Zoom Lens: The Selected Poems

By Marleen Rita Duckhorn

Duckhorn's poems contain from wide angle to a close up of meaningful commentary, where we can develop impressions thereof. Zoom Lens
will focus you into the big picture including an odyssey of topics
ranging from the microcosm and macrocosm of life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jun 13, 2009
• ISBN: 9781462819393

Marleen Rita Duckhorn

Marleen Rita Duckhorn is sixty-seven and lives in Southern California.

Book preview

Zoom Lens

THE SELECTED POEMS

Marleen Rita Duckhorn

Copyright © 2009 by Marleen Rita Duckhorn.

ISBN: Softcover 978-1-4415-2413-3

eBook 9781462819393

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This book was printed in the United States of America.To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

59757

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Dedication

This book is dedicated to Mrs. Francis Lea,

my high school English Teacher

and

Wolfman Jack, my radio mentor

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my husband David Neidener for his loving support.

I would also like to thank Lindsay Reas for her typing

and dedication to the project,

also thanks to Gerald Hebert for

technical assistance.

Chapter 1

THE NEW LIGHT

Earth Fetching

Summer and Santa Ana fall

Sleep under a suns spiraling protractor

Each say carefully calculated from winter

For spring to skim along as it’s benefactor

New trees and pollen for the birds and bees

The flourishing done in the warming trend

Creeping seasons rest in their drama

All the flowers, animals and green fauna nicely blend.

The land exudes a fragrance told

Through mulch and gully heaves

The pitchfork and hoe of gardening tools

And a sigh the good earth retrieves

Spring; a time for visual renewal

Before long heated days of summer’s ace

God has trained the earth to fetch

All people of the human race

The horizon’s failing to measure’s certain

All souls are written in earths blood

Changing seasons view from my curtain

Famine, fire, hurricane, earthquake or flood

There’s sorrow as the sky looks up

The savages of war are in account

Vast crevices open up while

Disdainfully, earth has lists of graves to count.

Distinction and Destination as One Ages

Through the gray hooks of aging

The temple light wrinkles strong

Our over used smile lines

And appears to further them along

The aging game is ruthless

And no match for the meek

The temple remains the temple

Whether the thinkers thoughts are bleak

Yet fortunes told rich or poor

Behind the mask in eye light

Beyond our looks make hay

While our visions try light.

What’s In a Flag?

A flag is a shock cloth

Of organization gone chaotic

Threads flapping left and right

And sometimes esoteric

The upper most flap on poles

Patent all victories

A semblance of stars or stripes

Through departed history

A symbolic come together

A country’s rod and staff

Seems sometimes without it

Our country would only be half.

The Spill Over of Elation

I never knew what being born again meant

It could mean I’m about to join a club

How I’ve come to understand

The essential part of me I snubbed

I rejoined the spirit

Which was so large no hat could wrap

I rejoined the larger picture

Which no frame man made could trap

The belief grew stronger

Which sent me out to learn a lesson

And every angle of life one has to earn

The right to stop confessing.

What God Must Say:

"I make up words

I make up places

I make up birds

I make up races

I am a race unto my own

No one knows my strong injection

As soon as you think you do you’re thrown

A hundred miles in every direction

Then more and more the shock waves ring

And logical truths prevail

That I, the only God, exists to make certain

Your ship has only one sail."

The Stubborn Sea

The stubborn sea is controlled by a stubborn spouse

As it’s married to the moon

Whose symbol is round the sea unbound

Swells the waves from July to June

It pulls and tugs a hundred times

Two hundred present sea fold

Though quite noticeably out of range

What a moon to be so bold

Folding waves crash the shoreline

Rocks, cliff, crag and counting

The stubborn sea, the stubborn moon

Eternity, surmounting.

Teacher Moon

The moon is always writing

And it’s desk top is always organized

Tonight the moon is wearing black

Horn rimmed reading glasses

Sitting in its classroom

Balanced on the huge chair

Of intelligent space

I heard a meteor’s paper clip

Drop from its dog eared book

Ah the reading and the peacefulness

In the outside skies darkened

Thoughtful nook.

Corporeal Plans I

We are all corporeal plans

That sometimes seem surreal

Identifiable body minds

Form destiny’s even-kiel.

Truth is we are avant-garde

Some become strange weeds

Immortal faces on corporeal roads

God reaps his scattered seeds.

Corporeal Plan II

Corporeal seems so surreal

As yet we’re identified

Our body mind destiny

Equally defines

Make haste before truth resides

Avant-garde the mortals place

God consciousness, the real McCoy

It’s as though we’re dealt on ace!

Gargoyles

Gargoyles are misunderstood

As Limericks are to children

They look fierce to the naked eye

But seldom dwell near caldrons

Their mouths drain off excess water

From buttress’ cursed plain

Their scowling eyes scare evil

Gone and down life’s drain

Their stony appearance is solid

More solid than a rock

Censorious matter of loyalty

Unless unconscious, lightening struck

Gargoyle’s stoic nature

Resides with air divine

The chosen few around me

Always protect my house just fine.

Continuous Religion

I am always on my guard

With a devil to my left

A challis in submission

The holy grails’ bereft

Will I ever find an escape

Freedom from evil’s ride

A challis in remission

Is here, my fondest side.

My Only Wish

My prayers reach the truest Lord

My life’s project in your wake

May nothing inferior tread my tide

Or render a mistake

The precious time I speak to you

Dear Lord please never shun

I’ll bask in poetry’s grand procession

With your blessings never done.

The Universe Is A Small Smidgen

The universe is a small smidgen

Concise to all of space

Comparison to an ant a million elephants

Wouldn’t explicate the fates

For that would fit in the

Small smidgen world so trivially

It is hard to imagine the whole entity

Without curling inside your brain to see

What occurs is sanity

That marvels at the stretch

Part and partial of areas matched

To the visions in eternity’s catch.

The Purpose and the Matter

Things evolve

Things have purpose

People evolve

People have purpose

Snakes evolve

Snakes have purpose

Things, people, snakes

All are part of Gods’ surplus.

There Is No Wholesome Sky

There is no whole sky

As beyond that whole sky

Is ever more to wonder why . . .

Is our Universe just resting

On an open bookends shelf?

Is there really a whole wish

That doesn’t deflate in on itself?

A Dance amidst the Yellow Fields

Daisies are such delicate things

Nature’s crumb cakes coat their bedsprings

As they dine on air that is always morning

Asters and daffodils begin their scorning

If flowers alone can’t get along

What hope then for human’s song?

As we shine on or so the song goes

Could jealousy from other planets become our woes?

Still daisies are such delicate things

Nature’s crumb cakes coat their bed springs

Floral metaphors invite humans for tea

Till the day the planet has an epiphany.

Fed Intravenously By Nature

If I were to be fed intravenously

My little pouch held by plumes of ivy

Vein to vein injected moss

Wild flower nectar always boss

A snip of everglade pine tree hearth

A prospective pinch of oak tree bark

Lemony ghee and lavender filigree

Saffron bold or an island breeze

Softly ground up mango seeds

A modest serving of milk wood brains

A violet petal only meadow stained

Last not least a grapefruits’ eyelash

Pineapple, yellow from Hawaii’s stash

Not to forget a pomegranates head

And just a touch of grapes, wine bled.

If I Could Say . . .

If I could seek relentlessly

The truth I know exists

And explain with passion

Raising high my fists

Sorting out the sermons

From the phony I dread

Yes I’d tell the stories

That the unsayable might have said.

If I could say the indelible

A quest I have had all my life

I would soothe my heart and soul

From reality, very blithe.

What Now Is:

Now is the chance

To survive

Then and there

Now is greeting you

Face to face

Making the future commonplace

Now is a deck of cards

Ace to ace

Easy to lay down or misplace

Now is the infringement on practicality

Not for the nostalgic

Or futuristic to see.

The Cheating Sky

While courting the sky

The stars formed a proposal rose

I do, I said at the wedding

Understanding how this immensity goes

Our home would be the Milky Way

Constellations would become my skirt

If skies cheating on me would apply

I’ll go to another universe to flirt.

As The Night Passes

To posses and not be possessed

Nighttime encourages my desire

To own the sky, an irregular wish

As regular wishes, expire

To feel night as a wonton food

As I clean up the Milky Way’s space

Nighttime always leaves behind a cherry

At the top of day time’s waste.

Recycled Revelation

Our breeding sexed

Is a passing phase

A resistance unto aging.

Our seeding vexed

An uncertain craze

Reincarnation could be staging.

Perfect Nature

Perfect nature

Release my soul

Stretch it far like

A bubble gum’s blow

Sit in silence

Beside me still

And breathe into me

Oblivion’s fill.

What is a Week?

What is a week?

I asked a kindly robin

He said, in warble gazing:

"A week is fourteen meals

And a cement bowl for bathing."

I said, "What about the flying

And the errands that you run?"

He chirped, "My flights are heavenly

My errands, entertainment

For the moon and sun."

Chapter 2

DEFINITIONS

Grit Under My Wheels

Trying to get along in life

After going through hell’s field

With