Month: March 2015

Porch Swing by Dandelion De La Rue

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Porch swing life in
some other place
moon humming happy
bugs playing fiddles
pies cooling
by the window

Down the road awhile
in smokey midnight bars
torchy songs low and thick
red lipstick eyes closed
songs for someone gone
a long long time

Outside slow motion
saxaphone
wakes the blood
sends foggy feet
to the magic house
yellow glow windows
Strong souls there,
souls so big
they never die.

Dreamstreet Man
drew that door
then walked through it.
You don’t know
he said
who’s the dream
and who’s the dreamer.

The air’s the same
The air’s the same.
It’s the same good
honeysuckle air.

Sunset and My Life with the Wave Two Video Poems by Octavio Paz Translated from Spanish

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octovio pazimages

Mexican poet, essayist, and political thinker. His works reflect many influences, including Marxism, surrealism, and Aztec mythology. El laberinto de la soledad/The Labyrinth of Solitude (1950), the book which brought him to world attention, explores Mexico’s heritage. His long poem Piedra del sol/Sun Stone (1957) uses contrasting images, centring on the Aztec Calendar Stone (representing the Aztec universe), to symbolize the loneliness of individuals and their search for union with others. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1990.

 
 

 
 

 
 
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“Poet” by Ron Olsen

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Poet
by Ron Olsen

Of all the people in the world
How many are there do you suppose
Who dare call themselves “poets?”

Who are drawn
To say more with less
Daring critics
To deny their voice
In a world that so badly needs
Imagination

A calling?
Or ego revealed?
Either way
The result is the same
An irresistible draw

For the poet
There is no alternative
But to create

To hope that
Someone listens

 
©2015 Ron Olsen – all rights reserved

“Alone” – A Poem by Ron Olsen

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Alone
by Ron Olsen

The Ship was rolling
Unnoticed
Except that the sailors stood in two rows
To catch you if you fell
As you jumped off the chopper
After hitting the deck
Before you got your sea legs
It didn’t hit us until we were in the mess
And they set the plates of donuts out
That we were in no mood to eat anything
Much less donuts
I pushed the plate toward Steve
He pushed it back
Looking less than settled
We made it back to shore
Without betraying our manhood
Stomachs intact
Stopped for a beer on the way home
“A mood adjuster” he called it
Handing me a Corona
I felt better
Then
Suddenly
With no warning
Bitch slapped in the face by time
We were putting him in the ground
Before his time
Up at Forest Lawn
And Mark said
“I can’t believe our friend is in that box over there”
I had no reply
What could I say
About death?
It was the same place they buried another friend
With the same name
Two Steves
Within days of one another
It seemed
Although it was actually several years
Time plays games
Hours are days
Days are years
Your friends are gone
They told us it would happen
But you really don’t know
Until it does
As the ship keeps rolling
Leaving you there
Alone

©2015 Ron Olsen – all rights reserved

 

Ron Olsen is a Los Angeles-based writer.  More of his work can be found here.