The gift of time doesn’t come to all
Morning air opens the day
Use it copiously and wisely
Savor it as it clicks down to sunset
Let slumber be dreams of your today’s
and rewards of the next tomorrow
Be thankful for the breadth that opens another day
Be grateful for those who share your air
Mrs. Jones can break your bones, but in her heart, your body stands.
Watch your tongue, you hear, or your jaw will be wired.
Words gone wrong will collect like bile imprisoned in your passage space.
She is a keeper, a jailer, a tailor, a feeder, and a guidance provider,
with gnarled hands shaped from the price paid to make you happen.
Blocking her trials will not stop her vision; failure is not in her lens.
Splinters of accomplishment spark flames that keep determination from lapsing.
Intelligence and intellect are hidden behind crude words, shouted out strong,
defiant, created from pressured survival.
Break your bones and put them together she will, stronger, more determined,
until the next generation and the next and the next, makes emancipation
a real proclamation.
By Mike Rosen
I’ve walked this earth a long, long time, and seen some troubles along the way.
Places I used to dream of, where facades are decidedly different but,
Inside, so much the same.
Places where problems exist and solutions arrive when the tide is too much to bear.
The cycle keeps on turning.
Our journeys path is full of obstacles, pitfalls and temporary jubilation. Overcoming them keeps us on the road to our destiny.
Some give love creating an aura that brings light to their hearts, others keep their petals closed and darkened down.
The cycle keeps on turning.
The evening masks the sun and breaths what you made of the day, its rays wake you with new thoughts and anticipation.
The cycle keeps on turning.
Days keep on burning, keep them relevant and directed. Make profitable use of your journey.
One day you’ll have to get off while another jumps on.
By Mike Rosen
Words dance in my head, poems start to rhyme, songs start to sing.
Sentences form and create visualized thoughts that bounce around from
one eye to another.
What should I do with these words? How do I stream them out in meaningful ways?
Who gave me these verbs and pronouns, and vowels and consonances?
Is it my responsibility to use them as I please or pass them from one form to another,
from one tap on a keyboard to a rainbow of creativity?
Will anyone care, will anyone want to see them, how will they be received.
Are they uplifting, vilifying, ingratiating, educating, entertaining, memorable,
heartfelt, or humorous?
Am I just wasting space?
Will I be read, will you dance with me.
Mike Rosen 3.26.2021
They are illegal.
They crawled… breathless, soaked in mud, vermin, and grime, scratching a path for a better place to plant themselves.
Climbing walls, dodging bullets, hiding under canvas, packed in vans and vessels that bulged with dangerous weight.
They were raped, beaten, robbed still clinging to humanity while some were lost along the way.
They come here to put roots in fertile soil for themselves, their families, and their family’s families.
They came to Texas, New Orleans, Arizona, New York City, San Francisco, Boston, Florida’s shores, wherever we would let them create a footprint.
They don’t ask for more than they can contribute.
Just let them breathe, work, grow and bear the fruits of freedom.
When a root takes, it feeds us all.
When you cut a root, you diminish the tree. When you cut a branch, you scar and disfigure.
When you feed, nourish, and protect humanity blossoms.
There is dignity and purpose in an immigrant tree; didn’t we all come from one.
Mike Rosen
If a bar tender is your only friend, and a liquor glass is all your lips ever touch,
then you’ve got to look in the mirror and ask yourself, how will this end.
If you’ve known nothing but heartache and pain, listen to your heart,
let its voice help you start living again.
Lie on a hill, look-up where the blue heavens bring peace to the sky.
Sit at a bench in the park; listen to children’s laughter, birds chirping,
barking dogs playfully playing, hands walking with each other.
Many have had the same call, known deep darkness, and climbed out of the same hole.
Embrace knowing hearts; let them help drive your goal.
It takes a hero to writhe in pain, to go through trauma again and again.
God knows it isn’t easy to skip a date with your only friend.
Mike Rosen 2.17.21
Photo: unsplash Steve Allison
Read some history books, view a picture of the past, and then
visualize what the future can be. Follow the ebb and tide of
significant influences and historic iconic patterns.
Follow the storms that create greed, the paths of money, power,
righteous endeavors, political shouting’s, uprisings, shifting fortunes,
and great poverty.
See the seeds of historic-periods that grow our landscape, and the
future evolves for you to foretell.
Find words, painting and revealing in harsh, and prolific beautiful
tones, and shapes. Soak in your view, and in the process, find ways
to improve the canvas.
Create the next brush strokes; hang in the museum of masters.
Who is John Foster Dulles*: A contributor to sometimes dark and
bright past murals: The United Nations Charter, the Cold War, the
Iran coupe d’état, the Geneva Conference…
Read; discover the history that creates the menu we dine on.
*An American diplomat, he served as the 52nd United States Secretary of State under President Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953-1959. His Grandfather and Uncle both previously served in the same capacity. His brother, Allen Dulles, served as the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency from 1953 – 1961. He fiercely advocated against Communism around the world. Born in 1888, the eldest son of a Presbyterian Minister, and passed in 1959.
Mike Rosen 2.18.2021
Photo: Wikipedia
Spending so many dark days living caged in voluminous solitude
Bombarded by erupting events knifing at each other
Yearning to experience the closeness of humanity, to hear the free breadth of life-affirming itself
Visualizing what was, what is, and praying for what can be, I think in contrasting terms
Clouded thoughts without focus or ingenuity race through my veins, darkening my heart and cradling unhealthy thoughts
Implosions that I try not to burden the one I share life’s table with
I hide with endless viewing through the screen of constant search
I review waves of thoughtless communications, sales tickets of unending things, magnets of free entrapments
Then I click on a few hundred letters of purple code that opens up
I hear an angelic voice singing with the purity and joy of youth whose presence and beauty makes the sunrise and creates a rainbow for me
It’s my 16-year-old granddaughter recorded, performing live on the stage of a nearly empty, epidemically challenged auditorium
Tears of joy well up and wash away the fog that covers my eyes, reminding me to put on my rose-colored glasses and engage again in life’s lottery of small and sometimes unexpected large prizes
Mike Rosen 4.18.201
Photo: pexels Rahul pandit
When I was small, I walked on patches of grass, picked up special rocks, saw big
trees, winged flying things dancing around puddles, tall parents, buildings that
pierced the sun, and long winding roads with no end.
Then I saw classrooms filled with kids, people in cars driving everywhere, birds
flocking together, families in pictures, music makers, people chasing games, and
crowds at destinations.
Now I see the whole forest, forks in the road, some dead ends, and entire
generations, political waves, and larger woven groups of my own making.
I see the earth from above, whole lakes and rivers, city skylines and green rolling
hills, crops of corn, and iconic groups of people.
I lie down and look up at beautiful sky’s, and see clouds sliding by like dancing
musical notes.
Darkness turns to light; poetry, love and friends touch me inside, individual
humanity becomes relevant, and I start to feel the enriched understanding of the
knitted landscape we breathe.
The more I look, the more everything changes and yet is somewhat the same.
Now it becomes time to accumulate what I see and pass some visions on.
Mike Rosen 2.10.2021
My Words Online 