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Bits of Poetry

~ Linda R Davis, Raven of Peace & Poetry

Bits of Poetry

Tag Archives: Freedom

Fuck the New Normal

30 Tuesday Jun 2020

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Chaos, CoronaVirus, Courage, Covid19, Death, Dying, Emptiness, Fear, Fear of Death, Freedom, Life, Loneliness, Longing, Loss, Masks, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Soul, Souls, Survival, Women's Poems, Yearning


The Clerk

Imagine being nineteen again,
still pimply and awkward,
parroting a script
from behind a plexiglass wall:
Phone number, please, you say,
and imagine her fingers,
typing one in. You hear the click,
clicking of keys on the keypad,
sickening,
music of the dead,
you think, you’re dying.

The Enforcer

You’re maybe a hundred pounds,
just a little thing, whose mask
covers two thirds your fragile face,
and they buried you at the door,
the enforcer, instructed to say—
This door, not that, and arrows,
follow them, follow them,
do like I do, with this cover,
my voice smothered, my soul—

Wrong Way

I’m sure I was just standing there,
leaning over my cart, watching
my daughter shop for cards,
when I heard her voice—
not the enforcer,
but a fellow peruser, like me,
another blank face, masked,
breathless, breathlessly,
you’re going the wrong way,
she said, you’re not following
the arrows, she said,
and her bony, dead finger
pointed down along the ground.
I followed it, and sure enough,
she was right about me:
Rule breaker, careless
spreader of germs.
The shame, the shame,
she would have me feel,
for facing the wrong way,
disobeying.

New Normal

Fuck that. My latest mantra. Fuck that
and fuck that, too.
Even as I do it.
Where’s the humanity in this?
I want to scream.
But who would hear me?
We’re too busy saving lives
by not living, buttressed
as we are behind masks,
She doesn’t even realize I’m not smiling,
Or, does she? Maybe there’s something
of, fuck this shit, in my eyes,
the only part of me she can see,
if she tries to see, but she doesn’t.

The mask isn’t merely the covering
for a mouth, a nose, —
it’s blanket, too, as in a morgue.
Covering the dead. And I know,
my time is coming soon enough,
but I’m not dead yet, covered as I am,
prepared for burial.
Yet, still pounding on coffins,
trying to pull back the heavy veil,
cursing my heart away,

fuck! Someone help us!

–into the emptiness.

This Pendant World: Passover

09 Thursday Apr 2020

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

CoronaVirus, Courage, Covid19, Death, Death Poems, Dying, Fear, Fear of Death, Freedom, Hope, Infinite, Life, Loneliness, Loss, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Survival, The Universe, This Pendant World

Wasn’t everyone born

thinking

they belong

here forever,

even death,

we hide

behind closed doors

praying it will passover

us,

the ones we love,

cling to,

this earth,

how it swings

on its chain,

from cold days,

to warm—our lives,

like seasons,

which go on and on;

how can it go on

without us?

The Sweet Smell of Starting Over

18 Saturday May 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Bird Poem, Bird Poems, Bird Poetry, Birds, Death, Divorce, Eternity, Forgiveness, Freedom, Grace, Gratitude, Happiness, Hope, Infinite, Life, Longing, Love, Love Poems, Mercy, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Rain, Sacred, Soul, Soul Poetry, Souls, Spirit, Spirits, Spring, spring poem, Starting Over, Survival, The Universe, Unity, Women's Poems, Yearning

Even the stars are made of this:

sunshine & sweet petrichor.

What comes from above,

and we are made right,

our thirst, our life—

forgiveness,

after years of anger;

we finally feel love again.

The earth wreaks well of redemption,

grace permeates the dry ground.

And, the only sound we hear now,

birds,

who sing of starting over,

or, at least that’s what we hear,

like the smell of fresh water,

among grass, and clover:

sunshine & sweet petrichor.

New Soul

12 Friday Apr 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

≈ 14 Comments

Tags

Birth, Brook, Children, Courage, Fear of Death, First Born, Freedom, Gratitude, Happiness, Hope, Life, Love, Mothers, New Soul, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Son, Soul, Souls, Spirit, Spirits, Strength, Yearning

Some, come into the world as old souls,
like they’ve been here a hundred times,
a bit weary, wise, or jaded, made cautious
by pain & an understanding of human hearts.
But not my son, whose eyes saw the earth
as if he, and it, were just created.

Yes, from first breath he was a wanderer,
like his father in his lust for the world,
possibilities stretched out before him,
no person stranger, no place strange,
a modern day viking making his way
across an infinite, angry sea, with no map.

Unless, music is a map. Song after song,
his heart in waves of hard-plucked strings.
He sang loud, and I wondered how
he could pour himself out in front of crowds.
I see him, even now, upon the ocean,
his wooden ship, the waves, the sails.

You, Me, and the Spokane River

02 Tuesday Apr 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Canada Geese, Cowboy, Freedom, Hope, Horse, Horse Poem, Horse Poems, Horse poetry, Horses, Life, Love, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Ravens, River, Soul, Souls, Spirit, Spirits, Spokane, Spokane River, Spring, Survival

We rode dirt and mud,

through standing water,

like ponds, to verify

the sun, and life

of returning things:

Canada Geese, wood ravens,

mule deer, grazing at dusk,

and the river, surging

with the spring run off

of our souls, singing.

Christchurch

17 Sunday Mar 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Afterlife, Beauty, Chaos, Courage, Death, Death Poems, Division, Dying, Fear, Freedom, Hate, Loss, Poem, Poems, Poetry, politics, Sadness. Sorrow, Soul, Spirit, Suffering

Can you be in awe

of how much some

are expected to suffer

in this lifetime—

we are often given

more than we can—

I saw a moth

with a broken wing,

and though it struggled,

I could not crush it—

but placed him, instead,

among the leaves of jasmine,

and walked away.

The Plan of the Unplanned

04 Friday Jan 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Divorce, Forgiveness, Freedom, Life, Love, Memory, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Self, The Universe, Truth

“It isn’t the experience of today that drives men mad. It is the remorse for something that happened yesterday.” Bob Burdette

The tape that plays

is not always a good tape,

or an accurate replay

of what happened.

What you said,

what I said,

over thirteen years,

a million things.

No, an infinity

of words and actions

that speak louder

than words, truer

than our memories

of one another.

I told you,

when I finally leave,

it will be forever,

and I think you believed me.

If I could do over

I would do the same,

and wish you would.

No part changed.

No person gone.

No person, gone,

brought back.

Remorse? I want to say,

No. I want to say

this unplanned chaos

is part of a plan.

I want to look back,

someday, and say,

This is what I wanted,

where I wanted to be.

Self, Be Kind, Self, Be Strong

02 Wednesday Jan 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Belief, Courage, Forgiveness, Freedom, Happiness, Hope, Identity, Life, Love, Love Poems, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Self, Soul Poetry, Yearning

He said, Tell yourself who you are,

or others will make you a minor character

in a play where they are the stars.

So, I gave myself permission to be

a poet, a musician,

a good all-of-the-above:

wife, mother, sister, friend—

the many roles I inhabited,

but always felt deficient.

I have rarely known love

in the way I need love,

yet, I am surrounded with love.

Tell me, self, where have you been?

Why haven’t you defended me

against the dark thoughts?

Why haven’t you picked me up

and protected me,

held me in your arms,

and told me I am worthy

of these simple things?

The Day I Knew the Way

28 Friday Dec 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

Afterlife, Bird Poem, Bird Poems, Birds, Conversations With Maggie, Death, Death Poems, Dreams, Freedom, God, Happiness, Heaven, Hope, Infinite, Life, Love, Maggie, Memory, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Reality, Soul, Soul Poetry, Souls, Spirit, Spirits

it was a dream, and hard to tell

where borders and countries began,

but there was a dirt path,

and only I knew the way.

The dirt was soft, and the day

beautiful, I was barefoot

and running freer than ever I have

in wakened-life. It felt good

running in a warm sunshine,

ducking under the Velvet Mesquite,

with their canopies, their shade,

their branches, like open doors

to some better, magical place.

I liked the dream very much,

and could have kept running,

but I came to a lone house,

stark in the barren desert.

A blonde girl stood outside a fence,

scared and holding a gun,

and just like that,

I was shot in the arm.

I said it was a dream, didn’t I?

So, you won’t be surprised

I was impressed with her aim,

rather than the pain of being shot,

and I had to go pee.

I looked for a bathroom,

but had to wake to find one.

What is memory, I asked

later over coffee,

a little box in our brain,

a string of pictures?

How do we get there?

Memory is what we tell ourselves,

he said, about what we see

and what we feel.

You see, when Maggie died,

she passed into a prairie falcon,

she banged against windows,

day after day after day,

then left a last gift of quail,

and traveled the road of her happiness

to some place better than here.

Months later, the sun smiled,

and I ran on dirt, soft as baby powder,

passed through door after door,

on long, liquid legs, more of wing

than bone, and only I knew—

only I knew the way.

Conversations With Maggie 2

21 Tuesday Aug 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

Conversations With Maggie, Freedom, Happiness, Loss, Maggie, Poem, Poems, Poetry, The Universe, Unknown

2.

Wander the roads of your happiness,

She said, With no purpose,

Except to wander the roads.

In silence, I watched her walk away,

Wondering where she would go.

Unity: Horse and Human Together

05 Thursday Apr 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

Death, Fear, Freedom, Happiness, Heaven, Horses, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Togetherness, Tom Dorrance, Unity

“Try to figure out some way to understand this thing the horse is so full of, and that he has such a strong desire to get from the person in return. It has to be togetherness. Mind, Body and Spirit is what we’re talking about here.” Tom Dorrance, True Unity

Our shared emotion,

Seventeen of twenty-seven:

Happiness, worry, fear.

What is it, rising up

Like spirit, from your eyes,

Like heaven. An open field,

Where all that matters is love

And connection, knowing

We are safe from what chases,

Knowing we are strong,

mistakes forgotten, and free.

What We Don’t Own

23 Friday Mar 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Freedom, Love, Mt Spokane, Nobility, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Strength

What a strange thing to own,

A view of Mt Spokane,

Windows, frame this home,

And look out toward its peak,

Covered in snow, and tinged

Orange by the sun rising in the East.

No wind, the sky is blue and brilliant,

With a few stray, stratus clouds

And a meandering sparrow.

It’s the kind of day that smiles,

Like I remember you smile,

And your eyes, always trying

To be kind, and painfully respectful,

Even when you should not be.

What is Aleppo?

15 Thursday Dec 2016

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

Aleppo, Death, Freedom, Poem, Poetry, StoptheKilling

“We didn’t want anything else but freedom.

This world doesn’t like freedom.”

Abdulkafi Alhamdo, Professor of English, Last Call from Aleppo

What is Aleppo?

All that it was, or dreamed to be,

In rubble. Have you seen rubble?

It’s what hope looks like when it’s collapsed,

Reduced to broken chunks of asphalt

And twisted, distorted beams of rebar.

It’s brown. Not dark brown, but light brown,

The color of dust.

There is no truth, but suffering,

And the realization no help is coming–

No haloed army, no golden trumpets,

No white horses or heroes.

The choices you made,

In your heart of hearts,

Choice, like stone in your heart,

That is Aleppo now–

Stone in your heart.

 

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