Poems
by JD DeHart

Reaching Now

 

I keep reaching down, but

Not for baby rabbit fur.

 

I keep reaching down into the creek

Flow, clouds of mud

Pluming up,

 

Careful not to catch myself

On the creature pinchers, the crawdads

 

My dad and I would wrap

Our fingers around. You catch them

Behind the claws.

 

That way, they can’t get you –

Which is probably good advice.

We put them in coffee cans with writhing

Worms.

 

Ready to catch shimmering fish,

A stringer full.

 

 

 

 

How Do You Measure Poetry?

 

by rhyme scheme,

            by trope?

by the way a line

            tacks onto a line?

 

            a child following

            behind?

 

                                                                        by placement?

 

by pulse,

            the tapping of emotion,

            spilling out,

            well spring of the moment?

 

            remembered, captured,

            reworked?

 

or else

            at all?

 

why measure and subscribe

to the fickle nature

 

of opinion, flaming,

            juxtaposing, changing

            with time?

 

why place tape around

the edges of a reflection?

 

 

 

 

Planned

 

Born in this universe,

born for this universe,

 

same world as you, dear

reader, but perhaps another range

of experiences,

 

my parents always told me

I was planned,

 

that there was a plan

for me.

 

I’ve gripped it as often as

I have been able.

 

I Break

 

one moment at a time,

all the ties that wrap so

 

closely,

 

an aged gear decorated

with rust, shakes,

 

another moment, a fleck,

another twist, seconds later,

 

a sudden loosing, spinning now

 

wildly, a freed beast from a thousand-

year cage, bursting, loosing

 

freedom as the dial, all my doubts,

my tensions, turn with abandon.

 

I fly and yet remain on earth.

 

 

 

 

 

Pencil Marks

 

I am (suddenly) the Pencil,

tracing a line.

What I will make, once

sharpened to a fine point?

 

A flickering screen tells me

I need to mix it up,

images of inspiring authors,

young and old.

 

  I want to try, even if it's difficult,

  even if it's rejected.

 

I need a new mix, worry it might

not come off exactly right, in the lines,

break the lines.

 

Working toward being a brave

creator.

 

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