Commonword Blogs

Stumbled bitter cold thru darkness into air as warm & thick as cornmeal porridge Bass line rising thru blood bone & sinew

Love Jones

like an arrow
that always
finds its target
gravity free
melodies
subtler than
lunar rays
softer than
falling snow
eurythmics
returning always
to the source
seduced me
as soon
as stylus hit vinyl
composed
wonder & awe
bound me
to your mast
wanted to be
that Buffalo soldier
riding the fat prairie
wind racing
thru my hands
knowing
change
must
come

The beginning

I gaze in awe
budlike finger and toes
unconscious potential
newer than creation
unblinking gaze
crystal clear pools
sharp as the first cut
mysterious as the new moon
under chanting priestesses
brought in a high tide
over whelmed defences
first cry
revealing a jungle terrain
with stalking tigers
eye bright with knowledge
kamikaze devotion
claws honed
ears tuned to the present
stopped haunting
the future
when I met my past

Yvonne Mc Call

The first Cut

the silver river glitters
molten current I cannot fight.
not that it pulls you against your will.
you have already made your choice,
turned your back to swim for another shore.

relinquished me to whirlpool blues.
sitting in the hairdressers I see red
my reflection ignores ribbons of steam
curling from my head
the stylist asks

wash and blow?
sharply firmly no I said

“cut it, cut it all off please”.

Yvonne MC CALLA

Hey ! Haven't been on this site for so long I was forced to change my password. er well...to tell the truth i'd forgotten it.
Good to see some are still keeping the site going... Had a crisis of confidence this summer. it got hi jacked by real life who sent a ransom note demanding my full attention before releasing her.

Got something I was working on earlier...much much earlier...smile

Di - verse

unlike my father
I cannot claim
rippling waves
of sugar cane fields
ivory sands and palm trees
of the West Indies
as my home.
I would like to think it
but the wish

Question..Pete / Martin

these 30 poems - can you subit poems already published?

yvonne

MY SISTER

SIBLING

my sister is a lagoon

a rippling counterpart

of erudite serenity

on Moon struck waters

phospherescent ribbons mirroring

the luminosity

of her smile

2008 Yvonne Mc Calla

Pete
I'll hire you as my publicist when i make it...

Here's the poem i won the competition with...

Overspread

touch me feel me
delicate buds
of candyfloss
I have soothed
torn skin
drank the fever from sodden brows

seen the heart torn
from living souls
until their eyes
no longer reflect
a spark of light
my softness stretched and taut

on the wheels of
spinning jenny’s
that worked me
endlessly remorselessly
day & night
until they had manipulated

my milky unblemished flowers
into the warp & weft
of misery & servitude
painted my face
transformed me

I didn't get to the African Oral Poetry Class but did look at the work and had some attempts which i'm not entirely sure of. Maybe there is something here i could work with.
here goes!

MY FAVOURITE PIECES? FAMINE, love the humuorous treatment of a very serious situation. BLUE GREY BULLS for reasons already touched on by Martin & others and ZEBRA. lOVED THE LINE

'One on which the eye dwells all day, as on the solitary cow of a poor man'

says so much in such simple language.
ok. my pathetic attempts...

FAREWELL
You stand at your mother’s bed
You brood on words unwrapped

Not sure if this is actually finsihed or not. This poem came so fast I hardly remember writing it!! Not usually the case for me....but think it would fall into the category of praise poetry...

THE DRUM

Foundation of our voices

Pa-boom! Pa-boom!

Cruising thru valleys

navigating mountains

Criss - crossing streams

Pa boom! Pa Boom!

Celebrating our victories

Dissembling history

warning of unseen doom

calling calling over the wind

Pa boom! Pa boom!

transversing currents

like the ancient gods

the mundane resonating

with the profound