A Throwback Friday Poem – Page 6

Throwback Friday, A Line in the Sand

For today’s Throwback Friday poem, written in April 2021, I have revised the first stanza and altered the final line.

A Line in the Sand (Revised #3)

Did you hear the latest hocus pocus?
About the world’s leaders’ lack of focus
Who resemble mythical fiery dragons
Ready to torch the refugee wagons
With their sponsored guns and cannons

In my mind, I am searching for the olive tree
Please come walk with me
We will go to the seashore
And watch the dove’s soar

Hold my other hand
As I scribe a line in the sand

A message to the sky
Love and peace I decry
Will I receive an honest reply?
Or nothing, but more blind eyes?

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Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) November 2024

Throwback Friday, Out of Breath (a Tanka)

Today’s Throwback Friday poem is from December 2022
All Featured Images: Were taken today at the magnificent “Geelong Botanical Gardens”

Out Of Breath (a Tanka)

Giant Grey-gum tree

Bears air for the atmosphere

Is life out of breath?

Nature continues to fight

Despite the disdainful crowd

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Creative Geelong MAY’D Shop,
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132 Little Malop St, Geelong
TRADING HOURS
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Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) November 2024

Throwback Friday, Wryly the Moon Sighs

I wrote today’s Throwback Friday poem in November 2022, however, all the attached images were taken at last night’s sunset.

Wryly the Moon Sighs

Looking up into the sky
There, beyond the clouds
The world’s twilight pilot
Our phlegmatic half-moon
Petitions our eyes

And spiritually
Wryly sighs at our demise
Then wisely
Waits for Sunset’s disguise

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132 Little Malop St, Geelong
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Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) November 2024

Throwback Friday, An Empty Shell

** Please note: The featured image above was copied, with permission from Niki Flow’s; >> blog site. https://under1000skies.org/

Today’s Throwback poem is from July 2019, six months after my third stroke, and stroke fatigue was still occurring regularly. Today, I’m feeling quite fatigued, but it has more to do with my hectic schedule lately …

An Empty Shell

I’m a broken stick
Hit by a tonne of bricks
I’ve stroke fatigue
Tiredness out of my league
The psyche says go
My body says no
Yesterday everything was fine
Today nothing is mine
Only rest and sleep
Not even a sneaky peep
They say, what’s wrong
I say, who’s playing my song
They say, you look ok
I say, I cannot stay
Read us your poem
No! I want to go home
Don’t spoil the show
I’m an empty shell, they do not know

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132 Little Malop St, Geelong
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Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) November 2024

Throwback Friday, A Universe Above the Sky

We were caught in the rain during our morning walkies, which prompted me to pick “A Universe Above the Sky” for today’s Throwback Friday Poem …

A Universe Above the Sky

Walking in the morning rain
Wearing water-logged boots
I am dodging millipedes
And hopping over the puddles
Along with the footpath crickets

I see a universe above the sky
As the liquid clouds
Drop their weight
Upon my empty hands
Filling them with verses
Of memories and rhymes

All Books. Now Available At:

Creative Geelong MAY’D Shop,
Shop 15/Centrepoint Arcade
132 Little Malop St, Geelong
TRADING HOURS
Thursday-Saturday
11am-3pm

Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) October 2024

Throwback Friday, We Are Sour, But We Have the Power

Today’s Throwback Friday poem, “We Are Sour, But We Have the Power”, was written in June 2020 … It was a beautiful spring day today. Appropriately the attached Dragonfly images were taken during my nature walk this morning.

We Are Sour, But We Have the Power (Revised)

Out of the blue ocean, into the black sea
We continue to be wet behind our ears
And we are still burning bridges made out of coloured trees
Repeating the same old stories, from behind our shields and spears

What about looking at nature’s dragonflies and bees?
How do they live in harmony without fear and tears?
We are the carriers of humanity’s corrupt disease
Ignoring the world’s racist problems for too many years

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Shop 15/Centrepoint Arcade
132 Little Malop St, Geelong
TRADING HOURS
Thursday-Saturday
11am-3pm

Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) October 2024

Throwback Friday, A Banner Of Sunflowers

I planted sunflower seeds in my courtyard garden this afternoon, which prompted me to post today’s Throwback Friday poem, “A Banner of Sunflowers”. The poem originally stems from a Geelong Writers Ekphrastic poetry workshop, in May 2022, and this was my poetic response to Shirley Drayton’s creative piece of textile artwork “Golden Sunflowers”.
Please Note: the poem also appears in my book “Until Eyes Hear Sound”, in Chapter 6, War! Without Peace? on page 86.

A Banner Of Sunflowers

look!
up there
above the War’s
darkest clouds
there is a blue banner
embroidered with sunflowers
swaying
through a hole
in the eastern sky

bearing a message
of ‘Hello’
or is it ‘Goodbye’?
a sweeping reminder
from our Ancestors
“we feel your suffering and pain
from the merciless hard rain
blood-filled rivers and cratered plains
smoke-filled skylines and cracked windowpanes”

“however, we also know
beyond the broken horizon
the sunflower plants of hope
will germinate again
and future seeds for peace
will regenerate a new campaign“

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132 Little Malop St, Geelong
TRADING HOURS
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Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) October 2024

Throwback Friday, Phantom-grams

Today’s Throwback Friday poem was written in May 2021, and appears in my 3rd book, ‘Until Eyes Hear Sound’, on page 50.

Phantom-grams

Holograms and Instagrams
How heavy are these grams?
LinkedIn and Facebook
How thin are their books?

Tumblr and Twitter
How can you weigh their feathers?
Priests and Politicians
How can you believe their repetitions?

Protest Songs and Subway Signs
Have you forgotten the messages of yesterday’s lines?

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132 Little Malop St, Geelong
TRADING HOURS
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Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) September 2024

Throwback Friday, Who’s Left to Row the Boat

Today’s Throwback Friday poem was originally written in August 2018. The story is about the occurrence of my first stroke on the 20th of September, 2000.

Who’s Left to Row the Boat

The storms are too many to count
Emotional lows had weathered me out
Her journey with MS was a struggle
How much lower could our lives sink

After fourteen years of our battles, I suffered a Stroke
An ambulance came, my brain was in a boat
Floating out to sea, overboard and panic-stricken
I wasn’t swimming, barely awake, and drifting
I had fallen, nothing was working, and not talking
She’s crying, I’m sobbing, my heart is dying
And who’s left to row the boat, I’m thinking
I was jabbed with a needle and silently sleeping

I awoke a day later, in hospital, feeling wasted
My face was limp, mouth parched, was that death I tasted
My mind was active, I thought, where is she
I knew I was bad; the room was all blurry to me
Strong anxieties had set in, I needed to know
Nurses came to me, I pleaded, I wanted to go
“Help me to see her, just give my bed a tow
Please let me go, before I’m covered in snow”

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Creative Geelong MAY’D Shop,
Shop 15/Centrepoint Arcade
132 Little Malop St, Geelong
TRADING HOURS
Thursday-Saturday
11am-3pm

Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) September 2024

Throwback Friday, Whispering Flowers

It was “our”48th Anniversary on the 10th of September, and my Throwback poem was written when I was recovering from 2nd and 3rd strokes, and of course, during that time I was not allowed to drive …

Whispering Flowers (Tullawalla, page 41)

Whispering Flowers

I went shopping this morning
To buy her flowers
For our anniversary day
A bus trip to the local florist
Then I boarded another bus to the cemetery
My first time on a bus carrying flowers
Bouquet in hand, on I hopped
You could’ve heard a pin drop
Over the silence, I heard solemn whispers
The men on the bus, courteously nodded
And the ladies knowingly smiled
Gratified, I dipped my cap in acknowledgement
Then I started to sense the day’s emotions arise
And with my honesty glowing, I felt proudly special

All Books. Now Available At:

Creative Geelong MAY’D Shop,
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132 Little Malop St, Geelong
TRADING HOURS
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Until Eyes Hear Sound

Lulu Books >> Until Eyes Hear Sound (lulu.com)

Perceptions:

Amazon >> Perceptions : Steven, Ivor, Knight, Derrick: Amazon.com.au: Books
Lulu Books >> Perceptions (lulu.com)

Tullawalla:

Amazon >> Tullawalla A Meeting Place Where My Empty Hands are Full of Memories and Rhymes : Steven, Ivor: Amazon.com.au: Books

OR: >> You may email me directly for a signed copy at
ivorrs20@gmail.com

Ivor Steven (c) September 2024