Poetry

Thanksgiving

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The bounty of the earth has graced us all--
The laughing vintage of the summer vines
Has mellowed into jeweled autumn wines;
The acorns and the orchard nuts enthrall
The squirrels and all pelt down in each squall.
O now's the hour that the Lord designs
For thankfulness, when every family dines
With fine abundance on the gifts of fall.

These are the blessings in a land of peace:
Where fruitfulness is shared in hours of joy,
When all the patient tending of the soil
Results in all this plenty, though the geese
Are fleeing winter in the clouds, we toy
With jests and have warm respite from our toil.

© 2010, Anissa Gage, both poem and painting

Translucencies

Illusions and realities combine:

This contemplative nature in us all!

They swirl together like the leaves of fall,

Or ivy and the forest intertwine.

This child is thus not just a child: divine,

The paintings of all sacred babes, recall

Old echoes, and those putti on each wall

Of great Italian frescoes' grand design.

Experience and meaning sweep and shift.

Fluidity in all emotions moves

Our lives along. Elusive, feelings fall

In layers upon layers, slow and swift.

Abundant, our reflection always proves

A haunting resonance unto us all.

In Solemn Dignity

This solemn dignity is all her own --

Our model, sharing with us here her loss:

She bears it stoically, a leaden cross,

Invisible without a wince or moan;

That burden that could make an angel groan:

This was a wound that gaped a mile across..

An inch, a heart, whatever: one can't gloss

Forever over quibbles -- she's alone.

Those waves of feeling making mourning whole,

Restoring life through all its veils of tears,

As time submerges wounds and with slow aches

Destroys perhaps some freshness of the soul.

How slowly change can sift the dust of years!

Until some newness out of sorrow wakes.

Truth Empearled

You'll see it sometimes when a pensive child

Is gazing down upon a curious world:

Her dreams are like a young fern tightly curled;

There's something in this poise that has beguiled

Us artists for eternity: this mild

And peaceful look as of a rapture: furled

Within this is a wisdom -- truth empearled:

A wistful knowledge pure and undefiled.

I lay my chalk in soft translucent veils

And strive to limn this gentleness so fair;

This quietude so loud it almost sings.

O how my patient courage often fails:

Somewhere beside her, in transparent air,

In breathless love we almost see her wings.