Rohn Federbush's Blog, page 33

Flicka

Flicka
We are two gypsies.I lay my head on her neck to caress her.I hear the sweet music of our ride.She points her ears toward my words of praise.
We fly on secret trailsthrough woods and brook,among the weeds as high as us.
I’m urged to stand in the stirrups to wave at the next tree.
I love her sudden bursts of speedleaving my breath along the path behind.
The stable hands say we ride too fast.But, they don’t know how fast we fly inside our hearts.

Have You Noticed

Have You Noticed
Have you noticed how big the sky is getting? 
I know they say the world is smaller than before. 
Perhaps that’s why the low fluffy clouds seem three-blocks long.
I wonder if we’re turning faster as we diminish in size. 
Heaven’s the same but we’re littler than we were last year.
And what of time, speeding by. 
If the earth did revolve faster would the clocks speed up?

Falling Sparrows

Falling Sparrows
The Lord knows when a sparrow falls;but are the birds aware of their Creator?
They know their way to the feeder,complain when their mates don’t return their calls.
Surely, they’re thankful for the largesse of the universe.
Perhaps they’re a feather’s breadth awayfrom wondering and experiencing God’s sureness.

Celebration

Celebration
Of Freedom,unfettered wanderings,to recognize how things are.without a mulish set of chins,under a new guise,devoid of the suave brutality of squally times,when they knew the soreand how to hit it every time.Reality is what works in the soulwithout the need to re-enter the fray
and rejoice in private blessings.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Child

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Child
The first fluttering of life felt in the svelte bellies of new mothers mimic the slight, soft flit of a butterfly’s wings in flight.Once delivered into her exhausted arms the perfect wonder of ten toes and grasping fingers often ignite a constant candle of maternal devotion.First steps and diaper-free nights presage the coming chasm – of being needed less.The letting go begins when school inserts strangers, the child expelled into a wider world.At the age of ten, as if programmed, a child knows which destiny to claim.Beware the teen of hormone filled emotional flights. No tethers are allowed except a careful tending of the status quo to avoid a shifting launching pad?The mates they chose you judge by how they treat your child. Your opinion against any choice produces renewed defenses for their decision.Truly cleaved to another, the married child relies on traditional celebrations to allow familial felicitations.The adult children of this mother bloom closer to her heart than on their first meeting, or stray beyond that candle’s reach.One such child hears every word, tucks in every joy, handles every quarrel, open arms his way around me.The other hears my voice as censure, throws gifts at me and closes down.There are no guarantees of love between a child and a mother. None such.Universal, surely is the constant home of a mother and child reunion, mayhap on a higher realm.

Ode to His Waterloo

Ode to His Waterloo

His voice is gone beyond what I can hear.I trace each step we took with newer, silent friends.Forty and one years have passed while I still tread our path. 
He spends his time hobnobbing with comrades of fame, though renown forgot his name. Not me. He was at once the king of all I knew. No nouns, no verbs become him now. 
He haunts the paths of Waterloo as four red-faced cranesand three skipping deer race over leaf-strewn hills. His directions to the spring are erased from memory. 
The pull of sky claimed him. This poaching trip called to capture the first sight of trilliumheralding spring along a black-bedded creek.
Those may-apple umbrellas are his calling card.

Happenstance

Happenstance
Mountains furnish a resting place for eyes,
where fates download stacked decks of garish prods
and the do-not’s far out-number any case for deeds. 
At odds, slim good men plod along an endless race 
against needs out-distancing their hearts. 
Abundance reflects the might and power our blessed nation 
can still heft to lift less-fortunates away from blight.

Gauguin’s Tahitian Escape

Gauguin’s Tahitian Escape
White head hung low, a shaggy blue-shadowedmare plods beside the sultry shore.
The humid air saps her energy.She lolls her head from side-to-side.Her nostrils sniff the retreating surf,as the sea tucks up its dirty petticoats,
Languid, pink passion flowers dipbetween garish orange fruits.Limp with heat, fifteen shades of green,blue, and yellow vegetation bow.
The relentless sun hides behinda beige wash of fog,while silvery mists meet a grayer bank of clouds billowing to the slim red horizon’s curve,
where carnage rages…wages from the sins of man.

For the Lady Who Thinks I Should Stop Writing

For the Lady Who Thinks I Should Stop Writing

If poems could travel past each day and delve deep into the firmament of soul, down and out of the realm of time, if words could wash the slippery soap of years into froths of joy, if the alphabet were able to concoct peace for life, 
then I’d give it up, that goal of printed thoughts. 
But words fail, are forgotten. People leave the playing field.
I need to call them back from the abyss. 
Eternity is written.

We the People

We the People
We have no hope for a peaceful nation While we school our children in violence From movies, video games and contact sports.
Our politicians teach us fear Sell killing machines To protect us from our hatreds. 
Death by cop For the next generation Accepted as normal behavior.