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A rose on a notebook

The Notebook

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Regarding "The Notebook"

The most important thing I do
Every day is to write.
It is my life. It is my balm.
It is peaceful. It is
The one dependable
Action I take which is sure
Any raging waters
To calm. It is a gift to me.
Unmerited. It casts
A fence around me as
If I was reclined in the sweet
Sheepfold of Psalm 23.
It could even be
Viewed as my version
Of the Kingdom of Heaven,
That blessed seed
Bestowed within each of us,
Which has the
Potential to leaven into
A majestic, flowering tree.

Leo Carroll
October 2, 2018

 

Would this notebook
Be able to keep me afloat in
A raging sea, its paper,
Once wood, a life
Preserver’s giving me
Buoyancy, or,
Would last sight of
Me be with an arm
Raised high, notebook
Held up to the last,
And then down,
Down deep, gone,
Below the waves and
Into the vast…?

Leo Carroll
October 9, 2005
Westford, Massachusetts



Photo by Elaina Carroll

The Muse

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Regarding "The Muse"

Effortlessly
My eyes lift, drawn
Mysteriously
To a mythical, desert
Mesa, sandy-
Reddish,
Where sits
Stoically an
Indian maiden
In Pueblo dress,
Eternally watching for
Me it seems,
As if she felt
My gaze, and knew I
Was waiting yet
Again for her
To release the words
Within me born
To live.

Leo Carroll
July 17, 2018

 

Find me,” comes
A quiet, whispered
Voice, female
In its sound, longing
In the depths of
A wispy, far-distant
Thesaurus…
Find me,” and
So up the high-desert
Plain my eyes
Lift, and there on
The mesa, in
Pueblo cloth, an
Indian maiden
Sits…

Leo Carroll
January 9, 2005
Westford, Massachusetts



Photo by Laura Colquitt, (via Unsplash.com)
Photo of falls at Yellowstone

Lifting Vesuvius

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Regarding "Lifting Vesuvius"

One day I simply
Started to seriously write.
I had always written,
And enjoyed it,
But one day I began
To finally view
Myself as a writer,
And not just as a writer –
But as a poet, and
A whole different, new
World began
To spread its wings
Before me, and my daily
Existence took on the
Form of stanza and
Verse, and there
Was not a depth I would
Not go to, nor was
There a height I would not
Attempt to climb.
Words took on
An indescribable
Significance to me, and
They swirled in my
Head as if they
Had always belonged,
And had finally
Found a way to
Come out…as rhyme.

Leo Carroll
April 28, 2018

 

From deep
Within a
Flood erupts,
Bursting
Through a
Wedge created.

Words gush
In endless
Source,
Flowing
Freely and
Unabated.

Leo Carroll
March 1, 1997
Westford, Massachusetts



Photo by Jim Sonia