such a beautiful evening here for Oct. 28

so warm

misty, cloudy

could be Pre-Raphaelite

could be Paris before the onslaught of dog poo

Queen St West near the Bell Media building at sunset

a kind of magic--

There were no poems added for national poetry month. 
Life got in the way.

Now there is the sad echo of a life taken without reason. A brave young man stood up for his country. For this he was shot in the back. His death will be forever entwined in grief and pain, not just for his family, but for all Canadians. This is the price paid for love of country, love of the people in it, love for earth. The fight for freedom does not gain just a patch of ground; it is like the ripples created by a pebble. It is for everyone everywhere.

An Out Of Season Poem

Nativity Abstraction

by Barbara Phillips

she nods over the eggnog in her hand

face lined, suffused with tree glow

so long ago and yet I can’t forget

she says, as she turns, eyes moist from the smoky

fire or something else; it’s hard to tell

my sister and I, on the run, in the forest

heavy with bombs falling, drizzle, frost

more dead than alive

I was tempted just to lie down, let something kill me

then the cry; I thought it was a cat or a rabbit

an excuse to stop, roast something, try to camp

against logs sodden, yet giving the illusion of shelter

the body beside the child shattered, the child

in rags, stained by shreds of flesh, and the blood

enough to drown in, so thick, getting darker by the second

in the twilight of that Christmas Eve, when a silence

of sorts came back, as the seraphim of steel slipped

into clouds falling through pain torn horizons

when I picked her up I remembered what it was to be alive

we cleaned her off in an abandoned house, and from a surviving

cow we got milk; we got so giddy, we cried

I told people at the refugee camp she was my daughter

we were each others’ angels; we went to the head of the

line with families for emigration, away from

forests hemorrhaging death, endings beyond reason

body parts sown across the underbrush in bizarre abstraction

mercy an alien unknown, tears another way of bleeding

National Poetry Month

Because it is National Poetry Month, I am going to try to post a poem a day. If these posts amuse anyone, the purpose of this exercise will be fulfilled.

Because Manifesto: We are So Lame

because oaks don't bend to catch you

while you stumble near their limbs

because roads don't point the way

when you can't read maps of places you don't know

because you don't feel compassion in light

blinding you while you

check your rear view mirror

because mountains show no passion

as you scrape away their skins

we are so lame when we want to say anything

full of gravity or significance

I am the apprenticed jester

my mentor's gone astray

but ----

I'll love you until

my arms can't hold you

lines invisibly converge

darkness slows me down too far

loving makes me raw

Barbara Phillips