Collected Poems: Patterson Gap Poetry, #6

By Daniel Warren

"Collected Poems" is a compilation of all poems written in the past fifty (something) years by the poet.

 

The poems are wildly different in their subject and execution. This is to be expected as the poet also is "wildly" different than when he started. So if one poem doesn't strike you the reader perhaps another one will.

 

And perhaps you will think that some poems are better than others.

 

The poet understands and only wishes that you will find one that you like.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Daniel Warren
• Release date: Mar 14, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201793395

Book preview

Dedication

To

Sarah

To The Reader

Collected Poems is a compilation of all poems written in the past fifty (something) years by the poet.

The poems are wildly different in their subject and execution. This is to be expected as the poet also is wildly different than when he started. So if one poem doesn't strike you the reader perhaps another one will.

And perhaps you will think that some poems are better than others. The poet understands and only wishes that you will find one that you like.

A Centripetal Force

If music isn’t life

then life isn’t a play

And there on opening night

How does it begin

A play of words?

As curtain ascends

A character on stage

Brings music to a halt

Treading words in a line

The troop carries on

til half-way at intermission

I notice others in my row

no one I know

I half-nod in recognition

And remove to promenade

Paintings hang in light

Careful crafts, ornate décor

More than men have drawn

this space

in mind and on page

than stand here in lobby

or there on stage

And now I have to ask

Though some will never attend

if line and staff and frame

have not drawn them here

What is the source

they seek

If not the word drawn line

unless of course you think

it just

a centripetal force

2/11/03

A lasting day

I stood

for awhile

against

the currents

of the day.

Never

making much

ripple

in comparison

To the ones

that ran

to play

their temporal days

in the sun.

I was blessed

I guess

by a different

longing

for a lasting day.

4.7.12

A life beheld

She had dreamed once

he had talked carelessly

she had enjoined in the lyric-life

he had described sing-song like

She had life to enfold

he had life to express.

He had given his heart

she had felt the change in tone

he had not known until later

she had known the moment,

and ever-after

She had life to gather

he had life to cast.

She could never dream anymore

he could never change his dreams

she had remanded her emotional heart

he had lost his footing for sure

She had life to cloister

he had life to bestow.

He had a past to forget

she had a future to face

he made a last slip of the tongue

she took him at his word

He had life to behold

she had a life beheld.

4.25.12

A life with you

I sit and am pensive

then panic

then despair

then resolute, I continue

The written letters

not answered

not shared

not read, I fear

I’ve only a slight chance

less than that

less than none

less hopeful, I am

As time passes quietly

now quickly

now a blur

now stops, I dread

Another moment without

a love,

a dream of,

a life, with you

1/8/07

A lovely fire

The heat

of a kitchen

in warm smells.

The baking

of a dozen

voices that swell.

The scorching

of a custard

turned dark to the sight.

You burn

the love

into life.

2/4/11

A natural course

What's the pulling force

that brings the water up,

through the trunk

through branching limbs

to the leaves?

Does naming it

explain?

Do we always

have to call it

by name?

Can we take up

ourselves

to such heights?

How is it we can accept

this pulling force

and join

its natural course?

9/30/11

A pound of justice

Hey old man,

you in jail,

they gave you paper

to pad your cell

not to poem on.

What were

you thinking?

Writing your

epic

when you

should be

sleeping.

Hey old man

what were you waiting?

Some great

awakening

from a sleeping world.

What were

you trying,

to poem off

on the unsuspecting?

Some modern wake

for the

just traditional?

Hey old man

take your meals

and your exercise hour

No one cares,

your jailhouse epistle.

What you

think

you in for?

A pound

of justice

not manuscript.

7/20/03

A reminder of ashes

The ash-grey men

perform their duties

in punctual

efficiency.

As the wind

blows life

through the valley,

the ash-grey men

shutter their stares.

And on the winding

green lawn

of a summer place

the delicate iron

window-keepers

swing in the breeze

While inside

the great live

as a fire

of dying ashes

flares briefly

from a poker

wielding butler.

Out the chimney

some glowing embers

cross the space

between valley and home

On their journey

to an ash cemetery

far from the

summer place

they have known.

The car starts

in the driveway

and speeds

towards the valley

curve

The ash-grey men,

remiss in remarking

its passing

until the crash

brings a flutter, and

a reminder of ashes.

4.16.12

A Southern Smile

Chair, the room with

white walls

Come... sit down to fry.

My body balloons with

a fever

Mother somewhere, cries...

My man sits down to break-

fast

sits down to food-feast.

My body longs a drink to health

longs a sad sweet sleep.

Rest easy my man I drift

by-e

All hail your toast and jam,

I taste your last bit of Oran-juice

Such soft shoulders in my hands.

A flip of wrists; neck-twist,

feel sadness,

a Southern lady screams in pain.

I’m drawn away to face the

day

looks like a sky-rain.

All is lost my body tossed

on a cool linen sheet,

Must have been a dream my friend

One dreamed quick before I sweet-sleeped.

It was in all the papers,

said the man,

"So fine a Southern belle,

the same morning he was

fried, God rest him –"

—he smiled—

God rest him in hell.

A synthesis of love

Being a (man) is sometimes

(bipedal creature of unique intellect)

being gentle

Being a (woman) is sometimes

(bipedal creature of unique intellect)

being firm

Not till you can peer over the edge

of your own abyss

and see my broken (life)

(an aggregate of local-energy

probabilities)

and forget self

and lose self

to (save) mine

(ignoring the random and unwanted        factors introduced ... selflessness)

And there high above

extend a hand

and pull another life-form up

from (misery, superstition, and spite)

(mans local sphere of influence, ie...       Earth)

will you know what being a man or a

wo-man truly is

Not till you rise above

can you know (love)

(the act of grace or the act of

receiving grace)

A Winters Death

When father died

it seemed to cry

snow

from a blank sky

that first day

of death.

Second day

the snow itself

in a melting rain

revealed the

barren ground

where we buried

dreams.

And it seems

even in rows

a-kilter

something

wants to grow

as a thistle weed

shoots up from

the snow.

On the third day

of death

I gathered

a handful of weeds

and scattered

their seeds

in a silent arc

of renewal

for the coming spring.

On the fourth day

I rest

as I'm sure

the best

I can hope for

is the continual

effort

to out wait

a winters death.

2/04/11

Absence

Where the blinding light?

The threatening sky at night, the

clarity of dawn.

Where the song

that warns?

On what morn

did the quiet fall?

When could we

no longer

hear?

And what answer

could we give now

if we could?

9/30/11

All life is dialogue

All life is dialogue

told by a brown toad

Down by a pond

I scream past

racing the road

and truck my load

to the next

fence post.

There I begin

to mend again

the broken wire

that sings in the wind

And the toad

I hear keeping time

in momentary a-cappella

in my mind.

We all listen

at times to the singing

and at other times

we beg quiet

busy remembering

a singing toad

talking really,

when the sun was higher.

10/18/10

All souls

Have you sat in the evening

with the sun going down

Maybe with the

curtains drawn?

As the light empties and

flees your grasp and

darkness enters

the room.

Have you seen the shadows slant

as they move almost alive and

wondered if there was

some connection.

How is it that there are moments

such as the fleeing light in

evening that makes a

Stop, in your life?

A barely perceptible knowing

that there’s more than

meets the eye

here under

heaven.

A palpable sense that you

could grasp the last rays

and hold a moment

regardless of the

flight of time.

I mean at that moment an

essence is with you,