Poems of Life
A local poet shares his writings based on real life.
Leaving the Family Behind
The very roots are torn from the tree.
The soldier must soldier on with heart,
mind and soul 9,000 miles away.
The very roots are torn from the tree.
While families left behind live a daily
palpable drama hoping to avoid the tragedy
of the reaper rapping the death knell knock.
Knock Knock, “Good day. We are the ones who stay
behind to comfort the dying for the dead. Here to
soak up the endless tears from eyes without lids.
Eyes staring blindly hoping this cannot be
really happening – please just not today.”
The family remains, the tree withers and
sheds its leaves blowing in the cold west wind.
Sergeant, I see the tears in your eyes beneath your
glasses wire rimmed, while holding young wife and child
in your arms so tender, in your camouflaged fatigues
and dusty combat boots. Suited up for war then packed
into a gutted flying machine like a thousand sardines.
Seated next to your brothers and sisters – comrades in arms.
No one is speaking as if words will only bring a suffocated
choking response and life would never again be the same.
The very roots are torn from the tree. Let us
nurture the fragmented ones left behind. So that:
Their pain becomes our pain; their joy becomes our joy;
Their lives become our lives; their love becomes our love.
One love…
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2010
All rights reserved
I saw cloud shadows
Atop rolling hills
Dusty green and hazy
In the mid-day sun
Cruising straight ahead
On a never ending road
I sit and see
Life passing by me
Cloud after cloud
Shadow after shadow
A feeling of uneasiness
Rises and fades away
The mind misses the train
White cloud misses the rain
All the while does not explain
The scissors in my brain
How can I live without you?
Cloud shadow floats still
Painting the good farmer’s hill
Where all good children return
To love To play To cry
Under radiant steel blue sky
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2013
All rights reserved
silos
here we live
in silos
of our own making
undertaking to
keep us warm
safe from harm
from coming undone
silos taller than we
i cannot see you
you cannot see me
how safe can one
really be
next door is an ICBM
door next is a long lost friend
whom i hope to see again
there is no sunshine
no sublime
no love
no holding hands
silos
built on our fears
brick by brick
a thousand feet thick
we are beyond reach
is my reality
so separate from yours
only two doors down
we can’t even talk
or touch
the tips of our fingers
and life lingers in
a forbidden zone state
it’s never too late
to tear down the walls
within and between our souls
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2013
All rights reserved
Row after row
The undertow
Pulling me out to sea
A dead man’s float
One man’s hope
Is not to be.
Row after row
Tan square little
Pill boxes simple, plain
Nothing in between
One green house with
Shutters, a single spire
A few flowers are seen
Here and there
Blowing in the wind
A broken gate
Swinging, creaking.
Row after row
Plate glass window
Ancient mothers’ children
Propped up, prone in bed
Some hanging head
All plugged in
Tubing intravenous
Sustenance losing ground
Clear blue sky
A single white cloud
No rain, no rainbows
I walk on idly by
To hospice, cathedral, Amen.
Row after row after row
A gust of wind
Dries the throat, the eyes
Silently whispering good byes
Row after row after row
Unflappable stone heads
Not bending to the wind
The roses, the grass
Lean in
And brush my soul
Between
The thistle and the tomb.
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2013
All rights reserved
Valentine
Listen to the music
Listen to the sound
Turn off your thoughts
Tune in turn on
Gather round
Miles Davis is calling you
Gather round
Listen to the sound
Tiga Tiga boom boom
Tiga tiga twiddly mac twat
Tweet tweet twat
Bang a dong
Never ever, never ever mind
So what
The song
Bang a dong
Free me baby, free
So what
Give it to me
The beat, the beat
The unintended
Syncopated beat
On the street
Off my feet
Down the street
Moves on
No song
No memory
No intentions
An uninterrupted stream
A stream of consciousness
Beat beat beat
Searching a rhyme
A rhyme divine
Searching for a mind
No clash
A movement
From my head
To my heart
To and fro
Sway and fro
Brain and soul
A rhythm
A non rhythm
Bang those strings
Bang those skins
Bang a dong
Rough rough roughillicious
I am all
Tongue tied twisted
Beat up inside
King Kong and his bride
His lily white
Princess bride
Whitey tighty twiddly diddly twat
Searching for a string of notes
A parade of floats
Blue blue aqua velvet green
What a scene
A parade of boats
Rocking, rollicking bouncing
The wavy undulating heat
Strike those strings
Zizzy zizzy bingaling
And that horn
Blare blare mocaholic sound
Beat beat
Blow baby down
To the ground
A ground zerooooooo
You are the one
You are the one
Be mine every
Be mine in
And every
Time
Baby, it’s so good
For what ails you
Move body, mind
Heart, soul
The beat goes on
In a song
Without a song
Bang a dong
Within your mind
Oh baby be mine
All you need is
Love Love Love
Beat Beat Beat
All the time
Loony toony
Rhapsodic
Time
Incredible
Tripper-cerrific rhyme
Be mine
Be my
Valentine
Ffff fade away baby…
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2012
All rights reserved
there was a fluttering
of birds…
must have heard
the word
in my head
bird, bird, bird
bird is the word…
they took off flying
floating, circling
futa futa fluta fluta flappity flap
going nowhere then
back to ground again.
where are dey going
this rainy christmas eve?
flutter flutter
zippity do da
zippity ay
then dey
back home again.
if we could only but
stay in this moment
in a bird brain trance
we could be
we could be
present
in this christmas of dreams
outside our own thoughts
circling circling circling then…
back home again
with omega the cat
who looks into my eyes
wondering…
where have you been?
flying with the birdies
my fine feathered friends?
then back to me
here
now
my present,
time to close these eyes
and sleep again.
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2012
All rights reserved
Watching and waiting
For a friend to play with
Why have I been alone so long?
The masked man came to school today
He took my best friend Johnnie away
Mommy oh mommy when will Johnnie
Come to play?
The masked man said
“It’s your turn”
Then boom Johnnie’s face blew away
And all that’s left
Is his blood on my socks.
Mommy oh mommy
The blood won’t come off
my socks so white
this morning… before…
I don’t understand.
Can I keep the socks red?
They will remember my best friend
Who won’t be over today.
Tomorrow or ever again
How does this happen?
Son, he is in your heart
Your love will never fade away.
Soon you will see me
‘Cause I’ll be all around you
But where i come from
I can’t tell.
The masked man said
It was my turn to play
Then click click no boom
And the game was done
The masked man left the room
Then boom all gone
Leaving me with the others
Who were already gone
And Johnnie at my feet
And no more song.
I don’t know…
I feel so lost and alone
Even when I’m home
I’m all empty inside
My heart has an ache –
It feels dried up, shrunk
I want to be with my best friend
And laugh again
It will never be the same.
Watching and waiting
For someone to understand me
I hope it won’t be very long…
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2012
All rights reserved
I am always returning to the past
It passes me by
And I’m left standing
In the middle of nowhere
Is it love?
Love we are searching for
In the deepest recesses of our minds
Between the cracks of our own existence?
We look toward beginnings
In the loving womb
The warmest, softest, wettest room
To the beginning of the end
Open my mind
To the truth that so painfully
Stares back
Through dilated, mutated, shredded, stoned out eyes
It is mine own truth
That scares me back into
The self-created hell of convenient infliction
Love is so easy
It defies gravity
Love is real
Real is love
Love is feeling
Feeling love
Love is wanting
To be loved
Back to the womb
Of all mothers subsistence
Before words got in the way
Of what?
No words to describe the
Ultimate peace within
The all-around soothing sound
Of waters embryonic
Return me to the emptiness
Of space
Floating, cruising the unknown
Happy to be there?
I just don’t know
Or can’t say
As my words are yet to be invented
Words will soon cloud
New horizons
Revolving, swirling, screaming
The chorus
Of my fragmented soul.
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2012
All rights reserved
The Stand of Birch
Protector of dark
Secrets inside
Halos of fairy dust
Tinker Bell tracers
Castle like spires
Splendiferous
Translucent
Lunatic-licious
A cloud gate
You must pass thru us
We will wash your
Mind
Then push you on
Into dark forest
Beyond
All experience and imagination
We will cleanse your soul
For your trip
Upon a path of no return
A shining cloud gate
Etherealite
Sparkling souls
Remnants of rusting leaves
Shuddering in the wind
Clinging like loose buttons
To a threadbare thread
Silver shadows with
Barely hanging ornaments
On bones so white
So straight
As not to bend
To your will
We will cleanse your being
As you walk and breathe
Air, dust, cloudy steam
A world beyond
Blinded minds
In our timbre of existence
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2012
All rights reserved
black bird cruising
over
grapes of wrath
purple delicious
yum yum
fly to the sun
overcome
mountain mist
in the distance
glaciers overlooking
warm earth
farmers hoeing
row after row
green luscious
rolling orderly
soldier fields.
sun squirt
left eye.
the birdman
sees all
that moves
makes him whole
black bird soul
fly with me
die with me
to the moon
over the frozen
sacred glacial ground.
Copyright © ed Corrigan 2012
All rights reserved
