Taking The Stairs
we lift a body
using the legs
and stair upon stair
we breathe
we do not even ask
why are we bent
on going upward?
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Halfway Down
Halfway down the stairs
is a stair
where i sit.
there isn't any
other stair
quite like
it.
i'm not at the bottom,
i'm not at the top;
so this is the stair
where
I always
stop.
Halfway up the stairs
Isn't up
And it isn't down.
It isn't in the nursery,
It isn't in town.
And all sorts of funny thoughts
Run round my head.
It isn't really
Anywhere!
It's somewhere else
Instead!
poem by Alan Alexander Milne
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The Stairs....
the stairs show us
a door, and we focus
to the moment when
we arrive at the very
doorstep
anticipating about
a day of an opening
and see finally what is next
what is there
we step upon each
plank
ascend every next
stair
each stair
and the next stair
all the days of our
lives
spending time
with little rest
and sometimes with
nothing at all
sooner we feel
so deceived
having spent so much
time already
ascending
habitually
but not really getting near
that attractive door
and when we notice that
it is too late
our faces have given birth
to all the wrinkles
our heads have grown
all the white hairs
and silences by all means
have sewn our lips
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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the stairs of Paris
In beauty to the stair
As we go up stair and see
The beauty of Paris for our eyes
But never the less, I’m sharing this
With you by being with me
To the fares of the place.
poem by Lui Albino
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Soyinka, At The Tip Of My Hair
I don't really
consider myself
a poet,
it just came out
purely by accident.
i just fell down
from a
stair
down to the
grassy ground
and that started
the first poem
to another poem to another poem
like a stair leading me
to nowhere
but there is no
fear really
just this
sense of comfort
and beauty
all around the dusk
and twilights
of my moments
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Jenifer's Love
Small is my secret-let it pass-
Small in your life the share I had,
Who sat beside you in the class,
Awed by the bright superior lad:
Whom yet with hot and eager face
I prompted when he missed his place.
For you the call came swift and soon:
But sometimes in your holidays
You meet me trudging home at noon
To dinner through the dusty ways,
And recognized, and with a nod
Passed on, but never guessed-thank God!
Truly our ways were separate.
I bent myself to hoe and drill,
Yea, with an honest man to mate,
Fulfilling God Almighty's will;
And bore him children. But my prayers
Were yours-and, only after, theirs.
While you-still loftier, more remote,
You sprang from stair to stair of fame,
And you've a riband on your coat,
And you've a title to your name;
But have you yet a star to shine
Above your bed, as I o'er mine?
poem by Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch
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Contemplation On The Climbing Of The Stairs...
as i climb the stair
i always think what is up there
when i arrive there
the door is closed
and i am thinking why
contemplating on the other possibilities
shall i open the door
and ask myself in
what if there is nobody there
what if it is just a door and there is nothing inside
i sit on the the last step
and i think again
what if it is not the stair after all
but only the ground
or the pebble or the grass
what if it is only myself and there is nobody else
what if i am just dreaming
what if i am nothing at all
but a thought
without weight without volume
what if this is all about air
a breath a hush a slip?
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Mother to Son
Well, son, I'll tell you:
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.
But all the time
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So, boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on the steps.
'Cause you finds it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall now—
For I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
poem by Langston Hughes
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One Gets Used To All These
one gets used to all these
these and that, matters of the heart and soul
veiled with secrecy, worshiped as a secrecy
a devastation of the mind
a burning of the soul but no matter what
we both are here
still strong and silent in pain
rejoicing that oh,
somehow God has a plan for each of us
dead or alive
a room is reserved, a blue sky, a full moon,
a shining morning sun
a white butterfly, a scar that heals
exciting walks of life, stair by stair we tread upon
milestones
we shake our hands
we are here, and move on to the next, where no one
no one
can say, that this is all we have,
look over there,
there is more to all these
go.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Up In The Tree
What would you see, if I took you up
My little aerie-stair?
You would see the sky like a clear blue cup
Turned upside down in the air.
What would you do, up my aerie-stair
In my little nest on the tree?
With cry upon cry you would ripple the air
To get at what you would see.
And what would you reach in the top of the tree
To still your grasping grief?
Not a star would you clutch of all you would see,
You would gather just one green leaf.
But when you had lost your greedy grief,
Content to see from afar,
Your hand it would hold a withering leaf,
But your heart a shining star.
poem by George MacDonald
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We
we build the stairs first
stair upon stair
wood and nail
and hammer
and hands
and some
determined thoughts
dreams to reach the skies
focus
and look what have be done
we have reached the door
of the room
it is here where we shall hatch
all our dreams
like eggs to our warm
hands
like chicks to our cheeks
time and stairs and hopes and dreams and nails and hammers
and hands
and eyes
be awake and always be vigilant
for dreams that do not die like night
stars
are we
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Someone's Mother
Someone's Mother trails the street
Wrapt in rotted rags;
Broken slippers on her feet
Drearily she drags;
Drifting in the bitter night,
Gnawing gutter bread,
With a face of tallow white,
Listless as the dead.
Someone's Mother in the dim
Of the grey church wall
Hears within a Christmas hymn,
One she can recall
From the h so long ago,
When divinely far,
in the holy alter glow
She would kneel in prayer.
Someone's Mother, huddled there,
Had so sweet a dream;
Seemed the sky was Heaven's stair,
Golden and agleam,
Robed in gown Communion bright,
Singingly she trod
Up and up the stair of light,
And thee was waiting - God.
Someone's Mother cowers down
By the old church wall;
Soft above the sleeping town
Snow begins to fall;
Now her rags are lily fair,
but unproud is she:
Someone's Mother is not there . . .
Lo! she climbs the starry stair
Only angels see.
poem by Robert William Service
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Day for you (3)
may the grey arms of the morn'
turn into life for a day
may silver meet you just there
where your chest is hollow bare
feeling like a ladder on a stair
sturdy ladder legs standing stronger
on the grey arms of early morning
silver legs staring seeing
seven doves' innocent love
in grey arms of the dawning
1. The Stair
the quietness of the
setting sun is haunting
the hurried chirp of
the returning swallows
echoing round the school
evokes a forlorness this
evening chill works to thicken
those flighty years have
come back like swallows
to roost, each echoing
a pain, a joy, a tear, a
smile, a hug, a kiss, a loss
each step of this stair
spins a tale, walks me up
a time warp of yearnings
and disillusions
the stair where a thousand
dreams were spun and another
thousand trailed the wind
poem by John Tiong Chunghoo
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Climbing
High up in the apple tree climbing I go,
With the sky above me, the earth below.
Each branch is the step of a wonderful stair
Which leads to the town I see shining up there.
Climbing, climbing, higher and higher,
The branches blow and I see a spire,
The gleam of a turret, the glint of a dome,
All sparkling and bright, like white sea foam.
On and on, from bough to bough,
The leaves are thick, but I push my way through;
Before, I have always had to stop,
But to-day I am sure I shall reach the top.
Today to the end of the marvelous stair,
Where those glittering pinacles flash in the air!
Climbing, climbing, higher I go,
With the sky close above me, the earth far below.
poem by Amy Lowell
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The 'Bulletin' Stairs
The Mecca of Bohemian men
Was Archibald's untidy den.
Firm-footed near the portals there
Uprose, as now, a spacious stair
That carried nearer to the sky
Their inky hopes in days forebye.
This ladder to Parnassus, they
Expectant climbed - as still one may.
Oft-times upon its steps appeared
The wiry brush of Daley's beard,
Of Henry Lawson's drooped moustache
Would upward glide and downward dash.
Betimes - a gem his pocket in -
Meandered upward Ronald Quinn,
Or Bayldon bore a sonnet new,
Or Broomfield occupied the view
Insistent, in a manner vain,
On making passes with his cane.
These might encounter on the way
The 'Banjo' glum, or Hugh McCrae
Or Souter with a leering cat
Or Bedford in a Queensland hat;
And other penmen debonair
Familiar with that famous stair.
The Red Tressed Maiden, all aglow,
And Clancy of the Overflow
And Dad and Dave, in company
With Ginger Mick and Jock MacFee,
From time to time, in singles, pairs,
By hand or post went up those stairs!
Awaiting by McMahon's door
For silver, little, less, or more,
Met jesting genius to abuse
The landlords and the lending Jews.
Anon with cash in hand such drear
Considerations - drowned in beer -
Would pass as pass the clouds of morn;
And from their ready wits, reborn
As from a fount in Arcady,
Would flow fair dreams of Days-to-Be,
When, in this Southland, shore to shore,
Art was enthroned for evermore.
That noble vision yet I hold
More precious is than all the gold
That men have dug from southern earth.
In loyal hearts it had its birth;
In loyal minds it will become
A trumpet-note, a calling drum
To lead this nation onward, and
To glorify and grace the land.
And through that fellowship may ne'er,
As then it was, re-climb the Stair
Its voices echo down the years -
The voices of the pioneers!
poem by Edwin James Brady
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Coming close
to the sound made of light
almost soundless steps stair by stair
eavesdropping
the crackling of the staircase
glued to the buzzing in my own ears
is that you
coming close to the window silently breaking
to the opening of the eyelids into the night
with the taste of the word 'never' on the tip of my tongue
a shadow swallowed in each word
is that you
coming close always to the outbreak
sewed within a bird mad enough to fly
coming close always with the hope
painful enough to remember a dream
is that you
is that you
thus whispered the night
is that you
thus cried the streets
is that you
thus thundered the mountain
is that you
thus were silent the galaxies
poem by Miroslava Odalovic
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In Your Dark Slated Halls
When I am away
And you are there
Padding the dark corners
And the distant stair,
I carry you with me
As quietly you sit
Deep lost in some thought;
Am I part of it?
And a hundred miles
May lie in between,
But the sky is blue
And the grass is green,
And you in my heart
Will lift my despair;
In your dark slated halls,
Am I with you there?
18 May 1994
poem by David Lewis Paget
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Shadwell Stair
I am the ghost of Shadwell Stair.
Along the wharves by the water-house,
And through the cavernous slaughter-house,
I am the shadow that walks there.
Yet I have flesh both firm and cool,
And eyes tumultuous as the gems
Of moons and lamps in the full Thames
When dusk sails wavering down the pool.
Shuddering the purple street-arc burns
Where I watch always; from the banks
Dolorously the shipping clanks
And after me a strange tide turns.
I walk till the stars of London wane
And dawn creeps up the Shadwell Stair.
But when the crowing syrens blare
I with another ghost am lain.
poem by Wilfred Owen
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A Windy Afternoon At The Beachfront
under the coconut trees
a nipa hut
a boy on a swing
another boy pushing his toy cart
the little girl on the bamboo stair
hugging her doll
the mother is burning the dry leaves
the father is mending the nets
such a happy family
perhaps, who knows? i do not even know them
i am just passing by
trying to breathe trying to take so much salty air
inside my lungs
on this windy afternoon at the beach front
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Sitting Upon The Stairway
lean upon
a rail of the stair
your head
finds a wall
thoughts in prison
bars
of the mind
the feeling of
being compressed
arrives
this early morning
eyes ache but
not squeaking
poor set
these tools for
that are dependent
on light
hands like driftwood
land on stair ways
upon the steps of
your perceived luck
you will be luckier
yesterday was a curse
the stars last night
keep saying
in this little town
some roads are still on
their way to somewhere
else
a bus flowering with
people
windows all blanks
filled with
straight faces
passes you by
you are staying put
there will be an absence
that they will not
ask or miss
dusts from the street
layer upon your eyelids
and you do not blink
you bite your lips
tasting another flavor
of your own blood
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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