Tuesday, September 25, 2007

PEACEFUL COMMUNICATION

So often psychic pain
Settles upon us
And we suffer, so in vain
Over pain we don’t discuss.
Te rationalize our silence
Seeing self as private soul,
Which can create violence
And destroy our life goal.

In strong desire to maintain peace
We hold our pain deep inside
Our souls then find no release;
Fear, hurt, anger still reside.
How often foe becomes a friend
When humbly, with a loving heart,
We bring our difference to an end
Which helps true friendship make it’s start.

Weakness fears confessing need;
It tries to flex it’s “would be” muscle!
Which incites fear in foe indeed,
And brings about a needless struggle.
Our world, like we, must voice it’s need,
Openly, as friend to friend,
And thus broadcast peaceful seed,
And bring world violence to end.

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

AFRAID OF NOTHING TO FEAR

Why, for fear of Old Ben Ladden,
Is our world now so downtrodden?
Of all the world, he owns so little
His wealth is neither jot nor tittle
Compared to wealth our nation owns,
So why sits he on war lord thrones?

To fear his strike fulfills his goal,
So we put terror on a roll
When we gird up to repell
His improvised troops of Hell.
Much better we should build a following
Than in world paranoia wallowing!

Rather than fear the Taliban,
Which Ladden builds because he can
Among the people who have no chance
By education to advance,
Let us provide opportunity,
And so to terror have immunity.

Saturday, July 21, 2007

BEST WE CAN; SEE WHAT HAPPENS

They who really “have the goods”
Have gone to school until they learned,
Have not regretted side lines spurned,
Have taken humbly what they earned,
Projected future like Tiger Woods.

“I’ll do the best I can,” says Woods,
“And see what happens,” we hear him say.
He knows sun, wind or rain can change his play
On any given golfing day.
If we don’t think like Tiger Woods - perhaps we should?

For sun, wind and rain come in our lives,
Illness, breaks, competition,
All bring life to its fruition;
So we are wise to make admission
That life can “happen” though man strives.

Maturity will always say
That all things work toward our good,
Poor ways show better ways would
Change poor “can’t” to positive “could”
As we learn to look, learn, laugh and pray.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

A PARALLEL

The game of golf is much like life;
Some shots easy, some fraught with strife.
So much depends upon the winds,
And fairway slopes around the bends.
Will your ball pass protruding limbs
Which form irregular fairway rims,
Or sands that form dangerous places,
Lying in wait with hungry faces?

It’s the thrill of shooting through such places
Which keeps us going through the paces,
Always looking for a better score
Though we have improved, we want much more.
There are those days when the hole seems small,
Or we just can’t get there from here at all,
So we must pitch out to mid fairway
For and easier shot and a much better day.

Sunday, June 17, 2007

DON’T BELLYACHE

If I should cry about my knees
Which ache in changing weather,
Or be disturbed each time I sneeze
When I and pollen get together,
I’d spend my time just wiping tears
Lentimenting aching joints,
Poking at my stopped up ears
And other tantalizing points;
So I’ll just roll with every punch,
And thank the Lord I’ve lived this long,
And maybe aches will cease a bunch
And leave me with a happy song.

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

A SECOND LOVE

The longer I live with my sweet wife,
The more I value our great life.
Though grief brought us to our first talk
It also brought us to this pleasant walk
In our growing garden of heavenly love
Which we recognize as a gift from above.

Losing life partners, it seemed love had ended,
Though hundreds stood by and often befriended,
Nor did we plan to be more than friends:
A friendship based on romantic ends.
But that great heart I met that first night,
Stayed in my heart and brought me delight.

Wherever she goes, I want to be;
The more together, the more we can see
That we were meant to love each other,
And denying that love we both would smother
New life that came from our grief to lift
Us right into heaven through God’s precious gift.

We have not forgotten those partners we love
We’re sure they rejoice as they watch from above,
The joy we feel through what they taught
About how to love as lovers ought,
Nor do they resent our love for each other,
For Dorothy’s a sister and Buddy’s a brother.

So it will be with Mary and Me
When we arrive in Eternity.
“No marriage in heaven,” is Christ‘s comment.
Brides of Christ will never resent
The mighty works that God has done
Once Eternal Life is begun.

Thursday, March 08, 2007

A TOUGH OLD DOG

Old Buster was a mixed breed dog,
As tough as any old Oak log;
He worked with horses, cattle, goats,
And just as well with Grandpa’s shoats.

At night he bayed to moonlit skies,
On summer days, he fought the flies.
With trust, he worked at his ranch life,
And seldom flinched when there was strife.

One day when he was feeling punk,
And from the smell, had killed a skunk,
We saw he had a swelled up head,
And wondered that he was not dead.

A snake had struck him on the nose.
His mouth was swelled and would not close,
But he survived that fateful day;
A tough old dog is what I say!

Would that men were as tough
When life gets hard and really rough;
Then maybe men, as well as he,
Could make life what it’s meant to be.

Saturday, August 12, 2006

THE GREAT QUESTION

Life is blamed and called so cruel;
Good and bad seem oft in dual
For the minds of creatures we call men,
Who may be to blame for “the fix we’re in”!

Oh, there are tsunamis, tornadoes, storms,
Which often upset what we call “Norms”,
But these are mild compared to the wars,
Which have placed so many behind strong bars!

Barred from the good they were able to do,
By loss of life or a limb or two,
Or the loss of nature, good and kind,
By learning to kill opposing mankind.

Barred from fruition to dreams for their life,
Concerning their friends, their family, their wife;
Barred from fulfillment of God’s great plan
For every wife, child and man.

Oh, Leaders of Nations, please hearken to Him,
Who does place peace above human whim,
And provides a way for all who are able
To disdain greed, and stay at the table.

In this world, there is ample for all;
Not a single nation should ever fall
If mankind learns to listen to others
And feel their needs as loving brothers.

Naive, you say? Then what, I pray
Is more naive than fighting today
When our world has tools for total relief
From poverty, ignorance, danger and grief.

Deserts are open to be irrigated
As war machines can be mutated
To engines of good and caring concern
As man comes to the table to learn.

Whole populations in some starving nations
Are much in need of good educations,
Easily achieved if money spent
On fighting is changed to this intent.

How can man and science continue
In such wasteful and painful retinue,
Which brings so much heartache and pain
When all time has proved it foolish and vain?

Why should not all nations begin
The move to cast out this horrible sin?
Violence breeds violence wherever it’s found;
Good overcomes evil on most all grounds.

So come, sad world, to the table for peace;
Learn of love’s unfailing release
From selfish greed, or staggering fear,
And make this year a liberating year.

WRITE WHEN IT'S RIGHT

WRITE WHEN IT’S RIGHT

When a poet has nought to say,
He had best go on his way,
Do some things that he can do,
Or just sit calm, in quiet review
Of life as it has loped along,
And that should give him one more song.

When day is drab and night moves slowly,
There is no need to feel so lowly,
For poets too need time to rest,
So they, in time, can do their best:
In times that beg to go on page
As they are written by some sage.

May I find grace to wait and see
The varied things life shows to me;
She will not let me rest for long
without intoning one more song
That will be right to pass along
To a listening, hungry throng;
So I will listen for that “gong”
That helps my bard see right or wrong.

To praise the right, or right the wrong
Should be a poet’s favorite song,
For poems are much more than word;
In their content, should truth be heard!
Truth inspires and sets us free
To live and love all life we see,
So, Lord, please guide my simple bard
So writing truth won’t be so hard.
Orion N. Lewis 8-12-06

WITHOUT MY BARD

WITHOUT MY BARD

I dislike those days
When my “bard” seems “out to lunch”,
When he simply sits and plays,
And never has a hunch
Concerning life as it goes on;
Not one simply thought to give
While he is up and out, and I’m alone;
Not helping me to be, to give, to live?

How am I to write a verse
About that “nothing” he left to write?
I don’t even dare rehearse
A line of “nothing now in sight”!
So, I guess it’s mine to sit and wait
Until my bard comes home,
A trying task I dearly hate,
But when he’s gone, my thoughts do roam.

Perhaps I need to walk around,
See the people, skirt the town,
See the trees and flowers too,
Hear the people, see what they do,
Listen quietly for his voice,
Telling me to make a choice
Of the words I’ll blend today
That some may hear what I say.
Orion N. Lewis 8-11-06