Category: 2019 Poetry

Read Poem: BREATHING EXERCISES, by G.R. Melvin

She won’t roll away & not watch me.
Y’see, I won’t seem to take another…

When I dream (or wake),

To take another breath before

The scene fades, before

Lights go up,

Then down to more of a zoom.

She waits in our bedroom for me to resume.

.

II.

We went to go to a yoga class.

Where a barefooted, hair-pleated group leader;

Beautiful, and calmer than a

Merciful last coma,

She insisted that our deep breath is

The gist of all of it (within, & out).

We rearrange the short & tall of it.

The Gist to change the depth, see,

Of our sea of possibility.

When we inhale

We re-memorize our own gods.

We exhale our hell. barefoot. on a mat.

Whew. To that.

.

III.

When I get to go to the Gulf of Mexico

I’ll try out the drink, 1st thing.

I’ll try not to think, when I try to let go

& sink, when I deadman’s float all day,

Into what I think of as a spiritual drift, in a way.

I’ll hold onto my own breath,

Face down,

Head down.
.
.
G.R. MELVIN

Poetry Reading: DAUGHTER OF THE DUST, by Fadrian Bartley

Performed by Val Cole

—

Producer/Director: Matthew Toffolo http://www.matthewtoffolo.com

Festival Moderators: Matthew Toffolo, Rachel Elder

Casting Director: Sean Ballantyne

Editors: Kimberly Villarruel, Ryan Haines, John Johnson

Festival Directors: Rachel Elder, Natasha Levy

Camera Operators: Ryan Haines, Temitope Akinterinwa, Efren Zapata, Zack Arch

Poetry Reading: He Looks Human To Me, by Elly Paul A. Tomas

Performed by Val Cole

—

Producer/Director: Matthew Toffolo http://www.matthewtoffolo.com

Festival Moderators: Matthew Toffolo, Rachel Elder

Casting Director: Sean Ballantyne

Editors: Kimberly Villarruel, Ryan Haines, John Johnson

Festival Directors: Rachel Elder, Natasha Levy

Camera Operators: Ryan Haines, Temitope Akinterinwa, Efren Zapata, Zack Arch

Read Poem: Letter to an Indifferent, by Noman Teserak

Genre: Life
Website: https://ajosephpoetry.wordpress.com/

Muse, dear muse
Faintly, I still hear you
crying, now laughing
with Charon

You are gone, yes
You’ve let me go
Now you can breathe freely

Dear muse
Do our dreams go on endlessly ?
Could you not have shown me one kindness
and taken from me these memories ?
Which, unbidden,
remind me of what was, once ?

The cruelty isn’t that you’re gone
It is that I remember.

Read Poem: ART OF WORSHIP, by Adekunle Adewunmi

I will stand upon my watch
And set myself upon the tower
To listen to;
The pangs of richness I long to eat and
Smell of His fragrance I long to savour.

I’ll pour forward waters of obeisance
Sending fresh smoking sacrifices from the
Corners of my room –the heart
From whence cometh unreserved worship.

Bowing in awe, unto Him will I rest my oasis
Lifting unto Him in surrender, the hands he gifted me
I’d beckon on the sweet Holy Spirit and,
Make a feast cooked with tongues of fire

While dishing Him assorted,
I’ll stand upon my watch and
Set myself upon the tower
As I long to koinonia in realness
Because I know, upon my waiting
I won’t return empty.

Poetry Reading: GENERATION, by A. Brown

Performed by Carina Cojeen

Generation, by A. Brown

To have Strength to persevere
in a time filled with:
peer pressure,
envy and hate,
is a modern-day miracle.
I’ve come to realise,
that the greater the blessing,
the greater the obstacle.
There was a glass ceiling,
until it was broken by
my,
desire not to be,
compared.
There are many opportunities,
but only one chance.
Father, help me,
I pray thee.
When disappointments come,
Please help me
to respond with integrity.
I don’t want to be,
another statistic,
whose life ends in tragedy.
You have never left our side.
Your promises are true.
Lord, I need you,
and our generation does too.

—

Producer/Director: Matthew Toffolo http://www.matthewtoffolo.com

Festival Moderators: Matthew Toffolo, Rachel Elder

Casting Director: Sean Ballantyne

Editors: Kimberly Villarruel, Ryan Haines, John Johnson

Festival Directors: Rachel Elder, Natasha Levy

Camera Operators: Ryan Haines, Temitope Akinterinwa, Efren Zapata, Zack Arch

Read Poem: Gone, by Michele Fermanis-Winward

She sings her ancient song
strives to keep its words alive
despite the grief it brings
to know she sings alone
no other shares her tongue.

She travels far from home
no land where she belongs
she is the last of her kind
we will speak for her
but cannot hear her song.

Read Poem: Clarissa and Charley, by Ingerid White

There was a tall lady who liked to wear hats
Sometimes, it is said, they contained even bats
When asked why she did this, she only would stare
And say, “But my dear, one has to have flair.

“And besides, there’s a hole at the top of my head
That must even be covered when I’m in my bed
For what would I do if my brains leaded on out
Without so much as a warming or shout?”

To church she would go with her latest ensemble
And all would admire her amazing aplomb
For her hats made her taller by half than before
And match, they must, every outfit she wore

Her husband, by contrast, was only 5’3”
He suffered the glances of all who were free
To gaze at the couple who sauntered on in
Suppressing the urge to let go of their grins

The lady herself was all goodness and grace
Her husband, undaunted, just quickened his pace
Though love her did, and all the way through
He hastened to light on his favorite pew

For though she was truly the one of his dreams
He never adjusted to be with her seen
So after a time, he stayed safe at home
And let his wife go to church on her own

But always and ever they remained a pair
Loving and laughing and having friends near
Though rarely together they welcomed a guest
One of the other was always at rest

Or working or playing or doing a chore
Regardless of this, their friends wanted more
Of Clarissa and Charley, who dressed to the nines
And share with their friends their dearest of wines

– Ingerid White, 2009

Read Poem: Native places, by Abhya Kajal

A motionless, eloquent wave would hit me, every now and then.
That could do things to me, not even a curse can.
Soothe me, for what I dreamt; leave some hope
Then break me into infinite pieces; hang me over the love rope.

Those blue orbs would hold me in their dark prison
In all those bilious moments of disagreement
Still, I would not sue you for invasion
’cause you came, played with my sentiments.
Oh I cried, yeah, those screams echoed in my mind
I focused on letting it go, but they held me and rewind.
All pearls of lonesomeness flew away,
I was left with deaf and senseless minutes of the day.

No one, but you can help me.
No voice, but your sweet sayings will set me.
No hands will toy with mine,
Only your eyes will make thy twinkle and shine.
I sighed alone with distress.
Could he not hear me; had he gone passionless,
Such a tender heart and still won’t express.

Why am I not as are the dead?
Then, I’d better die in his arms
One short hour of native air, and indeed,
I haven’t found that yet!

Read Poem: You My Dusky Hue, by Renee Bousquet

The range in its majesty gives way to open thoughts of the wild things in taming, I have eaten hard pan and dust as my regular meal to be had.

I to the constant trail beaten into the saddle just see what could not be tamed. There is beauty found within the beasts of the fields, within the tree’s to the treeline. They all feeble things next to you my dusky hue.

I but a small man in wealth not much to the offering bowl, to live from the saddle bags by choice not many would do.

I live half-feral, fighting the hard winds when necessary, blanketed in snow a brutal life. I follow in blindness of white, head down in the snowstorm– yes driven to see you.

I would but to give my all in any form to last breath in glimpsing you my dusky hue. I would then give open hand an outstretching for the touching of you; I worn hard and worked but still yours.

Goat trails and sage with the buck and antelopes, I follow from shade and shadow. I’ve seen all the crooked paths and mountain spires, ancient writing from lost tribes guiding me the man the myth to you.

I’ve sung from the saddle to the moon with the wolf and his brother the coyote. They answered in crescent smile, howling as my accompaniment…she just before the next rise was the answer.

The ever wanderer to you in my own solitude I driven as the whirlwind, eyes squint, cheeks leathered, living on the surface of the sun I travel.

Always to the horizon line is my sight, waiting, watching, praying today’s the day of salvation. I ride and say this day….this days the one.

I ask nothing for myself, I the sole provider of me the simple one, but to seek out you my dusky hue is my life I born to.

I wish a want of you from afar waiting, watching. Yes, it is more than I could bear to think always you’ve been real to me.

A man can only be a man when he’s succumbed to the knowledge that he is nothing without his dusky hue. She in my sight in the good drunk, in lonesomeness at times the only way to sleep.

She is the maker of the man– the maker of me in hard times, yes to be molded by the hand of the master by her will makes what could not be molded to the driven man…the hard man.

Perfection comes in many shades in the ways of the weary soul, I see and yet give way to the mirage in deep thirst and delirium. I know your face as the one and only, even if you know not I exist.

It’s to the will of it to dream the dream of the most beautiful, even if she’s not yours and can never be. A man can not be one, without a sacred thing to love even in a quest.

I feel the pains in the contortions of love. I see the exorcism of the heart to the soul open handed. Love…love…love…Oh! how I hate to love so much, an image I’ve never seen in real form which is you my dusky hue.

I say one day before the howling moon rises, I shall pull the hard drink before I die thinking you will be before me by mornings light and kissing sun.

You my dusky hue, my dream that’s kept me driven to the hard life. I worn by the saddle eating sand by the pound, sand by the day. It’s worth it to me to be what I must, in this world revolving around me.

I shall live till I die for just one silhouette of you, in the open plains watching waiting for me at least in my dreams of perfection… I live to die, always to you my dusky hue.

By Renee Bousquet