What are the subjects that I like to write about?
I will write about anything that comes to mind. What inspires me to write my poems can be something as subtle as a railroad engine chugging, or a complex as human interactions. Then the frequent turns to be found in my work will usually take a reader towards the infinity of God’s designs. There is such power in the gazing into our world that surrounds us. Also, to be aware of, and into the cosmos that we seem to be a part of, is powerful. Taking a trip into the meanings we all rely on -in our daily lives- is a strong source of subject matter.
Ray Whitaker
No War
My Father did not plant fruit trees
Or a garden with any sort of vegetable,
Like a tomato plant, or peppers.
It was I that planted, harvested all of that.
His example did not lodge with me
Never having flown down from the sky
Wrapped in a fighter plane
Machine guns blazing towards a ground confined enemy
They there, trembling in fear, hiding from
His bullets and bombs thrown while in God’s bubble.
I loved him so, yet my path differed
The healing arts chose me as sure as water churns in rapids
Born unafraid of cleaning up lacerations, wiping blood from torn flesh
When someone’s life was seeping away
Staunching the flow
With giving a damn ever present, it was
Acceptable risk to be in combat with purulent infection.
He was a great man even having never planted a plum tree
His bravery and deciding loving family decisions made
Did lodge with me, so it is now that he is gone
As it was when he, my best friend, was still here amongst us
His courage tempered my abundant compassion
Like the wind rippling the fall colors
In an autumn high plains field.
I can’t fly a fighter plane
Or command a tactical sortie in dive bombing a bridge
I have come home with blood on my scrubs though
Bearing stains from other’s wounds, having worked
Like a mule plowing furrows, towards healing Life’s casualties
And I have planted plum trees, some were for him
His face peering out from the green leaves
Feeling his hands on the shovel with mine.
***
On the desk
The mouse pad lying there brings possibilities
It asks for attention
For possibly going to the end of the internet
And having a departure into determination
The white mouse seems to have a life of its own
Accepting the click only on empowerment
That adds to my totality.
What is there when I move the mouse?
This interplay with consciousness and mechanics
Somewhere there is a river flowing
In all of it
Carrying the signals from my hand muscles.
It is a tributary
To what
Questions are here
That I have
Towards what makes me whole.
***
Close Journey
Just want to walk with you,
Go into the soft distance
Perhaps into a cave with hot springs
Where the entrance is a bit narrow
Gently pushing we two walkers close together
And touching the amethyst crystals in the walls.
I think I can go there with you
Unconcerned about where that destination may be
Go to a closeness where our fingers arch, and toes extend
That place where sweet is the only oder.
In there, the Qi blends
Into smiles.
THE LINK TO THE LIVE EVENT
https://www.facebook.com/100063542572511/videos/1222416528401031
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About the Poet
Ray Whitaker has been writing both prose and poetry since he was seventeen. What Ray is writing now is very different from what he wrote those so many years ago. All writers and poets are writing out of “the Self” however there are directions that the self speaks into, that change. Now Ray’s writing is to put foremost in his work, just who he is writing for. He intends on writing for the everyday man and woman. He firmly believes that poems need to reach into the everyday person’s pictures in their minds, and engage with those. This is where he aims to make a difference in his creative writing. He’s fulfilled when he sees that his work is provoking thought in his readers.
Ray has read around the state of North Carolina [USA] and Colorado [USA], and has been a member or the North Carolina Poetry Society, the Winston-Salem Writers, and The North Carolina Writer’s Network. He has thrice been a ‘Writer-in-Residence” at the North Carolina Center for the Arts and Humanities, at Weymouth, in Southern Pines, NC. He is the father of two daughters, and lives in Colorado Springs, USA.
He has three books published by Newness Twoness Books: “ACKNOWLEDGMENT: Poems from the Nam,” 2 volume set, and “FOR THE LOST AND LOVED”. A chapbook, “THE SCUPPERNONG WORKS” is published September 2022. He has one other book he is presently seeking publication for: ‘WHITE DOG SPEAKING.”
Some of his work has been published in online American, Irish, English, Belgium, and Bali Literary Journals.