Read Poem: CHILD’S PLAY by Dan Liberthson

I play the World Series with marbles
on our vine-laced Persian carpet:
its palaces are bases,
its bowers become dugouts
where my heroes’ cards wait
for their manager’s hand.
I play both sides, home and away,
hitter and fielder—as always
no one on my team but me.

Adult shapes, fat and crooked,
bald and creased or worn thin,
edge around me,
pass through the house smiling
down as if to say dear child
you know nothing outside
your magic carpet, which
one day you’ll find is only a rug
that will take you no place at all.

But I have just jumped
an impossible height, caught
Roger Maris’ hot line drive to right
and brought it back over the fence.
The roar of the crowd
puts any doubt to rest:
in that moment I am blessed
and that moment is all there is.

©2008, 2018 by Dan Liberthson
from my book The Pitch is on the Way: Poems About Baseball and Life
see more at http://www.liberthson.com

Read Poem: yellow by Andrew Liu

sometimes you come in my dreams. i can feel your warmth, locked in your soft embrace. there’s a tug on my heart and i feel so safe. you are my shelter. i could spend an eternity here, because when i’m with you everything is rain drops and soft conversations with our heart beats in the background calm. when i wake you’re nowhere in sight, i can’t find your face and all i feel is a wave of nostalgia. it’s a melancholic tone filled with wistful hopes. how we spent our days dreaming in a field of gold. i constantly search for you in my mind. who are you? where are you? will i meet you in this lifetime?

Read Poem: A Prayer Away by: Diamantina Browdy

Although I can’t be near you
You cannot hear my voice
My hugs I used to give to you
Are memories in your thoughts
The way we used to laugh
The times we used to play
Seemed like only yesterday
My how fast times pass
There may be times you cry for me
Even times where you’ll feel down
Just lookup to the Heavens above
And know I’m smiling down
When the day becomes too hard to bare
And you wish that you could call
Close your eyes and bow your head
Know that I’m only
A Prayer Away

Read Poem: Confessed by Marianne Joseph

Genre: Love, Pain

(A Man’s Words)

There’s something about her
That makes me miss her
Everytime she goes away.

I don’t know if it’s her loving smile
Or the way she stands,
Her head held high,
Dignified.

I don’t know if it’s the way she walks,
Hips swinging
Embodying her presence
Telling me she doesn’t need a man.

I don’t know if it’s the pattern of her hair
Intricate and complex
Telling of the past,
(Present, future)
With the groove of each strand

I don’t know if it’s her dark brown skin
The naturalness or her appeal
The truth spoken to me in this way
Thick lips and broad nose
Which tell me she is a woman
In the truest strongest definition of the word

But I love her
And I miss her
And I wish
I had never
Hurt her

Read Poem: Terwa by Matthew J. Thornton

“Terwa? What’s Terwa?” my mother asked.
“POP!” She slapped me as I reached for a glass.
The thump of her hand made my hand quake.
But dry tears were the hoax and I was the fake.
My temper may flare; my thoughts may take flight.
So much goes wrong in a world made from the right.
Bumping elbows at dinner; drinking my sister’s drink,
Each time I write, I drag my palm through the ink.
Some say that we lefties carry on like laggards.
But it’s only because we see everything backwards.
An awkward condition that never gets healed.
Right Brains like dancing around in Left Field.
For days on end, we went round and round…
I’d ask for terwa and my mother would frown.
It was finally my sister who wised up and taught her.
She said with a smile, “He’s trying to say WATER.”

Read Poem by Owen Aldin

Without defeats,

How is success defined?

If we don’t learn,

How can we rise?

A thousand no’s,

For just one yes.

Every victory,

Brings a much sterner test.

Saddled with doubt,

At directionless signs.

Trapped at a crossroad,

Courage left in the distance.

Continued ignorance,

Of struggles and strains.

As we seek the answers,

The questions change again.

Invisible baggage,

We continue to hold.

A suitcase of pains,

Weigh greater than gold.

The trail behind,

Might reek of failure,

Yet in the muddy reflection,

There stands your saviour

Owen Aldin
@owenaldin (twitter/instagram).

Read Poem by Michael Villalobos

I RHYME DYNAMIC AN DIRECT TO ALL GENRE SO READ ME THAN FEEL ME FOR I AM MICHAEL FREAK CALI !$!$!$!$!

STATE OWNED AN REMOTE CONTROLLED

NOW THAT I PULLED THE TRIGGER
I’M CONSIDERED AN OUT CAST FIGURE

A KILLER “DEAD-ICATED” TO THE SOURCE
SINISTER THAT SHOWED NO REMORSE

IF I EVER GET OUT OF PRISON WILL IT BE TO LATE
NOW I WAIT AN CONTEMPLATE WITH EXTREME RAGE AN VICIOUS HATE

NOW THAT I’M RELEASED AM I REALLY FREE
ON AN INSTITUTIONALIZE VACATION SOON TO BE
BACK IN GEN – POPULATION OBVIOUSLY

I’M A SEMI FREE PAROLEE WHO’S STATE OWNED
AN REMOTE CONTROLLED A DEMON THAT’S COLD
WHO THINKS DEVILISH AN WITH OUT A SOUL

THIS REMOTE CONTROLLED PAROLEE
IS FELLING 187 AS CAN BE

I HAVE TO FLIP THE SCRIP AND DISOBEY
ONCE AGAIN MURDERING MY PREY

KUZZ THAT’Z ONLY WAY I SEE FAST
TURNING MY FREE PASS INTO A TRANSFER
NOW ON DEATH – ROW BRAGGING TO MY PASTOR

SAD BUT TRUE MY FREEDOM WENT AWRY CONSTANT
CORRUPTION OF BEING INSTITUTIONALIZED

LOCK DOWN AGAIN IN MY CELL AN FELLING IN CONTROL
AS I WAIT EXECUTION HERE ON DEATH ROW

Read Poem: NOBODY by DeonteWilliams25

My mama always tell me life never gets too hard where you cant help nobody, im talking like where the streets get to foggy and you cant see nobody, where you see a perfect girl but ignore her because you don’t see no body, do you know what it feel like to be a ghost just want to be the center of attention, like a skeleton you here but you aint really there, when you feeling like your in everybody face but life aint about no skin care, do you ever wish you can talk to the sky and it talk back, people can tell you how it look but don’t know how it is to be black, sometimes you get into a place where you aint you but its good to be back, watch what you say because to many donalds trumps can be facts, you ever look in the mirror just to see nothing, nobody here to talk so you had to bleed from it, tears falling down so much that they turning into leaves, watch who you get close with because they fade away like febreze, when these kids looking up to some nobody’s so they turn to the streets, when you got a church on every corner starting to make more money then a real bank, when love and your heart take you as a joke and see you as a prank, while rich people laughing to the bank, they seeing the rest of us work to be a nobody, im just trying to live happy and die smooth, life go punch you in the chess but ima bounce back shout out to terry cruise, and I learned how to take a W, when I lose, no matter how many teachers can teach you, you only learn when you choose, kendrick wasnt lieing when he said it achohol in these pools, we drinking our souls away until we can find somebody, what do you do when you question life but life dont answer nobody, its those small phone calls that keep us all in the touch, because a 6 foot hole aint the last time im trying to wake you up, see life is a bump, we all a jump away from making it out, but we all stand on different knees, but yet people are still afraid to stand it out, trying to keep myself together but duck tape can’t fix whats on the inside, my whole life I been trying to get a hole in one but life still can’t save you on a disc drive, but shout to those people who got on the turf and start running, i got people 6 feet in the ground who started to question the government, while we trying to protect ourselves from the police, they on some other shit, they trying to see how many bodies they can catch before society make them throw an under pitch, see everybody want to have the privilege of being white but acting black, that shit is crack, the N word been used soo much, we have to start doing blood drives just so we can take it back, no voice can tell you how how it is to be a zombie looking for life, walking to the end of the tunnel scratching for light, just to be remind that you’re a nobody.

Read Poem: EARTH LINKS: FLIGHT RISK by Gary Beck

The birds of Bryant Park
do not live in cages,
though almost as confined
in midtown Manhattan,
since they don’t migrate
thanks to climate change,
deforestation,
excess concrete
smothering habitat.

They subsist on crumbs,
lunchtime leftovers
from local workers,
as there’s no regular
avian food supply
in this well-funded park,
that forbids feeding birds
because enterprising rats
claim their share of food.

The birds of Bryant Park
have a strange life cycle,
completely unnatural
despite genetic urge
ro reproduce in Spring
when food is abundant,
left by park visitors.

The sparrows and pigeons
dominate the food chain.
Sparrows fast, aggressive,
pigeons big, aggressive,
so warblers, catbirds,
other forest birds
without lodgings elsewhere,
can no longer compete
in the struggle for life.

But for several months
food is plentiful
for domineering birds
who reproduce like wild,
nourishing their young
with food snatched from beaks
of those who can’t resist.

Then the weather changes.
It becomes colder.
People eat lunch indoors.
The food supply is gone.
Hunger becomes constant
and birds begin to die.
The young and weak go first,
unable to survive
lack of food, the cold.

When winter arrives
no one eats in the park.
More and more birds perish,
fragile city dwellers
unable to move on
to benevolent clime.
Only enough survive
to repeat the cycle
when Spring returns.

In the richest city,
in the richest country,
the death of a few birds
is never noticed,
citizens too busy
accumulating goods
to care about creatures
that don’t affect their lives.

In an undeclared war
we assault nature
with powerful weapons
of mass destruction,
devastating the Earth
without consent
of other life forms
who share the planet,
condemned to death
by a selfish species.

Read Poetry: Poetry Of The Moment by Walt Page

https://waltswritingsonlife.wordpress.com/

Each and every moment
Is its own poetry
The tick of a clock
The turning of a page
Each drop of rain
The cry of a baby
The wag of a tail
In every moment
Poetry is created
A poem exists
In the beat of a heart
The blink of any eye
On the wings of a butterfly
A musical note
The scent of a flower
The purr of a cat
Poetry is everywhere
And nowhere
Inside and outside
All around about
Be in the moment
Be the poetry
You are meant to be

~The Tennessee Poet~
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