I'm Not One to Question God - Poem

I'm not one

to question God

after all,

against the odds

you found me

lured me with

your charm

..I can't help

but get lost

in your arms

think of you

from afar,

I know you

have doubts

while I have faith,

I guess,

it comes down to

"What are the odds?"

but really,

I'm not one

to question God

and everything is but

a breath in space.

by Mary E. Lohan

Bach Played on Guitar - A Poem (From "Four Folded Corners")

Slender ivory bones bow

pluck and braid
celestial sounds

on taut strings.

By Mary E. Lohan 

Epoch - A Poem

Time has a way of skimming
      souls, exposing the raw
wracked and burdened

a way of humbling egos,

slowly withering to a self
barely recognizable
except when smiling

hulling like a plane,
thinly
      surfacing a ship-wrecked
past of heart-laden words
laying upon rocks, forever
stranded

baring the wounded driver
careening down one way streets
that leads back to alleyways
of perpetual dead-endedness

the mermaids call, and as in old,
the sailors heed and are lead to doom,
desolation and despair,

Time has a way of tolling,

of moving you closer than farther
as you float to and fro,

of awakening you to the
potential of promise,

and as each day passes,
what ceases to be.

By Mary E. Lohan

Flick - A Poem

Too tired
to write
to a flea.

By Mary E. Lohan

Worry - A Poem

We worry to worry
What if we don't worry though?
Then what?

Will it be chaos?
Will we lose sight
of something
or just of the fright?

By Mary E. Lohan

Love Poem (from "Four Folded Corners")

Notebook - A Poem (2002)

Silver rings
   spiraling
holding leaves
   and lines,
a spine.

By Mary E. Lohan 

Paper Clip - A Poem (From "Speaking to the Darkness")

You may debate
the significance

Poem: Paper Clip

once straight
now twisted --
again and again

and the time to pull
metal or plastic
into a pliable
yet rigid thread

to partner leaves
or sheets
for a time

and then,
      unbind,

no hole,

only a lingering
impression

once undone.


By Mary E. Lohan

Hate Deserves Nothing - Poem (Written after the Death of Daniel Pearl, From "Four Folded Corners")

Hate deserves nothing --
no headline
no broadcast

Not the ink to print a word,
or less, a point,

Not the breath it takes to utter
the smallest note,

Let it die quietly

Leaving
no epitaph
no echo
no seed.

Written by Mary E. Lohan 

MOMA - A Poem

MOMA

(From my book, "Speaking to the Darkness" (Poetry, 2013), now available via Amazon.

Note: I wrote this poem one hot, sunny afternoon after a visit to MOMA. It's fabulous to post this as a blog because I can link to all of the paintings which will make its meaning more clear. :-)

The sun
kindles the sky
I dodge the New
York suits

the anthill scramble

of lunch time
pay the speckled lady
in the white, wide lobby

to broach the mazes

of these boxed halls,
the din of school kids
directionless,
            spins then falls,

up the aligned

escalators we go,
lovers and others,
like me, alone,  stroll

at the top, Marina

Abramovic —                                               
B&W films roll
suspended,

within a few steps,

post-war tension
jiggling breasts,
one feminine
face, aghast
      upended
mid-scream,
      extended —                                                                                                                                                                                
I retreat to spaces
less impeding —
the calm and familiar 
floors beneath:

Still Life with Apples,                                                           

Cezanne,                                                        
stippled, deep landscapes,
Matisse,                                                         
Still Life with Three Puppies,
Gauguin                                                           

                  But
why does Picasso's
Wives & Lovers
sadden me so?                                                                                                                                                                      
I leave burdened
by their loss
of color, their heavy
lined faces
that have yet
to grieve

Until, she bids me

Stay —

the Girl Before

a Mirror with her     
bright gestured
wave

with so much to say

like Christina

from her World*                  
reaching, reaching,
              Come back for me..

I cannot leave

              yet

with one still to see,

— Roulin**,                

a tourist

videotapes
him,  proud,
bright, always
a showman
his beard blaring
from behind 
the glass

What a precocious

       fellow:
always a flirt.

 *Christina's World - Wyeth

**Portrait of Joseph Roulin - Van Gogh
Note: About MOMA