You always asked me why,
how did leaves change color
giggling from the red wagon
I pulled around the block.
As the leaves parade, an early flaming row
burned into memory, your voice
is missing in the trees.
Wishing it returned
with the falling.
© Ali Grimshaw 2018
The voice of a poem can pull your feet from the muck and this one did so for me this morning. Therefore, I am sharing it forward with the hope that it free your feet as well. It comes from SINGING HEART POEMS, STORIES & MUSINGS BY KAREM BARRATT
ON A SPACE CALLED LAND
And so it happens that we are all walkers:
Runners, joggers, skippers;
Trail blazers, some of us.
Path finders.
And that is the answer of the ages.
Of the “who am I” and “what am I doing here.”
We are machete wielders, creating
The path unique to ourselves,
To our laughter and our tears.
We are charterers of the unknown
Jungles that our lives are, similar
To many, yet different in every sense.
We do not travel the road less travelled:
We create the way.
We build the bridge, draw the maps,
Write the memoirs that the
Next generation will forget or
Misunderstand, because I am not
You, nor you I, and my yellow
Brick road is blondish, buttery white,
Whilst yours is coppery gold.
And so, like the Spanish poet
Said, dear walker, there is no road.
The road is rendered by your feet when
You start your walk.
And that is life. And who you are.
A walker of dreams on a space called land.
By K. Barratt
Spills splattered the walls.
Counters filled with clutter,
multiple piles creating a new geography in the room.
There is a relief to cleaning it all away.
Everything in order. Repair and replace.
The seduction of a new cycle, sparkling clean.
Free from marks of history.
What if we could sit with Chaos
for just a little minute?
Feel the wind in our ears.
Hearing her secrets of cleverness.
To soak in the learning of this undone space.
Before an opportunity is erased.
A past disinfected before she can author her story
from which the plot differs from
perpetual duplicating.
First published on Vita Brevis
she wished to glue
leaves of color back onto the limbs
unprepared for season’s shift
then her dormant suitcase looked up
with eyes of grace, a reminder
of past orbits around the sun.
© Ali Grimshaw 2018
Leaves play tag in the breeze
as cars chase green lights.
I am the only stillness
in the city this hour.
Living without permission
no need to ask, “Am I allowed?”
The leaves don’t ask to dance
down the cracked sidewalk.
I grant myself this moment
this sunlight soak before
winter darkness.
© Ali Grimshaw 2017
She learned to take herself
out of her body, to separate
no longer be encased by flesh.
She learned to go, bundle her spirit
carry it out and away, above the invasion
the uninvited intolerable penetration.
She learned numbness, not to be
within her skin, to pack up her
soul and exit, just until it was over.
She learned how,
survival was her teacher.
It was the only way.
She didn’t know help
with mouth stitched closed
only endurance walked with her.
© Alicia Grimshaw 2018
Painted leaves sing in unison
Unlike music, their song
is soundless harmony.
This orchestra of color
soothes the tempo
an internal pounding
from a day of instruments
that refused to play
the same song.
Fall catches me
with muted volume
a serenade of equilibrium.
© Alicia Grimshaw 2018
