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NovemberNovemberNovemberNovember2012012012016666
1.
(Poems by PPS members —Electronically-shared)copyrighted by authors
28 lines or less,
formatted and illustrated by Ann Gasser with digital paintings, digital collages,
and other shared images.
PPS members are invited to submit.
Deadline for receiving—1st of each month, poems appearing in order received
Target date for sending out—10th of each month
or as soon after the 10th as possible.
“Pennessence”–“Pennessence”–“Pennessence”–“Pennessence”– The Essence of PPS,The Essence of PPS,The Essence of PPS,The Essence of PPS, (Pennsylvania Poetry Society, Inc.) (Pennsylvania Poetry Society, Inc.) (Pennsylvania Poetry Society, Inc.) (Pennsylvania Poetry Society, Inc.)
Louisa Godissart McQuillen...4
Carol Dee Meeks...9
Marie-Louise Meyers...23
Jacqueline Moffett...12
Prabha Nayak Prabhu...17
Dr. M.P.A. Sheaffer...6
Henry Spottswood...22
Jean Syed...6
Loretta Diane Walker...15
Lucille Morgan Wilson...16
Michael Bourgo... 21
Gail Denham...14
Marilyn Downing...5 & 20
Madelyn Eastlund...7
Vicky Fake-Weldon...19
Lynn Fetterolf ...10
Ann Gasser...11
Mark Hudson...3
Inge Logenburg Kyler...14
Emiliano Martin...18
A Note From Your Editor:
We try to get each issue
of PENNESSENCE
out by the 10th of the month
or as soon after as possible.
This year’s Election Day
was November 8th,
and the poems we received
about the election
were, of course, submitted
before the event took place.
Because of this,
it seemed to make sense to
group them together,
serious or light,
on the following four pages
which precede poems about other subjects.
2.
3.
THE BLIND LEADING THE BLIND
—by Mark Hudson
By now everyone who was going to, has voted,
regardless, our nation has been demoted.
What must other countries think of us?
A place where politicians are free to cuss,
a place where "rock lyrics" corrupt our teens,
and who knows what goes on behind the scenes?
Oh yeah, the rock lifestyle is evil and untrue,
but conservative businessmen are doing it too.
As a child of the eighties, I start to reflect,
was there reason to the ideals I chose to reject?
Was I just going through rebellious phases?
Isn't God the only one deserving of praises?
Some of my heroes from yesteryear,
are old or dead, and no one sheds a tear.
Republican, Democrat, all the same,
We're American, and it’s a crying shame
how we used to be the world's biggest superpower,
now Terrorists can make us hide and cower.
The super rich build their mansions bomb-proof
while homeless people don’t even have a roof.
The ominous deadline to vote came and went,
and for some it was a victorious event.
For others, the end—of what? I don’t know,
guess we will just have to see how things go
after the ballot and voting booth
decided who lied, and who told the truth.
For me, either way, I must stay free,
and the way I can do that? With Poetry!
grom Clipart Kid
ELECTION DAY: WHO CARES? —by Louisa Godissart McQuillen
For such a big Election Day,
This turnout is quite rare.
Few voters came to cast their votes,
And fewer seem to care.
While some folks vote no matter what,
Some others come to jest.
So how the right choice gets the vote
Is anybody’s guess!
What happened to the good old days
When people sought the best?
They simply chose “integrity”
And voted out the rest.
I hope by next Election Day
These halls will crowded be,
With voters rushing in the doors
For all the town to see.
It leaves us with a chilling thought
And we should be aware . . .
Do we want to keep our country strong?
Does anybody care?
4.
illustration from 123rf.com
5.
MAXINE FOR PRESIDENT!
—by Marilyn Downing
We can only hope for someone
who might set the record straight,
whose uncluttered vision poses
how to make the U.S. great.
She fires off her lipsticked mouth
like a repeating gun.
She’s got the Congress in her sights
for what they’ve left undone.
Then she targets all the Fat Cats
who buy votes as they please,
and lashes out at candidates
who lie and cheat with ease.
She makes our bloated government
look silly and unserving
as they perpetuate themselves.
It’s really quite unnerving!
So let’s listen to the blue-haired dame
who puts the pundits all to shame,
naming the parties we should blame,
if we hope to fix the political game.
6.
TO ANONYMOUS
—Jean Syed
He says he’ll make America better,
This fibber who’s a vulgar roué.
To the union he is a debtor
But says he’ll make America better
By allowing him to have a vendetta
To all who stand in his filthy way.
He says he’ll make America better
This fibber who’s a vulgar roué.
2.
PUTTING PRIORITIES IN FOCUS
—by Madelyn Eastlund
This afternoon we whiled away
time I had set aside
for all those things that must be done
before the eventide.
And now twilight accuses me
of tasks I did not do
but I do not begrudge the time
that I have spent with you.
Tomorrow comes I might be gone
but chores will still be there
and so today I prefer time
that you and I can share.
Then I must crawl into my bed
with daily work undone
content to leave my undone tasks
until tomorrow's sun.
I am not sure that worthy things
will change the winter's gray
but memories we share, my dear,
will warm the coldest day.
Perhaps the truth is: all those tasks
I think I must get through
are not one whit as important
as sharing time with you.
7.
8.
QUADRATIC
—by Dr. M.P.A. Shaeffer
In this frozen tundra,
We’re fresh out of dragonflies
And pond skippers
Darning needles weaving
Summer tapestries
In this cemetery of the Connect-a-Dot man
I feel the misplaced
Grain of my life
Under the mattresses of leaden brains
Like the princess’s pea
Here in this blanched-out gulch
Where ponds once brimmed over
And no one thought of inventing
Windmills
Or of reckoning with
Bleached lines trying
To connect faded dots.
illustration from www.lavaguardia.com.
ANNUAL THANKS
—by Carol Dee Meeks
The season of thanksgiving
and reason we are living
upon America’s banks
highlights time for forgiving.
On the shores from east to west,
remembering the Pilgrim’s quest
when they landed on Plymouth Rock;
the Mayflower trip was full of zest.
On their knees they offered thanks
for new home and future ranks.
Landing safe with newborn hope,
freedom flowed from plank to plank.
Every year we now remember,
celebrate with household members,
giving thanks this time this season
honoring the holiday of November.
9.
Picture from The Daily Beast
WINTER COLORS
—by Lynn Fetterolf
The hemlock, at dusk, leaves
a purple smudge on the stark-white snow.
The bare trees seem gray with sorrow
for the loss of leaves,
each smoke stream reaching for heaven
mirrors their grayness.
All is colorless or nearly so,
vague shades of white or gray,
even the usual blue of the sky
is bleached to monotone.
Only the purple smudge
left in shadow by the closing day
tells the possibility of color.
10.
from her book
‘Guided By Grief’
11.
REMEMBERING BILL
ON VETERAN’S DAY
—by Ann Gasser
Bill was a very special friend
with whom I'd laughed and cried.
We'd been close, but had parted months
before I learned he'd died.
They said the Iwo Jima skies
were black with smoking planes,
Marines dug foxholes on the beach--
to shield from shrapnel rains.
They said he was a hero who
died as he saved a friend.
And we who knew his selfless ways--
yes, we could comprehend.
I doubt he ever saw that flag
they raised up on the hill--
the incident they photographed--
whose valor thrills us still.
A host of maybes and what-ifs--
an age of years has passed.
Time scabs the pain, does not quite heal--
the numbness seems to last.
It's just when flags are flying high,
parades are marching by,
I think of Bill and all of those
who were too young to die.
It's then my tracer bullet thoughts
scud back to days of yore,
when all of us were innocents
forever changed by war.
photo from KERA
12.
FEATHERED SOLDIERS
—by Jacqueline Moffett
Six inches of heavy, wet snow
covers the ground
Roads plowed, walks shoveled
Rhododendron leaves tightly curled
This bush is nature's thermometer
Pine branches heavy with flakes,
suddenly shift their load
Birds depart to a safer haven
Hungry ducks check the corn fields
for frozen kernels
Starvation is reality for these feathered soldiers
Each winter day presents a struggle for survival
All species look forward to an early Spring
Let the tulips burst forth!
photo from www.alamy.com
MAYBE BATS?
—by Gail Denham
Esther peered inside the boxcar.
There could be bats – who knew? She
had zero tolerance for hundreds of God’s
crawly, scary creatures, except fireflies.
Her anxious mind flitted to memories of blue
Mason jars filled with those bright bugs, then
to her little brother, Samuel, who put a firefly
in his mouth. His cheeks glowed till he gulped.
Esther had always wanted to save fireflies
in a cage so they’d light her room at night.
Always seemed so alone in the dark,
although she never told Mom about that.
Mom never got over how Esther let her baby
brother eat a bug. But bats – that was another
whole situation. Maybe they slept during
the day. She sure hoped so.
Gathering her skirts, Esther climbed
into the empty train car. Now what was it she
came looking for? She sat on an old box
waiting for that flash of memory to hit.
13.
14.
WINTER’S MENU
—by Inge Logenburg Kyler
To every thing there is a season.
Ecclesiastes 3:l
After garden work is finished
and the pumpkins gathered in
and the tree frogs are no longer
noisy with their evening din,
when the nights grow ever longer
and the stars shine extra bright
Old Man Winter comes to visit
with his paint cans full of white.
Time it is to do some reading
or to visit friends of old
or to take a walk while bundled up,
or study things foretold.
NOVEMBER FALLING
—by Loretta Diane Walker
A red leaf dropped in the belly of November
when you made the announcement.
You thought I retired from worry,
packed up that nervous twitch one gets
when you have children.
Now that you have your own
twitch as you nervously pack up
the children’s belongings
to move to a house without his name on it,
how do you think I can retire from worry?
You said of me once, “You’re not Delilah,
you’re Samson.”
I say this of you, “You have the heart
of Hercules. Your beauty is like the embroidered
shades of fall:
dogwoods with small purple heads,
hickories with sturdy bronze bodies,
a carnival of red maple leaves rolling into themselves,
sculpting a scarlet mountain.”
The oak, the one outside my door, reminds me of you.
It did not shiver when the first coat of cold
zipped itself around its bare trunk;
you did not waiver under the thrust of his lofty words.
How I wish you were a child again.
We laughed and the world was light.
We laughed and the cool night air grew warm with joy.
We laughed and life was simple.
15.
16.
KEEPING VIGIL
—by Lucille Morgan Wilson
You lie,
dry fallen leaf
with unfilled plans ahead.
I guard your silent bed,
deny my grief,
but sigh.
Grass still
September green
betrayed by autumn’s guile
bends low to wait awhile
another scene:
April.
Next spring
upon our hills
bold renewed verdancy
spurs lilting melody
that my throat stills,
waiting.
photo from
Todd Johnson Vancouver Realtor
17.
NOVEMBER HAIKU
—by Prabha Nayak Prabhu
Halloween candy
culprit behind decayed teeth
a dentist’s delight
photo from Parenting
18.
photo from Parenting
HAIKU
—by Emiliano Martin
the wind is pushy
with ambition running free.
the leaves surrender.
19.
AUTUMN MIDNIGHT
—by Vicky Fake-Weldon
The longest night will settle in.
The arborvitae and white pine
provide a drafty bedroom, when
the titmice, cardinals, and wrens
need warmth and rest for little wings.
For when warm weather is a dream,
and snow transforms a winter scene,
the songs and nests of spring will wait-
the longest day still months away
20.
COMPULSORY READING AT
THE BREAKFAST TABLE
—by Marilyn Downing
Most days it’s routine to scan
obituaries, hoping no familiar name
or face is on the page. A quick glance
at bold print names and ages
or selected photos taken decades ago
assure me I am not listed that day,
and I too can hope – as most do –
to enter Eternity mystically
restored to my prime years.
But nothing quite prepared me for
the infant footprints pictured above
one short history of a life lost –
footprints unique to the tiny child
whose family arms and hearts are empty
whose feet will never touch the earth.
photo from sheknows
21
photo from jmlysunpress,com
AMONG MY PEERS
—by Michael Bourgo
We are all one misstep
removed from disaster:
either by diagnosis or accident,
a fact we soberly accept
as the truth of our age.
Dreams from years long ago
have not come to pass,
whether private or public:
we are resigned to a present
imperfect and unpromising,
but find no reason to surrender,
no excuse not to hope.
We await each dawn,
happy to be alive,
to be full of thoughts
in these still lovely days
which color our moments,
to find the words we must say;
and to watch the children
who run, laughing through days,
who will people a future
which we may not see,
but already welcome
as if we were there.
22.
IF I HAD ONLY
—by Henry Spottswood
this man's art, that man's scope,
and my red '57 Chevy Bel Air
with skirts, spinners and duals.*
If only I'd had a snappy comeback
each time I wanted one, and a clue
many many times to a lofty rhyme,
and a card from George Eliot
thanking me for a bracing evening
and assurance that were I to dial,
I'd reach Shemp, Larry and Moe.
I'll settle for an idea for a knockout
poem, and knowledge of the difference
it would have made, had I known.
*for us who were teens in that era
skirts were fenderskirts,
duals were dual exhausts.
and spinners -you may web search that yourself-
23..
BROWN-EYED SUES AND NICO TOO
--by Marie-Louise Meyers
A clump of brown-eyed Susans perched near the barn door
where a wayward wind scattered the seed. The flowers’
brown eyes were mellow--looking through the golden fall of petals
like my daughter’s hair, but her eyes are a shade of wisteria blue.
Sue deposited the seeds of her affection
in loving increments to Sassy, her first born Love, then Danny Boy,
both deceased now, and Nico, the donkey, who is still very much aware,
though now in his twentieth year, and surely will live another twenty
with his Mistress, who was a mirror of their souls..
Sassy the dark bay Morab, who stole her heart in New Hampshire’s wild,
and lingered long after in Chester County’s green pastures.
Danny Boy, of flaxen fleece and sturdy will, whom she brought along
to sing his own Song of Belonging.
Nico is stable and predictable still, his brown eyes looking through
her azure blue, absorbing both sorrow and joy in equal measure,
We tweak his ears, while he prances for my affectionate grandchildren.
When impending danger suddenly appears, he winds up, those ears alert,
while his piercing bray shatters the surrounding countryside--
as they did when Danny’s colic ended his reign over the meadow.
Perhaps the Donkey remembers the Chosen One,
who rode on this most docile of beasts from Birth to Death
amid Life-Long threats, the drumming echo through the centuries,
cataclysmic upheavals and storms of protest.
Yet when the pasture below was closed to him,
Nico yanked the brown-eyed Susans from the Earth.
To me they were worth more than a temporary door stop,
so I saved them in a glass vase to replant again
when the spring of his hooves delivers again ingenuous roots.
OnOnOnOnthethethethe
Lighter SideLighter SideLighter SideLighter Side
November
2012012012016666
Ann Gasser...31
Carmen Martucci...25
Jean Syed...29
24.
Michael Bourgo...28
Gail Denham...30
Madelyn Eastlund...26
Lynn Fetterolf...27
25.
photo by Don Prioleau
A STORMY FALL
—by Carmen Martucci
The dripping from my window pane,
and whilst I gently sleep,
encouraged deeper slumber than
the charges of Bo Peep.
And dreams of friendships long lost gone
that seemed to last all night,
they only took the early dawn,
just prior to daylight.
The clouds were dense as mist still fell
and yet my body called
because my bladder, it did swell,
and nature never stalled.
And so I stepped off of my bed,
just after my last snore;
but rather than a grip instead,
‘twas water on the floor.
"What's this!" I sighed, aghast and shrill,
and just before the slip.
I hit the deck and floundered till
I managed one last flip.
I finally rose and stood again,
inspecting what went wrong.
I rubbed my hip to soothe the pain,
but cursed a desperate song.
“The boards they are a wishing pool,
until I use my mop!!!
I’ll close the pane but not my soul,
and pray the rain to stop!!!”
26.
Dear Abby
(with apologies to A. E. Housman)*
—by Madelyn Eastlund
When I was not quite twenty
I heard my boyfriend say
“I just give kisses, baby,
But not my heart away;
Give hugs away and squeezes
But keep my fancy free.”
But I was almost twenty:
I knew that he loved me.
When I was just turned twenty
I heard him say once more:
"A ring I will not give you
And your nagging is a bore;.
I met some dame has plenty
And you and I are through."
And now at half-past twenty
I shot him, oh, 'tis true.
*”When I was One and Twenty”
27.
GERIATRICS
—by Lynn Fetterolf
Geriatrics, what a name,
it’s like theatrics without the fame.
Yes, we’re older, passions smolder
but we’re not beyond excitement
though our backs may be a mite bent.
We grunt and groan and whine and wheeze
and things don’t work well, like our knees.
But, oh, my dear, please understand
our brains are filled with golden sand
that’s flowing through the hourglass
and miracles of wisdom pass
through the gardens of our fertile minds.
Those gems of knowledge young folks find
surely came from a geriatric brain.
So overlook the muscle strain.
We function best in mental flight.
Our intellect can give insight.
Don’t count us out when hair turns gray.
We’re still learning and teaching every day.
photo from quotesgram.com
WAITING FOR NOVEMBER
—by Michael Bourgo
It cannot come too soon,
a plain and somber day,
the skies in quiet gray
and fields without a bloom.
Good-bye to lush display,
the sun too bright at noon.
It cannot come too soon,
a plain and somber day.
Let summer's senile swoon
run out its final play,
and equinox give way
to cold inviting gloom.
It cannot come too soon.
28.
photo from MountainPictures.net
29.
TO ME SWEEPING LEAVES
—by Jean Syed
Autumn is such an untidy season,
Resting in a green but scurfy coat.
Housewives glower with good reason
Autumn is such an untidy season
They think it were allowed treason
To kick leaves in fall’s fiery throat.
Autumn is such an untidy season
Resting in a green but scurfy coat.
photoo from RewardsForRecycling.com
STOP AT THE BAKERY
—by Gail Denham
My mother’s comments cut like swords:
“She’s never learned to butter toast”.
Only more of Mom’s mean words,
but now I’d like to boast.
At one surprising family dinner,
I supplied the dessert course.
The cake was such a super winner,
I’d ne’er reveal the cake’s sweet source.
30.
photo from Sam Tell Blog
31.
THERE IS ALWAYS A REASON
—by Ann Gasser
Why does she wear this stupid hat?
She’s got a very good reason for that.
She is not eccentric, she isn’t a nut,
she’d like to kick her hairdresser’s butt.
When she got a haircut the other day,
that zealous stylist got carried away
and truly scalped her—she feels so bare,
now wears a hat when she goes anywhere.
If she were a man, she could just shave her head,
but women won’t do that, they’d rather be dead!
She will sing “Hallelujah!” and joyfully shout
on the day her hair at last grows out.
This painful memory will linger on
even after she goes to a new salon.
So, Ladies, beware, of the passing years,
and too-eager stylists with snipping shears.