Posts filed under ‘PUBLISHED POEM’
PUBLISHED POEM
In 1974 I published a few poems in different anthologies. This is a very early poem, which I think, shows. Some of the titles of the anthologies were quite a stretch.
This poem was published in the anthology, Notable American Poets, edited by Linda Nash.
SUNSET
I stand here looking into the west,
At the time of day I can stop and
rest,
When the day slows down its hectic
pace,
When peace and tranquility the
world does embrace,
I face the sunset.
The sky is aflame with orange and
red,
It makes one pause and lift up his
head,
Stare up into the golden sky,
Gaze with awe, and say with a sigh,
Thank You for the sunset.
But soon night will blacken the sky,
And sunset’s beauty bids the earth
good-bye,
So now I wait until tomorrow,
When once again I can lose my sorrow
And look to the sunset.
PUBLISHED POEM
I offer to you another poem written in my youth. This poem was published in 1974 in the anthology, Expressive Arts Review, edited by Robert Alexander.
CITY MORN
Sunlight filtering through elevated
roadways,
Dawn, finding its way through twilight
As the sleeping city greets another
day;
Delicate steel webs vaulting gray
rivers,
Ribbons of concrete conveying
sleepy-eyed travelers,
The hush of night giving way to
din of traffic;
Morning-sky reds lost to haze,
Another day begins.
PUBLISHED POEM
As promised, I’m going to share more of my published poems with you. These poems were published in very small anthologies from 1973 – 1976.
What follows is my first published poem, published by The Shore Publishing Co. in their anthology, Shore Poetry Anthology, in 1973.
THE WANDERER
Hair matted and long
Face overgrown with mustache and beard
He walks down the city streets alone
A broken man,
He stumbles about in the dead of night
With only a ragged coat to keep out the cold
And cheap wine his only refuge.
Perhaps he once dreamt
A dreamer of dreams
And a victim of fate,
For the greatest and lowliest man are of the same stock
Dreamers all,
The only difference being God’s frown
Or smile.
God smiled on me when I met my wife, Joni.
PUBLISHED POEMS
In 1988, New Worlds Unlimited published two of my poems in their anthology, Mysteries of the Lyric World. They were the last of my poems they would publish for the folded shortly after the anthology was released.
Here is a poem I wrote when Joni was pregnant with my daughter, Lynn, born in the spring.
SPRING’S PROMISE
My breath frosts the winter scene from my eyes
as I peer out the bedroom window.
Trees bend their naked arms
as a cold north wind gives them life.
The lawn, the hue of hay
bristles with the wind.
I look to the future
when my world will once again fill with life.
I look to my wife round with life herself
and the sound of the promise of spring
rings in my ears.
It’s a little ironic that this was the last poem published in this fourteen year series.
I know you writers out there will savor its meaning.
WAITING TOOL
A pencil sits poised
waiting to give life.
As a sculptor creates form
from the essence of marble
So the words await
Needing a sculptor of thought.
That is the end of the poems published by New Worlds Unlimited.
But my readers, there is more to come. I also published, during this period, with various publishers. I will share those with you next.
Thanks to all who read these poems.
Walt Trizna
PUBLISHED POEMS
My first daughter, Annie, was born in 1986 and I began writing poems about her. Lynn followed in 1988.
I sent two of my ‘father’ poems to New Worlds Unlimited and they published them in 1987 in their anthology, Memories of the Halcyon Days.
Since each of my girls was about two, I wrote them a poem for their birthdays reflecting on the past year. That tradition continues.
MY CHILD SMILES
My child smiles
and I look into her eyes
and she knows nothing of the world.
And that is good.
My child cries
and she knows nothing of the sorrow
the world can give.
And that is good.
My child laughs.
And that is good for the world.
HOPE
I looked the Lord full-faced
and saw my daughter
and I knew there was
something greater than I.
I saw my daughter discovering the world,
feeling new textures, wondering at new sounds
and I wished she could know
all I know and more.
I hold her close and feel the future,
Feel my past having purpose.
I feel new life.
PUBLISHED POEM
The year was 1986, and my wife was pregnant with our first daughter, Annie. Eighteen months later, we had our second child, Lynn.
Being one who never thought I would marry, having a child was more than a miracle in my life.
That year, New Worlds Unlimited published two of my poems in their anthology, Secrets of the Poetic Vision.
The joy I felt at this time in my life is obvious in this poem.
NEW LIFE
My wife is pregnant
and the joy floods in.
Never expecting another life from mine
I stand amazed
and watch you grow
a love within my love.
I’ll tell you things,
I’ll teach you things,
I’ll show you the past
and stand amazed
as the future unfolds.
And I’ll hold you close
when life threatens.
This second offering is the result of a camping trip I took with my very good friend, Andy Lowe, to Yosemite National Park.
He introduced me to my wife, Joni. I think she has forgiven him.
On that trip I began the beard I now sport. Back then, it was brown. Now it is a dignified white. That is about the only part of me that is dignified, and that is questionable.
My wife and children have never seen me without a beard.
YOSEMITE
Granite faces etched with power,
The power, whispering in silent walks
through the sentinel pine
and those stone giants gaze down
with visages as old as time
and the whispering is there.
The night, a new moon night
with blackness deep and rich
and the power whispers
through pin-prick points of light,
speaking to us of other worlds,
whispering to us of our insignificance.
And the whispering continues
but chance to listen and its roar will deafen.
PUBLISHED POEMS
In 1985 New Worlds Unlimited once again published two of my poems in their anthology, Treasures of the Precious Moments. I’m going to give some background for the poems.
I spent years in the Midwest, in college and then in the air force, and had never seen a tornado. Although, I’d been close to one while I live in Wichita. I remember the sky turning a sickly green. I went outside and the temperature swung back and forth. The wind went from a fierce blow to a deathly calm. Next came the hail – golf ball-sized chunks of ice.
Wouldn’t you know it; I spent two years in Florida during the 1970s and saw a tornado. I was fishing with friends in the Everglades at Flamingo at the southern tip of the park. The sky began to darken – dramatically. We decided to leave and headed north. That’s when I saw it, a delicate finger dipping down from the indigo clouds.
THE TEMPEST
Lost,
In a torrent of storm and power
a delicate finger fondles the earth’s surface.
Extends from a dark gray womb reaching out.
Caressing,
Tearing with the force of a lover lost in ecstasy.
A mighty machine born of cloud and air
spending itself on the unsuspecting earth
I watch,
A distant viewer of a mystical force,
Amazed at the beauty Death’s angel has assumed.
Amazed at the power unleashed before my eyes.
Distance masks the fury, the rage of storms.
Distance masks the horror of life’s reality.
To say I am a loner would be a gross understatement. One cannot observe and participate at the same time. I chose to observe.
The fact that I am married is a minor miracle. Joni saved me from the life of a hermit. She will never know how much I appreciate that.
This poem was written back when I was till in my hermit phase.
WALLS
I’m just marking time
and can’t explain why
when the door opens I kick it shut.
A wall was built some time ago,
the seams mossed over
so that nothing can penetrate.
The walls purpose, lost with the key.
Yet, the prisoner finds the wall insecure,
builds walls within walls,
breaks into himself to find only emptiness.
And the final realization comes too late.
The walls protect nothing
and nothing was saved.
PUBLISHED POEM
Once again, in 1984, I had a poem published by New Worlds Unlimited in their anthology, Voices of the Majestic Sage.
NIGHT RAIN
The darkened hush of an autumn evening,
a distant murmur and a world of sound approaches.
The window sweats great flowing beads
yet in darkness
where colors turn to gray
and reality to hazy contours,
night hides the rain.
As if only the sound exits.
Night does this.
Night, a time for sounds,
a time for memories that have no sounds,
only pictures alive within a darkened mind.
A raindrop blurs a scene unchanged
time, a memory’s life.
PUBLISHED POEMS
In 1983, the year I married Joni, New Worlds Unlimited published two of my poems in Journeys of the Poet Prophet.
RESTORATIONS
The ground trembled and moaned
like some mighty giant stirring from sleep,
like some force gone unnoticed wanting to be known,
And Naples crumbled,
And men died, and women died,
and children would never grow old.
Even dead Pompeii died, died even more that day.
And the earth was changed, and people were changed.
Workmen hurried to rebuild Pompeii
working hard to restore its timeless death.
And people groped in rain filled darkness
trying hard to rebuild shattered life.
And small towns, villages rival Pompeii in their death,
And death is more easily restored than life.
OVERHEAD
Overhead, one by one the light bulbs expire,
Their guts bursting,
And in death their ghosts yield a softer view of life,
Harsh shadows melt away.
Reality fades into the background
and the room’s boundaries sink into infinity.
Another bursts in incandescent death.
Familiar objects take on new shapes
as possessions melt from sight.
A book left open,
the words blur into feelings.
Something calls from the darkness
waiting to be released as the last flame fades.
PUBLISHED POEMS
The year was 1982 and New Worlds Unlimited published two of my poems in their anthology, Dreams of the Heroic Muse.
LOVE VISITED
Love visited me once
on a moonlit night
lasting six months;
I grew,
was nourished
became almost human
as my being sought a home.
I held the moon at arm’s length
and watched it grow small
as its certain cycle
continued to darkness.
The baying of dogs rings untrue,
the sky is empty.
I wrote the following poem in remembrance of my grandmother.
ROSES
Roses were her love,
great flowing rainbows of pink, red and white.
Her children, small strangers would come
and each take home
a fist full of gaily colored affection.
Roses were her love,
And when rest had finally come from roses
roses were hers,
Elegant creations of empty colors
looking out on empty eyes.
Roses were her love,
And now her small garden
has yet to discover
a rose.
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