Time Traveling

Monday, March 20, 2023

My Thoughts Slip

Last night dressed for bed

looking down at the blanket

wondering what we'll do this winter

when it is cold again- then startled

when I remember it is winter now,

and I am embarrassed

ashamed...

Time and time again my thoughts slip

as more and more shadows become 3-D

reality.

Days of the week blur- months- years

all blur, faster than the speed of light

thoughts bend, names get lost

words falter, fall away, I lose my mind

I think, as I lose my memory, maybe...

But I feel,

I feel kindness,

I feel love,

I feel beauty,

I feel safe sometimes

so very safe

by my self.

Friday, August 6, 2021

The Sand Now ... an Aging poem by Anne Selden Annab

The Sand Now

The sand now

is such a challenge.

Balance, strength

endurance.

I think I can't,

just can't.

Every ten small

staggering

steps

I stop,

just can't...

catch my breath.

But I do

and onward

towards the ocean

I trudge

exhausted

overwhelmed

and yet

such delight

as the Atlantic

grows louder,

closer, I can

just barely

can,

and am.

Sunday, July 11, 2021

Cicada

Cicada .... a Time Traveling Poem

by Anne Selden Annab

Cicadas - East Coast, Mid-Atlantic

come tunneling out

Brood X - every 17 years.

The name is as it sounds.

Once when I was a little girl

camping in a pup tent, no tarp,

warm earth where the lawn edge

meets the fence and field beyond.

That summer night, early,

the earth erupted...

It was not fun.

17 years later,

divorced, one child, I was

a single mother working,

living downtown far far away

from the cicadas emerging

and the learned fears of childhood.

Then into my forties, 17 years later,

remarried, safe, respected,

3 almost grown children

and my delight

in hearing the woods hum

as we hike, collecting some

but certainly not all cicada shells-

nymph exoskeletons.

Now into my sixties,

slowing down

out for a country drive

in the passenger seat.

Revisiting childhood haunts.

Here and there, some green trees

with leaves on twig tips brown, flagging,

as the tree fed cicadas prepare

to drop back to earth,

tunnel back down

to feed on roots.

I feed on freedom ... a Time Traveling Poem

by Anne Selden Annab

I feed on freedom-

wind in my hair freedom

birds sing freedom

flowers bloom freedom...

Freedom from ugliness.

Freedom from anouther's rage

(funny how my own rage

feels so innocuous.)

Freedom from violence,

freedom from cruelty,

freedom from hunger

and joblessness.

Freedom from servitude

and slavery and homelessness.

Freedom from starvation

Freedom from selfishness,

I think... I hope ... Oh and the freedom to think,

and hope,

maybe even say what I think freedom.

Freedom to mourn the removal

of exquisite equine statues

and historic generosity...

Noble gestures once respected

and honored like gravestones

and old bones buried long ago.

Technology changes how we move forward,

from formal carved, upright headstones on

a hillside- to the opposite with countless

totally flat memorial plates, like trap doors

in a mowed expanse of grass lawn dotted by

tight bunches of cut flowers marking here

and there... to wilding now with native flowers

and new forests absorbing urns

that are compost for ashes.

Planned stretches of meadows

with birdhouses,

or meditation grooves

with water features... woods with paths,

living parks to mourn and honor our dead

while we the living still have the freedom

to wander and wonder what if...

Tuesday, July 6, 2021

Selecting ... poem by Anne Selden Annab

Bernard d'Agesci (1757-1828), La justice,
Holds scales in one hand and in the other hand a book with "Dieu, la Loi, et le Roi" on one page and the Golden rule on the other page.

Selecting

Always
things can go either way... we
the people more often than not will
what will be
with our energy
and investments:

So break away from naysayers
and negative nasty connections
for they build delusions
full of wounds
and failure.

Cherish good
seek it out
find it where you are now-
willing better times to come

Be of those who welcome life
negotiated step by step
to be balance
to be walking forward
to be dancing along the way
with whim as goodness wins...

Be of the will that gets things done
Be of the way where the Golden Rule
illuminates

Be of the stars
guiding ships
where bridges can't reach

Be of the will
willing
to shape destiny.

Post Woke

Post Woke- A Time Traveling Poem by Anne Selden Annab

I look forward to Post-Woke

when true hope has a chance

to climb up and replace

misplaced entertainments

that prance about as News.

A Post-Woke world

where online activists

no longer pedal hate

and scorn for America,

races or religions or

whatever.

A Post-Woke world

where virtue signaling

is not admired.

A Post-Woke world

where "Green"

is less advertising logo

and more an honest effort

to save our earth.

Sunday, February 23, 2020

Okra in America

A Time Traveling Poem by Anne Selden Annab

Okra in America

I like to imagine

that the first okra came to America
carried close to the heart of a beautiful

quite competent and loving woman
from Africa.

A loving woman with very brown skin
and very black hair and very kind thoughts.

A woman with curves
and complexities.

This loving and wise woman carefully kept safe
the okra seeds. Then when settled here,
in America, she planted them. Tended them.
Harvested them. Cooked the okra...
and all who tasted her magic
wanted more.

poem copyright ©2020 Anne Selden Annab