About Poetry - Kathy Figueroa

These days, pretty much anything goes
From measured meter to free-form prose
From haiku, odes, or tossed “word salads”
To precisely presented ballads
 
Like crickets chirp, wolves howl, and birds sing
To express one’s self is the main thing
So share your thoughts, let the words ring true
We learn from each other’s points of view
 
Kathy Figueroa


Image : GuernseyPoets

Where I Belong - Tony Gardner

There  is  much  excitement
So  much  vibrance  and  delight
In  the  heart  of  the  big  City
With  the  garish  City Lights
And  if  that's  what  excites  you
If  that's  what  turns  you  on,
Well  go  off  and  enjoy  it
But  just  leave  me  alone
For  here  on  my  little  Island
I  have  all  that  I  dream  of
My  family,  childhood  mem'ries
And  the  people  that  I  love.

Tony Gardner


Image : Pixabay - cegoh

Shooting Pains - Richard Fleming

Another day, another mall,
another shooting to appall
the world, astonished, that looks on
and, once again, the ghastly spawn
of frontier days produces nerds
who shoot, as though at bison herds,
and random bullets rip apart
some stranger’s brain, her lung, his heart.
For seconds, time’s arrested, then
restarts: the screaming starts again
in this red space, Hell’s ghastly twin,
as mall-security kicks in
too late, of course: the murdered child,
eviscerated and defiled,
the adults’ bodies, gutted, thrown
aside like debris, entrails, bone
exposed. These people won’t resume
their lively shopping in this tomb.
The shooter’s down: restrained, he screams
about his foul, frustrated dreams.
As sirens shriek, survivors cling,
to one another, anything
that has a heart that’s beating yet.
Blood spreads like a grotesque rosette.
 
Richard Fleming


Image : conversationprints.com

Nice Out - Joan Etoile

Do you remember ‘76?
When we were told to save all our drips
The reservoir was cracked and dry
And it was too hot for potato peel pie

I don’t remember too much fuss
The boiling sunshine didn’t worry us
All we had to do was bath with a friend
To save ourselves from a gruesome end

Cooking oil was our sunscreen
While we cooled off with Mr Whippy ice cream
No one had a hat or UV brolly
And Zoom was just another ice lolly

The weather warnings are so much tripe
How else will all my tomatoes get ripe?
Why all this panic, why all this blether?
It’s just a spot of bloney nice weather!

Then today in the Co-op I’m taken to task
By a group of children who all ask
“How can you be a climate change denier
When, like, most of France is on fire?”

Joan Etoile


Image : Pixabay - geralt

O Captain! My Captain! - Walt Whitman

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
       But O heart! heart! heart!
         O the bleeding drops of red,
           Where on the deck my Captain lies,
             Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up- for you the flag is flung- for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths- for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
       Here Captain! dear father!
         This arm beneath your head!
           It is some dream that on the deck,
             You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
       Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
         But I with mournful tread,
           Walk the deck my Captain lies,
             Fallen cold and dead.

Walt Whitman

Image : Pixabay - AlexSky

Preparation - Stephen A. Roberts

It’s on the TV now 
The things never discussed 
The inevitable 
The return to dust 
My parents never faced it 
Left a mountain behind 
For jumble sales 
And recycling yards 
Someone’s lucky find 

Let’s go through all my junk 
A catalogue of loss 
The indispensable 
The metal and the rust 
It seems a shame to waste it 
To throw it all away 
Memories and 
Faded photographs 
Of those salad days 

Stephen A. Roberts

Image : Pixabay - Alexas_Fotos

Sanctity - Jude Neale

Baby’s  in the cradle 
because you 
put her there, buddy.

While mommy cried, no
more subdividing my body
into plots, then setting up house. 

Selling our uterus for votes,
and using moral superiority 
as your shield.

You were a thief in the night.

Laying claim to our bodies
with a flourish of the pen,

that cut through our choice,
to render the impossible, possible.

You who have no place
in our reproductive biography.

We shout like a black cloud
of crows,  to get off of our land—

or we’ll leave the dishes and children,
    the cooking and tending,
the factories and hospitals,
     nursing homes and banks,
schools and prisons,
    ghettos and suburbs behind.

All those places that are held
together by the glue of our kindness,

will whither and die. And throwing 
nice aside for a moment 

let It be said that 
our biggest enemy

is simply shaking our heads,

instead of plunging 
into a battle 
for the sanctity 

of our own bloody lives.

Jude Neale

Image : Pixabay - jeffjacobs1990

Tamara Lich - Kathy Figueroa

Tamara Lich is like Canada’s
Very own Joan of Arc
Though she didn’t lead soldiers to battle
But truckers to Ottawa to park
 
Where they were met with vitriol
Of the most calumnious kind
When a Liberal honcho to talk to
Was what they had hoped to find
 
The people longed to be heard
To make their concerns known
But for “mandated” impacts on their lives
Rude political disregard was shown
 
The truckers were defamed as “terrorists”
Lies were disseminated far and wide
And the person occupying Canada’s main office
Actually chose to run and hide
 
Similar to the men
Who declared Joan of Arc a witch
So have Liberal Parliamentarians
Reviled brave Tamara Lich
 
Though they can’t just seize her
And burn her at the stake
They can level charges of dubious merit
...Some possibly even fake
 
So, here’s to Tamara Lich
May she ever be brave and strong!
Canada, people still stand on guard for thee
Though some politicians pretend it’s wrong

Kathy Figueroa


Image : Toronto 99 Independent News

Rescue Dog - Tony Gardner

There’s no need to flinch when I lift my hand
No need to cower each time I stand
No need to run when I come near
No need to tremble, I see your fear.
You can sleep with both eyes shut,
Don’t need to jump when you wake up
Your food is yours to eat in peace
No need to fight to keep your feast.
No need to lie on the cold, hard floor
The beds and the sofas are yours to explore
Don’t need to sit out in the rain
The house is your shelter, your new domain.
I cannot erase the memories and fears
Cannot compensate for those awful years
But all that we have and all that you see
Is yours, ….you’re now part of our family.

Tony Gardner


Image : Pixabay - Alexas_Fotos