Day # 108: Sharing Poems

#108

April Is National Poetry Month

Tonight I bring two poems, one is by Jay Davis, the other written for my birthday by my niece, Grace.  Thank you both for letting me post them.

POTATOES
A family of potatoes lives under my sink.
They huddle there like wretched immigrants
in the hold of my kitchen, eyeing anyone
who peers down there with suspicion.
Despite the language barrier, they persist.
The more industrious put down roots.
They wear the same brown shabby coats
they brought from the old country,
though one or two are wrinkled now
from sleeping in them every night.
When the cupboard door is closed
I sense them in there, huddling closer,
muttering in their dark dialect, comforting
one another, whispering their dreams.
~Jay Davis

Her House is a Treasure Box

          By Grace VanSteenburg

She surrounds herself

 with what she loves. 
Her little white house

 is a treasure box,

 toys and trinkets,

 heirlooms and artwork,

mementos and books

 grow

 in piles around the perimeters

of each room

 engulfing the floor and the furniture.

 At any location,

my eyes are stimulated

by this wonderful, dusty puzzle

 enclosing around me.

A turtle made of

 thousands of tiny

 blue and green beads.

 Hundreds of photographs,

framed and unframed,

of frogs,

and of trees,

and of birds,

 and of lovely people. 
Funky earrings dangling

on a piece of lace

 on the wall.

Dead goldfish in the freezer.

Paintings

 by children and masters

 hang side-by-side.

Elephants!

Elephants everywhere!

 Large, bulky elephants.

Elephants the size

 of my pinky tip.

Marble elephants.

 Carved wooden elephants.

Psychedelically

painted elephants.

The strangest herd

you’ve ever seen.

 Her house is a treasure box

for she surrounds herself

with Love.