Word Poetry
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Sample Poems by Martha Deborah Hall
Wounded Child
Beautiful lamb,
barely in a high chair,
tinged in pink dress
with matching shoes,
learning the walking art,
you've just been weaned,
sleep through the night.
14 Wildflower Way
Through binoculars Mother Goose spies:
A cat asleep on a shelf in a living room.
Juice and cereal being served in a breakfast nook.
A mom and dad hugging before he leaves for work.
Kids with matching backpacks headed for school.
Toddlers gathering apples in the yard.
Grandma watches over them from the porch.
Mother Goose wonders why life isn't as sweet at her house.
On First Days of School
My twin
and I did it.
One of my children too.
We laid down on sidewalks first days
of school.
Mother's Room
I see her at our vacation cottage in Chelsea, Vermont. Going there was supposed to be one of our mountain tops of summer fun. But I remember only one time when she came with us to nearby Lake Ferry to swim. In a photograph that Dad took, my two sisters and I are standing with her on the lake's shore. She's in a black bathing suit showing her lovely figure-her arms around all three of us. It's such a poignant contrast to most of that summer's time. She was usually in her petite bedroom asleep. Or was she passed out? From that room I still have a lovely, tan, 1 liter, antique ceramic wine bottle, whose cork had a slit in it, so she could quietly suck out the bottle's ingredients-to cover up her inner feelings. I can't even visualize any windows in her escape room as no sunlight ever came through those closed, dark drapes. No laughter came from it, only tears. Even a necklace placed on that marble-topped bureau seemed to have disappeared in the night. One can't put the genie back in the bottle as the expression goes. So I became my own self-driving car at the age of eight years old. I had to because of the despair that seeped out from Mother's room.
Once
He was a minister who was always busy. We had just come back from a family vacation in Vermont. The mail had been put on hold at the post office for a month. I saw Dad sitting at the dining room table looking over the mail he had picked up, and watched as he came across an envelope scored in black lines on all four sides. It was postmarked from Stockholm. My father's father had died while we were gone. I never did learn why we hadn't somehow been informed earlier of this awful loss. It was the first and only time I ever saw my father cry. I tried to comfort him with a hug.
Also Fallen From...
The innards of my mother's unsnapped and turned upside down pocketbook was evidence of wished for moments of happiness, which heaped on the floor like snow on impassable roads in winter. There were two condoms for Friday afternoon's love affair. And from a partially secured open vial-depression pills-to mask her betrayal and shame from my father. They pinged and glided across the wooden kitchen floor, and got stopped out by the trash can container.
Wounded Child
Beautiful lamb,
barely in a high chair,
tinged in pink dress
with matching shoes,
learning the walking art,
you've just been weaned,
sleep through the night.
14 Wildflower Way
Through binoculars Mother Goose spies:
A cat asleep on a shelf in a living room.
Juice and cereal being served in a breakfast nook.
A mom and dad hugging before he leaves for work.
Kids with matching backpacks headed for school.
Toddlers gathering apples in the yard.
Grandma watches over them from the porch.
Mother Goose wonders why life isn't as sweet at her house.
On First Days of School
My twin
and I did it.
One of my children too.
We laid down on sidewalks first days
of school.
Mother's Room
I see her at our vacation cottage in Chelsea, Vermont. Going there was supposed to be one of our mountain tops of summer fun. But I remember only one time when she came with us to nearby Lake Ferry to swim. In a photograph that Dad took, my two sisters and I are standing with her on the lake's shore. She's in a black bathing suit showing her lovely figure-her arms around all three of us. It's such a poignant contrast to most of that summer's time. She was usually in her petite bedroom asleep. Or was she passed out? From that room I still have a lovely, tan, 1 liter, antique ceramic wine bottle, whose cork had a slit in it, so she could quietly suck out the bottle's ingredients-to cover up her inner feelings. I can't even visualize any windows in her escape room as no sunlight ever came through those closed, dark drapes. No laughter came from it, only tears. Even a necklace placed on that marble-topped bureau seemed to have disappeared in the night. One can't put the genie back in the bottle as the expression goes. So I became my own self-driving car at the age of eight years old. I had to because of the despair that seeped out from Mother's room.
Once
He was a minister who was always busy. We had just come back from a family vacation in Vermont. The mail had been put on hold at the post office for a month. I saw Dad sitting at the dining room table looking over the mail he had picked up, and watched as he came across an envelope scored in black lines on all four sides. It was postmarked from Stockholm. My father's father had died while we were gone. I never did learn why we hadn't somehow been informed earlier of this awful loss. It was the first and only time I ever saw my father cry. I tried to comfort him with a hug.
Also Fallen From...
The innards of my mother's unsnapped and turned upside down pocketbook was evidence of wished for moments of happiness, which heaped on the floor like snow on impassable roads in winter. There were two condoms for Friday afternoon's love affair. And from a partially secured open vial-depression pills-to mask her betrayal and shame from my father. They pinged and glided across the wooden kitchen floor, and got stopped out by the trash can container.