Unexpected Fire, A Son's Cycle
for my father,
Major Warren Falcon, Sr.
Of Childhood Lamenting - Song of Experience
Might I sing it then?
How many stones he hauled
Not bidden but rough forced
Hand by hand from coagulate soil,
A boy's red wagon rusting
Full of spilled tumble-stones -
Unyielding stars between the rows, silent.
Brooding father with
His hoe to weed or ridge
To row or brow to strike
Made of a boy a mule and plow
At Earth's farthest Edge
Too ill-tilled to nurture
But more to fracture.
Land and the boy turned by his
Father's bad blood to waste.
Both boy and corn obedient
To his And Greater Hand grew tall.
He hid there late summers in
Fateful stalks, grew small on
Shadowed afternoons reading of
Exiled, royal Odysseus and scores
More, native born and slave, driven
From homing soil beyond surf, beyond tall
Mountains and fragrances desert-walled.
He waited, a stone for a small boy's hand,
Or a God's, to haul him or throw,
But it was his father's.
I often stare now at my own to know the difference...
*
Adolescence - Praising.
Cleaning Fish On Good Friday,1966
Fate, then, heavy in a boy's hand
hoists dead weight to a nail on a tree.
His knife scores firm flesh yielding
beneath freshly limp gills - there is an
instrument made just for this, pincher-pliers
for catfish skin - he grips and tears,
uses his weight down-stripping smoothly
bare to such luscence little ribs of roseate flesh.
Only the overly large head, the ugly face
whiskered within gilded monstrance,
remain pure to form, thin-lipped and
mocking, restrained by depth pressures,
sustained on surface trash, dead things
that sink down it's treasures.
Tenderly sing, then, to a nail
a boy's blood catechism -
hands, minds, meant to be stained,
mercy's quality unstrained
neither by will nor gill.
Scavenging flocks gladly fill their
gullets inhaling entrails tossed
in supplicant bins.
In unison Gregorian they scream:
There is a nail for me
plain, a chorus of barks** -
splintered lips
punctuated surprise,
glossolalia of rivers
now given weight.
One can only will
praise to 'The End',
and spill, after pliers,
one's silken guts in offering.
**A catfish when brought to shore barks, a rasping, barking discharge of air.
*
Middle Age - Awareness of Mortality Sure
Our Mutual Confession
Descending the hill in unplanned rehearsal
for what has become a destined association,
our mutual confession is invisibly drawn.
A ruined one-room church appears,
a cemetery plot weed-hidden behind this
once sentinel house long remote to men and
as present as God, my own presence is bound
to his who stands confounded now as three,
one above grave, one within it, and me
in between, one eye upon him, the other
upon sagging dirt where bones and a
ragged shirt share an unexpected
moment of veils confused in sunlight's
disarray of leaves, wood, of stone and
shadows frozen there, not breathing
for us all in unstoried astonishment.
Here horseflies feast.
Upon weathered stones are
only creases where once were
names, dates, even God's Word,
chiseled by a now unknown hand,
an impression only, one among many,
reduced to no plot but that of Providence
left to surmise swatting at Eucharistic
flies proving only flesh and only blood,
a flood of questions eventually exhaled,
and exhaling still, waiting beside
a white rock with wings,
ignoring fire,
leaning into changes.
*
Middle-Age - Acceptance - Forgiveness
Repose Of Needles
For Sanju,
If you need to stand or lie
in the shade for awhile then
do so as farmers do, as does
my father who farms his despair
in hot sun then lays beneath
pines in cooler shade to rest,
to dream that activity between
dirt and sky means some lasting
thing in its doing even though
his ruined life cannot make
it right between clouds and
his obsession with weeds.
Between the garden and the
un-tilled woods he rests,
repose of needles and bark,
mid-day sun insisting its
question slowly. Night dawning
he at last in darkness stands
returned from day, a practical
vision of green shoots to come
from blistered hands.
Up hill to the colder house,
he wills himself to life enough,
speaks some words to wife,
arcs widely around silent wary
children and lives to be old.
His loss of memory leaves it
for others to forgive, to live on
in the rich rot of that ongoing
question which nurtures his
memory haltingly, gracefully, on.
Astonished, I have arrived at
love for him who hurt me most,
have learned to obey the odor
of decaying things compelling
hands to dirt. Within the dream
of staying, the tendril and the heart,
my aging body takes on my
father's form; I, too, like him,
am a farmer when I note how
it moves in its winding reach,
rooting, rising, giving horizon.
*
Reconciliation - Radiance:
Psalm
What can I bring to harvest but these
bruised hands, these cracked stones?
Praise to the fruit tree long untended
beneath mendicant stars.
A boy above, his Radio flyer** lightening full,
Reaches to me now en exilio, the farther flung.
Father, my most difficult, most diffident friend,
My most loving curse,
A strange and fragrant Grace arrives -
Look.
From unexpected fire
comes frail, brief blossoms.
*William Shakespeare
**Radio Flyer is a toy company, famous for it's red wagons.
The company opened in 1917, the year of my father's birth.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Related quotes
Cleaning Fish On Good Friday,1963
.
Fate, then, heavy in a boy's hand
hoists dead weight to a nail on a tree.
His knife scores firm flesh yielding
beneath freshly limp gills - there is an
instrument made just for this, pincher-pliers
for catfish skin - he grips and tears,
uses his weight down-stripping smoothly
bare to such luscence little ribs of roseate
flesh.
Only the overly large head, the ugly face
whiskered within gilded monstrance,
remain pure to form, thin-lipped and
mocking, restrained by depth pressures,
sustained on surface trash, dead things
that sink down it's treasures.
Tenderly sing, then, to a nail,
to a boy's blood catechism -
hands, minds, are meant
to be stained, mercy's quality
unstrained neither by will nor gill.
Scavenging flocks gladly fill their
gullets inhaling entrails tossed
in supplicant bins.
In unison Gregorian they scream:
There is a nail for me
plain, a chorus of barks** -
splintered lips
punctuated surprise,
glossolalia of rivers
now given weight.
One can only will
praise to 'The End',
and spill, post-pliers,
one's silken guts in offering.
**A catfish when brought to shore barks, a rasping, barking discharge of air.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Repose Of Needles
For Sanju,
who says she is
rotting within,
and dampening
And once again,
for my father
If you need to stand or lie
in the shade for awhile then
do so as farmers do, as does
my father who farms his despair
in hot sun then lays beneath
pines in cooler shade to rest,
to dream that activity between
dirt and sky means some lasting
thing in its doing even though
his ruined life cannot make
it right between clouds and
his obsession with weeds.
Between the garden and the
untilled woods he rests,
repose of needles and bark,
mid-day sun insisting its
question slowly. Night dawning
he at last in darkness stands
returned from day, a practical
vision of green shoots to come
from blistered hands.
Up hill to the colder house,
he wills himself to life-enough,
speaks some words to wife,
arcs widely around silent wary
children and lives to be old.
His loss of memory leaves it
for others to forgive, to live on
in the rich rot of that ongoing
question which nurtures his
memory haltingly, gracefully, on.
Astonished, I have arrived at
love for him who hurt me most,
have learned to obey the odor
of decaying things compelling
hands to dirt. Within the dream
of staying, the tendril and the heart,
my aging body takes on my
father's form.I, too, like him,
am a farmer when I note how
it moves in its winding reach,
rooting, rising, giving horizon.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Our Mutual Confession Invisibly Drawn - Pentecostal Church Ruins
Descending the hill in unplanned rehearsal,
what has become a destined association,
our mutual confession is invisibly drawn.
A ruined one-room church appears,
a cemetery plot weed-hidden behind this
once sentinel house long remote to men and
as present as God, my own presence is bound
to his who stands confounded now as three,
one above grave, one within it, and me
in between, one eye upon him, the other
upon sagging dirt where bones and a
ragged shirt share an unexpected
moment of veils confused in sunlight's
disarray of leaves, wood, of stone and
shadows frozen there, not breathing
for us all in un-storied astonishment.
Here horseflies feast.
Upon weathered stones are
only creases where once were
names, dates, even God's Word,
chiseled by a now unknown hand,
an impression only, one among many,
reduced to no plot but that of Providence
left to surmise swatting at Eucharistic
flies proving only flesh and only blood,
a flood of questions eventually exhaled,
and exhaling still, waiting beside
a white rock with wings,
ignoring fires,
leaning into changes.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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History Of A Place, A Bombast, A Psalm In Voices Several
'What thou lovest well remains.'
- Ezra Pound, Canto 181
'Let him not be another's who can be his own.
- Paracelsus
1
'All this our South stinks peace.' - Ezra Pound
In exile, by whose hand unsure - mine, or those hammers of
The ill-starred fathers. Unsure yet on fire I fled their dredged,
God-flooded cotton plains, those self-appointed lords over
They who were deemed lesser dirt or worse. Those who did
Not sing self-praising songs belonged to lordly minds in Hell
So there to I fled and still make a bed there more content to
Be among the bastards for whom the Bard* pleads,
'Gods! stand up for! ' Ay. If the gods will not, and they do, I stand
Up and bray, a fool certain, but in the neighing take deity's cause
Upon Myself - Justice, Beauty, Mercurial Love's Sublimity
Though my heel be wounded by Adamic paternity.
2
Of late an old apple tree cracked,
Twice lightening struck. Dying, insistent
Urges, blooms anew tender shoots
Out of season. One resplendent limb reaches,
Just waking pink on tips, from all
The tangled rest for which I, too, reach,
Grasp and reclaim my own patch, my
Own history though scarred, attached
To hurting words, fists, and cornfields forever
Alien, though bittersweet when recalled -
A boy there, hard staring into distance, his wagon full of stones.
3
Might I sing it then?
How many stones he hauled
Not bidden but rough forced
Hand by hand from coagulate soil,
A boy's red wagon rusting
Full of spilled tumble-stones -
Unyielding stars between the rows, silent?
Brooding father with
His hoe to weed or ridge
To row or brow to strike,
Made of a boy a mule and plow
At Earth's farthest Edge
Too ill-tilled to nurture
But more to fracture.
Land and the boy turned by his
Father's bad blood to waste.
Both boy and corn obedient to
His And Greater Hand grew tall.
He hid there late summers in
Fateful stalks, grew small on
Shadowed afternoons reading of
Exiled, royal Odysseus and scores
More, native born and slave, driven
From homing soil beyond surf, beyond tall
Mountains and fragrances desert-walled.
He waited, a stone for a small boy's hand,
Or a God's, to haul him or throw,
But was his father's.
I often stare at my own now to know the difference...
4
The apple tree at his garden's stop I often climbed
Repledging myself to 'Anywhere but here'.
Beneath open sky a wind-swayed tree top cradles
Views of further hills reaching at land's edge,
Lake and barricading woods muted.
Soothed then, envisioning my nascent journey out
And away, I discover the most difficult to be that both
Land and father, a part of me still, require of me
a psalm.
5
Psalm
What can I bring to harvest but these
bruised hands, these cracked stones?
Praise to the fruit tree long untended
beneath mendicant stars.
A boy above, his Radio flyer** lightening full,
Reaches to me now en exilio, the farther flung.
Father, my most difficult, most diffident friend,
My most loving curse,
A strange and fragrant Grace arrives -
Look.
From unexpected fire
comes frail, brief blossoms.
*William Shakespeare
**Radio Flyer is a toy company, famous for it's red wagons.
The company opened in 1917, the year of my father's birth.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Uses For Wings - Variations From 'We Can Be Broken' & Other Discarded Poems
.
'It means so much that we can be broken.' - from an early poem,1978
For Tien Ho, departed,
and Michael R.
carving the empty space
of her leaving still
*
Here is a Presence beyond
illicit fires bearing witness
to evidence, remains of flight,
contrived escapes blocked by panes,
walls striped in ramming panic,
of ritual and a broken neck,
petrified wings placed in open
spaces they once could range.
*
I began
a bird flown down a chimney
dying in an empty house,
a hidden mountain valley,
night time fires upon surrounding
hills, moonshine stills signaling
flame warnings, bootleggers' silent
spirits conjuring drip by drip
metal and grain.
*
Here are uses for wings:
something returning,
or turning inward
eventually climbed,
rested upon,
or fallen to some chimney life.
*
Descending the hill in unplanned rehearsal
for what has become a destined association,
our mutual confession is invisibly drawn.
A ruined one-room church appears,
a cemetery plot weed-hidden behind this
once sentinel house long remote to men,
as present as God. My own presence is bound
to his who stands confounded now as three,
one above grave, one within it, and me
in between, one eye upon him, the other
upon sagging dirt where bones and a
ragged shirt share an unexpected
moment of veils confused in sunlight's
disarray of leaves, wood, of stone and
shadows frozen there, not breathing
for us all in unstoried astonishment.
Here horseflies feast.
Upon weathered stones
are only creases for once were
names, dates, even God's Word,
chiseled by a now unknown hand,
an impression only, one among many,
reduced to no plot but that of Providence
left to surmise swatting at Eucharistic
flies proving only flesh and only blood,
a flood of questions eventually exhaled,
and exhaling still, waiting beside
a white rock with wings,
ignoring fires,
leaning into changes.
*
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Bare To Such Luscence - A Catfish Mass
.
for John Berryman, his Bones, Confessed
Antiphons:
The original fault
Will not be undone by fire.
The original fault was whether wickedness
Was soluble in art. History says it is,
Jacques Maritain says it is,
Barely.
- John Berryman, from 'Sonnet ix'
Introit then Lauds:
Punctuated surprise,
hosanna of rivers
sounding with
or without gills...
I could not make it there,
that 'pointed conjunction',
nor up to air. I, Catfish,
soft sift bottom mud, give up
on purity, on flitting civilizations
lifted or pressed between
surface and aspirant spaces.
Done with all that, some
have had no choice.
Catfish choices differ
from those of the 'Windhover' Christ,
'dappled, dawn drawn' though they be
(Hopkins implicate flights of resurrection) .
'Stead, Berryman, without art or Maritain,
out leapt his sonnets from sonic
height-bridge to river-fells and missed,
the fool, one last scansion - dirty trick -
'hisself, too, hit, Bones sans pomes,
hard mud, perhaps one foot or his
beard delicately dipped
in paginated river'.
Catfish Homily:
Witless old mud spawn, widest mouth,
no lips to speak of, pulled greedily from
black water to shore, there's a bark in
air that old Catfish makes in punctuated
protest at too much light or is it, rather,
ecstasy, final vision gasped dimly seen
in depths, hinted upon surfaces,
Platonic shadow plays portending?
Is it the latter, sparks of praise to what
is finally seen at the end, a life mucked
and mired in obfuscated fundaments?
Eucharist 1965:
Fate, then, heavy in a boy's hand
hoists dead weight to a nail on a tree.
His knife scores firm flesh yielding
beneath freshly limp gills - there is an
instrument made just for this, pincher-pliers
for catfish skin - he grips and tears,
uses his weight down-stripping smoothly
bare to such luscence little ribs of roseate
flesh.
Only the overly large head, the ugly face
whiskered within gilded monstrance,
remain pure to form, thin-lipped and
mocking, restrained by depth pressures,
sustained on surface trash, dead things
that sink down it's treasures.
Tenderly sing, then, to a nail,
to a boy's blood catechism -
hands, minds, are meant
to be stained, mercy's quality
unstrained neither by will nor gill.
Scavenging flocks gladly fill their
gullets inhaling entrails tossed
in supplicant bins.
In unison Gregorian they scream:
There is a nail for me
plain, a chorus of barks** -
splintered lips
punctuated surprise,
glossolalia of rivers
now given weight.
One can only will
praise to 'The End',
and spill, post-pliers,
one's silken guts in offering.
**A catfish when brought to shore barks, a rasping, barking discharge of air.
**************************
[The poet's brief commentary about 'Bare To Such Luscence - A Catfish Mass':
Thought one might be informed of my inner dispositions, theologically and 'Other-wise', by this piece in progress...it refers to John Berryman, one of my poetic masters who, brilliant, alcoholic, tried Grace and tried out Grace - Grace never tires though we do and sometimes expire seeking for it - took a leap off a boozy bridge, a true 'whiskey priest' to Poesy and That which he praised and bruised to purple if not completed purpose...the Catfish is referent to my southern roots and the Fundamentalist 'perch' (stance and fish!) which can n'ere be rooted out of me no matter the plier-pinchers...
Also, poem refers to Gerard Manley Hopkins, his poem, 'The Windhover' which is one of his most praised...a phrase, 'dappled dawn drawn Falcon', of course inflates me, Falcon, to the elegant and predator Christ he sings hymns to, 'Windhover -Wingedhunger' for souls if not for bodies which Lord Death takes good care of.
...I've learned to be brutal in editing my poems but, alas, not my sins and both deserve further 'edits' now and to come...thus the universe will spill my guts in the end from slimy rooftop perches of enthroned roof dwellers.
In spite of guilt I still praise...]
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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That We Can Be Broken - A Bird Spirit Speaks Of Beginnings
.
Citizen! What have they done with all the air? - Victor Serge
1
I began
a bird flown down a chimney,
an empty house hidden in a
mountain valley, a night time
fire upon surrounding hills,
a moonshine still's signal flame,
a bootlegger's warning,
a silent spirit conjuring
drip by drip
metal and grain.
No blue fire therein.
Suddenly spun,
some beckoning thing
wings between night's crumbled
brick and rusted tin,
white rock and
a wide sky,
braced by
a
closed
encircling valley.
2
Here
is a Presence
beyond illicit fires
bearing witness to evidence found,
remains of flight, contrived escapes
stopped by panes,
walls striped in ramming panic,
of ritual and a broken neck,
petrified wings displaced.
Now remote is the open space
they once could range.
3
Descending the hill in unplanned rehearsal
for what has become a destined association,
our mutual confession is invisibly drawn.
A ruined one-room church appears,
a cemetery plot weed-hidden behind this
once sentinel house long remote to men and
as present as God, my own presence is bound
to his who stands confounded now as three,
one above grave, one within it, and me
in between, one eye upon him, the other
upon sagging dirt where bones and a
ragged shirt share an unexpected
moment of veils confused in sunlight's
disarray of leaves, wood, of stone and
shadows frozen there, not breathing
for us all in un-storied astonishment.
Here horseflies feast.
Upon weathered stones are
only creases where once were
names, dates, even God's Word,
chiseled by a now unknown hand,
an impression only, one among many,
reduced to no plot but that of Providence
left to surmise swatting at Eucharistic
flies proving only flesh and only blood,
a flood of questions eventually exhaled,
and exhaling still, waiting beside
a white rock with wings,
ignoring fires,
leaning into changes.
4
There are uses for wings -
thoughts,
ramming walls,
and panes,
earnest though
contrived escapes.
At first midnight in stillness,
wait.
A white rock,
wings,
a still,
ignorant fires,
illicit spirits
lean into changes.
5
In arms
we carried It
as one does
a child
yet it was
He who carried us,
both bird and man,
who cried
openly
on the way
for our presence
solid in his arms,
he who did not care
who saw his tears shed,
head down,
beneath spring blossoms,
living presences
within bestowing
strength,
order
from
stone and remnant wings.
6
How all this will turn.
I do not burn to know.
I only yearn here,
air and more,
of air now air
all the more
in sustained
moments
without height.
Something returns
or turns inward
that may be climbed
to rest upon
or fall again to
some chimney
life to be found,
itself a winged burden.
.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Two Poems, Remembering Barnardsville Days, Blue Ridge Mountains, North Carolina
1
Uses For Wings - Variations From 'We Can Be Broken' & Other Discarded Poems
'It means so much that we can be broken.' - from an early poem,1978
for Tien Ho, departed,
and Michael carving
the empty space
of her leaving still
*
Here is a Presence beyond
illicit fires bearing witness
to evidence, remains of flight,
contrived escapes blocked by panes,
walls striped in ramming panic,
of ritual and a broken neck,
petrified wings placed in open
spaces they once could range.
*
I began
a bird flown down a chimney
dying in an empty house,
a hidden mountain valley,
night time fires upon surrounding
hills, moonshine stills signaling
flame warnings, bootleggers' silent
spirits conjuring drip by drip
metal and grain.
*
Here are uses for wings:
something returning,
or turning inward
eventually climbed,
rested upon,
or fallen to some chimney life.
*
Descending the hill in unplanned rehearsal,
what has become a destined association,
our mutual confession is invisibly drawn.
A ruined one-room church appears,
a cemetery plot weed-hidden behind this
once sentinel house long remote to men,
as present as God. My own presence is bound
to his who stands confounded now as three,
one above grave, one within it, and me
in between, one eye upon him, the other
upon sagging dirt where bones and a
ragged shirt share an unexpected
moment of veils confused in sunlight's
disarray of leaves, wood, of stone and
shadows frozen there, not breathing
for us all in unstoried astonishment.
Here horseflies feast.
Upon weathered stones
are only creases for once were
names, dates, even God's Word,
chiseled by a now unknown hand,
an impression only, one among many,
reduced to no plot but that of Providence
left to surmise swatting at Eucharistic
flies proving only flesh and only blood,
a flood of questions eventually exhaled,
and exhaling still, waiting beside
a white rock with wings,
ignoring fires,
leaning into changes.
2
What Is Revealed Side-By-Side
....recalling Barnardsville days
in the Blue Ridge, North Carolina
1
Silent, side-by-side, reading.
An occasional 'hear this then. '
Read aloud, words, bread, jam;
familiar tarnished knives spreading;
wedding set, grandmother's, all hands
forget intent on feeding, reading to each
gathered mouth.
Heads nod agreement.
Backs of hands and books
as napkins. Smiles all
around.
2 - What Is Read Out Loud
Beneath witnessed wheels
dancing stars gather stones at dusk,
pockets fill climbing World Tree to
apogee
then downward turn,
stones flung low to dawn,
that largest sun stumbles
alone to blue, screaming,
I WANT A WOMAN
heat enough to reveal morning's dove-blind croon,
burnt crow, having no use for light, missing
a leg, perches hard against solar winds.
Sun's call, different as bird and star, discloses.
3
What is revealed:
the mouse in the hole who loves the hole.
how the serpent's tail shimmers when tossed
out the door -
BE GONE
how one has learned to shake the sheet,
the pants, the socks, the heel-worn boots
before the getting-into, the putting on,
for even a snake loves a warm bed,
a pillow for its head - found once a
skin shed on my flower patterned
pillowcase, fleecy lambs forever silently
bleat as the cloth thins slowly slowly
from head wear, dream wear
because I was once a sleeping man.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Mercy on me
My body now worn and riddled with pain
FATHER have mercy on me, LORD have mercy on me
Your hand on my life even before my first breath
FATHER of my life, LORD of the wholeness of my life
My life entirely in Your hands
I do not question why my suffering
FATHER Your healing hands on me, LORD Your healing hands on me
My faith and trust in You always
FATHER the author of my being, LORD Your grace upon me
No blame, my life is in You
Your Grace keeps me from long lonely nights
FATHER Your presence comforts me, LORD Your peace in me
Loneliness will never defeat me
FATHER of everlasting love, LORD Your sacrifice in love
Humbled, I surrender to You
Though my breathing becomes harder
FATHER Your breath in me, Lord Your life in me
My eyes become dim, and life escapes me
FATHER, the giver of life, LORD, the healer of my being
Your healing in me, now and forever
poem by Lisa Finney
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The Strand
I saw my father’s face last week,
across the gulf of time..
I chanced upon a photograph
That you had left behind.
His hair shock white, his shoulders large
from years of heavy toil,
His eyes pale blue, his hands were rough
from working with the soil.
I thought I saw his face again
Across a crowded room
It must have been a trick of light-
a product of my gloom.
I saw my father’s face last night-
within a vivid dream.
We walked familiar streets of home
in forty year old scenes.
Long vanished homes and people
paraded through my head.
I did not choose to break the mood
or remind him he was dead.
I took my father’s hand last night
We walked a moon lit shore.
The beach’s sand was coarse and black
the surf a subdued roar.
The land behind was all I know,
But the Ocean beckoned me
So together, hand in hand,
We stepped into the sea.
*** *** *** ***
*• a poetic term for a shore (as the area periodically covered and uncovered by the tides)
poem by John F. McCullagh
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Thank You Father
Thank You Father,
For giving me this life that I live.
Thank You Father,
For giving me the chances to forgive.
I believe in You...
I pray each day to prove that I do!
Thank You Father,
The Keeper and Ruler of Love.
Thank You Father,
You're ALL things on Earth...and Above.
You opened up my eyes,
Your power can not be denied.
I dream of a life that is full
And giving!
To dream of a world
Where all people live in peace.
In true harmony released!
Thank You Father,
My soul will flow eternally.
Thank You Father,
The breath that I breathe
Just could not be.
In everything I do...
I ask of you
To help me see things through.
I know You are there with me every hour.
And each day...
It is clear that You're everywhere!
With You...
Why should I despair?
Thank You Father,
For giving me this life that I live.
Thank You Father,
For giving me the chances to forgive.
In everything I do...
My purpose here,
Is pleasing only You!
Thank You Father.
Thank You Father!
Thank You...
Father!
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Father Of Night
Father of night, father of day,
Father, who taketh the darkness away,
Father, who teacheth the bird to fly,
Builder of rainbows up in the sky,
Father of loneliness and pain,
Father of love and father of rain.
Father of day, father of night,
Father of black, father of white,
Father, who build the mountain so high,
Who shapeth the cloud up in the sky,
Father of time, father of dreams,
Father, who turneth the rivers and streams.
Father of grain, father of wheat,
Father of cold and father of heat,
Father of air and father of trees,
Who dwells in our hearts and our memories,
Father of minutes, father of days,
Father of whom we most solemnly praise.
song performed by by Bob Dylan
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Wood Handled Shovel
I take its smooth wood in my hands
to turn the earth as spring returns.
I make straight furrows in my garden
Like those before me worked the land.
This was Dad's shovel years ago
And in my father's callused hands
it coaxed our plot to yield us fruit
as good as any farmer's stand.
Outside of faded photographs
So few of father's things remain
His house torn down, his stuff dispersed.
his kingdom shrunken to a grave.
Of all the things that I possess
this little shovel made of wood
is my link to Him I loved
and to a time when life was good.
J.M.
poem by John F. McCullagh
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Hailstone Food
My father loved the rain
Rain with hailstones
Twenty years gone past
When green and blue
Was all I knew
No red of blood
Nor ‘supreme’ of white
Nor ‘beauty’ of black
Just green and blue and love
It rained with hailstones
White stones from heaven
My father knelt down
On wet September grass
His head to the sky
Few stones in his hands
My father said
‘‘Thank you Lord for hailstone food! ”
I recall less of other days
When it didn’t rain
Perhaps such days were spent
Patiently waiting to say
“Thank you Lord for hailstone food! ”
Twenty years long wait
Four hearts waiting, breaking
My father waiting, breaking
Waiting! ?
But every body waited for him
I think my father never knew
About the power within him
To make the rain fall
Down once again
And hailstones to scatter
His September lawn
I know now
He was a patient man
Yesterday I dug a hole
And I closed a chapter
With all my childhood’s tears
I put my father in the ground
Funny this:
As the body went down
The clouds began collecting
As the sand filled the hole
The rain began to fall
And as we left the site
White stones scattered the land
poem by LLM Mbatha
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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No father?
i told my father it was so and i got up and left him then you know
though there was nowhere i had to go and nothing i had to do
i stand before you father
but you refuse to see
oh father, have you forgotten me?
i kneel before you father
but you do not feel
i am your flesh and same blood
if only you knew
if only i could tell you your an ass
if only i could say and put into words what you've put me through
if only you were around to say good job
as a father you have failed
as a father you were never there
i am ill be gotten history
...no father?
poem by Calvin Jenkins
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Father Sun
Strange imaginations, children hide your secrets well
Is it not temptation, makes you kiss and makes you tell?
Theres a traveler on the airwaves, and hes pleading for my heart
Light up all the candles, Im still in the dark
Hurry operator, get redemption on the line
Pull back the curtains, I think I recognize those eyes
If love is so criminal, then my penance due
cause Im still holding onto letters written straight to you
Oh, wont you save me, father sun, father sun
I need to tell you that my life is on the run
And now you know that youre the only one
Oh, please forgive me, father sun, father sun
I swore I needed you in the back of my mind
Laid the beads upon the table, right beside the wine
It seems that we say forever, but forevers just a word
And I will be coming back for you is all I heard
Oh, wont you save me, father sun, father sun
I need to tell you that my life is on the run
And now you know that youre the only one
Oh, please forgive me, father sun, father sun
Please dont forget me, father sun, father sun
I think I hear him whispering
Put your hand in my hand and you wont feel a thing
Oh, wont you save me, father sun, father sun
I need to tell you that my life is on the run
And now you know that youre the only one
Oh, please forgive me, father sun, father sun
Oh wont you save me, father sun, father sun
I need to tell you that my life is on the run
And now you know that youre the only one
Oh wont you save me, father sun, father sun
Oh wont you save me, father sun, father sun
Oh wont you save me, save me, save me, save me, save me, father sun
song performed by by Sheryl Crow
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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For My Father... The Slip, Falling
The slip...falling...
Our Father. I beg
The begging. Kneel.
In kneeling, blooded flesh.
Bloody hands' supplication.
Do not lift my soul, eyes, heart.
Not now. Not this day.
I will not pray, but
Our Father...
Hundreds of staples in my
Creator's legs...
Eyes open to ceiling, tears icing
Cold, stainless...stained
Pain.
Sheeted, still form.
Cold hands.
Our Father...my Father-
Why?
'Daughter, ' whispered split lips,
'I love you.'
The slip...falling...
Our Father!
His eyes, mine. Heart, soul...
Steel belief again, rain prayer
To reality.
Reality to prayer...
Our Father...
Where the compassion suffered
On your cross...
Where, the divine guiding...
Surgeons' hands, bloody.
Tears...blood.
Our Father.
Too high this price...for my
Pauper Father.
Where, your salvation...
The slip...falling...
Our Father.
Hear you curses
Louder than prayer?
Clothe demons, not angels?
Do you hear me? Watch me?
See me place yellow roses
On this stone.
The stone which set you free...
With my Father...
Imprisons me.
poem by Elysabeth Faslund
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Father's Son
Sheryl Crow & Jay Oliver---
Strange imaginations, children hide your secrets well
Is it not temptation, makes you kiss and makes you tell?
There's a traveler on the airwaves, and he's pleading for my heart
Light up all the candles, I'm still in the dark
Hurry operator, get redemption on the line
Pull back the curtains, I think I recognize those eyes
If love is so criminal, then my penance due
'Cause I'm still holding onto letters written straight to you
[Chorus]
Oh, won't you save me, father sun, father sun
I need to tell you that my life is on the run
And now you know that you're the only one
Oh, please forgive me, father sun, father sun
I swore I needed you in the back of my mind
Laid the beads upon the table, right beside the wine
It seems that we say forever, but forever's just a word
"And I will be coming back for you" is all I heard [Chorus]
Please don't forget me, father sun, father sun
I think I hear him whispering
"Put your hand in my hand and you won't feel a thing"
[Chorus]
Oh won't you save me, father sun, father sun
I need to tell you that my life is on the run
And now you know that you're the only one
Oh won't you save me, father sun, father sun
Oh won't you save me, father sun, father sun
Oh won't you save me, save me, save me
save me, save me, father sun
song performed by by Sheryl Crow
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Bastard Son's Story
I stand before you Father,
but you refuse to see
Oh dear Father, have I fallen from the tree
of your good grace, our last embrace
now a memory
Oh Father, have you forgotten me
I kneel before you Father
But you do not feel
Oh dear Father, have you forsaken me
I am your flesh and blood
Dear Father, look at me!
I am your ill-begotten history
© 2009 Sonya Florentino
poem by Sonya Florentino
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The Child Dying
Unfriendly friendly universe,
I pack your stars into my purse,
And bid you so farewell.
That I can leave you, quite go out,
Go out, go out beyond all doubt,
My father says, is the miracle.
You are so great, and I so small:
I am nothing, you are all:
Being nothing, I can take this way.
Oh I need neither rise nor fall,
For when I do not move at all
I shall be out of all your day.
It's said some memory will remain
In the other place, grass in the rain,
Light on the land, sun on the sea,
A flitting grace, a phantom face,
But the world is out. There is not place
Where it and its ghost can ever be.
Father, father, I dread this air
Blown from the far side of despair
The cold cold corner. What house, what hold,
What hand is there? I look and see
Nothing-filled eternity,
And the great round world grows weak and old.
Hold my hand, oh hold it fast-
I am changing! - until at last
My hand in yours no more will change,
Though yours change on. You here, I there,
So hand in hand, twin-leafed despair -
I did not know death was so strange.
poem by Edwin Muir
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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