Robbi Nester Verse-Virtual 2017 July

July 2018

I am a transplant from Philadelphia, PA and retired college educator who has become part of the thriving poetry community of Southern California, which includes some of our fellow VVers. I keep myself busy writing, doing open mics and other readings as often as possible, practicing yoga, and enjoying the gorgeous climate in this area. In the age of Trump, I have joined with others to create a community of resistance.

NOTE: This is the final poem in my Ekphrastic manuscript with images, Crossing Borders, to which our own Jim Lewis has contributed his considerable talents as a designer, as well as offering an image to accompany one of the poems. The artwork here is by Ira Joel Haber, and is among 9 of his works represented in this collection. I thank these artists and all the others for their generosity, and hope that one day soon, the book will find a home.

Benediction to the Earth

Let your broad back bear the weight
of all human sorrows.
Let the cumulonimbus, already
freighted with rain, carry our heavy regrets,
dropping them where they hurt no one,
over the desert or a field of shocked grain.
Let the tides smooth away all brokenness.
Let the sun gild us by day in warm light
and the moon’s cool palm calm our fever.
Bring us the chambered face of the sunflower
and the composite eye of the fly.
Resolve all that is far away
and all that is too close.
Open the sky’s great wings, blue
as a morpho, and bring us peace.

Editor's Note: If this poem(s) moves you please consider writing to the author (email address above) to tell him or her. You might say what it is about the poem that moves you. Writing to the author is the beginning of community at Verse Virtual. It is very important. -FF