As he crossed the road the man he saw
Was he real the man so old and haggard
Of what did he dream was it shock and awe
Did he imagine, this old man, this laggard
The sweeping lines of time twisting
Bent out of shape defying rhyme
Did he ever want to stop climbing
Or was he content to bide his time
And the man when he saw the boy
Did he wonder what lay in store
What dreams and hopes might have that boy
A life waiting to hear the lion roar
Working and striving to do what he can
Was the man the boy or the boy the man?
(a poem about the future in the form of a sonnet with a hint of chiasmus for writing 201 – future)
Cold, icy, fingers, reaching out, twisted, full of avarice, tainted with malice. Clawing, prying, like lice. Sure in purpose, disturbing, exposing, dealing in deceit. Touched unseen by fingers, trice unexpected, so uninvited. Wait. Crisis averted, like an oasis, those fingers are not
real
(for wordpress writing 201 – fingers, a prose poem about fingers with added assonance)
These words, from Rainer Maria Rilke, once shared with me at a time when I felt empty and without hope, are simple yet compelling.
“Let everything happen to you
Beauty and terror
Just keep going
No feeling is final”
The image I chose to use today comes from a shoot in a famous cemetery that I shared recently on belgianstreets, the words seem to fit both the expression in the eyes of this dead wartime warrior, and the feelings of those he left behind.