Simians – Renowned Poet Ray Whitaker Shares his Poems

0
2
Horus-coin-FEAT
The Eye of Horus

What I have seen with closed eyes is yet to be. Where in the river is there a rock to hold on to?

Ray Whitaker- Poet- Sindh Courier
POET READING FROM HIS LATEST BOOK RELEASE “THE IMPROMPTU” IN COLORADO SPRINGS LAST DECEMBER

Ray Whitaker has been writing poetry since about age sixteen. His poetry writing covers current events with intuition, clarity, and form.  His poetry has been described as poignant, relative, and invoking.

He is a member of the NC Poetry Society, the NC Writer’s Network, ‘The Neopoet Group’ in promoting an International Poetry Family and participates with other Poets in anthology works [2022].  Since moving to the Colorado Springs area in 2021, he has been participating with the Pikes Peak Arts Council and other cultural resources during National Poetry Month and Arts Month in Colorado Springs.

His interest in photography has been in place since his teenage years. He uses several Olympus Digital Cameras to record and compose his images.

One of the mature voices in poetry, his work brings insight to the everyday occurrences in our lives, as well as in-depth examinations of the dilemmas we find ourselves in.  Sometimes writing as a Poet of Agitation, as well as a Poet of Witness, his work is current to most any reader.

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 four books published, and two chapbooks. His work has been published in ten different countries.

Ray was a Delegate to the 2024 Writer’s International Panorama Festival this past January. He participates regularly with several zoom poetic events worldwide. Among them, he has been spotlighted on a US National Poetry broadcast from Quintessential Listening Poetry Online Radio In April, ’24; and also has an upcoming International Poetry Recital hosted by The Fertile Minds out of India this April.

eye-of-horus
The Eye of Horus

SIMIANS

What I will become waits in me like an ape

Moving hand in hand thru the tree limbs

Shaking the flitting leaves with the movement

As if a wind blows strong.

 

What I may become is different from that

Like an orangutan

All orange and hairy

With and expressive face

And having arms too long

For a nicely tailored shirt.

 

Thinking sometimes that what I have become is

Expressing like a howler monkey

White-faced, with a screech

That resounds off the trunks of trees

In the jungle

As their leaves absorb the rain.

 

What I have seen with closed eyes is yet to be.

Where in the river is there a rock to hold on to?

 

The Eye of Horus stares at me

Its magical power inherit

Daring me to use

My opposable thumb.

***

7fe470d7e2cc10bec920a90c54ee32e3HALLWAY OF COMPASSION

The sign reads Radiology across the hall

Nurses and therapists walk by carrying

Their nourishment for the work

To attend to the infirm

Sometimes it takes all they’ve got to give.

 

A bit further down the hall

The wall pulses Cardio-Pulmonary in bright red letters.

Some folks hurry by

As if they are afraid,

To breathe.

 

When what’s true is they are just in a hurry

To get to the cafeteria at the far end of the long corridor.

The reception area is nearly empty.

The patient has been taken in.

The family awaits as if a bear is around the corner.

 

The bear is large, quiet, yet angry and reddish-brown

The patients and family do not dare to disturb it

A Therapist comes out of the staff only door

Calls: “Mrs. Aorta, it’s time…”

Though he would have taken Mr. Venacava if need be.

 

It is the dream of many to get to the doors

At the other end of the great long hallway

Passing the bear safely, unnoticed

Still strongly able to put one foot

In front of the other.

***

6a00e54fcf7385883401a3fcea3357970bWALKING THAT OLD ROAD AGAIN

Deep in the woods

There is the stream crossing on flat stones.

Down by the creek

Where the turtles are up on the flat rock

Look closely now clouds suddenly cover woodlight

Its dim, you may see Mr. No-shoulders on the bank too.

 

The journey continues through the thick standing woods

To where the log cabin once stood

Four cornerstones still mark their job

Support plain, even these many years later

Further down by the creek is where the turtles sun

And where the otters play.

 

This woods walk gives a time for reflection

On your considerations this day

Deep behind the leaves just off the path

The deer are watching your paces.

Closing your eyes, you can still hear

Her sweet sad voice singing y’all’s touching song.

 

You can sit on the place of the broad, open bank

With your feet in the water

Sunlight and water splashing on wet toes, it’s just stirling

Wondering where next is it you need to go,

To continue to grow,

Which path is there, to take you to a destiny that cares!

___________________

Read: No War – Selected Poems of Ray Whitaker, an eminent American Poet

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here