Heart tight bound again
with futile cords. Door echoes.
Yearly denouement
.
A plant can not thrive
uprooted every few months.
I am still root-less
.
How can teachers bloom?
Hopeful blossoms fight
‘gainst futility.
school over haikus June 28, 2013
memory June 27, 2013
Here is your memory
a box
a cube
a dream
a fantasy.
Here is your future
exploding
imploding
eroding
Here is
a box
a cube
a dream
a fantasy
exploding
imploding
eroding.
Here:
a box
exploding
a cube
imploding
a dream
eroding
a fantasy
here
future
memory.
Grad dad June 26, 2013
Oh, loser dad,
squealing the tires of your
red convertible in
front of all the grads.
I’m sorry
you peaked in high school.
The revving of your engine
declares you
as a fool.
Faces turn, loser dad,
with pity on your son,
the grad.
May he go on to be
much better
than the man
he sees.
.
.
.
Ok, ok. I know this one is harsh. But seriously. 2-300 people in the courtyard, little kids moving through the parking lot, and this idiot is smoking his tires as he parks his car. Really? Common sense, man!
crows June 24, 2013
Flying oilslick
on thrumming wings
collapses on my pine tree
and stares at me
daring me.
My protectors
bark their disapproval
and it languidly lifts off
trailing them behind.
Until they reach the fence,
then, tails
immensely satisfied,
lope back to me,
for their reward.
Black garbed intimidators
with steely eyes
do not impress
the wolf clan.
This is a comfort.
rain power June 22, 2013
Morning rain
pouring over drains
everywhere,
overflowing weirs.
Rivers risen,
spreading,
heading for places
no river should be.
We could see roads
but brown water
obscures,
fills houses
rushes, hisses.
Morning rain,
Warnings reign.
Please water,
drain.
.
.
.
For my friends and their families in Southern Alberta suffering from the massive flooding throughout the region. May people, pets, and possesssions be reunited without damage. May insurance cover the rebuilding! May rebuilding be prompt.
lost mother June 21, 2013
She sheds memories
like dandruff
and as we brush
away the flakes of her,
she loses us.
She squints through
vast blankness with
vague intensity,
“Who are you?”
Her life drifts
in and out
on images as tenuous
as imagination.
Thus, mother transforms
into a mesh of
our memories of her,
even as her memories
drift into fog.
.
.
.
.
I see sweet ladies at the Extended Care unit, who are lost to themselves. So sad for them and their children. I’m thankful that my parents both hold tightly to their memories.
exam time June 19, 2013
The sky drips
its soggy sorrow
on students
walking into exams.
They step
out of white hazes
in expectation
(or desperation).
The sky drips
on their satisfaction
of consummation
and their sighs
of celebration
for coming
graduation.
faithless June 18, 2013
Originally posted Nov 8, 2011. It’s nice to revisit old posts!
This was written from a prompt for Gooseberry Garden on Feathers, Fidelity Figment and Fables.
.
Your name is faithfulness.
Time stretched the fidelity
and you left that future,
For years t’was fueled
by the fervour of adoration,
and the declaration of forever.
Faith dripped
faintly
across forever
and fell
in fragrant furrows
of fallow hope.
you
Your footprints mark the dirt in your garden.
Your finger prints are on the door frame.
Your handwriting tells me we need
Saskatoon berry jam
potatoes
and milk.
Your hair is tangled in your comb.
Your breath is in the bristles of your toothbrush.
Your head left its impression on your pillow.
Your scent is on your clothes in the closet.
But you
are gone.
ocean angels June 17, 2013
You are a poem
that only angels know.
You move with the ocean’s pulse
waves kissing the shore
twice a day,
touching sky,
swelling with promise.
You are a poem
only the angels know,
but I am listening
for your words
on the wind,
reaching to catch
the rhythm,
in the rolling tide,
stretching to hear
the angels whisper.
You are a poem
I long to know.
Shawn L. Bird 