MEMENTO
A mist of rain
Hides the Autumn moon
Like a stream of promises
Obscuring true desires
I sit in an empty bed
Cloaked in the sound of steady dripping
I close my unread book,
Switch off the lamp
And turn to sleep alone
In the middle of the night
I get up and sniff
The breezy sleeve
Of the Spring shirt
I wore as I once walked with her
Hoping to steal some fragrance
To soothe the Autumn thoughts
That press in my chest
Till all hours of the mornings
Until the sky grows light again
Only her promises remain
To stretch the empty bed months even longer
As spiders weave their webs
Above my head
2001
from: October Meditations
© George H. E. Koehler, 2010
Posts mit dem Label October Meditations (cycle) werden angezeigt. Alle Posts anzeigen
Posts mit dem Label October Meditations (cycle) werden angezeigt. Alle Posts anzeigen
Mittwoch, 20. Januar 2010
Montag, 14. Dezember 2009
Negotiating With The Dead
from my "October Meditations" cycle of poems.
NEGOTIATING WITH THE DEAD
As the morning light approaches,
Once more, my bedroom is peopled with ghosts
In discourse with the birds outside
Nights and days are pillowed
On my never ending stream of desire --
A maze of lingering echoes:
Anniversaries are fallen blossoms
Strewn upon the ground,
Sticking to the soles of my feet --
Tendrils of memories
Reliving the last of their lives, but
Another negotiation to turn my weak blood into wine
2001 + 2005
© George H. E. Koehler, 2009
NEGOTIATING WITH THE DEAD
As the morning light approaches,
Once more, my bedroom is peopled with ghosts
In discourse with the birds outside
Nights and days are pillowed
On my never ending stream of desire --
A maze of lingering echoes:
Anniversaries are fallen blossoms
Strewn upon the ground,
Sticking to the soles of my feet --
Tendrils of memories
Reliving the last of their lives, but
Another negotiation to turn my weak blood into wine
2001 + 2005
© George H. E. Koehler, 2009
Prisoner of Life
This one's taken from my cycle of poems called "October Meditations".
PRISONER OF LIFE
(Morning Meditation I)
The broken cobwebs in the staircase
I pass underneath each day
Float above me into empty months
Stretching into nothingness
Trying to shake echoes to life
Dry leaves blow from my avocado trees
My cut toenails
On the bathroom tiles
Lie like the cold shells
Of crickets from yesteryear
Like dead insects crushed
Between the pages
Of my notebooks, damned to become
Part of an unrequited museum of the future
Trying to shake echoes to life
All clocks have stopped
Fallen blossoms scatter in the backyard,
Crumbs lie beside my bed --
Lingering echoes
Of songs yet to be sung
The skylight in the stairwell
Cuts a slice of sky into the roof
I walk up the stairs and I walk down
I come and I go
But I come no nearer each day
To cutting some sky into my roof
In our lives, this patch of blue
We prisoners know
As sky, becomes the strongest pull
Of all our days
Days go by
In a blur --
Jungle rivers cutting their way
Toward their seas
2001 + 2003
© George H.E. Koehler 2009
PRISONER OF LIFE
(Morning Meditation I)
The broken cobwebs in the staircase
I pass underneath each day
Float above me into empty months
Stretching into nothingness
Trying to shake echoes to life
Dry leaves blow from my avocado trees
My cut toenails
On the bathroom tiles
Lie like the cold shells
Of crickets from yesteryear
Like dead insects crushed
Between the pages
Of my notebooks, damned to become
Part of an unrequited museum of the future
Trying to shake echoes to life
All clocks have stopped
Fallen blossoms scatter in the backyard,
Crumbs lie beside my bed --
Lingering echoes
Of songs yet to be sung
The skylight in the stairwell
Cuts a slice of sky into the roof
I walk up the stairs and I walk down
I come and I go
But I come no nearer each day
To cutting some sky into my roof
In our lives, this patch of blue
We prisoners know
As sky, becomes the strongest pull
Of all our days
Days go by
In a blur --
Jungle rivers cutting their way
Toward their seas
2001 + 2003
© George H.E. Koehler 2009
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