Here’s the poem of the Month for June, and sun can get hot in Laredo …

My Victory Song

Hello world,
I’m ready for you today.
I’m going to fight and fight,
and I will not be afraid.
The sun can blaze and burn,
the ice can bite and freeze,
the desert sand can blow,
but I will still feel the gentle breeze.
The hours seem longer,
as my watch ticks on.
I will fight and fight.
I will sing my victory song.
I’m here at last, home
safe, happy and alive.
The sun, ice, desert sand have
done their best, but I still survived.

To read this poem in Spanish, click here.

Photo by Mike Hall
The sun will rise and set on our love” is a poem that is about 10 years old, but its still as good as if it were written yesterday. 

The sun will rise and set on our love,
and it’s light will make us shine.
When the light goes down at night,
I will want your body next to mine.
It’s going to take a little more time,
but I know it won’t be much longer.
Our feelings for each other will
have the chance to get stronger.
We’ll get back together again,
and I’ll spend everyday with you.
Each day will be an adventure,
and each morning will be new.

The sun will rise and set on our love,
and it’s light will make us shine.
When the light goes down at night,
I will want your body next to mine.
Now that we’re in the same place,
we can have a heart  to heart talk.
We can go in the waves by the sea
and hold each other close as we walk.
We can be free to express our dreams,
and how they can become real.
here will be no secrets between us now,
and  we can say how we feel.

The sun will rise and set on our love,
and it’s light will make us shine.
When the light goes down tonight,
I will feel your body next to mine. 
 

Thinnest Conceit

 The conceit is a type of poem that uses imagination, fancy metaphors that are sometime elaborate.  The power of words is clear when the choices of words are critical to the poem’s messge.

 Thinnest Conceit    

A rubber band is used best
      when its material is stretched,
      and my heart expands to hold
  your  love and caring of
      others until the time the
 rubber band breaks at the thinnest 
      point.  Then the circle of friendship is
 snapped, laying out broken  
      hearts along the line,
 including mine.

Train Crossing

There are times in our lives when decisions that directly affect us need to be made.  These choices often affect other people, which makes the decisions even harder to make.

A some point, though, there is a time when that choice is made.  As the reader, recognize the poem below is at the climax of a story whose details are in your imagination, and what happens after is up to you. The poem, Train Crossing, is at a point of no return, for the tracks mark the threshold to a new life. 

Train Crossing

The train is not coming,
and there’s nothing on the track.
It’s time for me to go,
and it’s best if I don’t look back.

This is just an old country road,
but it’s the only way out from here.
It’s not what lies before me now,
But my past that I really fear.

The big city has opportunities
and I hear you can easily blend in.
Get a new job and a new life, and
I know I can start all over again.

The train is not coming,
and nothing’s holding me back.
The memories begin to fade away
as I ease my way across the track.

Calico Creek

There is alway a place that is different for each of us where we can remember when important times in our lives occured. Often, this place is the same place for several of these “events.” Of course the physical place this coule be would naturally change over time, but also our memory’s perception of this place would change at the same time.

The color of calico is not one true color, but a mixture of colors, like a mixture of memories. For me, there are several places that could be a “Calico Creek,” but the photo above the poem is not named Calico Creek. If I had ever taken a photo of a place I could envision as all my places put together, this photo comes close.

Where is your “Calico Creek”?

Calico Creek

I learned to fish on Calico Creek.
I figured out how to put the wiggly
worm on the sharp hook.
You can’t go fishing by the book.

I learned how to swim at Calico Creek.
My brothers thought it would be fun
One day to throw me off the bridge.
I had to swim if I wanted to live.

I learned to love at Calico Creek.
I brought my first girlfriend there
And stole my first kiss under a tree.
With a different girl, I lost my virginity.

I learned about God at Calico Creek.
I saw how He made the grass, the water,
The movement of the water and why
People, like my father, had to die.

I learned many things at Calico Creek.
When, now as an adult when I need a
Private secret place I could call my own,
It is a place I can think and be alone.