The longer you live
the more memories linger
‘neath the Christmas tree.
tinsel waves and winks
knowingly, like an old friend
who knows your secrets.
You smile and just know
that this Christmas day will be
the very best yet.
#164
Category: Writings
Winter Musings
Somewhere by a pool
there’s a deck chair in the sun
with my name on it.
#163
Gold and Crystal
I hope my aura looks like a hoar frosted aspen
when the dawn’s first rays turn it all gold and crystal.
I hope all my good thoughts, any kindness I may have shown,
each time I gave of myself without calculating the cost,
all become the intertwining tangle of branch and twig faceted with prisms.
I hope their glint and glow shine into the knots and burls
of anger and envy and drive out the darkness in my soul.
I hope my aura looks like a hoar frosted aspen
when the dawn’s first rays turn it all gold and crystal.
#162
Time Will Pass and So Will This
(an ode to my code in the node)
Take a breath and close your eyes and
feel the sun on the horizon
breaking through the cloud and darkness
like the heaviness that’s parked itself
upon your chest. You manifest
the universe within your breast
and like the universe you’re wheeling,
stealing minutes, stealing hours
just to squander them
like flowers in a vase, you touch the water,
find that it could still be hotter,
clouds of steam that you ingest
to try and lift the heaviness,
time will pass and so will this.
#161
note: If you can’t do anything about your cold, you may as well use it for poetry fodder… sigh.
My Cold
Juice, jello, gingerale, vitamin C
Homemade chicken noodle soup, fireweed tea
Echinacea, bed rest, heating pad, naps.
Tissues, Vicks and cough drops. Feeling like crap.
Hot bath, soft blanket, well fluffed pillow
hot lemon honey and a couple Advil. Oh
nothing’s getting done till this cold takes a hike.
Good books, good movies, good grief, goodnight.
#160
Self Determination
Changes are coming
Free will is a breath away.
Just watch me, just watch.
#159
Through the Falling Snow
The glow from the street lamps
throw spotlights on the sidewalk
and the snow falls like sparkles inside a snow globe dome
and the path from my footprints
draws a line through the spotlights
as my feet join the dots on the long, cold way back home
Through the falling snow
Through the falling snow.
The road may be long but at least I have a place to go.
As I look back behind me
at the proof of my passing
the snow fills my footprints like I was never there.
And my mind drifts in wonder
has this life made a difference
or am I just a snowflake falling through the frozen air?
Through the falling snow
Through the falling snow
The journey may be cold but at least I have a place to go.
Through the falling snow
Through the falling snow
Take my hand and follow me and we’ll both have a place to go.
#158
Solstice Solace
Darkling comforter;
tucking the night around my shoulders,
whispering long day lullabyes,
and drawing dreams of flowers and sunshine
within the flickering of firelight
on fresh fallen snow.
#157
Elephants at Christmas
Do not peek into bags and boxes.
Do not walk in unannounced.
When Christmas secrets lurk in closets
courteous circumspection counts.
If I ask quite innocently
“What is that behind your back?”
you must tell me quite sincerely
“It’s an elephant in a sack.”
Christmas elephants decked in paper,
ribbons, bows, and ‘to/from’ tags.
Christmas elephants languishing
in colourful boxes, shiny bags.
So keep your speculation checked.
Curb your curiosity.
until the twenty fifth comes ‘round
when all the elephants can run free.
#156
Everything New is Old
The back of my hand is changing.
I don’t know it anymore.
New freckles hiding in the wrinkles,
veins like fat rivulets of blue shadow,
knuckle joints ringed like holes in the boles
of slightly crooked trees
(I almost expect an owl or two to gaze back)
All these new things, just to remind me
I’m getting old.
#155
Linda Studley 