The Diary

Where will the pages take me today?

Far from the realm where I stand

Through histories, fantasies, fictions, and rhymes

With depths unknown on the sand,

A sliding kaleidoscope throwing the spray

Of magical oceans, where places and times

Cover the shores where the dreamers delay

And bask in those faraway climes.

The diary, gingerly held in my hand,

Though only a memory, lives what she planned.

I wrote this short poem on a plane ride back from Kisumu, a city on Lake Victoria in western Kenya. I started with the first couple of lines, and then, as I continued to write, a fairly involved backstory started to develop in my mind. It involved a couple, one of whom was very interested in traveling the world and walked to the beach every day to look out at the ocean and imagine where they could go. She wrote plans in her diary about these places and the things they would do there. But, she passed away before those plans could come to fruition. So, now, every day, her partner walks to the beach and reads the pages in the diary, giving life to those dreams as they are experienced in the mind.

Walking after Dark

There’s something about walking after dark

When the air is cool and the shadows stark

Below the periodic streetlamp glow.

A special magic percolates, its mark

Drapes itself over every unseen arc

Where searching souls and spirits grow

To bind the threads that make the world one.

Or maybe I’m simply homeward bound

As the night sky’s crowned and the day is done.

 

This past week was a very busy one, and there were a couple days when I walked home from our office after the sun had set. On one of those days, the first few lines of this poem came to mind, and I finished it that same night.

Pages Dispersed in the Wind

History flows,

Comes and then goes,

Pages dispersed in the wind,

Fluttering, flimsy, ascending the sky,

The writing exposed to the sun’s blazing eye

And fading as morning clouds thinned.

 

Diaries close,

Thinking one knows

Destiny’s every reply.

Sketchbooks keep capturing life’s present trial,

But rainwater runs over memories while

The ink’s not had time yet to dry.

 

Somebody sows

Seeds where what grows

Soaks up what falls from the sky,

And someone has saved a page from the wind,

A guide, enshrined on the wall where it’s pinned,

To roots we forget and deny.

 

 

 

This poem was inspired by the front cover of a book I started reading last week - Dandelion Wine, by Ray Bradbury. The poem doesn't really relate to the actual content of the book. For some reason, the picture led me to think about how history can be difficult to record accurately - and the farther removed we are from events, the more they, or at least our collective memories of them, can become distorted. Of course, there's also the question of who's writing the history, and what perspective they have. In any case, this poem's about that difficulty, and also about the importance of trying to remember and record, because those roots may help us to better understand things that are happening now - the fruit that time has borne - and how to move forward into the future.

Until the Veil is Lifted

Can you hear the grass grow?

Can you feel the stars glow

When the rhythm of the heart

Skips a beat, comes apart?

All the world seems to slow

While the scene, like painted art,

Draws the eye to row on row

Full of flowers, nature’s start

In tracing what true beauty is.

Never being hers or his

Or anyone’s to own,

Beauty’s beads are gently blown

To all, and none can lay a claim.

Faces show themselves, alone.

Veils no longer hide the shame

Of pride in who we thought we were.

Spirits sting and angels stir,

And soon, among the silent stones,

A voice is heard as we endure

The truth deep-set within our bones

Of flaws and faults and thoughts impure,

But also, through unvarnished tones,

Of humbler selves, to build a cure.

 

 

Most of this poem was written before the dark events in the US this past week, but I feel like it may be applicable, at least to some extent. The actual inspiration for this poem was a book written by C.S. Lewis titled Till We Have Faces, which reworks the myth of Psyche and Cupid and reveals some of Lewis's Christian ideas and influences near the end. I think the main theme of the book has to do with how we see ourselves, and how we may hide parts of ourselves, our motivations, and our desires, even from ourselves. Uncovering them can be painful and frightening, but in the long run we're likely better for it, since we can more clearly understand ourselves. I think Lewis's ideas were focused on the level of individual people, and I can certainly relate to that - I know there are parts of me that are far from perfect. But, in light of recent events, I also think it can apply on a more societal level.

The Writings of the River

Over centuries, the river writes its story –

A tale of ebbs and flows,

Of gentle suns and storming throes

Of kingdoms and their glory.

 

Over dynasties, it carves a path –

Erosion, sediment, and time –

As periodic wars appear to rhyme

Though armies change and find new reasons for their wrath.

 

Over destinies, the river shifts its sands

Though each side claims the land was always cut

By one unchanging border, ever shut

Against another nation’s greedy hands.

 

Over rhapsodies of battle and of mourning,

The river lifts its heavy song

And runs blood-red to purple seas as long

As present kings heed not its cold refrains of warning.

 

Over royalties, the waters rise.

The river swells to flood the thrones that stayed so dry.

The voices of the casualties refuse to die.

They wash away the kingdoms as they realize

They were all the same, despite each separate guise

Of flags and uniforms beneath the sky

And over mingled waters of the river,

Which writes of death and new rebirth, and tries

To guide the generations toward a different kind of prize.

 

 

 

This poem presents an imagined story of what a river sees over a long span of time. It sees kingdoms rise, fall, and change as they battle one another. Over such a long time, the river sees the futility of all the fighting and the dying, as the blood mixes with the water. Eventually, the river rises to wash away it all, with hope that something new, and more harmonious, will come.