Photo credit: 123RF
Back then, our clocks had hands and feet
No wings, yet time still seemed to fly
As singing trucks brought ice cream treats.
Back then, our clocks had hands and feet,
And we played kickball in the street
While friends and neighbors happened by.
Back then, our clocks had hands and feet
No wings, yet time still seemed to fly.
© Marie Elena Good
Photo credit: Today I Found Out
I began as Flesh,
But only because it was 1958,
And they didn’t yet understand
A white baby may have a tint
Of Raw Sienna.
No understanding that changing Indian Red
To Chestnut is not only untrue,
But negates a child’s ability to learn
That Indian Red describes a pigment native
To India,
And not the skin of a Native American,
Or for that matter, the ability to learn what it meant to be
Prussian.
Was it easier to change Prussian to Midnight,
Than to teach us the blues of history?
And sixteen new colors were added that year, and
When I turned four I was no longer Flesh,
But Peach.
Peach with still no tint,
And no understanding that Peach is not white,
And I am not white, and I am not Peach.
But colors are sharp,
And when the summer sun shines
On sixty four colors left on Grandma’s porch,
They can run together
and
Permanently
Mingle.
© Marie Elena Good
We line the street
Despite the heat;
Await the beat
Of drums.
The cadence stirs
My heart, and spurs
Excitement! Here
It comes!
The Stars and Stripes
And countless types
Of instruments
Pass by.
The pride I feel
Is deep and real
Beneath mid-
Summer’s sky.
My father’s band,
Baton in hand
Directing more
Than tunes.
His students find
He’s guided minds
And morals
Many moons.
Time marched along
So fast. So long,
Oh fleeting song
Of summer.
Now winter’s come
And slowed the drum –
But oh, I love
The drummer.
(With love and great respect for Dad … drummer, conductor, teacher, mentor, father)
© Marie Elena Good, 2016
Photo credit: Desde La Republica Dominicana
Sunny day of summer play with friends
Ends.
Night falls.
Streetlights call me home.
Bathed and pj’d,
Porch swing lulls, but cannot dull
The day’s fun,
Spun of love.
Mom smiles;
Files away another day.
We pray and say goodnight.
Sleep tight.
Sweet dreams.
Even the moon beams.
© Marie Elena Good 2016
Sounds of fun
Blow in through my window.
Mistaking laughter for music,
My curtains dance on the breeze,
While my head has trouble staying on the pillow.
© Marie Elena Good 2016
Image courtesy of en.wikipedia.org
A star-struck me in childhood bliss
Off day dreaming, as dreamers do
And in this dream, I steal a kiss …
And would, were I a cricket too.
© Marie Elena Good, 2016
Sadly finding
Old fashioned prayer
Wretchedly rare;
Socially railed
© Marie Elena Good
Photo by Keith R. Good
Loss can be peculiar
Sometimes trading nothing
For something
MERCIFUL.
She finds it easy to be merciful, as she experiences daily the mercy of her God.
APPROACHABLE.
Welcoming eyes and ready smile … not peculiar enough to frighten, nor so lovely as to intimidate.
REDEEMED.
Sinner-deemed-sinless, a debt she can’t pay.
INDEBTED.
Humbly and deeply thankful for parents who taught much, and loved regardless; an abundance of encouraging, uplifting, loyal friends and extended family; and mostly her Creator, whose unyielding love, grace, and mercy breathe her very existence.
ENTHUSIASTIC.
Taught by her father that “Nothing great was ever accomplished without enthusiasm.”
This shining city on a hill
Has but a flicker of goodwill.
Our homeland’s in profound unrest;
Precarious as a young stork’s nest.
No longer held in high esteem …
Yet pray’ers pray, and dreamers dream.
Our brethren’s blood runs through our streets.
Unwelcome history repeats.
We’ve chosen shady and debased
To fill an office that’s disgraced
While haters hate, and schemers scheme.
Still pray’ers pray, and dreamers dream.
But God grants vision to the blind,
Redeems the lost; restores mankind.
His faithfulness is unsurpassed,
As through it all, His love holds fast.
My hopefulness remains agleam …
While pray’ers pray, and dreamers dream.
© Marie Elena Good, 2016
pictured words 