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Best Poems From
LAURENCE OVERMIRE
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5.
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Slave Ship
I lie on my back
Look up through the grate
Light streams in bars across the planks
The black and white reflection of an angry god
A pair of shoes walks across
Keeping watch with silk-stocking regularity
The slow, insistent plodding of minutes lost
Happy in his stuff-bellied fortune
He breathes clean, salty air.
We here below packed in chains
Swallow the thick foul vapors of human waste
Rolling in filth with each turbulent toss of the wretched vessel
The moans of the dying and the bones of the dead
Join in eerie incantation
Knocking
On the doors of conscience
A haunting litany to invoke the spirits of the wind
The seas revolt
Hurling epithets of froth and foam
To wash the sin away
The gull shrieks
An agonizing plea
For mercy
But deaf and blind, haughty lumps of men
Shut all sense and stop their hearts
Their thirst for gold will not be quenched
Till millions die in shame
Their pockets lined
With generations
Of untold wealth.
(Previously published in Avalon, Oct.1999; Honor and Remembrance, Indelible Mark Publishing,2007)
Laurence Overmire
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6.
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A Honeycomb In Amish Country
Nestled into the side of a hill
Warm fire, blazing
Comforter and footstool
Coffee steaming from a freshly brewed pot
Through the windows bay
A circle of stone to
Frame the sky
Mist in the valley like a dream
Awakening
The red light of morning
Peeking oer the trees
Somewhere below
Down a road winding through
An unseen distance
The clip-clop, clip-clop
Horse and buggy on its way
Bird song and cow bell
Dragonfly and wildflower
Still pond and fragrant field
The beckoning promise of
Another day.
Laurence Overmire
Read more: horse poems, song poems, red poems, dream poems, fire poems, sky poems, light poems, tree poems, wind poems
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7.
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A Sheepish Reply
They told him he was a happy man
And happy so he was
He wore the clothes they told him to
He brushed his teeth, he combed his hair
He said the things they said he would
He married and had kids.
He went to work to work to work
And after work he went to work
To work on something more.
He died a happy happy man
Quite happy so they said
For living such a happy life
What was it to be dead?
(Previously published in The Short North Gazette, July 1999)
Laurence Overmire
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8.
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From the French
Lai me, Mademoiselle
In sweet couplet of your rhyme
A melody of satin to lace
Our dreams in song
From your lips to mine
Knights and maidens in
Chivalric dance together
The centuries-old lyric
Of lovers hearts.
(Previously published in Infinite Race, Aug 2000; Poems Md, Apr 2008)
Laurence Overmire
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