Speaking of single stanza poems, here’s a few that I think are pretty good (poet’s names included):
Infinity
To the ever-rising sun
There is no time, no age-
Tomorrow yesterday are one;
That which was as is to be
Doth with now as one become.
From whence we glean infinity.
Edwin A. Ackerman
Memory
Memory is a fragile thing;
A bee’s honey, and its sting.
Violet Wiggins Newton
Night is so Long
A strip of void fastened to my window frame,
And one assertive star;
Chasing me, purging me in its white flame,
Where all tomorrows are.
Mary Caluori
Friends
Some are true;
Others are not.
They’ll either love you,
Or what you’ve got.
Bea Myers
Stoic True*
Although you’ve read Chrysippus through-
And studied Epictetus too-
This doesn’t make you Stoic true,
Until you do what Stoics do.
John W. May
Hilltop Chapel
Those barless prison walls of Delta camp
Were not as frightening as one would deem.
Indeed, there I received the Spirit’s stamp,
And on hilltop chapel seen angels gleam.
Johm W. May
Bunky
With a crumpled ear and a crooked tail
And a stripped coat, like they wear in jail,
I may not amount to so very much
But still I’d like to make it clear:
I’ve earned my bed and board for life;
I caught a mouse . . . last year!
Billie Marie Crabb
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It delights me through- this thing that bothered me a little in the past- to know that the idea of a single subject (a subject that could easily fill volumes) can be so beautifully conveyed in so short a poem. Not that I hadn’t known this before, but to see it reinforces the knowledge that it’s so.
* For the pronunciation of Chrysippus and Epictetus
