Category Archives: light verse
Blue Monday: Banderas
A street festooned with blue banderas, San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato, México
What’s a celebration without a flag or two?
It really doesn’t matter if they’re red or blue,
As long as they can flutter high above the street,
While the people down below laugh and drink and eat.
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
Warriors
Two saguaro cacti seem to be battling each other at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, Southern Arizona
Sometimes in this world you see things that are strange.
I once saw two cactuses out on the range,
And swear they were punching out each other’s lights—
It was one of those weird and wonderful sights.
I wonder if that’s the way things go on Earth:
Contentions beginning the moment of birth.
Does anyone think that all warring will cease,
So all of Earth’s creatures can revel in peace?
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
War
Cholla cactus blossoms at daybreak, Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, Southern Arizona
You’d think that a cactus would welcome the light.
Instead, it was fighting with all of its might
The vanishing darkness, the lengthening day—
How strange was the battle I saw by the way!
The battle continues, or so I am told;
The stones and the sands repeat stories of old.
The warring goes on between darkness and light,
With cactuses getting caught up in the fight.
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Ruby Tuesday Too
More Midweek Motif at Poets United: “War and Peace”
The Yogi
Sunrise, Sonoran Desert, Southern Arizona
A yogi once lived by himself near a tree,
Waiting and watching with wonder;
His mission in life was solely to see
How rain came from lightning and thunder.
Alas for the yogi, he didn’t attain
The dream he had so long pursued.
And so, he massaged his poor muddled brain,
And proceeded to meditate nude.
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More SkyWatch Friday
More Midweek Motif at Poets United: “Yoga”
Blue Monday: Monsters
A mosaic dinosaur footprint at Prescott Public Library, Prescott, Arizona
Monsters, monsters everywhere,
On the land, and in the air!
Monsters with great clumsy feet!
Monsters you don’t want to meet!
Stay away from monster land!
Stay away from where they stand,
Lest you fall beneath their feet,
And your downfall be complete!
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
An Everyday Place
Robert J. Moody Demonstration Garden, Yuma, Arizona
There’s magic about an everyday place,
There’s magic afoot—it’s true!
Just open your eyes and take a good look
At things that you thought you knew.
The sky, for instance, see how it’s glowing
Brilliantly, bitingly, blue?
The sidewalk you’ve traveled day after day—
That leaf at your feet, it’s new!
And isn’t that stone, the one to the right,
Flushing a different hue
Now that you pause for a much closer look?
O happy magic to you!
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More SkyWatch Friday
More Midweek Motif at Poets United: “Seeking the Extraordinary in the Ordinary”
Ordinary
A duck pauses for a rest at Yuma Conservation Garden, Yuma, Arizona
An ordinary duck
On an ordinary day
Doing ordinary things
In an ordinary way.
But take another look
At that ordinary duck:
I think it’s quite amazing
That he’s not built like a truck!
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Midweek Motif at Poets United: “Seeking the Extraordinary in the Ordinary”
Blue Monday: Trail Marker
Trail marker at Willow Lake, Prescott, Arizona
Off we go on the mile-high trail,
Off we go with a shout!
Following signs marking the way,
We know what we’re about.
Perhaps we will glimpse a hobbit,
Or maybe soaring hawks—
These are the hopes that sustain us
On long and winding walks.
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
Oceans of sand
Imperial Sand Dunes Recreation Area, Southern California
Oceans and oceans of sand
As far as the eye can see!
Oceans and oceans of sand
From here to eternity!
Can you see the waves billow,
And can you hear the waves roar?
Oceans and oceans of sand,
Far from the watery shore!
Poem © 2017 and photo © 2015 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Midweek Motif at Poets United: “Oceans”
Blue Monday: Desert Family
Detail from a mosaic on a community wall, Ajo, Arizona
We’re a desert family,
We know the ways of stones,
Cactus wrens and rattlesnakes—
The desert’s in our bones.
To snatch us from the desert
Would make our poor hearts ache,
For desert-dwellers cannot thrive
Beside an azure lake.
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Poetry Pantry #362 at Poets United
