door behind her.

Footsteps descend, she imagines
it is the real Jodie Foster
in her role as Agent Starling.

The other Jodi
cries softly in the dark as she clutches
a Dollar Store spatula,
a utensil that will never work
as well as a real branded one.

Memory

...that builds its scaffolding within
neuro-rivulets
brain tidy 
or caught in random whims
to form a sense of self

memory, where it resides
                with packed up boxes of old photos
sometimes in mistakes made
                     that rub me the wrong way
                     like the gray torn threads of frozen seams

no microscope needed
recalling
a spring of sprawling promises
in a stubbled field where lovers once cooed

memory tousled like skipping ropes abandoned 
or in your grandmother's hands craddling tea
fitting thoughts of tip-toed dancing
or childhood blips of snatching snowflakes
                                     on tongues and lashes

sometimes the shoes it wears are boots in war song blues
or slippers that breeze through rosebud dreams
                             sleighs down hills
                             and sugar apples at Halloween

beyond the frame of what has ceased
memories like rock yokes about our necks
                   or the morning bread on which to feast

These Are the Last Days My Yokes Easy

For my yoke is easy and my burden is light 
These are the last when the world will rest 
On my shoulders
These are the last days my yoke is easy 
Soon and very soon it's going to be all over 
These are the last days and my yoke is easy 
When we will a new sun your new earth be born 
I'm on haven't got time to trimble 
Haven't got time to fear 
Having got time I to remember 
Soon the time will end 
It is near for my yoke is easy
 And my burdens in His light
They are light these are the last days 
When the world will rest on my shoulders 
These are the last days that the world will end 
On my shoulders
The end is at naught 

Written words by James Edward Lee Sr 
8/6/22

Chants In a Breakfast Diner

The door rings
I look up 
then
back to my eggs and hash browns.

The door rings
I look up
nobody I know,
my first time here
why should I know anyone!
Back to the eggs.

Two sunny-side-up,
the busting of yellow yokes
with a tip of toast --- O Lordy.

I look up
the waitress has bodacious tats,
a phone bursts into song
 another vibrates
as loud as a sleeping panther.

The door rings
creamy salutations
of comfort and grease.
Spoons jangle on tinkling handles,
spatulas knell upon the  griddle.

A buttery booth crush
a flush-faced coffee klatch.
The skinny cook yells in Kentucky Yiddish.
I look up 
flapjacks slap air
syrup pours and dongs in jug and jar.

The door chants and chimes -
Hallelujah for this ring-a-ding diner
and our Waffle House hunger.

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