Poets Forum
JANUARY PRAYER
Thank you, Father, For the joy of new beginnings.
Just inside the doorway of a new year, we pause to ask for wisdom and courage and guidance, that when this year is spent, we will have spent it well.
Free us from the way of old mistakes.
Help us not look back upon smudges and grudges, except to learn of forgiveness, and count the learning again.
You’ve given us a clean, new slate to receive the thoughts, words, and deeds that tell the world who we are and whose we are.
Make us mindful that we are your handiwork.
Make us think as you thought, touch as you touched, speak as you spoke, and to use the gift of time as if there were no tomorrow.
— Faye Boyette Wise Benton
WHAT’S WRONG WITH JANUARY
The ball falls, fireworks boom,
corks pop and another year is here.
I make resolutions – same as each year:
Lose weight; be nicer.
I cram decorations in dilapidated boxes
and lug the tree outside
while TV football blasts all day – all night.
I’m expected to produce black-eyed peas and hog jowl for good luck, cabbage for money, keep chips and dips available and beer on tap. And I’m expected to be happy, “Happy New Year,” they say.
Then it’s back to work over treacherous roads.
January brings cold days, colder nights, drippy noses, feverish flu, power failures and shivering feet.
Credit card bills for gifts I wish I had not given flutter like snowflakes.
IRS notices say it’s time to pay.
The kids break new toys; I break resolutions.
— Verna Lee Hinegardner Former Poet Laureate
FOREVER FRIENDS
You and I, friends forever, we opened the door, forever more!
Friendship! The most wonderful word in the world!
Whether childhood friends, for a lifetime, or eighty-year-old friends, for the first time!
Friendship! The most wonderful word in the world!
Friendship! The kindest word in the world!
A real friend will be true to you, will hold you up, when you’re feeling blue!
Friendship! The kindest word in the world!
Friendship! The most giving word in the world! When illness bites, or hardship strikes, a friend will help you fight your fights!
Friendship! The most giving word in the world!
Friendship! The most lasting word in the world! When you leave this earth for heaven’s door, a friend will mourn you, evermore!
Friendship! The most lasting word in the world!
You and I, friends forever, we opened the door, forever more!
— Cathy Parker Alexander
PEACEFUL PERSONALITY
I am a person slow to anger, I’ve been called too meek. But if my Bible is correct, and I know it is, we should be slow to speak.
In the higher scheme of things, the meek find their reward. For they shall spend eternity in the mansions of the Lord. — Mae Hobbs Bryant
•••
To submit poems for publication, please send poems of 16 or fewer lines to Dennis Patton, 2512 Springhill Circle, Alexander, AR 72002, or patton_dr@hotmail.com.