poem

Found Poem

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

I found this poem on page 40 of the September 2004 issue of Sojourners Magazine.  In an article by Danny Duncan Collum about Michael Moore’s then-new movie Fahrenheit 911, I circled some words and blacked out the rest.  Here is the result.  It’s a little more disjointed than I want it to be, but it’s really about playing around, seeing what sense I can make out of seeming nonsense, what happens when half-random words and phrases are created and strung together, what meaning is suggested.

DREAM

I saw Che Guevara on a day filled with omens
we went to lunch there, on the big screen
he won’t go back

I am troubling the dead
I won’t tell you this again

that didn’t happen
today he is lucky to be rooted
in this great global anthem

I pulled a few interesting quotations directly out of the article:
“The war is not meant to be won.  It is meant to be continuous.”  George Orwell
“If you let the world change you, you can change the world.”  from The Motorcycle Diaries

Gratitude List:
1.  Hearing the story through the voices of young people and children
2.  Visual Poetry
3.  Songs of journey, songs of water–“Wade in the water, children”
4.  Gentle guides through the liminal spaces
5.  Community support for unpacking uncomfortable, anxious and difficult questions, powerful questions

May we walk in Beauty!

All in the Bowl

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 2 Comments

Into that bowl of my heart,
along with my rages and furies,
with recent betrayals,
with my crushing self-doubt,
with your anxieties and your tears

(yes, let me keep them there, too
you know as well as I do
and as well as the Universe knows
that when my crying time comes
as it unfortunately and inevitably
comes to us all
you’ll be running to catch my tears
in a bowl of your own, and not because
I hold yours now–no, it will be because
it’s who you are
it’s what you do
it’s what we do)

into just that bowl,
along with all that,
I place

a small white stone
bee, bee, bee, crocus, bee
concentric circles of friendship
the feel of the sun on my hair
deep rumbling rolls of laughter like thunder.

May we walk in Beauty.

There Was Going to Be a Poem

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

There was going to be a poem about the little birds,
but that didn’t happen.  Of course, all the poems come back,
at some point, to the little birds, so there’s that.
And then I would have been writing about shame,
or rather, I did write about shame.  For days.
But then I never took it past the messy draft,
and so this big space opened up and then the bit about grief
started to rise like dough in the back of the oven
near the pilot light.  But I’m sort of an amateur myself
when it comes to grief.  And I don’t want experience–
please, Universe, keep me naive on that score–
but I want to know how to hold it, because it’s always there
in the soup we swim in, always edging up to someone,
somewhere.  And I want to know how to hold it,
because it is part of the essential story, yours,
and someone else’s, too.  Not just Mary watching her son
die up there on that hill.  It is, well, part of the soup.
And then there are, of course, the little birds,
and the way they hover over the flowers at sunset
or dart through the brush, whisper-like and timid.
The way shadows grow over the fields in the afternoon
and the breezes begin to settle into the hollow.

Gratitude List:
1.  Friends who, intentionally or inadvertently, light a fire under me when I need it most.
2.  Considering the semantic shading of gratefulness and gratitude.
3.  Vermilion
4.  The wild excitement of coming down the home stretch on a long-term project.
5.  Re-fashioning, re-crafting, re-purposing, re-making, and not just in the realm of the physical, you know?

May we walk in Beauty!

Transpiration

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

2014 January 103

I always have to think a moment before I say that one.
Is it transpiration or transubstantiation?
Perhaps it doesn’t matter.
The snow is transmuted before our eyes
from one sort of substance into another,
mystical and magical, a sacred event,
rising like a breath in a haze above the white fields.

Trans-spire.
Change of spirit.
Altered breath.

I know my own spirit rose,
transformed,
to watch the wraiths of haze lift
upward into blue sky
where gulls were flying
south to north and north to south.
My heart joined them in that dance.

Gratitude List:
1.  Collaborative art.  This one began as a squiggle.  “I’ll draw and you color,” said Joss.  I took a little heat for interpreting it into a drawing instead of keeping it abstract, but he’s satisfied now that it’s done.  The scanner washed out the color a little.  It’s called “Checkers Turtle climbs the ladder to the stars.”
2.  Kombucha
3.  THAW
4.  Helping out at Preschool today
5.  Left foot, right foot, breathe.

May we walk in Beauty.

Prepositions and Polarities

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

Gratitude List:
1. So many faerie diamonds a-dazzle in the sunlight on the ice on the River in the morning.
2. Prepositions
3. Holding the polarities
4. Valuing my work
5. This poem by Rilke:
I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.

I circle around God, around the primordial tower.
I’ve been circling for thousands of years
and I still don’t know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?

May we walk in Beauty.

Last year, I read something by Rob Brezsny, in which he challenged people to look at that Rilke poem and use it as a template for their own poem.  Here’s mine for today:
I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across time and space.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.

I circle around the Mystery, around that ancient tor.
I have been circling all my many lives
and I still don’t know: am I a the dancer,
the crone, or the ineffable fool?

Illumination

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

Tanka

The fields are open
to the moon and falling snow,
an old, well-worn book
the moon reads through shadows
before she drifts off to sleep.

 

Gratitude List:
1.  Sharing lists of favorite books
2.  Mary Oliver’s Red Bird
3.  That garlicky guacamole my mom made–if that doesn’t send this cold running, I don’t know what will
4.  Moments of illumination
5.  Fairy Tales

May we walk in Beauty

In the Hall of the Disappearing Creatures

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

<Prompt 30:  Last One.  Write a Disappearing Poem> An interesting piece of synchronicity: someone declared today (Nov. 30) to be the International Day of Remembrance for Lost Species.

One black rhino falls on the Savannah.
Deep in shadowed jungles,
the Formosan clouded leopard
winks out of time.
Poor old Lonesome George,
the last Pinta Island Tortoise,
slowly ages to stone.  And gone.
Celia, the last Pyrenean Ibex, taking
one last breath beneath a quivering acacia
on a windswept, sunset plain.

The Japanese river otter.  The Liverpool Pigeon.
The Eastern cougar.  Javan Tiger.  Golden Toad.

The Ivory-Billed. . .don’t say it.
The Ivory. . .no, not yet.
Keep that door open yet a little longer.
Listen for the wheep and cluck
deep in the swamp.  Watch
for that flash of white through the mosses.

2013 November 210
From the State Museum of PA

Gratitude List:
1.  Hope
2.  Warmth
3.  Light
4.  Art
5.  This moment.

May we walk in Beauty.

Commercial

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

<Prompt 29: Write a Commercial Poem> Oy.  I’m tired.  Here’s a toss-off:

Face it.  You’re not good enough,
not clean enough, not nice enough,
not beautiful.

You need more stuff to fill you up,
to ease your grief, to fit your need,
to fill the hole.

Don’t you feel that blinding ache,
relentless need, the restless urge,
desire’s pull?

Just buy more stuff, just do your part
to keep the Corporation in the black,
to meet our goals.

Gratitude List:
1. Venus!  She is so big and bright she makes me want to grab my frankincense, saddle up the camels and slouch off to Bethlehem with the other rough beasts.
2. Day trip to the State Museum of PA.  We got a membership to all the state museums for half price, and free parking for the day, to boot.  It was wonderful and educational.
3. The Bird People of the Susquehannocks.  Carved as glyphs into the rocks into the middle of the river, wings spread and soaring.  Carved standing into shell and bone, wings folded, beaked faces watchful.
4. Reading Anne of Green Gables to the boys.
5. You.  Have I said that yet? I am so very grateful for you.

May we walk in Beauty.

Wherever You Stand

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 2 Comments

<Poetry Prompt 24: Write a poem that responds to a statement or quote>

“Wherever you stand, be the soul of that place.” ~ Rumi

Be the spark, the knowingness,
the mother of the moment,
be the dream, the home, and the hope.

Wherever you stand, be the stone
and the wind.  Yes, be the wind
in the trees of the soul of a place.

Wherever you stand, be a memory,
a hope of the future remembering
how
once
we all lived together in peace.

Gratitude List:
1.  CaringBridge.com –A wonderful communication tool to keep friends and communities updated on the health of someone who is in critical need of prayer and caring.
2.  Stories of forgiveness, of grace, of communities and people choosing the higher path.  Perhaps when I feel the need of vengeance, I can be inspired to instead follow in their steps.
3.  Watching Ellis become absorbed in minute crafting details.
4.  Candles and prayer
5.  Cornmeal mush

May we walk in Beauty.

Aunt Eliza’s Advice for Lost Children

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 1 Comment

<Prompt 13: Write a Self-Help Poem>  Oooh.  I am tired, but I am loving the wildness of where this one is going.  So I will write down what I have and come back to it later.

Once upon a time there lived a golden child
who followed a trail of bright flowers
deep into the heart of the forest.

That’s you, in case you hadn’t picked it up,
and the forest is the life you are wandering in.
This is the story you chose for your own
in those rainbow days before you were born.

Oh, for most of us, and much of the time,
the forest is fairly navigable, and not too scary.
But sometimes we get caught in the brambles,
overwhelmed by the shadows, befriended
by suave and creepy fellows in wolfskin.

We forget how to find our way,
forget that we are the main character,
the child of the glorious day,
forget our identity,
forget our destiny, our star
forget how to follow our guides,
forget who they are.

So step into the clearing, Dearies.
Have a seat by the fire.
Here’s a little advice:

Keep following the flowers,
the butterflies, the little birds,
whatever drew you in here in the first place.

Go ahead and flirt with the wolves,
but don’t give them Grandma’s address.

Breaking and entering is still
breaking and entering, Sweetie,
even if it’s a cute little cottage.
You never know what’s in the oatmeal.

Listen to the doll your mother gave you.
Your mother’s voice inside yourself
will always lead you true.

Beware of riddling with old women.
Always remember your manners,
and always be kinder than necessary.

There’s a happily-ever-after
right around the bend,
but you might have to travel
half a lifetime and complete
three impossible tasks
to reach it.

 

Gratitude List:
1.  Appearing in a friend’s dream.  I feel like my day and night selves are working in tandem.
2.  Cozy clothes on a cold day
3.  Sourdough bread–I finally got the stuff baked, after two and a half days of proofing and rising and prepping.
4. Coalescence
5.  Irridescence

May we walk in Beauty.