Poem: Watery Lights

Free Verse Poetry-A Slow Rivers Edge

A Slow Rivers Edge

Purchase Art Dr. Murad Abel

fingers of running blue
softly inch the landscape

drawing forth life like a mystic’s finger

upwards life reaches into the daytime air

soft swirling pools of water

 bring cool current to dipping toes

leaves, twigs, and sediment trail round

tree tops glisten against the sun

as the leaves sway in amusement

each together in skyline dance

bridge to nowhere

solid and strong

a bracket on earth

sit upon a tree trunk

 gaze into the horizon

hours of long pauses

the day is as slow as silent

until shadows reach to the watery edge

time is only turning of day to night

Dr. Murad Abel

Poetry is something that has existed as long as man could formulate a sentence. In many cases poems became stories or epics that passed values, beliefs and culture. Free verse poetry is seen as something new but has been around for a few centuries with a more recent renewal. Free verse poetry offers an opportunity to write without the strict rules of more academic forms.

Free verse poetry uses figurative language with metaphors, similes, and personification.  They generally have no set meter nor do they need to fit within a particular rhythm scheme.  That doesn’t mean they don’t have rhythm it just means that it isn’t the same throughout the entire poem and may change on a regular basis.

There are many poets out there from professionals to amateurs. In today’s world these poets gather together into online communities and create profiles that help them support and interact with each other. Building an online community based within shared interest also offers opportunities to market relevant products and services.  If you like poetry you may want to check out the free Poetry Soup at http://www.poetrysoup.com/

Free Verse Poem: The Providing Tree

Title: The Providing Tree

The tree anchors the soil to the earth,

It is a home to many and shelter to some.

Creatures find their sustenance in its reach,

Leaves, branches, roots and bark makes their den.

Each finds their use for the branches held high.

Taking refuge in the umbrella of the tree’s time.

It is the blanket that keeps the earth warm,

The fan that keeps it cool.

It maintains sturdy course, bracing high and low.

Dr. Murad Abel

Free verse poetry does not have the rhythm or meter like other poetry. However, one can argue that free verse is not completely free. It does have some level of comma use, word choice, and themes that give it a structure. The free versus is meant to tell more of a story than it is to delight in rhythm and rhyme. Other examples of free versus may be found in Walt Whitman’s work where commas and words create natural pause.

The writer seeks to connect images in the readers mind. They do this through the specific choices of words. For example, “like a willow reaches for mother earth” could put an image of a weeping willow with the branches focused downward or it could be used to enhance a concept of a crying infant such as “The child became like a willow that reaches for mother earth”. 

For example, the poem above is considered free versus but it also has a number of images it portrays to the reader. Consider the following:

Line 1-Anchored, connected, foundation.

Line 2-Shelter,  home, refuge

Line 3-Sustenance, food, life

Line 4- Den, home, borough

Line 5-Usage, utility, providing

Line 6-Time, longevity, unending

Line 7-Blanket, warmth, protective

Line 8-Cool, refuge, oasis

Line 9-Sturdy, unbreakable, strong

If we look at only these words and the images associated with them we may find a tree to have a strong foundation, be shelter, give us living, a place to exist, having practical use, providing nourishment, always giving, giving warmth, giving coolness, and never ending.  It is possible to look at the poem as representing life and homes. That homes are strong, teaching us skills, always providing something we need, giving us protection, and never ending in its quest to provide this. The tree is the stable unending home to the creatures that live on the earth. The poem helps us respect nature and interconnected activities of all things that exist in that environment.

You might be interested in reading the following article on how plants try and reverse overheating through releasing cooling gases. Here