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Sunset of Her Memories
—–SUNSET OF HER MEMORIES
Written for my mother VONCILLE HUGHES NAYLOR from the format of a short story she wrote for publication when I was a little boy about how she felt when she was a girl of 18…now 74 years ago!
Sometimes on those rare occasions
When I am alone at that sad,
Yet contented time of day when
The world grows tired and weary,
And the sun has slipped quietly
In its hiding place, I sit and wait
For my family to come home. Unsolicited
Taunts of sweet smelling rolls
Rising in a pan, send my mind
Racing down the backward path
A slumbering yesteryear to awaken.
Little by little, I grasp hold of fluttering
Memories riding in like tidal waves,
Inundating me and splashing around in
My mind, only to slip away, and back
Out into the vast sea of time.
It happens every spring at least once,
That to the past my yearning heart returns
A little while, just a while, as memory
Walks a tree-shaded lane. Lazy steps
Kick up the dust, and I bid farewell
With soulful relish to gentle rays of the
Warming sun. Idle time on a narrow road,
Richly spent. I stand now, as then among
The Catalpa trees, drinking in the sweetness
Seeping from fragrant white blossoms. The
Burdened look of heavy laden-boughs turn
My thoughts to summer, when innocence’s invite
Is to lie securely beneath its leafy ovate fans.
Standing tall and reverent, clusters of tiny white
Bells dangle from their branches. A mile’s span,
And far beyond, march the imperial Catalpas.
Their rank is broken only once, by the rustic
Gap of nature’s intrusive irregularity, flanking
The arched columns with wild briar, warped, tangled
And leaning in space. The radiant love vine
Winds its golden thread-like taffy around the
Jumbled door, which leads to a shallow channel,
Shaped like a shovel, and surrounded by prehistoric
Green moss and royal saplings yearning to grow.
To this place upon the seductive grass I go,
To dream and lie breathless. Closing my eyes,
Pulsating flames enrapture my heart, capturing
The music of eternity, as it floats upon the wings of nature.
Their fading tones hang long in the distance and
The air is heavy with notes soft and sweet. The
Swelling vibrations to which my begging soul does
Stir, plead mellow for me to wait, and quietly
Linger there. Whispering echoes caress and stroke
My dreams, painting a sunset of purest hope and serenity.
The sunsets of all my yesteryears melt liquid into the sunset
Of today and becomes a covetous refuge of treasured solitude.
Delicate memories forever cling to that place now long
Gone, but never far from here. Today’s sunset turns the
Pages of my mind to the sunsets of yesteryear and give
Repose with the thought, that the past is never lost.
Categories
I Walk in the Philippines
—-POEM INFO: A Barangay in the Philippines is what every little division within a city is called; sometimes a Barangay is just a simple village — all alone. But in “calling” a destination within the Philippines without the precursor of “BARANGAY” one commits a faux-pas.
I WALK IN THE PHILIPPINES
In Barangay Pit-os briskly I walk
And turn into the village center
Smelling the market stands
Full of splintered fish and hairy fruits,
Sitting with vegetables so exotic
A combinant taste properly satisfies
As my movement slows at first
Then slower still as scarcely I move.
The people in Barangay Pit-os
Seem to never frown when I
Move from stand to stand
From suspicious fish to shaggy fruits
But only smile with curiosity
As to whom I might really be.
I stop to talk but never to reveal
Who I am, because they know
Who the tall stranger is to them.
Content they are that I am here to
Buy their goods and give them all
Unsolicited smiles of gratitude
That makes the people here just
A little happier that today again
I took this walk with them.
Categories
Wake up! Wake up!
wake up wake up
i see you sitting there with your eyes wide awake
sitting there sleeping in your head
when you could be doing so much more instead
Categories
Marred by Chelsea Danielle Naylor
Death leaves the heaviest mark
engraved on our souls
memories come and gone
now vivid, vibrant
pushed to our consciousness
by the heaviness
weighing on our hearts
Death leaves the deepest mark
sunken far beyond our bones
memories come and gone
now vivid, vibrant
pulled from our deepest reprieves
deeper than the marks
far beyond our bones
Death weaves with strongest thread,
linking us to places unknown
it is this mark that
solidifies in our hearts
in our minds
who and what we loved
but mostly why we loved.
Categories
Moving the Mark
I know every day is a battle,
no less for the young than it is for the old.
When you are young you need to remind yourself
that you are, INDEED, young!
The future is still a malleable uncertainty …
unfixed….and yielding to your ambitions.
There are certain things in life that I know I can never do…
time and opportunity make them unrealizable dreams.
However, you have unnamed decades stretching out before you
that are unmarked, waiting only for you to make your move.
Whatever you dream to do, awaken its blood-rich soul!
it is forever wintertime for those who flounder in slumbering thought!
Life is a space measurable by fullness or emptiness…
you are the one who moves the mark.
Categories
Vunerable by Chelsea Naylor — 2009
I felt the ribboning of my skin
a soft scar slowly forming
How delicately our bodies do sin
as our minds, gently, are storming
Heroes have come and gone
to vulnerability no longer we are prone
A sea of self-saviors has reached its dawn.
no help, we shuffle along the darkness alone.
Steps fall, darkening paths,
echo no longer do our laughs
Scars from our righteousness form
slowly, ribboning our flesh
reminding us always that we are
Vulnerable.
Categories
The Unseen by Chelsea Naylor–2009
You see dreams fleeting across faces
You see the steady rise of a chest
You see a tossing and turning body
You see a nightmare gripping with fear.
I see an attempt; one that ended too soon
I see hopes beginning and ending
I see struggles to exist
I see pain clenching a heart.
You see someone asleep
I see someone alive
I see the potential of what is unseen.
Categories
To Linger by Chelsea Naylor–2009
A smile flees
ever so quickly
a tear flows through stormy weather
oh so slowly
Your sigh seems to linger
as does your touch
as does your laugh
as does your smell
as does your time.
My sigh seems to linger
my hands feel cold
my laugh so short
myself so distant
my time so alone.
I feel the twinge as I remember
the time you fell asleep in my arms
the time you pressed your cold hands to my skin
the time you kissed me in the rain
the time you told me you loved me
as we laid sprawled on my
small, bedroom floor in innocent talk; and then
the time you told me you loved me no more.
Categories
A Wonder to Wander by Chelsea Naylor–2009
I watched a blind man once.
I wondered how he walked.
Was he aimless?
Did he walk or wander?
I wondered how he thought.
Did he despise what he never saw?
Did he listen to his head or to his heart?
Did he allow temptations
lead him astray?
Did he walk along
simply to be walking?
Had he lost a purpose
simply because he could not see it?
Then I saw someone approach the man.
I heard, ever so faintly, say,
“I was looking for you.”
The Poetry of Jeffrey L. H. Naylor 
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