Here is the latest installment of Poet’s Corner, presented by the Edmonds-based EPIC Poetry Group.

 

Starbucks Windbag

She chatters on her cellphone

Natters, blusters, shouts

Her anguish and her anger

She loudly spews and spouts

 

It’s washed across her tabletop

Splashed across her shoes

Overflows the coffee shop

As she blurts her blues

 

Brandishing her expertise

Blaring sage advice

She ups the damning decibels

And our ears pay the price

 

We move in hopes of finding peace

But futile proves our flight

She’s brash and blatant, unrestrained

And dammit all, “I’M RIGHT!”

 

Righteous though’s the better word

To sum up her rude ravings

While shrilly riding her high horse

And blindly misbehaving.

Tom Fortin

~ ~ ~

Moonswept

Who could resist this night sky

Moonful

Would you look away unimpressed

When nature gifts you

Moonglow night light

This gently smiling face?

 

Its silence could fool you into thinking

Life should be found elsewhere

But it hums with life, a low pulsing life

No glaring spotlight this one

Just a low-slung luminescence

This thrumming wave of sub-sound echoes

 

Let it charm you, win you over

Slowly, sleepily, sneakily

Whisk your consciousness away

The swish swish twitching of a soft spirit’s tail

 

Let it lull you into bright realms of dreaming

Take you places you’d never choose to go

Away, away to the far side

Hidden glowing magic

Tom Fortin

~ ~ ~ ~

Secrets Shared

Little secrets held close, often magnified

Out of all proportion

To their weight or great importance

To anyone else

 

Young crow above me cries for food

His stomach empty but

His heart and mind happily lack

Dark burdens like mine

He soars and plays, cajoles

Nearby trees and branches his refuge

Hides his morsels there

Escapes from wind-blown rains

 

One bright secret binds us

Surrounds we scoundrels here

Our trees, our mischiefs too

We laugh and crow together

Join my neighbors, his squawking flock

In clandestine celebrations of

Nature’s bounty, her beauty

Enfolding our worlds

 

Together we guard it fiercely

Outsiders beware!

Tom Fortin

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

About the poet:

I’m a longtime, retired high school and community college teacher with plenty of time now for “Fooling with Words.” My active interest in creating my own poetry was launched by that Bill Moyers-titled PBS series in 1998. And lately I enjoy becoming more public with my poetic attempts.

I love my present Lynnwood/Edmonds/Sno-King life. The vibrant artistic climate surrounding us here today fills my heart — and my poetic spirit — to overflowing.