Folded Dreams by PORG at Deviantart.com
Only A Dream- A Poem
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Category Archives: Poetry
Paths Not Taken- A Poem
Sometimes I look back upon the paths I have taken and wonder about the paths turned aside
The possibilities, the different journeys and relationships and adventures
Each one full of its own love and pain, dreams accepted and denied
In each one the person I become is different because the world in which I walk changes
Sometimes I dwell for a moment in this imaginary me surrounded by the people who walked those paths
Never knowing if the way I imagine the journey down the untaken path reflect reality
Yet, I can’t help but wonder who I might have been
Not that I regret the path I have taken or the person I have been shaped to be
For in the crucible of the journey I have been on has shaped me to be the man I am
I don’t regret the lessons learned by the willingness to love and to lose
Nor do I regret the experiences learned by moving from place to place
Meeting so many new people, learning so many new towns
Yet, sometimes I think back on the friendships that were just beginning to grow
When yet again I was transplanted to some new soil to take root.
Perhaps it is the reflective nature of a poet’s soul to look upon the past and wonder
To imagine different possibilities and unseen futures
And as I look back on so many of the paths I may have never used those eyes to see any other world
And sometimes I wonder how much choice I had as I moved along the paths
Or how much was preordained and how many alternate paths were really choices
Would the man I was then have ever made any decision differently even knowing the pitfalls ahead?
Or would I have steadfastly held fast to the path that would have led me to where I stand today?
Neil White, 2014
Caesar is Not Amused- A Palm Sunday Meditation
Ivory Constantinople, c. 950-1000 Jesus Entry
Neil White, 2014
Other Holy Week poems: At The Table, Golgotha, Stay Here and Keep Watch
Opening a Galaxy-A Poem
In a universe where 42 is the answer to life, the universe and everything
Resides the world of Magrathea where planets are custom made to order
On the factory floor is every world conceivable
Any customer can request a tailor made environment
So long as they have the funds to support the massive building project
Yet, Magrathea itself is contained within the unimaginable expanses
Of a universe which the story allows us to hitch a ride into
And we find worlds taking form in the factory floor of our own minds
Countless imaginations there for the taking from the stories
Contained in books, stories, movies, and some which are our own creations
Even when the words are shared, though the worlds are our own
For such is the elastic nature of words to evoke images in the eye of the mind
And we don’t panic as we hitchhike through galaxies as improbable
As a planet where planets are created and restaurants where that universe ends
And yet once we pick up another story it begins anew
Neil White, 2014
Waiting Rooms-A Poem
Sitting alone in the waiting room
Waiting to hear good news from the surgeon
That the loved one I committed to their care
Is waiting in recovery for me to come and join them
In that place where the waiting is over
And the journey of recovery begins anew
Rather than being in the uncomfortable limbo
Of the waiting room with those sentenced
To this place where talking heads echo soundlessly
On flatscreens to people who are seeking not information
But distraction from the minutes and hours that tick away
As they sit in the waiting room
Wanting to be somewhere else
But their love holds them here
In hope that this Purgatorial time will soon be over
Neil White, 2014
Daydream- A Poem
New Era by Aeon Lux on deviantart.com
My mind drifts off to another place
I’m raising anchor to sail away from reality
To go wherever the spirit blows
To another world crafted in the corner of my mind
What possibilities and problems reside in this new world?
What monsters have emerged in the air or land or sea?
Is it a place filled with the hustle and bustle of commerce?
Or is it an isolated wilderness, some undiscovered country?
Will it be filled with technology that staggers the imagination?
Or perhaps some magical land in a time before rationality
Wher’er it may be never fear, I shall return
When the klaxon calls of necessity bid me return
But for now my mind is seeking some new adventure
Neil White, 2014
Making Monsters- A Poem
Monsters of the Mind, by Tirby@deviantart.com
Stitching together the fragments of reality and imagination
Combined with the human energy of creativity
To construct our own monsters and demons
As a place to house our fears and concerns
Personifying them into corporeal forms
With mortal bodies that can be slain
For all the monsters found their wilderness banished
Under the unending growth of the cities
Cast aside into another cosmos
Yet without their presence there is an emptiness
And so like Frankenstein we set to work
Exhuming the monsters of the past
Adding a bit of our own devilry
And setting them free to roam
In the open places of our minds.
Is this also a Promethean struggle to rise beyond the limits set for us?
Some new and strange mutation of an original sin
Passed from fathers to sons and mothers to daughters
To need the foul creatures which take our own evil
And carry it as a scapegoat in their misshapen forms?
As the dark shadows of the world become know and its creatures labeled
And the imitation and exaggeration no longer holds our attention
Do we delve ever deeper into our darkness?
Fascinated with our own capacity for the creation
Of the beings to trouble our dreams
The peculiar draw of our nightmares
And our conflicted need for something to fear.
Neil White, 2014
At the Birth of the Day- A Poem
In the midst of the unmoving darkness with its bone chilling cold
Emerges the beginning of a new day
As the approaching sun paints the sky with its pallet of light
As the skies cry out in the labor pains of the genesis of morning
As the sun slowly emerges from the depths of the ground
Breaking the reign of darkness, crying out for life to re-emerge from its slumber
Smiling with its rays of fire to warm the creatures of the day
Re-inviting those with eyes to see into the drama of another cycle of new possibilities
Of awakening from the land of dreams to shape a new reality
In the breaking dawn of a new beginnings
Neil White, 2014
Re-enchantment-A Poem
The demons and angels and magical forces that reigned in the world no longer hold sway
In a world of people governed by rules and laws and discipline, order and civility
In the grave seriousness of the moment where the past is closed off
And fairy tales and ghost stories belong to the world of children
Walled off from the worlds of imagination in our buffered realities
Carefully constructed to ward off the shock of the unknown
Ballasted with the bulwarks of certainty to hold off the devilry of doubt
Where the only monsters left are ourselves
Yet our souls were never created to inhabit a mechanistic world
Nor our spirits excommunicated from our body
For all our science, suffering still calls out for an answer
For some new type of heroism that might call us from the banality of a disenchanted world
Yearning not merely for some romanticized past but a present that is not ultimate
To move us again to the transcendence of our excarnate realities and disembodied feelings
To the incarnate immanence that can somehow re-enchant the cosmos
Allowing the winds of creation to penetrate the armor of our buffered reality
And breathing free the breath of God in the midst of the polluted heavens
Neil White, 2014
The Silent Night-A Poem
Nativity by Lady Macbeth @deviantart.com
As we hear the story again, that ancient story we know so well
Of the days when heaven and earth touched and angels sang their praises
When shepherds heard and a virgin gave birth in the midst of the stable
There in the magic of the night where simple shepherds knew what kings did not
And somehow God came down to dwell among us in the weakness of a newborn
When the deafness of humanity somehow missed the Word of God
Except for those few gathered together to witness the chorus of new creation
And as we echo the strains in our own key two millennia displaced from that day
May the mystery and majesty of the heavenly chorus blend in harmony
With the songs of the faithful gathered from all corners of the world
To fill the silent night with songs, to join with all creation in singing a new song
And in the cacophony of noise perhaps we too might hear the stirring of angels
Proclaiming the message of peace on earth and goodwill towards humanity
Singing of the love of God that comes down to be among us on this silent night
To share God’s song and to join in ours this day
Neil White, 2013
Blessings to all my friends who will be a part of the song tonight
Sign of the Rose 