After that damn bastard tumor
crushed your brain, Daddy,
I could only take Honest Abe of the homely face
off our wall and hang him on mine.
Courageous to your final hour,
I could never return all the love
that you gave me.
You were the richest poor man
I ever knew, and I have tried to live
with the vision of your pain-filled
blue eyes, but it hasn’t been easy –
Like the sword smelted out of shape in a forge,
I have been hammered and banged
into a new mold and pushed toward-
“…the great task remaining…”
Daddy, you taught me to love President Lincoln,
and I, born the day before him,
found his footsteps wide to follow—
But his stern face now on my study wall,
reminds me of your history lessons—
5,500 dead lie buried at Gettysburg, and we all have a limited time…
We cannot waste it crying about our losses and broken dreams.
Bullets and tumors lie waiting around the corner
and there are no promises for tomorrow…
There isn’t even a promise of a tomorrow.
Rather that we be—
“Dedicated to the great task remaining before us…”
And it isn’t easy to let the hammering forces
bend us into a stronger cast…
You, my backwoods Hero,
and you, my flesh and blood father
insist rather – That we remember—
“Those dead shall not have died in vain…”
And my pen quivers as I push it across this present day,
not daring to tell anyone, Daddy,
that Lincoln’s grim face has relaxed of late.
Sometimes, he even smiles at me.
Ruth Wildes Schuler
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Monday, March 8, 2010
NIGHT OF THE BROKEN MOON
Still that nightingale
that dares sing
in my garden.
Does he not know
that my love died tonight?
My love lying
encased in woven lace,
covering the cranberry waves
pouring forth from
the slash within his skin,
and where do I even begin
to express my sorrow,
record the dimming
of the sun, and the crumbling
mountains on the moon?
War has wounded my warrior,
broken my heart like his.
I have no answers,
for I know not even
the questions that float
in the air against
a vague backdrop
of a vanished future.
The light diminishes, silver beams
fade, and I see a bronze coffin
in the distance. It floats nearer.
Is that reality shrieking like sirens,
or is it only my screams,
drowning out this obtrusive nightingale?
Ruth Wildes Schuler
Salopeot Spring 2010 (England)
that dares sing
in my garden.
Does he not know
that my love died tonight?
My love lying
encased in woven lace,
covering the cranberry waves
pouring forth from
the slash within his skin,
and where do I even begin
to express my sorrow,
record the dimming
of the sun, and the crumbling
mountains on the moon?
War has wounded my warrior,
broken my heart like his.
I have no answers,
for I know not even
the questions that float
in the air against
a vague backdrop
of a vanished future.
The light diminishes, silver beams
fade, and I see a bronze coffin
in the distance. It floats nearer.
Is that reality shrieking like sirens,
or is it only my screams,
drowning out this obtrusive nightingale?
Ruth Wildes Schuler
Salopeot Spring 2010 (England)
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
POETIC TREK
I have traveled the earth trudging among
the broken statues of Easter Island,
listening to the children of Pitcairn Island
sing hymns, felt the icy blast of Dutch Harbor winds
and swam in the Black Sea.
On my poetic search I climbed the Great Wall of China,
rode a camel near the great pyramid of Giza,
walked within the walls of the Kremlin,
through the barb-wire horror of Dachau and observed
the blood stained walls, ovens and bins of suitcases,
shoes, and false arms and legs in Auschwitz.
I saw the ice floes of Greenland,
the Monkey Dancers of Bali, the Berlin Wall,
the ruins of Dresden, the Komodo Dragon,
the glaciers of Alaska and many churches and castles.
I saw Mongolian cowboys riding camels,
and ate the rare fish of Lake Baikal
Always searching. I saw joy, sorrow and fear
among this planet’s people. Russians were afraid
to speak to us, while the Chinese wanted to practice
their English now taught on TV instead of the previous Russian.
I ate a feast of all the world, and it all mixed to form
this persona, this person, this poet, and this poem.
RUTH WILDES SCHULER
the broken statues of Easter Island,
listening to the children of Pitcairn Island
sing hymns, felt the icy blast of Dutch Harbor winds
and swam in the Black Sea.
On my poetic search I climbed the Great Wall of China,
rode a camel near the great pyramid of Giza,
walked within the walls of the Kremlin,
through the barb-wire horror of Dachau and observed
the blood stained walls, ovens and bins of suitcases,
shoes, and false arms and legs in Auschwitz.
I saw the ice floes of Greenland,
the Monkey Dancers of Bali, the Berlin Wall,
the ruins of Dresden, the Komodo Dragon,
the glaciers of Alaska and many churches and castles.
I saw Mongolian cowboys riding camels,
and ate the rare fish of Lake Baikal
Always searching. I saw joy, sorrow and fear
among this planet’s people. Russians were afraid
to speak to us, while the Chinese wanted to practice
their English now taught on TV instead of the previous Russian.
I ate a feast of all the world, and it all mixed to form
this persona, this person, this poet, and this poem.
RUTH WILDES SCHULER
Thoughts To Ponder
The economy is so bad,
So what can we really do?
It’s like waiting for the man
upstairs to drop the other shoe.
Ruth Wildes Schuler
--------------
First, I must put something in context. America is unique in the history of the world. In the history of the world, whenever there has been a war, the nation that is victorious has taken land from the nation that has been defeated – land has always been the basis of wealth on our planet.
Only one nation in history, and this during the last century, was willing to lay down hundreds of thousands of lives and take no land in its victory – no land from Germany, no land from Japan, America. America is unique in the history of the word for its willingness to sacrifice so many lives of its precious sons and daughters for liberty, not solely for itself but also for its friends.
Shimon Peres, Israel’s former Prime Minister and President to Mitt Romney, former Massachusetts Governor
and 2008 Presidential Candidate
The only land that America took after World War II was what was needed to bury our dead.
Former US Secretary of State Colin Powell
TRADITION
Where once the oriental warrior
exposed the back of his neck
to the sword as a gesture of peace;
he now merely bows from the waist.
Ruth Wildes Schuler
So what can we really do?
It’s like waiting for the man
upstairs to drop the other shoe.
Ruth Wildes Schuler
--------------
First, I must put something in context. America is unique in the history of the world. In the history of the world, whenever there has been a war, the nation that is victorious has taken land from the nation that has been defeated – land has always been the basis of wealth on our planet.
Only one nation in history, and this during the last century, was willing to lay down hundreds of thousands of lives and take no land in its victory – no land from Germany, no land from Japan, America. America is unique in the history of the word for its willingness to sacrifice so many lives of its precious sons and daughters for liberty, not solely for itself but also for its friends.
Shimon Peres, Israel’s former Prime Minister and President to Mitt Romney, former Massachusetts Governor
and 2008 Presidential Candidate
The only land that America took after World War II was what was needed to bury our dead.
Former US Secretary of State Colin Powell
TRADITION
Where once the oriental warrior
exposed the back of his neck
to the sword as a gesture of peace;
he now merely bows from the waist.
Ruth Wildes Schuler
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