A Christmas Poem

Take me, take me, home,

Wherever home may be,

Oh, take me.

Or toss me, toss me,

in the deep blue sea.

Just toss me.

Could I stand upon a mountain?

Could I look for the end of the sky?

Could I find the safest place

that could ever be?

I've been upon a mountain.

I've looked for the end of the sky.

I've seen that one safest place,

hold no poetry.

Let me, let me, tug

the string between you and me.

Yes, tug too,

so we know, we know,

the connection;

I am you as you are me.  

© Dennis Wright, 2020

A Christmas themed painting depicting
Peanuts character Snoopy and Woodstock on a window.
Photo by Noah Wulf
from Wikimedia Commons

Note Taken About My Body (After a trip to Sam's Club)

My left side leads my right side

and it has always been this way,

from, I suspect, mother’s womb

until, I expect, I find the grave.

My left foot anchors my right foot

each time I begin to walk steps.

Then I feel it solid on the ground

before I forward shift from the left.

As left hand hooks it, right hand plays

note found first before pluck or strum.

From this arrives one more tune

likely that again I sing and hum.

But so you say my left ear

hears a bit better than my right.

Well no surprise do I feel

always left carried the work and fight.

And from the womb to grave I go.

Being me requires this will be so.

© Dennis Wright,  2012

"Walking Man" by Alberto Giacometti

Waiting While Poetry Lurks

Spontaneity reveals nature,

The guide man lets us know.

A figure is born in one stroke,

That’s what painting shows.

I, with my personal traits, 

Look challenge right in the eye.

"Tell us what is right and wrong,"

The song goes, "you won't have to die".

I speak many words with less thought,

Some words fake ones; some are real. 

Here is where I write one more poem,

To tell you precisely how I feel.

Peace is right and war is wrong,

I think love is better than death.

If summer were here all year long,

I would worry not about my breath.

Summers come and summers go,

And I find beauty is but a dream.

Paintings may be all that is left,

And they are covered with steam.

Who is right is better than who is wrong,

Some say they change with every scene,

With money, everything is possible,

I believe that's the American Dream.

So, I put on my clothes every day,

We all go that way to work.

Then I take them off to go to bed,

As I wait while poetry lurks.

© Dennis Wright, 2018

"American Dreams Come True,"
photo of Spc. Nikolaus Stiles taken by Sgt. Uriah Walker,
from Wikimedia Commons

On Ground Cut Small

It was my wish before this all began

That the generals felt our pain and rode off

In the night when we were so sound asleep  

We could not arise and begin our fight

Once again, once again, on ground cut small.

Surely great leaders know when troops weary,

And though spirit bound by bronze and steel, they stand

Where tomorrow finds them a new home beyond

The bounds not of steel or bronze defining them

As one, in what they never were nor want.

My wish so sorely slashed by fear and pain,

Generals by small men retained again,

And love turned to hatred again in flame

As my home falls to the depths of grief,

Golden only in defending itself.

Golden only in defending itself.

But now a song is sung I wish were new,

Yet began seven centuries ago, 

When fire and metals blended for weapon 

And tool in kiln of concrete kept secret

To survive in the desert that goes like this,

  

The highest steeple in the greatest land

Is no larger than the pettiest man.

The highest steeple in the greatest land

Is no larger than the pettiest man.

Once again, once again, on ground cut small.    

© Dennis Wright, 2018

Unburied Dead on Battlefield ~ Hanover County, Virginia
June, 1862
Civil War stereograph
DeGolyer Library collection, Southern Methodist University
from Wikimedia Commons

We Fought No War This Time

We fought no war this time to find a time

Without the likes of you who even though Cuba

Is no longer the place you hide your face

And live the life that led to Castro

While we crawled neath our desks and

Received the request to be good Dullian 

Citizens who hate what they create

And anyone they suspect to blame

For the fear of the cloud we brought aloud

In sirens that went off every Wednesday at noon

And warned that soon we would be taken over

By godless Catholics, Baptists, or blacks

In a storm of equality falsely defined in identity

Not in being equal in the eyes of God and law 

With lies and rewrites, you cover yours and others

Eyes with the grey shroud of false wisdom. 

But you don’t care, as you stand right there,

In casinos, liquor, prostitution, and dirty money

As we fight no war this time to find a time

Without the likes of you.  

Without the likes of you. 

Without the likes of you.

© Dennis Wright, 2017

Snowy egret at Key Largo
Photo by William H. Majoros
from Wikimedia Commons

Cooperstown, New York

Ferris Wheels and fire works, 

sailing ships upon the lake. 

Horse-drawn wagons and cotton candy, 

and the children run everywhere. 

Lovers stand at the ring toss booth 

while vendors hawk burgers and fries. 

Boys pitch pennies to win a game, 

to give their prize away sweetly. 

A runner is on second base 

in the Fireman's Baseball Game. 

Someone sells homemade pies 

while the high school band plays. 

A barge drifts by the shoreline. 

It proudly flies the American flag. 

The captain wouldn’t fly it just any day, 

but today is the fourth of July. 

© Dennis Wright, 2015

(Based on an oil painting called

 "Cooperstown, New York, July, 1987," 

by Janet Munro) 

A Fourth of July celebration. St. Helena Island, South Carolina, 1939
Photo by Marion Post Walcott
from Wikimedia Commons

Little Chicago

(Milwaukee’s near north side)

Dad drove taxicab on the near north side.
He went up and down the big little town.
Some of his fares were looking to hide,

and in little Chicago, our north side,
the mob could stay if they behaved.
The socialists though, would not be bribed.

The new rock in a bay held the big guy.
Small fish rode right on like the big Muskie rode,
with face or name never applied.

Wisely, Dad returned to selling clothing instead.
Later he went back to these stomping grounds.
“They have the best hard rolls” was what he said.

© Dennis Wright, 2016

Old taxicab in Aleppo, Syria, taken 1995
Photo by Spielvogel
from Wikimedia Commons

I Remain Here (In Memory of Daniel Berrigan)

I remain here as I hear you have left.

I could be sad, but I am still inspired.

My own life can mean more than it has

Though I can never reach all you have done.

© Dennis Wright, 2016

Daniel Kerrigan with his niece Frida
at a Witness Against Torture event in 2008
Photo byThomas Good
from Wikimedia Commons

Put Down the Gun

Put down the gun and we can talk.

This world is too small for our hate.

There are many paths we walk.       

Put down the gun.

There is time it is not too late.

We can live with the paths we walk.

There is one thing we can get straight,

There can be no hate in our talk.

This world is too small for our hate.

There is much to say in our talk.

Put down the gun.

© Dennis Wright, 2016

Re-enactment of the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral
Photo by James G. Howes
from Wikimedia Commons

Your Short Leaving (for Nelson Mandela)

You are in our hearts and our souls;
our thoughts fill with only your being.
We dance not for dying on this one day,
But we sing in joy of your short leaving.

For we are here to keep your name alive
in words that tell of you as saint to none,
who was of this world when in sorer want
and saw new from the old under the sun.

We sing and dance in joy for your going;
our thoughts fill with only your being.
You are in our hearts and our souls;
We will long keep you in your short leaving.

© Dennis Wright, 2015

Nelson Mandela in Johannesburg, May 2008
South Africa, The Good News
from Wikimedia Commons

Monday Snow

Monday snow drawn from high to low in waves 

Looking to find a place to moor and grow 

In banks and drifts in the early moments of the day.

I see it land now softly with a lightly blown spray

In the crooked of branches of Dogwood elbow

Monday snow drawn from high to low in waves. 

Then cradled as a baby held against all sway

Innocence in a path it does not know

In banks and drifts in the early of the day. 

Like some ancient pilgrim seeking the way

Finding the sky holy holding earth its bones

Monday snow drawn from high to low in waves. 

What was then for what is now know I may 

A snow laced dream resting here alone

In banks and drifts in the early of the day.  

Snow rests in sun and changes by its rays 

As a wayward one who moors then he goes.

Monday snow drawn from high to low in waves

In banks and drifts in the early of the day.  

© Dennis Wright, 2015

Trail at Ivy Creek
Photo by Tony Russell