On the peaks, the snow is blinding white.
Where has it found the light to glow so brightly
beneath this cloud filled sky?
I need to find sun,
so I am an equally inspiring sight.
poem- cloudy April 13, 2025
poem-ornithological optimism April 8, 2025
Each year with peace the mother geese
Find those penthouse nests after the snows
They see platforms for ospreys:
prime waterfront real estate. For a time,
they settle themselves, get comfortable,
squat home with mirth; they are there first.
But.
Each year in May there comes a day
when these geese have lost their lease.
Ospreys come back. I’ve never seen an attack
and yet one day raptor eyes appraise the skies,
and forsooth! There’s no longer a single penthouse dwelling goose!
poem-insomnia March 30, 2024
Black night
sleep tight
creeping creature
thoughts feature
rampant racing
adrenaline pumping
thumping heart.
Black night
count sheep
crush the creeping thinking
shrink the thinking
block thinking
stop thinking
Black night
sleep tight
Yeah.
Right.
A Hope Poem March 21, 2024
This poem is wishful
. .wistful
Whistle fears into the dark
Spark hope
Scope out the dreams
that mean the most
Mark out those goals
Be wishful, even when wistful
and whistle whatever
brings joy into being
Sing hope
Be peace
Achieve what we need
Believe wholly
in hope.
.
.
.
I was leafing through my draft poetry notebook and found this one written in the fall. It seems a very appropriate poem for the first day of spring!
.
.
.
.
.
.
poem-Dear Rachael March 15, 2024
Dear Rachael,
After years of joy with Jamila Mai
It’s very hard to say goodbye.
Rachael!
making us all grow daring
baring our bellies! Our thighs shaking
like jellies, as we shimmied
our way to a happier day
making laughter priority—
What a joyful sorority!
Flyng veils like full sails,
Sounding zagreets as we’d come
Every week. We dressed up
and had fun. Everyone welcome,
whether younger or older, the shy
and the bolder; we twisted our hips
to long-lasting friendships.
Folks overcame fears because
Rachael was here.
When we are apart, we’ll still zill in our hearts:
“I want chicken legs not chicken wings, buddy.”
‘Til we see you again.
.
.
This poem was performed and presented at Rachael’s last Jamila Mai hafla March 13, 2024. Nearly 20 years of dancing for joy in the Shuswap and she is moving to the Island. It was so sad, but wonderful to see so many dancers from various times through the years could all gather to dance together for another time!
.
.
.
.
.
poem- pandemic life December 2, 2020
It is a wearisome year
Each new day weighs heavier
than yesterday.
poem- feeling beachy November 18, 2020
Crashing waves
Splashing children
Deep thinking trickles like sand
I’m seeking peace:
waves wash over me.
.
.
.
.
Demo cinquain poem for class today. Kids chose theme of beach, and I wrote a line with a different poetic device in each: alliteration, assonance, consonance, onomatopoeia, internal rhyme. Turns out, it sounds better in reverse, so that’s the version you see here.
.
.
.
.
poem-they’re thinning the trees November 12, 2020
Pines and spruce tower
ninety feet into the air
a wall of green
a squirrel playground.
Broken by the last windstorm
Branches the size of adult legs snapped,
tangled,
blocking the road,
risking the roof.
With each roar of the chainsaw
years are cut away.
Now, we see the lights of town
glistening below.
Greenery sacrificed for urban beauty.
Our new view
comes with grief for the scent of spruce
in the waving wind.
Poem- Stinky socks cinquains October 2, 2020
(These were fun demos written with my students as we worked through some poetry devices on “Poetry Friday-the Wednesday edition”)
Super stinky socks
So easily knee socks crease
Stinky socks stick to my shoes
They slurp when I pull them out.
But say! My socks still rock!
.
Socks are mittens for feet
Comfort like a warm fire in winter.
My wooly socks hug my feet
My silent shout of happiness
declares my stinky socks the finest perfume in the world.
I like my socks.
(Can you find assonance, alliteration, consonance, hyperbole internal rhyme, metaphor, onomatopoeia, oxymoron, personification, simile, and understatement?)
.
.
.
.
.
(ignore any ads placed by WordPress. I do not endorse them)
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
poem- snow piles January 20, 2020
Narrow views
All white perspective
Cut down the plow pile
Find an eye hole
Explore more than your white world.
Shawn L. Bird 