Dress Pockets

Over the years, I’ve collected
the best fragments
from the jagged breaks
of the past,
revisiting the scenes
after the immediate threats
have into ashes passed.

When the sun faithfully returns,
each ray seems to gently lead,
reflecting in intermittent beams,
to rebuild resilient dreams,

refracted off each of these
gorgeous shards of glass.
I add to these, the heartifacts
unearthed from avalanche

and dug up from old spots,
buried for protection,
washed and polished rocks
diversifying my unified vision.

In dress pockets,
I tuck into shadows
the reflections resurrected,
reunite them with the rays
as I sentimentally
deconstruct them,

assembling a mosaic
stained-glass arboretum
to grow from pains and grief
a new garden of suncatchers
and walk among the rainbows
into a new and beautiful future.

Poem and images ©LauraDenise

Tranquility Ripples

Tranquility inside,
a choice,
choosing the bay side,
slowing rough waters
to ripples,
muting colors to fuse
land to sky as
complex fades
to simple. 

Walking the plank
to pause the world,
abandoned pier, 
quaint and personal,
tucked between 
leafy trees
and sea grasses
swaying subtly,

a landscape painted
lovingly
just for you.
Slip into
serenity,
retreat until 
restored anew. 

Poem and image ©LauraDenise 

Resetting the Sand

With wide-opened arms,
I offer myself
again to the sea,
double-red flag at the
abandoned beach
and in me.

I give it all to God
who takes it up
with the wind,
wild waves
rush up from within.

Benevolent powers
remind me
who I am
and what I’m capable of
in this lifetime chance

when He is inside me
like He’s always been,
and all of nature,
my lifelong friends.

The beach itself
is rippled clean,
new slate
on which to imprint
the path
He leads,

another first step
into the trust
of His plan,
the next leg of a journey
to lead me even closer
to where He is at.

Poem and images ©LauraDenise

Re-Lighting

Rough week. Double red flags waving. The bay wilder than the ocean. It called me home. Here’s to the ones in the throes of it. Let’s relight ourselves. Again.

I give my light freely,
but sometimes it is taken,
emotional perpetrators
breaching my innermost spaces.

They underestimated 
my strength
and did again
today,

for as long as there
is the sea and my God,
I will raise my arms
in faith;
you will never 
keep me down
as long as there 
are waves and rays. 

I will wash 
what you left
away. 

You underestimated 
our strength. 

Among the Pink

I sat among the pink today
to have the rest fade away,
mesmerized by the world within,
tracing with eyes each leaf and stem.

Concerns abandoned 
in the face of trichomes;
transfixed am I
under nature’s hold.

I visit the center,
greet the stamens;
they let me hide out
in the silken cavern. 

Next I intentionally slip
into the labyrinth of green
and lose myself
for as long as I wish 
to be unseen. 

This is how I restore
when I give too much 
of me to the world.


The Light in My Reflections

Amongst the backdrop
of artificial light,
even in the pretty art
the water makes of it,
reflections at night,

my lens, guided by
the lighthouse of my soul
seeks the single detail
to anchor, to hold,

for only in the hushed detail
can I find my story,
mine alone,
these silent allegories,

and when the lyrics
feather float
to the page,
I hope
my heart’s songs
resonate,

for really we are all
the same
as the stalk of grain swaying
before the moonlit bay.

Poem and last night’s images ©LauraDenise