The River (For Ella)

The River

(For Ella)

The sweet sound

of her sleeping

between white sheets

sun-scented from a noonday sky

She hung them to dry as the wind
whipped and lashed the fairness from her face.

She stared toward the river
feeling it pulling her back
to that day when all above
was blue and still-

Until her heart tore
when she heard his cry
knowing she couldn't save him
from something so deep.

 

Fences (re-posted from 01/2013)

Fences

Tell me

of the fences,

places you’ve crossed

and climbed

of the splintered flesh

which has healed

when the chain was broken,

 the gate opened

where the once petrified fear

crumbled in its stone

and life began anew

once more-

behind those planks of painted white,

hiding the worn and weathered

hurt you left behind.

Lady Blue (MLM prompt 17 optimist, pessimist, realist)

 Lady Blue

Lady Blue

I remember you-

In the depths

of sought perfection.

I hear your silence

between the words-

Thoughts not spoken

fear holds them captive.

If you were to say them,

wouldn’t the world shudder

in the bare bone honesty

that all is not right?

 The years were not

 always kind

 and love crucified the beauty

 it was supposed to cherish.

Lady Blue

I remember you.

You  still stare

through the looking glass.

Heaven

Heaven

Weave me a heaven

which will sustain me-

Fill my sky with cloudless blue

on those lost days when tears

cannot be held between the words.

Weave me a heaven

where I remember

you as you once were,

filled to the marrow

with hope and endless

desires no hell could extinguish.

Weave me a heaven

where breath is sacred

and when the snow falls

I am not hidden in the cold

searching for that island

surrounded by old dreams

that now awaken me in the

stillness under the moonlit sky.

Metamorphosis (re-posted from 11/23/12) In response to Mindlovemisery poetry prompt 16, Life Lessons

Metamorphosis

By

Lisa A.Williams

And so we stand

facing each other

ghosts haunting our past

fear lingering

in the dark of ourselves.

Years have made us strong

we embrace it all-

the old we couldn’t let go of,

the new which

 fills us with hesitation.

We sift through all

 those days we

 breathed away,

scattering ourselves

to a merciless wind

who will transform us-

                                                                   in spite of ourselves.

The Deep

The Deep

By

Lisa A.Williams

Salty taste of you

in my tears

pulling me downward

to the sands I have never seen

with these all too human eyes.

I know they are there

like the soul knows

its maker.

You rise above me,

pushing the earthiness back

to its roots.

Deep blue-

mirror of the sky,

waiting for the moon-
Milky white ghost
who haunts these shores
I call home.

Ocean (re-posted from 2012)

Ocean
by
Lisa A. Williams


Ocean-

In your sound
I am silent.

In your depths
I feel forever.

Those Childhood Dreams (Mindlovemisery poetry prompt #15 Childhood Dreams)

Those Childhood Dreams

By           

Lisa A.Williams

                 

Ask me-

of her dreams

Little girl with eyes like mom

Tears like dad, seldom shed

Ask me

what she wished way back when

the world was small and she still

didn’t fit in

Ask me

What she wanted to be

other than accepted by

the cold blue stare

like hers, not like hers

For she always sought

 the warmth

 the embrace

Ask me

and I will tell you

how she still wishes

her father didn’t die

Her mother wasn’t forever lost-

A ghostlike image lingering

in faded photographs

which never showed the true color

of her eyes

 Ask me

if she still dreams-

Always

August (reposted from 2012)

August

by Lisa A.Williams

August

came and

I remembered the

onslaught of things lost

fading in their sun scorched

fields, withering to fall's intrusion filled 

with promises of redemption, I breathed in 

her solemn splendor, felt summer's sorrow knowing she

would return in her same old lazy way; she 

would be unchanged, it is I who would be different.