Fallen Lilies, by PD Lyons Poetry

 

Fallen Lilies

 

We will surround you with silence

Like the voices of our children never to be heard again

We will surround you with fallen lilies

Like each of one our children cut mid bloom

 

We won’t ever know what to do

With a hypocrite’s thoughts and prayers

 

We won’t ever find anything

In a hypocrite’s concern for  grief

 

But we’ll not match the hardness of such hearts

By hardening our own

 

We will not meet such hearts with violence

We know too well that path of sorrow

 

So, we will meet you in silence

Like the voices of our children never to be heard again

We will meet you in fallen lilies

Like each one of our children cut mid bloom

 

Unlike you

We will do what must be done

Unlike you

We will remember and continue to find days to be thankful for

 

Mothers rocking babies rocking mothers

Fathers rocking babies rocking fathers

Altar of the Virgin of Guadalupe in Notre – Dame

Slips ~25.1.21 #2 words and photos by pd lyons

 

I have lived

Long enough

To come back

Back To everything I knew When I was fifteen

Only now Certain of its richness.

 

How wonderful sixty-five is.

 

 

 

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Fallen Lilies, by PD Lyons Poetry

 

Fallen Lilies

 

We will surround you with silence

Like the voices of our children never to be heard again

We will surround you with fallen lilies

Like each of one our children cut mid bloom

 

We won’t ever know what to do

With a hypocrite’s thoughts and prayers

 

We won’t ever find anything

In a hypocrite’s concern for  grief

 

But we’ll not match the hardness of such hearts

By hardening our own

 

We will not meet such hearts with violence

We know too well that path of sorrow

 

So, we will meet you in silence

Like the voices of our children never to be heard again

We will meet you in fallen lilies

Like each one of our children cut mid bloom

 

Unlike you

We will do what must be done

Unlike you

We will remember and continue to find days to be thankful for

 

Mothers rocking babies rocking mothers

Fathers rocking babies rocking fathers

Fallen Lilies by pd lyons

 

We will surround you with silence

Like the voices of our children never to be heard again

 

We will surround you with fallen lilies

Like each of one our children cut mid bloom

 

We won’t ever know what to do

With a hypocrite’s thoughts and prayers

We won’t ever find anything

In a hypocrite’s concern for our grief

 

But we’ll not match the hardness of such hearts

By hardening our own

We will not meet such hearts with violence

We know too well that path of sorrow

 

So, we will meet you in silence

Like the voices of our children never to be heard again

We will meet you in fallen lilies

Like each one of our children cut mid bloom

 

Unlike you

We will do what must be done

 

Unlike you

We will remember and continue to find days to be thankful for

 

Mothers rocking babies rocking mothers

Fathers rocking babies rocking fathers

 

 

dear america – A response to reading the news today by pd lyons

dear america
how many does it take?
how many of my beautiful daughters
torn beat burned drugged ripped raped shot?
how many of my beautiful sons?
torn beat burned drugged ripped raped shot
why is there no room for tenderness?
why are the breasts of my motherland sharped to razor edge?
why the strength of my fatherland perpetrating not protecting?
dear america,
when did you become such an abuser of your children?

these things that come to me in dreams, by pd lyons

we came upon them by stealth
a group of children play with sticks and  rags like flags
a half dozen ponies hobbled in high grass
a thin trail of smoke rises through cold air like a prayer
and we antitheses of blessings readied our weapons

I saw her
silent to death
her child
no more than four
open
ribbons before
her

burning
anger
bullet
met
that moment stopped in violence
never ends

from “the bluebook poems” ruff

Divorce, by pd lyons

Divorce

Two boys
Sons before school
Dad’s darlings
Learning to swing
“…all by yourself!!!”
Under a friendly sun
Free vitamin D
Lace of green tree buds
Song of wandering sparrows

Who knows the sorrows of another?

 

not soldiers , by pd lyons

pdlyons photo

 

 

they are not soldiers terrorists victims fundamentalists political religious communist empire builders – they are lovers friends sisters brothers mothers fathers infants toddlers adolescents elderly wise asses genius and then they were not that either-

 

 

photographer unknown

 

Big Lorraine, by PD Lyons – a ghost poem

 

Big Lorraine

 

 

I dreamed my love had found me
my children gathered too
put down all their weapons
eased their hearts cried their fill
then they began to play
like they did when they were young
and when I woke I’d forgotten
all my dreaming days were done.

I went down to make the coffee
sat by the open window
ran my fingers through my hair
thought I heard somebody talkin’
voices carry on the air
birds out over the ocean
rising silver like a prayer

 

 

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Big Lorraine is in Cape Breton Nova Scotia, Canada. In one of those vast woodland logics of Cape Breton, Big Lorraine is much smaller a town than Little Lorraine is. In fact I don’t think there’s more than a house or two visible from the highway.  Maybe it was different back in the day? Anyway Cape Breton is one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever lived in.  There are many ghosts along the rugged coast and through out the highlands where sometimes they don’t even get a town left standing for them. So this is a ghost poem and it is obviously for Big Lorraine.

I’d say this was written in 2003 or maybe 4. A version appears in Caribu & Sister Stones : Selected Poems by PD Lyons, selected by Deirdre Kearney, Published by Lapwing, Belfast, 2009. ISBN 978-1-905425-90-7 .

 

Hues of Blue by pd lyons

 

Hues Of Blue

the Sylvia part of me

wants to skip and play with children

instead restrained by crafty undertakings

that barefoot girl walks into the kitchen.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHVEMogmxZ0