If you asked me to describe myself with ten words, "poet" would probably not be one of them. Nevertheless, I do write in verse from time to time, especially when I'm especially moved by a situation or event.

Last week while at my mother's, I ran across some poems I've written in the last few years and thought I'd lost when I had a computer crash. This was a time I was very glad that she still likes to keep hard copies of everything...I was able to retrieve several pieces that, though they wouldn't be worth much to anyone else, are treasures to me because of the people and things to which they're connected.

I share one here, written at a time that I was dealing with discouragement over health issues and pain in my own life and others close to me...

O sweetest Rose who yesterday
stood erect upon my ledge
and proud with blood-red bravery
withstood the knife's cold edge

Your velvet sides surrounded sure
a secret deep within:
the knowledge that ere dawn arrived
You would be broken then

And scattered there upon the lace
which once had graced your hues
would lie the velvet petals limp
and fragrance now diffused

Do you not grieve for life withdrawn,
for yester glory gone?
Do you not mourn the death of all
that slips away undone?

“Ah, no my Friend, for you mistake
the fragrance for the Tree
You view my fading light and strength
as a Rose that used to be

“But look! Oh, look beside the stoop
from where my green stem grew
and see the Life still supple there
and rugged through and through

“Here is the Rose! Here I reside
long after petals yield
Here stalwart branch and tender bud
hold hope for hedge and field

“No grief have I today, my Friend,
O'er glories now unseen
for Life is sheltered in the Tree
whose beauty I have been!”

cw
2/22/05

Labels: Poems