Everything the Power of the World does is done in a circle

Everything the Power of the World
does is done in a circle
By Black Elk

Everything the power of the world does

is done in a circle.  The sky is round,
and I have heard that the earth is round
like a ball, and so are all the stars.
The wind, in its greatest power, whirls.

Birds make their nests in circles,

for theirs is the same religion as ours.

The sun comes forth and goes down again

in a circle.  The moon does the same,
and both are round.  Even the seasons
form a great circle in their changing,
and always come back again to where they were.

The life of man is a circle from childhood to childhood,

and so it is in everything where power moves.

Reprinted by permission from Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux, The Premier Edition by John G. Neihardt, the State University of New York Press ©2008, State University of New York.  All rights reserved.

Sun shining by Annella Grayce

Sun shining

Wind rustling
Birds singing
Bunnies eating
Trees shading
Blood pressure lowering
Mind clearing
Heart calming

Shades of Green

Shades of Green

I lay on the grass and look up at a tree.

The dark green shades on the leaves are enlightened by the sun shining down.
All of this is accented perfectly by the deep brown trunk and branches.
I watch robins dance from branch to branch as they decide if I’m friend or foe.
A squirrel races up the opposite side of the tree.
He’s decided I’m a foe.
The alarm on my phone goes off.
Lunch break is over.

The Rain

The Rain
By Robert Creeley

All night the sound had

come back again,
and again falls
this quiet, persistent rain.

What am I to myself

that must be remembered,
insisted upon
so often?  It is

that never the ease,

even the hardness,
of rain falling
will have for me

something other than this

something not so insistent –
am I to be locked in this
final uneasiness.

Love, if you love me,

lie next to me.
be for me, like rain,
the getting out

of the tiredness, the fatuousness, the semi-
lust of intentional indifference.
Be wet
with a decent happiness.

 

Used by permission.  Copyright 1983 by Regents of the University of California. (University of California Press)  From:  Americans’ Favorite Poems by Robert Pinsky and Maggie Dietz; © 2000 by Robert Pinsky; W.W. Norton and Company, New York

 

Fog

Fog
By:  Annella Grayce

I envy animals.

Survival of the fittest
means they don’t age.

They don’t contend

with the fog of age.

Why our human brains

fog over in age.
I will never understand.

Watching the fog

roll in is disheartening.

Gone is the fun

easy-going family member.
Fog is all that remains.

I envy animals.

Small changes

I've had fun writing this blog.  It takes a lot of time to write a blog every week.  Unfortunately more time than I have right now.  I'm going to change to posting every other week.  I've also noticed that the poetry gets more views than my little opinion pieces so poetry is all that will be in this blog from now on.  Thanks for reading.

Pied Beauty

Pied Beauty

By Gerard Manley Hopkins

Glory to be God for dappled things—

          For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
                   For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
          Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
                   And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;

          Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
                   With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
                                      Praise him.

From:  Americans’ Favorite Poems by Robert Pinsky and Maggie Dietz; © 2000 by Robert Pinsky; W.W. Norton and Company, New York