Category: Art

If You Really Look, You’ll See

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 4 Comments

wpid-20140925_124045.jpg

If You Really Look You’ll See

Diamonds mounted on each blade of grass
No gold or platinum
Here
Emerald green
Shoots safely sheltering
Droplets left
Last night or
By the early morning dew

Do you see
Whimsy rained down on the land
Perhaps it’s sips of champagne
Resting on the verdant shoots
Served in earthen flutes
On the lawn
For a thirsty, spotted chipmunk
Parched from
Racing through the rain
To toast the earth’s season change

And if you look you’ll really see
What is invisible
To many
So many rushed and hurried
Souls
Blind
To the garland embellishment
Laid carefully on the old grey stone
Preparing a Fall Party, a grande fete
With mushrooms, toadstools
For each guest
To sit and sip the beauty
Served to those who wish to see

If you look you’ll see
Her
Red carpet’s been
Rolled out
Maple, Oak and Dogwood leaves
Nature’s finest Oriental underfoot
The finest accoutrements for
Each merry guest

A harried pace will make you blind

To diamonds, garlands
And tree roots bent in such a way
To give a weary sojourner
A place to sit and rest

I was blind
But now I see
The field mice sipping Jasmine Tea
From the finest porcelain
Beside the Monarch’s who dropped in
For a festive tea party

And I like Alice
Remain with them

For childlike wonder
Unveils the hidden things
Previously unseen by man

Without The Music

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 2 Comments

Without The Music

Without music
Quiet has no notes to wake her up
From muffled morning’s sleepy headed slumber.
So, instead
She hangs her winsome head,
languishing in her lonely bed.
Hoping that a harp will play, or
maybe a cello will save the day.
Praying a piano quite possibly might
saunter  in,
Or trumpets wake the dead
Say arise, awake
With blasts of wind
instruments, drums and snare,
Replacing thick and quiet air
Violins or soothing flute
The horns will shout forth
an exclamation point.

Breaking the blistering silence of her mind
Hoping a happy stanza
peppered with piccolo will fill the air
But instead the quiet
Lingers, hanging void
The music hidden, lost,
Is nowhere.

Life without a song

Sounds like life
Without a pulse
dull
and fallen
Silence fills the air.
Only black and white
All color gone, no song.
The music must play on.
The strings shall sing, the harmony restore
The runs, the rifts, the ivories,
The keys will sing from lips of fingertips
The music.
Melody and symphony, sharps and flats
Notes from low to high, cascading making merry in the dark
Mirroring or changing the mood within the room
Transforming quiet, into music,
Liquid poetry.

Give me a blessed song that wakes my spirit up.

Turns the sad and lonely mood around
Plays hymns of praise
My anthem raise
No longer will I live my days,
Alone in silence lingering long
Without the sounds of  dancing
On clouds of spirit-thought.
Without
The music
Playing in the chambers,
The rooms of my heart.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Joining Laura at Laura Boggess dot com for her Playdates at The Wellspring.

Back In The Day

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 2 Comments

box woods and bench WH's

Back In The Day

Circa 1908
You left ghosts
Good ones
Memories
Mark corners
As a dog every tree and bush
Buried bones
In cracks in floors and ceiling
Bust open, every door
We escape
The heat
Of the day
Going out then in
As if it were an Olympic sport
This sitting on the porch

If you can’t stand the sitting
Stand up
Get outside awhile
Air your dirty laundry
Everyone below can hear
Your voice carries

Rising up and through
The oaks

Down the road the sanatoriums
Sprang up
A million mushrooms
After the rain
To house the sick

Breath deep
The air it heals

Did you sit as long as we
You visions of the past
Rocking back and forth
Trapping every smell of lilac,
Rot, wet earth
From the hills

We identify every waft
That wanders by
Anchoring our living
Senses fully engaged
Right here, right now
Frozen
On the edge of boxwood and vine
Perched like birds for hours
Watching them

Watch us
Lose all track of time
The train will whistle
Wakes us up

You left us more than memorabilia
But a metronome
Set on slow
And barely moving
To pace our days
Tasting wet rain mornings
Pallet cleanser

Come and linger long
On the edges of the sides of hills
Anchor here
Upon the slippery slope
Lingering
Life
Measured in the sightings of the finch
Don’t blink you’ll miss the high point of the day

How strange
We may live  even slower
When we come through the gate
Than
You, ghosts of
Circa nineteen hundred and

oh eight

++++++++++++++++++

Joining Sandra Heska King for Still Saturday

The Art of Remembering

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 4 Comments

new fave for art quote

The Art of Remembering

In a home
Frozen
In time
You will remember
Funny the fragments
That break apart
Aren’t we
Bound by memory
Remembering
While
Picking up the pieces
Remaking a life
Re-ordering the pages
Living in reverse
The mind rewinds
In fact
You can go home again

You too have a
Docent
Telling the story
Slant it lovely
Slant it real

Sift it in remembering
As you go home again

Virtual remembering
Physical changes in time
For us to pick up the pieces
The smallest of detail
Left in the dust
Off the places with the Pledge
Soaked cloth
Light as a feather
Dust off a memory
Here
One over there

All in the home
Housing your memories
You can look homeward

Angel
All of the memories
Are yours

OneWord2013_ArtBl