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~ Linda R Davis, Raven of Peace & Poetry

Bits of Poetry

Tag Archives: Hope

Love Letters

04 Thursday Aug 2022

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Afterlife, Death, Death Poems, Fathers, Forgiveness, Hope, Letters, Loneliness, Loss, Love, Love Letters, Love Poems, Lovers, Memory, Mothers, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Soul, Souls, Spirit, Survival

Whisper me a tale of lovers,

Through limbs of trees and years,

Rattle a leaf, turn a page,

Rifle through an abandoned dresser.

You will find them there among socks,

With no feet left to cover.

The body is taken away,

Yet, rises again in pen.

She recognizes the scrawl,

It is as much him as him,

And hymn to her hurting heart.

You realize love too late,

She thinks, beyond the day-to-day

Bicker and fuss, we lost us-–

She sees her lover now,

In what is left undone–

The many things he touched

And with his touch, flourished,

They wilt now that he’s gone.

Yet, in her hands,

She holds his scribbled words:

Nineteen sixty three, nineteen sixty four–

And, it all comes back to her.

Some Gifts

29 Friday Jul 2022

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Afterlife, Dad, Death, Death Poems, Dying, Eternity, Fathers, Hope, Infinite, Life, Loss, Love, Love Poems, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Soul, Souls, Spirit, Survival, wolfhound, Wolfhounds

Some gifts are better than others,

The way I saw your heart extend

Into past memories of her—

Tears from your uncrying eyes—

Her loss was the one loss

That broke you like that,

Like that,

The sobbing unashamed.

And then, it’s as if we fast forward

The great movie of our lives together:

You’re dying,

I’m a middle-aged woman.

You give me a dog.

A wolfhound,

Like the one whose loss broke you

Way back then. Riagan. Riagan.

Whose eyes held our gaze,

Whose eyes sought to impart wisdom;

Perhaps, her eyes saw beyond this life,

To where you are now.

Wouldn’t it be something

If our lives are that special,

They continue forever,

Two points–three–an infinity of dots

On some great line that extends forever.

A Hope For Something Better

24 Tuesday May 2022

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Attention, clouds, Death, Death Poems, Dying, Earth, Hope, Life, Loss, Mindfulnesses, Murder, Poem, Poems, Poetry, School Shooting, Souls, Uvalde Texas, Yearning

Would our lives be better

If we paid attention

Each drip drip

Each rustle and bow of leaves

The branches of the pine are dancing

To a song in 4/4 time

So is the purple sand cherry, dancing

Clouds upon clouds upon clouds

Let me describe them:

flat, dark bottoms, mountainous tufts

Bodies extending far into the sky

For sun, sun lighting up their top halves

I should say, the earth side is ominous

The heavenward side, radiant

Would you know what I mean

Today, of all days

When so many innocent are dead

Why wouldn’t they turn their eyes away

And hope for something better

Skunk Cabbage

19 Thursday May 2022

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Death, Fear, Fear of Death, Hope, Life, Love, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Promise, Quartzite Mt, Skunk Cabbage, Spirit, Spirits, spring poem, Survival, Truth, Yearning

No, I did not bend down too near

To smell the yellow flower

Which grew in weaving lines through

The swampy crack, the scraggly creek,

Creeping amid mid-high, mid-spring grass.

We were at the base of Quartzite Mountain,

Nestled behind a tiny ski town, ghost town,

When the skiers don’t ski, or snowboard,

Or venture icy roads to snow-topped peaks.

You said the clicking was cicada,

I said, cougar, because I’d seen a video

Of a cougar making a clicking-ticking sound,

And decided the next clicking-ticking

Behind a bush, or tree, or grassy knoll,

Would be a mountain lion. You see,

We will never know who was right,

Because we passed safely the miles up,

The miles back down the hill, to the creek,

With those most beautiful, yellow flowers;

You could see them recede into the woods,

Like mystery, like scattered crumbs,

Showing us the way to an unknown truth.

I followed them for awhile, alone,

While you stayed back, and packed the dog;

Those irresistible, extra steps along their path,

Like blazing torches, luminous, yes.

One Swan, One Last Kiss of a Bee

12 Thursday May 2022

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Afterlife, Beauty, Death, Death Poems, Dying, Happiness, Hog Lake Falls, Hope, Infinite, Life, Loss, Love, Poem, Poems, Poetry, prairie smoke, Prayer, Sacred, Soul, Soul Poetry, Souls, Spirit, Spirits, Spring, spring poem, Survival, The Universe, Truth, Yearning

Hog Lake Falls, a cool breeze,

One single, solitary swan.

I think I see him preening

From this vantage, far away.

Last time I hiked here, you’d just died,

And I thought, how lovely to know

I can bring you with me,

Free of the dying chair,

The dying bed, the whole dying room,

And house, where you’d locked yourself away.

Such days are ripe with feeling alive:

Prairie smoke droop their heads,

Their beautiful faces turned down,

As they wait for the kiss of a bee.

Then they will finally look up at the sky,

Say one last prayer, go to seed.

Dimensions Around Us, Heaven

14 Monday Mar 2022

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Afterlife, Belief, Death, Death Poems, Dying, Eternity, Heaven, Hope, Infinite, Loss, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Sacred, Soul, Souls, Spirit, Spirits, Survival, The Universe

If there’s a heaven,

Who’s to say

It’s not right here,

Next to us,

Rather than far away?

Another dimension,

Our souls

Walk through at death,

More whole,

than in life.

Scientists say,

Our lives replay,

As we pass,

They can map

Our brain’s waves,

An almighty flash

Of memory cells,

Flashing.

What’s that about,

If not

Making us better?

And so

I talk to him,

In woods and fields,

My father,

Who loved woods

And mountaintops,

And me,

Less alone than before

He walked across,

Or flew across,

Or emerged across

The invisible line

Between life

And death,

The breadth of which,

Seems smaller

Than I knew before.

Toward Our Once Bright Existence

03 Thursday Feb 2022

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Afterlife, Aging, Beauty, Belief, Children, Death, Dying, Eternity, Family, Gratitude, Hope, Life, Loss, Love, Memory, Mothers, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Soul, Souls, Spirit, Spirits

In the end, we don’t know

How the end will come,

Peaceful, as we sleep,

Or, under the thumb

Of morphine. Memories,

Like flotsam, from the depths

Of our once bright existence,

Form a tunnel toward our exit,

Each day, one step closer,

Almost touching what was lost:

mother, child, father.

Diminished, But Singing

04 Tuesday Jan 2022

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Tags

Courage, Death, Fall, Healing, Hope, Love, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Song of Sorrow and Joy, Soul Poetry, Strength, Survival, Truth, Winter poem, Yearning

You must admit,

a song of sadness

Is a decent song;

A song of rage,

The songs we banged to

In our younger age,

That made us stand

And raise our fists–

Is better yet.

The rage is gone.

Somedays, sadness, too,

And happy tunes

Are few.

Yet, sing we must

To shake the silent woods.

Our souls,

They still have much to say,

Of getting past, beyond,

The dull,

Diminished days.

2022

01 Saturday Jan 2022

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Gratitude, Happiness, Hope, Life, Love, New Year, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Spirit, Survival, Yearning

The past,

And its happiness,

Sadness,

Must its minor role

Encompass,

As we seek renewal,

And move forward

Into the unknown

Abyss of a world

Made new by one day,

One day,

A New Year—

Think of it—

A chance,

A calling,

A maxim:

To start again.

Happy New Year, Friends everywhere!

Lost Child New Year

31 Friday Dec 2021

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Belief, Christmas, Healing, Hope, Longing, New Year, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Yearning

Christmas is gone, and I am glad.

Does that make me a bad person,

I asked my husband, last night.

Can the child, finally, be lost forever?

Or is it latent, still, observing from afar?

If the child dies, does the body follow?

Those who live to one hundred

Always see themselves younger,

Or so I read, the others, dead,

Cannot speak to this.

Katherine died before Christmas;

Did she see herself sixty-five,

Or forty-five? Did she realize,

Or did she fantasize–hope?

It’s a fragile thing, hope.

The world conspires against hope.

And now, twenty twenty-two,

Tomorrow, we say, is New,

New, but is it really?

The latent child wants to speak;

I can’t hear what she’s saying–

Something about trying again,

To be better, to believe, to trust–

What is it I must do, child?

The Not So Little Things

29 Wednesday Dec 2021

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Tags

Aging, Death, Family, Fathers, Forgiveness, Happiness, Hope, Life, Love, Memory, My Dad, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Souls, Survival, Winter

“Weep for what little things could make them glad. Then for the house that is no more a house. (Directive, Robert Frost)

1.

The frosty backs of horses at the bale,

The red fence, framing the snow,

This is the beauty I found

In the extreme cold

of December.

And I remember

Wishing for it.

2.

Do you want to save this bird,

It was a falcon,

And it ran, with broken wing,

At the edge

Of a barbed wire fence.

He asked me, as he knew

I was a lover of wild things,

And a nurturer of broken wings.

I do, I said, I do.

Then, he was out of the car,

Walking among snow

And wounded bird.

I watched him from the backseat,

The car, I would someday wreck.

But that day, it was whole,

And we were whole,

And he returned, victorious,

Gloved hands,

Cradling broken bird.

3.

I don’t know why he gave it to her,

But she was in possession

Of his cowboy hat,

And she knew

I was the one who wanted it.

I was in possession of money,

And funny prankster that she was,

My sister knocked on my bedroom door.

She was having a yard sale in her room,

And I was invited to shop.

I can’t remember how much I spent,

But the hat became mine,

and I was wearing it.

He laughed when he saw me,

His big hat on my small head,

And heard the story of its quick journey

From her to me–

He’d given it to her for free–

But I didn’t care,

I wore that damn hat everywhere.

4.

Before I wrecked his car,

I slid his truck off an icy road

At two am, in a snowstorm.

I remember hiking to the first house,

And a man answered the door

In his underwear, staring dumbly

At me. I was desperate for a phone

To call my dad, praying he’d pick up,

Otherwise, I’d be stuck

With the undressed stranger.

He did, and soon my dad was sliding

down the dangerous hill,

In the car I’d soon wreck.

Next, he held his metal two-ton jack,

And ratcheted the truck up, and off,

And up and off, back

Onto the road, where the ice melted,

And the snow turned to rain,

And the sky filled with lightning,

But we survived, and now,

We can laugh at this story.

Preparing for Infinity

25 Saturday Dec 2021

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Death, Death Poems, Eternal, Hope, Infinite, Infinity, Life, Love, Multiverse, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Spirit, Survival, The Universe, Unity

In his last days, he contemplates this:

In the multiverse, our universe,

In the universe, our galaxy,

In the galaxy, our solar system,

And in that, our planet,

Where you find us,

Small as we are,

Celebrating

What it means to be eternal,

To join the stars,

To become one with love,

Two points on a line,

That extend forever.

Song of Sorrow and Joy: 5

12 Sunday Dec 2021

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Tags

Cancer, Death, Death Poems, Family, Happiness, Hope, Loss, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Song of Sorrow and Joy, Souls, Spirits

V.

Joy is found in minor chords,

Singing our truth to the universe.

The story of love is never perfection;

It is always one dropped note,

A half step away from resolution.

Out of Our Hands

24 Saturday Jul 2021

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Hope, Letting Go, Life, Loss, Love, Miracles, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Survival, The Universe

The universe told me
Our hands are empty,
They do not contain miracles
Or, even wise words.
Moment by moment,
Only moments,
The brokenness of hearts,
A temporary rise to our feet,
As if to help,
but we didn’t–Did we?
Because our hands are empty.

A Hideous Brightness

13 Sunday Jun 2021

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Belief, Death, Death Poems, drought, Dying, God, Heat, Hope, Horse Poem, Horse Poems, Horse poetry, Horses, Life, Loss, Love, Miracles, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Prayer, Sacred, Sun, Survival, weeds

Drought year,

Everything is dying early.

We realize what is hearty,

And what is not.

Weeds, they multiply,

Even after we spray,

As if they know,

This is their time.

They sink taproots,

And suckle what is left

Of underground aquifers.

We’re breaking heat records in June;

The sweltering, unrelenting sun

Is just getting started.

How many trips to the barn,

Down this cackling road?

The day I saw the barn cat

Kill father Robin–

It was an ominous sign

For the foal.

And then I succumbed

To this hackling cough.

Death is a time for prayer,

Calling out

for whatever hope God can spare.

Cries sent, not into a dark night,

But a hideous brightness.

Waiting On Miracles

13 Sunday Jun 2021

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Death, Death Poems, Dying, Fear, Fear of Death, Hope, Horses, Life, Loss, Love, Miracles, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Prayer, Souls, Survival, Yearning

When death gets a foothold,

You don’t know who it will take.

Souls grow heavy with guilt,

And the weight of silence.

Hope, a fragile light;

It fuels us.

Small, but mighty.

We wait for miracles;

They are fickle things,

Miracles.

The Virtue of Aspen

05 Saturday Jun 2021

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

aspen, Beauty, God, Hope, Infinite, Life, Love, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Souls, Unity

The virtue of aspen:

quake of leaves

in soft wind;

you see one tree,

friend,

look beneath,

it’s a family,

a colony

of roots and starts,

a community of rattling souls.

I imagine, if one is cut,

all else will shudder.

Listen: Black Lives Matter

04 Friday Jun 2021

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Courage, Crows, Forgiveness, Hope, Horse poetry, Love, Love Poems, Mercy, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Ravens, Truth, Unity

We don’t understand what the birds say,
Or, the horses, who nicker and neigh.
The raven sounds far away, a message,
We think, a harbinger of what will come,
On this path today. A fellow traveler?
A moose, a deer, we can’t know,
But we try to know.
Yet, people cry out to us in real words,
We thought we knew: Black Lives Matter,
Isn’t that true? Isn’t it a simple thing
to say, but you insist it’s wrong:
All lives matter. They do.
But which of us is hurting now, friend?
Which of us feels our lives might end,
Or, be judged for the color of our skin?
Why can’t our words be simple again,
and our hearts open, to a better beginning?

The Difficulty Getting Here

24 Saturday Apr 2021

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Children, Courage, Death, Family, Forgiveness, Generations, Hope, Life, Love, Marriage, Mothers, New Collection, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Strength, Survival, Women's Poems, Yearning

It’s a wonder I’m here, progeny of lost souls,

orphans, abandoned wives, poverty & places

so uninhabitable, unsustainable—

Yet, I’m here, and the generations beyond me

refuse to wither, too.

When the earth begins to close,

there’s always just enough left

to sustain us. One small patch of grass,

free of weeds, or drought,

and just enough blue sky and sun.

We find that place, and stay long enough

to drag another survivor on.

A Low Barrier Between Life and Death

23 Saturday Jan 2021

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Ash, Beauty, Bird Poems, Bowl and Pitcher, Courage, Death, Death Poems, Dying, Fear of Death, Healing, Hope, Life, Moss, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Ponderosa, River, Soul, Souls, Spokane, Spokane River, Strength, Suicide, Survival, Winter, Winter poem, Yearning

I wonder how many have plunged,

broken bodies against the steep,

unforgiving basalt, to flow far away

from the tether of this rocky outcrop.

There are worse places to die

than underneath a basking ponderosa,

on a glorious day in deep winter,

high, above the earth’s mucosa.

Here is heaven, its gods, the osprey and eagle;

they preside from piney thrones, regal,

and survey with indifferent contemplation;

from their perch, suffering is also celebration.

There are less noble ways to die,

than beneath the wings of geese.

See them glide peacefully

over the rapids of the Spokane,

rage of water in the ears,

shiver of blue sky, full sun.

Yet, if hopeless traveler made the steep climb

to this one, celestial throne:

its blood, a brilliant green moss,

its body, the bare, leafless skeleton of alumroot,

entreating with outstretched arms:

See, the promise of spring.

If they were to navigate loose rock,

on the treacherous path that leads here,

would it be enough to make them cling

to the rock wall in front of me,

this low, precarious barrier between?

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