Poetry

. Polarities The only certain solidarity among the Self-Reliant is the ease with which their pride in insularity is spoken of like some esteemed disease they welcome to their homes: To seek a cure would be a show of weakness to appease the Socialists who want them to endure the...

. I. I travel thanks to water, But do not float or sail. More quickly than an otter And have a smoke-like tail. What am I? . II>. II. When at the beach, I soak up sun, Look down on waves (that’s always fun), But sometimes I get carried away,...

.   The Death of the Old Met 1883-1967 Unsinging silence fills the empty spaceWhere once the divas aria-ed and trilledPuccini’s La Bohème before the faceOf audiences eager to be thrilled. And music critics filled the mezzanineAnd wrote reviews for papers long since dead.Where now the echoes of “what once...

. Loose Me! “Loose him, and let him go.” ---John 11.44 O loose me, Jesus! Jesus, set me free from all that binds my soul and blinds my way. Unwrap the shrouds of death that cling to me! Let every shade of doubt enlightened be, the gloom of night bathed...

. Fall Back: Central Standard Time Already it is dark: the falling arc Of each advancing year, when the eager moon, To catch the setting sun, comes up too soon. Full light no longer lingers at high noon, Or loiters there long past our long day’s work, But languishes at...

. Hey Gen Z, There’s a Huge Inheritance Coming Your Way Inheritance? What could it be? __A house? A yacht? A jet? No way. It’s much, much bigger. __It’s called the National Debt. The debt is 35 trillion plus. __An upward trend is clear. We add at least another trillion...

. The Knucklehead Defense If you’ve implied that you have fought in war,but meant your statements more as metaphordesigned so you’ll appear to be less lame,the Knucklehead Defense will clear your name. If you are ever charged with DUI,and you’re a Democrat then you can lie.There is no need to prove...

. Lady Gwyn  I hear the scratching of a claw--- A disembodied monkey’s paw Scraping at decaying bones. I feel a gust of ghostly moans Wuther through my withered heart. It’s time to stir. It’s time to start This ghastly party with a scare To widen eyes and heighten hair....

. Song of the Spirit After midnight slightly drowsy, Contemplating writing lousy, While the script-score I redacted, Something in my head reacted. Dreamed I heard a stirring curtain, Though my mind remained uncertain. Wondered whence had come the stir, As upon my feet upspringing, Heard a hissing and a whir,...

. The Iron Road  Flecked with the dust of snow, the iron rails Lie still and undisturbed beneath a sky Of cloudless blue where eagles freely fly, Their wings outspread to catch the wind like sails. They soar in circles high above a scene Of rocky crags and canyons where...

. Elisha's Bones II Kings 4:32–37, 13:20–21 Elisha died, the prophet doubly strong In spirit, and his sepulcher was grand, For he had caused a lifeless child to stand And speak, then heard the mother’s grateful song. A withered elder passed away—erelong The bier was carried forth, with burial planned...

. Sonnet 83 A thankless task. You churn them singly out. They’re ordered chronologic’ly. And when someone asks idly what they’re all about, you can’t avow a single theme. But then you add as afterthought, “I like being arch”--- you’d think wit travels on iambic wheels. Alas, the modern earnestness...

. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5zId3BCl6M . . Andrew Benson Brown has had poems and reviews published in a few journals. His epic-in-progress, Legends of Liberty, will chronicle the major events of the American Revolution if he lives to complete it. Though he writes history articles for American Essence magazine, he lists his primary occupation...

. Passing Through a Graveyard Marred old friends whose breath has passed Are cold friends whose breadth I pass. Some I pray they pray for me. Some they pray I pray them free. Hewn in granite where was wrought Endings lest they be forgot. . . Robert Nachtegall is an...

. Where Babylonic Rivers Flowed after Psalm 137, a lament at the destruction of Jerusalem Where Babylonic rivers flowed We settled down to weep and mourn And mused on Zion, our abode, Our city sullied and forlorn. In foreign land by poplar trees We placed our lyres. For it was...

. Prayer as an Antidote for Unbelief Just imagine if, while you’re entreating the sky, You were met with the wink of a generous Eye. __A very grave disaster it would be __If all there was to your approach to God __Were, now and ever, for eternity, __Dead fingers pushing...

. The Venetian Doge on the Sack of Constantinople Setting: Constantinople in the Summer of 1204 AD. Doge Enrico Dandolo of Venice prepares for bed after an exhausting day visiting Byzantium’s famous bronze Hippodrome horses as they are loaded onto a ship for the journey back to Venice. These venerable...

. Autumn I find myself possessed among the red (The maple) and the yellow (oak); possessed Of some distinct yet subtle joy inbred So deep within me, there so dear impressed Its merest hint the whole world reinvests With all the native goodness of that day When its Creator, just...

. A Ballad of Bellport In stockings and slippers, A dress to her knees, She scans the horizon And takes in the breeze. She glances to Heaven, Peruses the seas. Reports of a mishap Have filled her with fear, But surely his promise Would bring him back here. O, please,...

. The Java Joe Machine My jiffy Java Joe machineAllows me to make only oneCup of coffee when I please,Convenient when I’m on the run. But in the seconds as it brewsI recall my coffee potDripping cheerfully while newsI read. The Post, which I pre-bought So it would on my...

. Senior Village The ambulances come and go. Last night it was the man across The hall, whom I’d begun to know. Another friend, another loss. __I never know, From day to day, who I will see Driven away. They come and go--- The red-lighted emergency Vehicles. It’s sad---although, __Realistically,...

. Not So Grand Poo-bah Middle brother with lesser brain, Descended from the killer Cain. More grasping man you never saw, Believes he is the Grand Poo-bah. He flew down south to get his Dad, But he was not a thoughtful lad; Gained the Will through sheer chutzpah, Controls it...

. The Force of Dreams I dreamed of you last night.  I dreamed and dreamed, Yet more, as if there never had been dreams In me before.  Reality it seemed Had never been reality.  Green dreams Of Eden never could have been like you There in this night of nights....

. Homage to Morton of Merrymount To you I pay this homage and devotion: Thomas Morton, Host of Merrymount— You, whose learnèd writing put in motion The court suit that brought Plymouth to account. Yes, Plymouth Bay—that gaggle of fanatics Singing hymns with nasal intonation— Those prim, precisian whiners and...

. Contemporary Logic Tattoos were blanketing her skin, Pierced everywhere, objects put in, Eyelash extensions, purple-haired, “I love my body,” she declared. . . Stolen Land I heard two liberals talk at length About the theft of native lands, And what a shame it was that strength Determined how it...

. The Good Life What is the good life that God is providing? What is the good life He seeks to impart? How can I know that I live in God’s favor? How can I know that I’m close to His heart? If in my life I am faithful and...

. S O S Keep the fleecy wolves from bleating. Hold the pack of jackals back. Seize the greedy grubbers eating Scraps from bowls of those who lack. Bar the charlatans from cheating. Quell the yak of quack and hack. Snare the fat cats trick-or-treating--- Stealing sweets and doling flack....

. The Mask Sin wears a Cherub’s mask And beams forth paradise. “Come in, recline, and bask.” Discerning eyes looks twice: The gate shuts like a vice. . . The Strange Case Of Homo Sapiens At my right hand, my fountain pen Waits on the desk by me. A loaded...

. Look Up Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn on a world split apart The prophet scorned the academic dress of those who had invited him to their Parnassus of the Ivy League. Why wear their garb, when he intended not to bless them, but to warn, and even to condemn their way of...

. Skellig Michael a remote island off the Irish coast A whispered, whistled wind resounds the echo Of the circling gannets’ raucous cry. While far below, the white noise, sea surge surf Collides with barren cliffs and wraps the Skellig Michael in a timeless shroud of mist. As like a...

. The Night My Father Punched the Cow The night my father punched the cowWas dark and windy, late; and nowHis job was dangling on a row,And he was sick of it, somehow__That night. He broke his hand, and held it tightIn place throughout that fractious night— My mother thought,...

. The Walk Whether you call it a walk or a run, some animals tread on the water for fun, to flee, chase their food, or show off for their mate. Grebes, doing a dazzling dance for their date, slap their lobed and impressively wide and flat feet on the...

. Tattered I watched a butterfly today, grappling with the barbarous breeze. She was suspended and entrapped under a canopy of trees. Her tattered wing was on display, a tragedy for all to see. Descending onto blades of grass, so frail and weak she seemed to be. But then she...

. Mother Government We modern people don’t believe that pointless rituals relieve the crushing angst felt deep within, that we once thought was caused by sin. But Mother Government has shown to all of us that she alone has what it takes to intercede and give us what we truly...

. The Waste Land: 2028 You said you loved her---everything about her---Her color, accents, laugh, that she was woke.Her joy outweighed all duty and was louder!America, you said, should go for broke.You shrugged when unelected politiciansAll propped her up like Stalin’s politburo.You wanted a divorce from white patricians,To socialize the...

. Apologies at Antoninus Pius’s Table, 155 A.D. . I. Rome’s Glory “Arriving at this feast, how proud I stand that Rome endures to succor those who dwell here in this citadel and those whose hands till soil across the empire that reaps well.” Sharp Aristides spoke to those who...

. To Melody, on Her Wedding Day And now the hour has come for you to fly, To leave your early nest and take the air For vistas yet unseen (though God knows where He’ll take you, as He knew in days gone by). For since the moment that you...

Old Chestnut I’m the spirited girl with the chestnut hair, Common countenance pale, smile occasionally stressed, High forehead and wide, sculpted jawline square, A pert single chin, curving neck recessed Over straight honest shoulders of soldierly flair, Alert at beginning a whimsical spree. My first tresses were trifling and thin...

. Washington’s Armor Under a watchful sky, a thick, long snake Was slithering: red regulars and blue Virginians groaned while dragging banners to stake In Fort Duquesne; brown wagons splashed its crew Of teamsters as a shallow river rippled; Gray axes, swishing through a sea of green, Approached a tranquil...

. Sudan, 2005 ---on the death of Dr. John Garang, Liberation Fighter and Sudanese Vice President Garang is dead! An accident, they say--- his helicopter downed by slanting rain. This man who kept the Northerners at bay no longer lives to temper hatred’s strain. Conspiratorial tongues have lit a fuse...