first kiss

it wasn't momentous

several of us had gathered
at our twin friends' place
above a vfw hall
with the plan
to pile into a vw bus
for a night
of christmas carols

anna held mistletoe
above her head
and beckoned me
i obeyed
obliged

i think i was sixteen
she would have been fifteen
i suspect now
what i didn't consider then
that this was not her
first kiss

maria
her best friend
my one-time crush
stood by
and i wonder
still
all these years later
if it all was
just
for
a
laugh

 

part II

 

*       *       *

 

Unless otherwise noted, all writings on this blog are copyright Patrick T. Power. All rights reserved.

If you're interested in commenting, please sign up at Blogger to do so. The spammers have yet again found a way to ruin something, so I've configured this blog to accept only comments I've read first.

6 January 2001

Windows
Ducks still gather
not far from the bridge
at the river’s bend.

Snow and frigid air
have narrowed
their hole
in the
ice.

I pass by
as they huddle
and wonder
where they’ll go
when that window
finally
closes.

*       *       *

Unless otherwise noted, all writings on this blog are copyright Patrick T. Power. All rights reserved.

If you're interested in commenting, please sign up at Blogger to do so. The spammers have yet again found a way to ruin something, so I've configured this blog to accept only comments I've read first.

12 October 1991

I am alone in this bed
I touch you with the trepidation
with which one might put a hand
(or head)
'neath a guillotine knife blade

I am alone in this bed
where once souls danced
now only bodies lie

*       *       *

Unless otherwise noted, all writings on this blog are copyright Patrick T. Power. All rights reserved.

If you're interested in commenting, please sign up at Blogger to do so. The spammers have yet again found a way to ruin something, so I've configured this blog to accept only comments I've read first.

did we almost kiss

you'd think
we would have

we were married
after all

but no
you turned away

i wish
i could recall
which film we had just seen
at that theatre
that no longer exists

something tells me
it was
the war of the roses
which was all too
predictive
of our lives to come

*       *       *

Unless otherwise noted, all writings on this blog are copyright Patrick T. Power. All rights reserved.

If you're interested in commenting, please sign up at Blogger to do so. The spammers have yet again found a way to ruin something, so I've configured this blog to accept only comments I've read first.

Un petit poème

Comme un livre ouvert ©2024 Patrick T. Power. All rights reserved.

I was going through my old blog posts here, deleting most of the political rants that I had written back during the Bush administration, when I came across this post, which at the end mentioned Montréal and linked to the website of the North American Folk Alliance. I discovered that the link no longer worked, so I found the organization's current URL and fixed it.

In 2005, I attended the International Folk Alliance Conference in Montréal, so I was rather delightfully surprised to find, upon visiting the website, that the annual conference will once again be held this coming February in Montréal. That brought back memories not only of my early days of Flickr activity, but of a woman in Canada with whom I had become quite smitten. I suggested she make the long trip from where she lived in the western provinces to Montréal to meet me, and to spend four days with me immersed in music. As those memories came back to me, so did I recall that I'd written a poem for the occasion that would not come to pass.

Je désire ton amitié
by Patrick T. Power

je désire te rencontrer à Montréal
si la neige commence à tomber
si le vent du nord souffle
on trouvera la chaleur et le confort
on utilisera des mots pour allumer un feu

mes yeux
tes yeux
ma main
ta main
mon cœur
ton cœur

tout allumer pour le feu
et continuer la chaleur

je désire ton amitié
je ne désire rien jusqu'à ce que j'aie ton amitié
dans mes mains
dans mon coeur

je désire ton amitié

 

It's probably lousy French, but it nonetheless came from the heart.

*       *       *

If you're interested in commenting, please sign up at Blogger to do so. The spammers have yet again found a way to ruin something, so I've configured this blog to accept only comments I've read first.

moins de 46

Photo copyright 2024 by Patrick T. Power. All rights reserved.

you didn’t make it to 46

often i wondered
what you might think of me
once i was no longer of this earth,
or if you would even
think of me at all

i never would have guessed
that you
would go first.

*       *       *

NOTE: I've decided to abandon my Substack account because of that platform's decision to create a partnership with right-winger Bari Weiss's organization. I will migrate what few posts I've published there to this site. This post was originally published on 27 May 2024. I wish I'd re-published it on the 19th of December, the second anniversary of her death.

*       *       *