CRY OF A HEART IN DISTRESS

by Roodly Laurore & Bichini Laurore

“Spirits / Loas” by Payas Augustin Pierre Sylvain, 2012

Generations follow one another.

Same causes, same effects.

Chained hearts, slaves to hatred.

 

The wind of fear contaminates thought,

turns it into violence, sows mourning.

 

Anguished souls, thirsty for peace,

In the middle of a barren desert.

cry for the end of a painful pilgrimage.

 

Exhausted body, dejected mind 

find their peace

in a journey of no return.  

Roodly Laurore was born and raised in Haiti. He is an engineer and poet. His poems, widely published, are included in: Spirit Fire Review; Welter University of Baltimore; Taos Journal of Poetry; Kosmos Journal; Autism Parenting Magazine; Solstice Literary Magazine; Synchronized Chaos; The New Verse News; Jerry Jazz Musician and others.

 

Bichini Laurore, born in Haiti, is the son of Roodly Laurore. He is a lover of accounting and poetry with a passion for writing poetry in English & French. He has recently collaborated with his father Roodly Laurore in Taos Journal of Poetry. Bichini was 3rd place winner of an interschool competition in Port-au-Prince in 2020.

TREE TRIPTYCH

by Beth Evans

 

Cuttings

 
I walked the yard recently,
Past the chickens,
You know them well by now,
The compost creators.
Walked until I saw the damaged Rose-of-Sharon.
 
A branch, several branches,
Hung bent to the ground,
Clinging to the center trunk
With shaving of themselves,
Like the first loose tooth of a child,
Hanging by a thread of flesh,
About to part company.
 
I ripped the clinging branches from their mother,
Threw them aside,
More compost,
Feedings for new life,
Leaving a wounded mother,
With one branch embedded, still,
At her side,
No sign of its leaving home.
The mother tree reaching up towards the sky,
Bare,
Bare of most of her branches,
Bare of most of the tender leaves
That the branches shoot out each year,
Year after year,
New every time,
The ever-changing interests and pursuits of her children.
But now they are gone.
As is their future.
 
I have heard,
That entire branches of families
Have been obliterated.
The mother, the father, the grandchildren,
The mother of them all, the grandmother.
Obliterated.
There will no longer be changing interests and pursuits.
There will no longer be their future.
 

Reachings

 
This tree,
This mother has wandering branches
That reach in an undulating choreography towards places,
Each other has never been.
They have their interests,
They follow their pursuits,
They live in their present
And towards their futures.
Not a single one has been cut down,
Though they all range far from the center,
Pilgrimage, the Hajj, Aliyah.
Risking annihilation in the
Moving winds of time and space.
The center holds.
I tell Yeats.
It is in their wandering,

Courage of exploration and redefinition,

That the core gains its strength.
 

Leavings

 
I woke this morning with a poem in my head.
                The black sheep
                Creep
                Away.
                They never fit in their flock.
                Do better in the outskirts,
                Do better where they find other black sheep,
                Or pink sheep,
                Or green sheep,
                Or no sheep at all.
                And find their home among the antelopes,
                Or the orangutans,
                Or even among the wolves.
 
My son has left me,
Gone to find his new home
In the mountains or the meadows or a desert,
Like the branches of the bush that now lie rotting in my yard,
Like the branches that leap from the undulating tree,
Like the sheep that leave the flock.
He tells me,
That when he has a daughter,
He will name her Rose of Sharon,
And he has not even read the Grapes of Wrath,
Or the Bible.
But he has walked in this same yard,
Past the chickens,
Past the wounded tree,
When in his day,
It grew strong and whole,
As wood should,
And he will still,
See a future,
And procreate.

The poet, Beth Evans, lives in Brooklyn, NY and writes with the Thursday Morning Poets. She holds a master's degree in English literature and works as an academic librarian. She is currently overseeing the care and maintenance of her son's 23 chickens in her urban backyard with her pitbull Chichi and her cat Shadow.

INVISIBLE ROOTS YANKED

by The Bangkok Bards 
Saknarin Chinayote & Charles Frederickson

  Nothing in nature is constant
Habitats ever-changing dense woodlands overgrown
Shading out caterpillar-dependent herbivorous plants
Heartlands afire deserts toughen parch

All humanimal species including butterflies
Emerge genetically programmed leaving homespun
Cocoon dispersion exploring ephemeral Newfoundland
Windswept transitions diverting obstacle course

Seasonal migratory sun compass evolution
Following vitality source riverbed path
Internal time-compensated cyclical rhythms
Circadian clock built into antennae

We’re all descended from immigrants
Pilgrimage sentimental journey without maps
Mass movement penniless not cultureless
Synthesized traditions unwelcome only tolerated

Cast into giant meltdown cauldron
Forced to assimilate own alienation
Borderline disoriented outsiders belonging nowhere
Starved souls hungry for certainty

Estrangers created unequal labeled illegal
Fleeing past escaping oppressive lethargy
Cherishing those who matter most
Understanding family friends being understood

No Holds Bard Dr. Charles Frederickson and Mr. Saknarin Chinayote proudly present YouTube mini-movies @ YouTube – CharlesThai1 .