I loosed my heart once
in a second of pure impulse,
opened the cage of my chest
& it flew to perch
on your shoulder,
all the while singing.
When you left
it went with you,
made a nest
in your beard
& months later
finally returned home
in unwilling migration
to quietly pulse your memory
through my veins.
***sharing this with the folks over at dVerse, because I love the bird imagery.
if we are one
like we said we were
& yearn to be
still
then come
without bitterness
& I will abandon blame
& we will fuse
this broken thing
we are
into wholeness
together
I think of you less often than I want to
& far more often than I should,
but, I have learned to savor
unexpected sweetness when I find it
& whatever quantity is available
is sufficient,
like a hummingbird, feeding itself in sips
drop by drop of pure nectar joy.
A prince of the church
threatens a hunger strike,
but it is not his own fasting
he promises.
Sir, if you will not feed the hungry,
if you will not tend the sick
& the dying,
& if you will neglect suffering
supposedly in His name
in a fit of political pique
it is your will
not His, that you follow.
Remember the lesson the moneychangers learned
in the temple
& leave politics to the politicians
& God’s work to the true servants,
an army of love
from which you will go AWOL.
I think some tables
need to be overturned again,
but this time,
these tables should be in your dining room,
your excellency,
right before a banquet is served,
so you can go hungry for one hour,
or a day, or a week,
like the children you would refuse to feed.
Just for kicks, and because I need to start a new folder of rejection letters, as the old file is dusty and over 17 years old, I decided to put a manuscript together and send it here.
Why not start big, and work down from there? Forty-some selections later, and I am finis.
Not lovers yet,
we passed long nights
walking together,
our summer sandals
marking minutes
on cracked sidewalks
as we continued a conversation
we swore we would never tire of
or finish.
Once, we walked into another country
starting from my front porch.
That was Canada.
Until then, neither of us knew
there was a walk for pedestrians
spanning two countries,
& we stood amazed
at the foot of the Peace Bridge,
the Canadian side
where our wandering led us,
feet damp with dew
on the other side of the Niagara
& watched our city
string its reflection on the river,
its dull nighttime glow
dimming the stars.
Another night,
we started in your neighborhood
& traced the periphery
of the zoo walls with our steps,
its wildness safely contained
behind that tall granite.
Still, the calls of lions
and peacocks,
beautifully lonely & borne by the air
of our own city, & mingled with its exhaust
took us to a different place;
a continent
both seductively warm
& dangerous
on our safari of the spirit.
Using this today for the Dverse poetry prompt, where we are playing with symbolism.
At the end of a workday
where I have squeezed plump, juicy, unruly words
into shoes two sizes too small, and made those shoes so shiny,
combed out tangled subject-verb agreements
and trimmed those dangling participles,
I want my poetry to march into the finest restaurant,
short-sleeved and tie-less, demanding service,
put its elbows on the table
and slurp its soup
and afterwards, dance wild and wide
a zapping tangling tango
as it leaves us to disentangle meanings.
***My friend, co-creator, and often nudger-of-my-muse, Noel Ihebuzor, not only inspired this piece but also wrapped it up beautifully with its concluding lines 🙂
Susan Daniels Poetry 