Resisting the Ground

By Barbara Blanks

This collection of prize-winning poems focuses on people: Real, Unreal, Unhappy, Funny, Personal. We are just doing our best to keep going, and trying to avoid those crash landings by keeping our feet up and resisting the ground. Some comments about the poems: " ‘Filled with empty’ was the most perfect wedding of craft and content.’ " ~Pat Laster, twice-former president of Poets’ Roundtable of Arkansas. “The closing lines of ‘The Hospice Volunteer’ will be forever seared into my brain. I shall cherish your words and hold them close and be stronger for it." ~John Hoag, Dripping Springs, TX. "Your name comes up regarding poetry contest anthologies -- many comments on the excellence of your work!" ~Jerri Hardesty, New Dawn Unlimited, Inc. “In Utah, at the Chaparral awards, I heard your ‘Lost and Mounds’ read! The woman next to me said, ‘She must be quite a character.’ I assured her that you are.” ~Budd Powell Mahan, thrice-former President of Poetry Society of Texas.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: May 22, 2019
• ISBN: 9780359677931

Book preview

Resisting the Ground

RESISTING THE GROUND

Prize Winning Poems

by Barbara Blanks

Copyright 2019 by Barbara Blanks

All Rights Reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced in any way without written permission from the author, except for reviewers who may quote brief passages in a review.

ISBN 978-0-359-67793-1

The author may be contacted at:

[e-mail]

Website:

www.barbara-blanks.com

My thanks to all the judges

of so many different contests

in so many different states

who chose my poems as winners.

Unbounded Journal

Life begins

as a blank page,

one filled with

potential and possibilities.

It is written on line by line,

printed or in script;

elaborate calligraphy

or rapidly scribbled;

usually difficult to read or understand.

Large and loose,

tiny and cramped,

average or fancy …

everyone writes on his page.

Sometimes the page is crumpled,

adding texture and character;

sometimes it is torn

and raggedly taped back together;

often it is cut short …

for life is not written in ink

but in pencil—

and easily erased.

Synthetic Citizenry

a kind of plucking from the memorious air

Idyll Persuasion

These moments pass like pickets in a fence,

they flicker light and dark. The breezy leaves

and waving grass caress your skin, so thoughts

of Eden drift across my mind, though not

as pure as Eve was just before the fall.

This rill is knitting strands of silver threads.

We dabble toes in icy water, gasp

in thrill of sharp surprise, while pasture glows

with green, with gold, with sheep as vestal white

as lilies. See how border collies, dark

as wolves before the door, do not lose sight

of what’s important, marking time before

they make their moves. Like they, I will not rush

to gather you within my arms, corral

your lithesome figure, shear away reserves.

Your lustrous hair gleams golden in the sun.

Its silken waves flow over me, awash

with fragrant clover, tempting me to stroke

its sleekness. Lips as pink as blushing cheeks

beguile me. Mouth this plump and moist must taste

as sweet as honeyed mead, so—first I’ll drink,

then let my fingers flutter as they graze,

and set the pasture of your skin aflame.

Blank verse

Charon Carries On About His Job

Seriously, what was my mother thinking?

My name means fierce brightness,

yet I’ve always lived in darkness—at least,

it seems that way. Like—I used to play

with the Fate sisters, and they made me

their beast of burden—so to speak.

Clotho spun the thread of life, Lachesis

measured its length, and Atropos lopped it off—

leaving me to haul away the dead body,

be it bug or bird or worm. I never thought

I’d wind up hauling dead people.

I don’t mind. It’s a job—someone has to do it—

but I’m not the Grim Reaper, for Thor’s sake.

Really, all that weeping and wailing

by the dead is so tiresome. It helps that Hermes—

he brings me the souls—is such a practical joker.

Sometimes he takes the passage fees from mouths

and hides them in other orifices. Too funny.

Of course, if someone doesn’t have the fare,

I fling him overboard, but—

Hey, not even in death

does one get something for nothing.

Rules are rules.

Anyway, easy gig for me. I ferry the dead

down the river Styx to Hades.

It’s not a long trip, but …

it probably seems like an Eternity

to my passengers.

Death Devours All Lovely Things

On the white shroud that clothes the lofty peak

the heavens stretch fair and sad like some great sheet

of lost, imperial music, played when fair

earth in her flame-woven vesture is drowsy with heat,

unseen, unknown, and greet as angels greet.

A fair young girl, with light and delicate limbs,