NEK Wednesday Poets on October 24, 2018

And the poems were just as handsome!

Left to right:  Scott, Stephen, Mark, Jed, Carol, Peter, Carter, Jerry, Jean, Joanne, Judith, Sylvia

Mark Creaven from last summer, just found in a notebook

Mark handed this over a long time ago, just after a major illness.  The photo is from last summer, when he was barely recuperating.  He's fine now, as is this, without title:

Mark

It slowly crept up on the heart on me.
I can't remember when
I used to move so easily,
Just every now and then
A twinge a pull or maybe a tear,
A slowing down for just a while.
I still moved without a care.
But now each day brings a new pain,
A deeper more distracting thought,
A memory once held so dear now lost,
A skill once learned, now untaught.
So now the end stares me in the face.
As my spirit still tries to soar,
My body still calls to end the race.

Adrien Helm's poem for Sister Gail of the Green Mountain Monastery

Adrien Helm

    

Sister Gail

Flower sprigged dress 

Below lacy blue bolero,

Solid trim figure, pixie cap of curls and
      those eyes --

Blue lanterns of pure light

Reading of Jesus 

In green garden boots.

Our open mic nun

Setting a toe-tapping beat

In recalling childhood street

And soda can dancing.

A perfect last voice

In sunlit brick and wood

Cathedral of disparate songs.

You set our feet tapping

With perfect punctuation

To close our program --

Poetry and natural beauty

Our imperfection on display.

We couldn't help but smile

As you lifted our moody

Congregation to rollick with you.

*************************************************

Adrien Helm has co-led the Wednesday Poets for six years.  She read us this poem after the group held a poetry reading session with open mic at the Green Mountain Monastery in Greensboro, down the road some 15 miles or so from Barton.  Sister Gail of the monastery impressed her.