Meet the Sun

Planting

            source

radical loving
root by root

From
the words
you gave me

Before 
virus forced 
us inside alone

Forgiving 
took me 
a long time

Now grow, plants.
Meet the sun.

Day Ten International Poetry Month

 

Today’s prompt (optional, as always) is another one from the archives, first suggested to us by long-time Na/GloPoWriMo participant Vince Gotera. It’s the hay(na)ku), a three line poem.  I've written the hay(na)ku sonnet, described by Vince in April 2012: 

"Four hay(na)ku, adding up to twelve lines, and then a couplet of three words per line, each equivalent to the third line of a hay(na)ku. This means that each stanza, in whatever shape, contains six words. A total of 30 words for the whole poem, then."

My blog poems are rough drafts.

     Please respect my copyright.

 If you quote, credit this page.
     © 2020 Susan L. Chast

What Would Shakespeare Do?

 “We know what we are, but know not what we may be.” 

– William Shakespeare, Hamlet

My walk took me around two blocks, one more

than yesterday.  Not enough.  The mask fogged

my glasses, I’ll say, I need a smaller bandana.

The truth is I am out of shape.  Downhill

was easy on the lungs, but hard on knees.

Uphill—all twenty yards of it—strained both,

and left me panting, holding a corner

building until my laboring breath slowed.

The other truth is no one checks on me.

No one else.  I interrogate myself.

What will you do?  What is your intention? 

If you have no plan, you’ll achieve nothing.

“Nothing will come of nothing,” King Lear warns

his daughter Cordelia when she won’t woo

his vanity.   He disinherits her.

It backfires.  Lear, too, loses everything.

I scold, Stop dropping names and playing games.

What is my intention?  To show I care

through my actions.  No one else will do it.

Get up.  Move.  Walk one more block tomorrow.

Macbeth mocked “Tomorrow, and tomorrow . . .

The days creep slowly  . . . til the end of time. “

Stop!  Just as possible for clocks to wind

up as run down, I think.  The point is, I

push, do you love yourself enough to try?

Not today, I say, gobbling down a cream

cupcake.  Maybe tomorrow.  Maybe then.

For international Poetry Day #9 

My blog poems are rough drafts.

     Please respect my copyright.

 If you quote, credit this page.
     © 2020 Susan L. Chast

Planting Revolution in a Super Moon

Prayer in Color

Sitting in new soil waiting to begin,
day and night meet at twilight and dawn
         where transformation is everything.
Let me be part of the revolution
          we are practicing now.
Physically inside, our minds are beyond boxes
          walking humanity, standing trees,
          foraging for food like any other animal.
Absolutes dissolve.
Let me be part of the revolution.

Day and night meet at twilight and dawn.
         Transformation is everything.
Do night and day wait at their borders
          for leaders to emerge?

 for International Poetry Month Day 8

My blog poems are rough drafts.

     Please respect my copyright.

 If you quote, credit this page.
     © 2020 Susan L. Chast

Underfoot, the Backyard

Underfoot, the backyard is squishy soft,

its grass cut within an inch of its life.

Sheared off dandelions and paper whites

are evident.  Bright pine needles cover

only places the lawnmower has missed.

We have different aesthetics for the lawn,

my grass cutter and I.  

                                    But he remembered

to spare the lilac bush this year.  A true

purple, its blossoms will delight someday. 

The Douglas fir and white pine will provide

more needles as the years roll on. And you

will walk on green moss and orange needles,

will dance among stubborn tall flowers—home

to dancing butterflies and hopeful birds.

 for International Poetry Month Day 7

My blog poems are rough drafts.

     Please respect my copyright.

 If you quote, credit this page.

     © 2020 Susan L. Chast

How to Pass the Time

Atop Haines Falls, NY

I wonder if—as I trek around  barriers

like legal systems and landfills—if I’d find time

to sit with trees, flowers, rocks or even slips

of greenery I can’t identify, for long

enough to feel my breath match theirs, to imagine

myself as important to how the whole earth turns?

And would I know to pause if seeking refuge from

virus or murder, fire, or flood—if the trek turned

into a trudge, shuffle or mad dash?  Constantly

suffering, would I continue to love life—at least

enough to defy death and save the children and

try again? Try something new given half the chance?

Would I take out Mary Oliver, John Lennon,

and Marvin Gaye to pass the time and learn to sing

with wild geese, imagining what the world needs now?

Sit in the mass of weeds drinking trickling water

right here, now, joining the poorest outcasts waiting

to live before rich men make it impossible?

 for earthweal weekly challenge: PANDEMIC AND CLIMATE CHANGE

 

My blog poems are rough drafts.

     Please respect my copyright.

 If you quote, credit this page.

     © 2020 Susan L. Chast