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Best Poems Written by Linda Eide

Below are the all-time best Linda Eide poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Linda Eide Poem

Lost


I am the lost one
Wandering from city to city
Street to street
Like a leaf adrift on the sea of life
Once someone loved me
And gave me a name
Now I have become nobody
I want to say look at me here I am
We don’t have to talk I know you’re busy
Smile nod your head
I need to know I am still alive
Not just a ghost walking briefly through your day
The nights are cold, but the stars keep me company
I tell them my story and they listen
The darkness keeps my secrets
I do not like the sun
It takes the shadows away
Leaving me no place to hide
Too many eyes can see me in daylight
I prefer walking at night
Amid the solitude spun like a web
Under the trees
Once upon a time I wasn’t lost
I had a home clean sheets friends and family
Never understood how I lost myself
Is there anyone looking for me?

Details | Linda Eide Poem

Life






Is there really such a thing
As a life smooth as the sea in moonlight
No storms to darken the heavens
No sorrows to break a heart
Is it possible I wonder?
When sleep is elusive 
And tomorrow too far away to be real
Do all stories have a happy ending
And Prince Charming rescues the fair damsel
I gaze out the window
There is not much else to do
At midnight in a house filled with ghosts
And too many memories
Why do I cling to the hope
I will escape the evil ogre hiding in the attic
I am no longer a child
Who believes in dreams and promises
Hope refuses to die
I wait for the sun to come up
And play with the flowers in my garden
Maybe this is the day
My prince will come to rescue me
And take me away to his castle in the sky

Details | Linda Eide Poem

I am

 My name is not six million
I am Anna who once loved
And dreamed and hoped
I am not a number tattooed on my arm
I have a name Anna who knew fear
When they made us run down the street
To the train station laughing and calling out names
I didn’t understand
They beat those of us too weak to run
I looked at their faces and saw my friends
From school neighbors' people I knew
Turned into jeering strangers
I never suspected they hated us so much
I am not a number you can forget
Or take out when you need to feel good 
About your beliefs
I have a name I am Anna
And even if I turned into smoke one summer day
I am here in your memories
Never forget that my name is Anna

Details | Linda Eide Poem

The suicide

 
 


The suicide

His question
The night wraps itself around him
Like a comforting blanket of stars
And for a moment there is silence
No questions roaming in his head 
He thinks of her with joy
Not the terrible sense of loss
That has been his companion since the day
She died and he found the note
I must go my darling the words said
The memories have won
I can no longer carry their burden
You were the shining light in my darkness
Remember me if you want with a smile
No tears
I have shed enough for both of us
Why did you leave he cries?
To the buildings indifferent to his pain
Why?
The passerby stares at him and hurries away
Carry your own sorrow I have no time for you
What word what gesture did I forget
That would have kept you with me.
Now I must be alone with your ghost
To haunt my days and nights





Her answer
Never tell what is in your heart
No one wants to hear
Even the one who says he loves you
How can they understand
What is impossible to know
You are alone with your memories
Until the day they eat you alive I am afraid
He was my life my love
I stood there as they killed him
Look at me I wanted to say
And remember when we were happy
I stood until I knew he was dead 
Then I walked away
He took my soul with him that day
There is nothing left of me
But an empty shell
The days stretch without end
What am I to do with this life
That’s left me like a curse
I tried I tried to love you
I saw the plea in your eyes
Tell me what I can do
Tell me how I can make you happy
And all I could do was stay silent
I knew the pain you would feel if I told you
There was nothing I had become a nobody
You couldn’t save me
And it broke my heart 
 Finale 
 My beautiful princess 
I hear your song drifting over the fields
Like a charm it draws my heart to you
Hurry my prince charming
Hurry to my rescue 
Before the dragon of sadness takes me away
To his castle high in the mountains
I feel the mist like cold fingers
Waft around the trees
Silent ghosts from the past
Calling me to go with them
Hurry to my rescue brave prince
I hear the dragon’s roar growing louder
Alas too late sweet prince
Too late to save the beautiful princess
Shadows hide the tower where she lives
Do not look for your love
She is gone sing the birds
She is gone whispers the grass
You came too late to her rescue
A prince does not cry
He bows his head in shame
I was too late my beautiful princess
Now I wander the world
Shouting your name to the four winds
The mountains echo with my grief
I have no home
The one who sheltered my heart is gone

Details | Linda Eide Poem

Secrets

 

 He said
Tell me your secrets
I promise to keep them safe
I gave him my heart
Told him about the wind
Rustling the leaves outside my window
The owl like a night spirit
Sitting in the branches keeping me company
On sleepless nights
Took him to my garden
Introduced him to my flowers
Told him all my secrets one by one
Until I had none left
He opened his hands and threw them into the air
When they fell to earth, I couldn’t find them
Now I stand here with empty hands
No secrets
No more secrets

Details | Linda Eide Poem

Letters from the front 1915













I am writing these letters to someone who no longer exists for me and if she ever did, she is lost somewhere in a past I can no longer visit. I write them for myself. I do not know why it is important I put words to what I feel and see but if I ever do make it back to the past where she waits, we can read them together and she can help me understand what happened.

Letter from the front. September 1915  
Is there a world where guns are silent
The birds are not afraid to sing
And nightmares do not invade my dreams?
I want to be your hero my darling but tonight
I sit in my foxhole shaking with fear
Wishing there was a place where I could hide.
Then I remember lying in your arms under our special tree
The final summer when it was still possible to hope
And I long to be with you, my darling
A man died today because of me I killed him
And I felt nothing as he lay in front of me nothing
For this man who had not harmed me
We did not even know each other until he died
At my hands. My soul is stained with his blood
Stains that will never go away. 
I tell you this, my love, so that if I do not return to you
Someone will remember the man I was before I came here
Remember the good in me and not this stranger I have become
They lie those who say war is a great adventure we are fighting for peace 
They say and I want to ask them what peace? Is it for you those with power
Or for the simple man who only wants to live a quiet life with his loved ones?
Parades hide the noise of those who die in muddy trenches under grey skies
The sun no longer visits they hide the tears of those who mourn friends and lovers
No, I tell you darling, war is an adventure for old men safe at home 
May the glory be theirs.


Letter from the front. October 1915
I smell roses
We march and march through endless days
Rain mud and grey fog surround us
I smell roses and remember your garden
We sat there late at night
The scent of your roses wafted to us on gentle breezes
There is no sleep my bed is wet the guns never stop
Did I ever tell you about James?
We met on the boat taking us here to war
Neither one of us could sleep so we talked and never stopped 
The words kept the fear away made us think of home
Well, he died yesterday. The guns were angrier than I remembered
And I told James to stay down if we were quiet
No one would know we were in the trench 
No one would come to kill us.
I don’t know why but James stood up and the bullet tore into him
He fell back in my arms and I talked to him
Until I knew he couldn’t hear me.
They wouldn’t let me take James with me I had to leave him behind
And still, I smell the roses and remember your garden
Sometimes I ask myself if I am going crazy
And a voice answers that losing my mind
Is the only way to survive
If I am not here, then why do I hear the guns
Smell the blood and drown in mud
While officers scream to keep going
The enemy is waiting just ahead for another battle
I promise you, darling, that I will come home

And so, it ended

Details | Linda Eide Poem

Memories Lost

 
 
 
 
 
 

 Slowly a little bit each day
So I won’t notice their passing
Thoughts and dreams drift away
To a time when I was younger
 Try to remember the small corner store
Where I bought candy for a penny
And won a prize for guessing the number of jellybeans
In a jar by the pop machine
Nothing comes back
And I wonder where they went
Jimmy and his collection of marbles
Jenny and her pretty pink dress
I thought was so glamorous
A wind swept them away
Does anyone know who I was
Before the old lady who looks like my mother
Began to stare at me in the mirror
Maybe growing old means we become memorials
For those who stayed in our yesterdays
While we remain lost
In a today that makes no sense