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On Being a Poet and Other Existential Ideas

• Flashback – poem by Bruce Whealton

  2009 Nov 21

  Flashback It’s funny how a place can age-regress you - take you back in time - but that’s what happened when I got there and saw it… it’s like the years instantly had receded and folded in and back and I was there, not just at a place but at a time. There’s a man-made jetty that curves out to a small island on this beach south of Wilmington… if you look [...]

• A Question for Anne – Poem by Bruce Whealton

  2009 Nov 18

  A Question For Anne I know what she meant when Anne Sexton wrote, “To Bedlam and Part Way Back.” Yet that’s where our stories diverge. She never made it all the way back, while she found the healing power of poetry, in her life, like her contemporary, Sylvia Plath, she took her own life. So, I want to ask you, Anne, in that next life have you finished your awful rowing toward [...]

• Post Traumatic Stress Disorder – Poem by Bruce Whealton

  2009 Nov 18

  Post Traumatic Stress Disorder I’d like to think I’m just like anyone else, that we all have limits… There’s only so much we can take… So much of what? Pain… Fear… Loss… Trauma. There’s only so much any of us can experience and remain sane and remain true to our ideals, our values, who we are and the person we’ve become - When the pain, the fear, the trauma exceeds this, We [...]

• Drive-by – Poem by Terri Kirby Erickson

  2009 Nov 18

  This poem was also submitted to me for the Neighbor House Poetry Reading. Neighbor House is a non-profit serving the homeless/needy in Northern Orange County, NC. Drive-by Terri Kirby Erickson Pacing the sidewalk, a woman in dark, dusty clothes, hair hanging in greasy strings beside her bloated cheeks, carries a cardboard sign that says, help me, scribbled in red crayon. [...]

• Tent Cities – Poem by Jean Jones

  2009 Nov 18

  Here is a poem by Jean Jones that was written in response to my request for poetry relating to homelessness and poverty. TENT CITIES BY JEAN JONES I try to imagine living in a tent city, and I can’t. I keep picturing the cold at night and in the morning but I can’t picture it. I keep imagining what [...]

• The Passage of Seasons at the Beach – Poem by Bruce Whealton

  2009 Nov 18

  The Passage of Seasons at the Beach On this cold Autumn Beach I stare at the waves… I don’t know if I’m looking forward or backward in time but I remember the warmth and the life that was here and I want to believe and I want to hope that this season of Death is only temporary… that this will change. Bruce Whealton November 17, 2009 Tags: Bruce Whealton, poetry by [...]

• Masculine Destruction – edited version with feedback by Ron Bayes – poem by Bruce Whealton

  2009 Nov 17

  Masculine Destruction As males we possess the potential to create to join with become a part of another - these are expressions of life and love. Instead we fashion phallic shaped and formulated implements - with explosive force they spew lead. Intoxicated on our testosterone we seem to have forgotten our feminine side our ability to nurture, comfort. by Bruce Whealton Tags: Bruce Whealton, poetry by Bruce Whealton Related posts No related posts.

• Left Out – Poem by Ron Bayes – submitted for Neighbor House Event (homelessness related)

  2009 Nov 17

  The following piece was submitted to me by Ronald H. Bayes of St. Andrews College. I had asked some poets to submit poetry for a Neighbor House poetry event. Neighbor House is a non-profit 501 (3) c that serves the poor and homeless in Hillsborough and northern Orange County, NC. I, Bruce [...]

• Suicidal Days – Poem by Bruce Whealton

  2009 Nov 13

  Suicidal Days These days you’d think there was just this death everywhere… these gray somber skies, skeletal trees, this damp mourning and remembering but I still don’t completely understand why my aunt and my cousin took their lives. Maybe, on days like today, I begin to get some idea - some partial understanding - cold damp days where life seems to be fading like the leaves fall from the trees… when you don’t [...]

• TAZ – Poem by Bruce Whealton

  2009 Nov 13

  TAZ He goes by the name Taz. Only a few know his real name - he wants it that way. That’s the homeless man, laying in a tree bed wearing a coat too heavy for a warm day like today… That’s the homeless man asleep on a gray November day on Franklin Street. That’s the homeless man who goes by the name Taz - decorated Vietnam War Veteran, trained in our country’s Special Forces many, [...]