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Juliet’s Words
What dreams are these? Talking with eyes closed. Private and stolen pictures of love, like an opera, swaying with the power of language. I will not cry. I have a place in this kingdom. Even if Shakespeare brings on the lines, I will not die for you! “Romeo… Romeo… Wherfore art thou? Romeo…” I will not die for you! You, Romeo, thought more of yourself than I. You, Romeo, failed to check my pulse!
Paula Curci Spoken word artist, radio talk show personality, school guidance counselor, chapbook published, voted best female poet at “The Vault” in 1998 and 2003 |
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Will O’ The Wisp
What is that light that limns the further hill? Is it fulfillment of the thing I dream A wonderous light, reflected from the still, Enchantment of perfection, the soft gleam Of Beauty’s pool, where I may drink my fill?
Perhaps, perhaps — or maybe it is just The Phosphorescent glow that marks decay, The hallowing of offal, flame of lust, Made beautiful against the fading day. But let your heart discover what it must.
Then shall I seek to follow where it goes, Even though foulness mock me at the end? Yes, for the most untutored gardener knows Fertilization of the soil will lend A brighter bloom to the most perfect rose.
Paula Clayton Many awards won, leathercraft artist, former radio talk show personality, was L.I.’s most senior active performing poet (b. 1902 d. 2006) |
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PRELUDE
I know it will be wonderful, I know That to touch you and to stroke your hair Would be ineffable joy — it was, and Heaven Moved in my hands as they caressed your face. As my lips clung to yours a million strings Echoed the music vibrant in the air Around us, swelling with our shared embrace Into a poem of joy, that rose and grew Ever more tenuous until it left Earth for infinity, soaring into Space, Leaving me breathless, lovesick, and bereft. Waking, my mind, loathe to relinquish, clings To the dream petitioned for so long. Gently your arms enfold me, and I know Sweet as the music, high as the rapture given, That is but the prelude to our endless Song.
Paula Clayton |
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THE GIFT
A bagel, a simple bagel, a strip of rawhide rolled into a holey mass, basted, blessed with some sort of something short of what would tempt you.
A bagel stuffed into a corner of a room, behind a door that never closed. A bagel never tasted, never chewed.
You put it there, hidden away for other days, days that would not come to you.
This brings me to my mother’s things: silver, china, golden rings. These things she saved for other days, days that she would never see. These things she hid away for me.
Yolanda Coulaz Many awards won, many publishing credits, first book ‘Spirits and Oxygen’ , second book ‘Reckoning’
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Performance Poets Association® |
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A Poem
a child an idea an ideal a potential incubates kicks around and rolls inside you until it burst forth gasps for life nurtured disciplined, edited corrected, it evolves and expresses itself listen to it, guide it, let it grow, it matures let it go it exists on its own.
Peter V. Dugan Poetry workshop leader, multiple PPA award winner, one book published |