dVerse OLN

and just when I think, “How much could it matter?” – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 23 Comments 


How many days can you claim bold aliveness
on an airstream of love 
where wordclouds hover to make shadows?

What sweet relief to witness the magesty of 
bloom on blue, a gathering of cells 
multiplying magnificent.

"I'll miss you," he said in a whisper. "How many ways 
can a mountian be climbed?"

Dipping skinny-style, screaming out in glee
we entered the river to revive.

Lavendar dusk of sky
arched islands like the backs of resting animals.

Oh, what can be unfolded inside my twisted heart
by sunlight on water if each person is a light
if we are billions of shades shifting into place.

© Ali Grimshaw 2024

Join in dVerse Poets' Pub OLN #354
Learn how HERE.

This poem was inspired by Laura's prompt - Last Year's First Eleven
I chose one poem from each month and used the first line to make
this new poem. All of these lines were from poems I posted in 2023. 
Writing this was like a word puzzle.

Awakening – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 10 Comments 
I expect to wake each morning.
Safely carried through night's passing.
How have I not noticed this?
Before dreams retreat, my feet finding floor.

Safely carried through night's passing.
Pixelating myself onto this day's screen.
Before dreams retreat, my feet finding floor.
I have taken wholeness for granted.

Pixelating myself onto this day's screen.
Standing in this ordinary.
I have taken wholeness for granted.
Movement is my freedom to be.

Standing in this ordinary.
How have I not noticed this?
Movement is my freedom to be.
I expect to wake each morning.

© Ali Grimshaw 2023

Join us at dVerse for Open Link LIve #348, this Saturday, October 14 at 7:00 AM PST or wherever you are in your time zone. Come to listen or read a poem. Visit dVerse Poets’ Pub HERE for details. See you there.

Held – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 23 Comments 
"The answer is always a question. 
There is no truth more true than wonder." - Andrea Gibson

Is there anything that I hold
that isn't also holding me?

cool air breathing me alive from the inside

the back of the chair supporting me
as my weight is upon it

the trusted walls enclosing me 
as I hold space for myself to be

outside my window weighted limbs layered with frost

holding you in my thoughts
I wonder widely
while held within the hands of change
as twilight slowly surrounds me.

© Ali Grimshaw 2023

Join me for Open Link Night
on dVerse Poets' Pub
OLN #342 information HERE. 
Come share a poem.
Saturday, July 22, 7:00 am PST.

The Gift of Goodbye – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 33 Comments 

I'll miss you, he said.

3 words that land large within me.
I let them soak inward
pausing, to embrace this moment.

I'll miss you, he said.

Within these words I hear.
      I noticed you while you were here.
      I have felt your presence.
      You mattered,
      a space will be left here after you have gone.

I'll miss you, he said.

How wonderful to be able to hear these words, 
words I didn't know how to hear
before

tears on my smiling face.

© Ali Grimshaw 2023

Photo taken on my journey to France, 2019.

Join a welcoming community of poets at dVerse Poets Pub for Open Link NIght HERE.

Purposeful Pause – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 10 Comments 
when will the subtle 
silent, shadows of sureity
be noticed in your day

will your eyes always be drawn away
suduced into following flash floresent
the orange-red of fake fire
immediate over postponed desire

will you try on the bluegreen lined in lime
a cool energy alternative 
worthy of afternoon considerations 

oh, I understand more than you know
this would require stopping
and
you don't have time for that

© Ali Grimshaw 2023

dVerse Open Link 
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Morning Forecast – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 22 Comments 

The wordclouds hover above
to make a shadow on my morning.

Looking up I wonder, how am I to decipher
which are fact or which are fiction?

Layered marks of truth and dare
like a novel netted weather pattern

and I am no meterologist,
just someone looking

for a small clearing in the sky.

© Alicia Grimshaw 2023

Join a welcoming community of poets
for Open Link Night on 
dVerse Poets Pub, HERE.

Revisiting Beliefs- Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 29 Comments 
Your belief in aloneness
is your greatest mistake.

You were born into the hands 
of the world, for us 
to sing you through.

Mountains to call you upward
rivers to bring forth and release.

For what you are made of, I am made of
elements of rock, sky and sea.

Your error is not that you are broken
It is that you have yet to see
your wholeness.

© Alicia Grimshaw 2023

Join a welcoming community of poets
for Open Link Night on 
dVerse Poets Pub, HERE.

City Dweller – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 23 Comments

“You are comprised of 84 minerals, 23 Elements, and 8 gallons of water spread across 38 trillion cells. You have been built up from nothing by the spare parts of the Earth you have consumed, according to a set of instructions hidden in a double helix and small enough to be carried by a sperm. You are recycled butterflies, plants, rocks, streams, firewood, wolf fur, and shark teeth, broken down to their smallest parts and rebuilt into our planet’s most complex living thing.

You are not living on Earth. You are Earth.”

— Aubrey Marcus

My heart has felt the isolation of cold times
walls that didn't allow visitors to enter.

if I had grown up in the forest 
sung to by the wind in the trees
watched the birds flit, feed and gather in song

if I had slept by the rushing river
soothed by it magical movement
of freedom to flow over and between 

if I had foraged with the bears
following their lead to thread through
undergrowth to find my fill

would I have ever met loneliness?

Does separation exist for forest dwellers 
moss to mouse
tree to tribe
river to racoon
webbed connections none to separate?

© Ali Grimshaw 2022

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for dVerse Open Link Night #327 - HERE

Beckoning – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 35 Comments 
turning the page
tilts my story's full, first half

daybreak spills, spreading

past pages highlighted 
scribbled, dog-eared 

moldable mornings
of my middle life

a return route mapped
for when memory fades

my shadow lengthens
I am far past sunrise 

now imagination holds 
the pen 

©Ali Grimshaw 2022

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for Quadrille #158 Morning Has Broken -HERE

Taking Flight – Poem by Ali Grimshaw

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 26 Comments 
Transitions are in the air... some are leaving the nest for flight. 

As you join the others
a new word grows inside me,

a tight bundled joypain sits within
my chest cracking open to release 

the scent of baby powered damp hair

for the many practiced days have passed
the next migration is a solo flight.

Your sturdy shoulders of readiness 
experimental charm accompanied with grin

will be a gift many will appreciate.

Your graduation to come 
is a forced exhale and I breathe in 

the flight to come.

Shake off the illusion, you were never 
really mine from the start. 

You have always belonged to to the world.

I was always ever the warm nest
from which you would someday fly.

©Ali Grimshaw 2022

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Dedicated to all parents of graduates.  Yes, part of your heart is stepping out into the world to touch the lives of others. Let it go. Part of it will stay with you forever. What a privilege to experience this amazing journey of expanding love. Congratulations.