Echoes
hark! hear the rumble
across the desert;
my soul remembers
the great movement of stones
and great boulders
and simmering sand
mighty Saguaros loom
above tiny desert creatures,
gifting water and sun shade
a death rattle threatens
beware! … fangs at the ready
— find another way
my soul remembers
from layers deep within
the baking sun at mid-day.
foot-prints soon cover
with impressionable sand…
but the desert remembers me
©Sometimes, 2017
Category: Dreams
a dream of dreams
This is a poem I wrote nearly a year ago, inspired by a charming and fascinating site called Osseous Design: The Blog . I happened upon the site one day when surfing, and wrote the date 1-24-17, and name of the Blog at the top of my notebook page. Tracing back, I was able to find the unique site, with its creative and innovative “faces” and an original painting and poem with a dream theme. https://osseousdesign.wordpress.com/2017/01/08/identities/
I was moved to write a poem of my own in my notebook. Here it is:
dream of dreams
a dream is never “just a dream”
but a manifestation of reveries
ever real, everlasting, ever true
figments of memories—a dream is never “just a dream”
for much of life’s experience exists
within a world of somedays and might-have-beens
through which hopes and wishes bravely persistthose who discount or ignore life’s dreams
lose and squander the joy of make-believe…
forfeits the pretense and right to achieve
truth never known remains to perceive.©Sometimes, 2017
Anne Finds Her Career (originally posted February 2016 )
— I first published this poem here on SOMETIMES in February of 2016. The plan is to re-post some of my favorites among my 400+ posts since the blog began back in 2011.—
Anne finds her career …
When Anne was a girl, she always wanted to be
a dancer. To wear flowing gowns and satiny slippers
and be guided as a sylph, lifting in twirls and leaping high,
up in the air with skirts twirling and shoes barely touching the floor,
and feeling the thrill of the collective sigh from the audience.
But as fate would have it, her two left feet, and her lack of graceful
moves — more like those of a duck than a lovely swan, or
even a goose–combined with her brother’s snickers
she stepped on her skirt instead of her shoes
and tripped over her partner’s feet.
So then, when she saw that a new goal was needed
Anne decided that she wanted to be, when she grew older,
a doctor. To have a white coat, a stethoscope and thermometer
and peer into ears and down throats of her patients…to quickly discover
what ailed them…and find a cure, and all of the people would just be
astounded when Little Anne became a Doctor!
A wonderful plan!
It would be a good position, pay plenty of money, and mean
great prestige…and besides, the town needed a Doctor.
It might have been the perfect profession, except…
she fainted dead away at the first drop of blood.
Not to be derailed on her track to gainful employment
Anne thought long and hard to find just the right profession
that would serve both her ambitions and her need for recognition.
“One thing that I can do well,” said Anne, “without tripping over any feet
while dancing…or to lose my wits and panic when anyone bleeds…
The perfect job for me (why didn’t I think of it sooner?) is to get
pen and paper, and a computer — and spend my life Writing!”
So she wrote and she wrote, books and poems, and tales
about dancers and doctors, and all kinds of things.
©Sometimes,2016
Dreaming imaginary Prague, reposted
Dreaming imaginary Prague
I have never been to Prague, except in daydreams…
but my impressionable mind is easily led
into the magical world of zithers and Gypsies,
of violins singing and wailing in ageless melodies…
music of joy and abandon…or sadness and melancholy.
Put on your hat, my girl, and come along with me…
We will trip the light fantastic (or is it a Fandango?)
whirling, twirling and dancing …and laughing at nothing
as our echoing soles click and ring among the cobblestones…
back to the days of fancy and intrigue.
Halcyon days of exquisite youth and passion for it all–
sordid or glorious, respectable or ridiculous–
days when common sense stayed at home amid the quiet
and comfortable over-stuffed chairs…and crackling radio static
never quite able to drown out the strains of an orchestral tune.
Prickles of goose bumps remind of running with n’er-do-wells
and bad influences…those mysterious, exciting ones that
never existed, masquerading as “ladies” and “gentlemen,”
life’s forbidden (or at least frowned upon) adventures
among the brilliantly dark recesses of shadowy corners.
The mere mention of Prague always brings unseen wonders–
half-vision, half-dream. There are Ladies in satiny dresses
and impossible shoes…. dancing away the nights, until dawn.
They sway with the music of instruments with no names,
enticing dangerously handsome partners with unknown designs.
But I digress, as is my wont…
the thoughts of romance and mystery subside–
old Prague returns to an idea that lives on
for dreamers…and poets.
©Sometimes, 2016
Come and Dance with me…a poem
Come and dance with me
across the hills and time stream
let’s echo always!
© Sometimes, 2017
clouds and memories, a poem
Draw me gently to your chest
my heart will linger there;
across the ages, along time’s trails,
the memories ever return.Wait for me!—oh, wait for me!
the plaintive echo pleads.
When least expected, awakening
to memories in words of a poem.Oh tell me—where do they dwell?
Among the dreams and reveries
apart from the wrack of reality
forever a blend of torture and joy.©Sometimes, 2017
Promise in a Poem (Cee’s Odd Ball Challenge entry)
I am unique among my peers
having arisen from the Winter
more or less intact… if a bit bedraggled.
One might say the word—disarray?
to describe broken remnants
and staring, bleary rimless eyes
askew and discolored
arrangement of my limbs and leaves,
disheveled scraps of nascent green
tones, silky serrated edges of hemline.
Better days have been….and will be again
and my modest Winter garments
will have fallen to the ground.
Please don’t judge me—for who among us
can preserve the beauty and newness of Summer
beyond the ravages of rain and snow
and Cold from the relentless winds?
You are invited to return in half a year hence,
and feast upon my resurrected beauty
as new green foliage and velvety petals
of red and white roses prevail.© Sometimes, 2017
Cee’s Odd Ball Photo Challenge: January 22, 2017
ever wonder if all is really “but a deam?”
Day 9, 2017.
Dreams are still one of the great mysteries of life—probably will always be. Thoughts are paths leading through the dim reaches of our sleeping brains, bringing joy and fright, often even in the same dream. OK, I admit to having an affinity to Kermit the Frog, with his songs about rainbows and his “lovers, and dreamers…and me…”
Enough of that kind of nonsense, I suppose. It’s just that my nature runs to the beautiful and kindly connected features of life in general and life-on-the-edge in particular. Sometimes it seems that no matter how terrible the evening news gets to be, there is some sense of surreality that tinges the horrific details with fuzzy edges that lend a hint of humor, at least ridicule, that belies the other-worldy bizarreness.
Occasionally I will think of something, a conversation or place that I have been, and it takes awhile to realize that the incident had actually been a dream. An example of this phenomenon occurred for me at the time of the 9-11 attack on New York City. During the day the news channels were playing the footage repeatedly in which the second airplane hit the Twin Towers, flying into the side of the already burning building…like a Frisbee sailing toward its mark endlessly on a giant loop.
I had entered into a fitful sleep, having watched the 9-11 tragedy over and over all day. Also, coincidentally a family crisis was evolving closer to home, involving my adult children who were present at the impending death of their father (my ex-husband,) in a hospital in Michigan. More than once I got out of bed and turned on the television to reassure myself that it had been in a dream of my own that the jet passenger plane was slicing into the tower …but each time I checked my TV the horrific incident was happening again in real time.
A similar reality-dream happened to me again in November of 2016, when I was awakened by a dream on election night. I had not waited for the final count to come down before turning in, but I did have a long and detailed dream about the election…but my dream did not reflect what really happened. In the morning CNN came on with news that was the opposite of what I had been dreaming.
Every now and then the thought recurs—that maybe Shakespeare was right about
life and dreams and the interaction of the two concepts alternating in the realms of reality and make-believe.
Smitten
(first published January 2017
Smitten
Please make your point, Madam
spare me the hints and hyperbole
your subtle suggestions are quite a lot
for one who prefers words spoken verbally
in addition to clear and simple…at all cost.
Please make your point, Madam
be so kind as to avoid this torture
What do you want from me? I beg you to say!
Just as I think I understand your demeanor,
and decide to venture a move—you’re off.
Just as I think I catch your drift…do I earn your fancy?
Say, how can I tell? I really hoped that I know you well.
But my imagination is befuddled…trying to see,
my poor heart muddled…beating a loud tattoo.
Pray tell: what are your intentions for me?
Marching off to war is far more assuring
my enemies always make their intentions clear to me…
and in return I do do not lead them on unfairly.
Please make your point, Madam—
What is your business with me?
© Sometimes, 2017
never say never
One of my favorite places where I’ve never been
on the deck of a sailing ship, out on the ocean.
The boards are thick and smell of pine,
as a ballroom floor with satiny shine…
o’er looking green hills that slope to the sea.
Where sweet maidens whirl in fine silk dresses
in powdered faces and warm shining eyes,
dancing in time with the orchestra’s strains.
Back on my ship with the music still dancing
and humming gay tunes that remember …
my heart yearns for places that might have been;
for the deck boards of pine that echo sweet tunes
wafting o’er the salt-tinged breezes of memories…
or dreams…of nights that might have existed
in one of my favorite places where I’ve never been.
© Sometimes, 2016
dreams of day
Days go by in dreams…
more complicated, it seems,
day-dreams pass away…
are replaced by dreams of day.Not intended to be obtuse,
or in any way clever, or to abuse,
by flippant tries to make a verse,
or to neglect decorum in place of subterfuge.Dream places are often familiar,
if not in actual points of reference,
at least recurrent and commonplace
locales to retreat for reassurance.© Sometimes, 2016
The D’s have it
Day
Dawning
Dreaming ends
Desert Dew Drops
Discover Basins for Drinking water
Destiny provides portals for refuge
Designed to hold
Delicious
Distant
Drums
© Sometimes, 2016
SOMETIMES 