Category Archives: Poetry

Why I Ask Is It That We Choose To Destroy

Why I ask is it that we choose to destroy,

Leaving vast swaths of land ravaged,

Acres of ocean uninhabitable,

Water unfit for consumption,

Farms barren of life-giving crops,

Forests clear cut for human development

Exploitation of the gifts given to mankind,

Simply…I do not know!

Why is it that we deny the evidence,

Oceans rising to previously unrecorded levels,

Temperatures, the hottest in history,

Storms, perfect and oh so deadly,

Property destroyed and lives lost,

Still we refuse to believe,

Why–I do not know!

Why is it that we allow ourselves to be victims,

Plagued by profiteers,

Suffocated by our government,

Tolerant of our polarization,

Blind to our abuses,

Living as pawns to the powerful,

Yet we choose to ignore,

Why, I haven’t a clue!

Why we have allowed this to happen, I do not know,

We have become complacent,

Allowing our fellows to trample our dreams,

Stifling that which is our destiny

Instead of finding common ground,

Leaving us more distant than ever.

I wish I knew how to fix the ills of this world,

But I do not!

I like you, am only a temporary inhabitant,

Borrowing my time in this life.

Why must we destroy this precious world

Poisoning ourselves and those we love

With words and chemicals?

Material gain and profit are fleeting like this existence.

Shouldn’t we endeavor to make the most of what we’ve been given?

Isn’t this what it means to be human,

To use what we need leaving the rest for our future?

Perhaps I am naive,

A dreamer,

Or just hopeful,

But I must believe that it is not too late

For man to overcome his arrogance and greed.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

Beauty Fades

Beauty fades;

Stripped of color

Under unrelenting sun.

Once vibrant petals

Brown and crumble,

Scattering dust and seed

To the four winds.

A life run its course

Gives birth to the next generation

Through its death in the dawn of spring.

Never regretting,

Never questioning its fate

It gives itself unapologetically

For the propagation of their future.

As with all living things

We are here for a brief time

To live,

To spawn,

To die,

Returning to the earth

From which we came.

A cycle that has repeated itself

For eternity.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

What Is Left Of This Experiment

What is left of this experiment

Could it be that we failed intention

Selling it to the highest bidder?

Look at us!

Brother fighting against brother,

Ideals defined by television news,

By partisan writing,

By ignorance and lack of humanity.

Not relegated to one party or another

This is but a symptom of the disease.

A plague we allowed to ferment;

Feeding venomous pustules by blindness,

Blindness to surroundings,

Blindness to the lies we’ve been fed.

Beginning many years ago,

Blamed on the latest–current ruler,

Yet it is ever so misplaced.

Each is just the latest in a long line of failures

Given to us by their parties,

Held up as a choice to the people.

Choice…ha, this is but a facade,

Leaving the people to believe that they staked claim.

This is but a belief of fools,

Those that fail to realize they are pawns,

Misled and offered the promised land,

Finding that there is nothing but hollowness.

What does it take to awaken the populous?

Will it take total collapse?

Will it take blood?

Might it take revolution?

This is our right…our obligation;

When our system fails we are called to fight,

Called to change what is broken,

Beckoned to change what is fruitless.

Perhaps we have run our course,

Made a great attempt at political perfection,

Failing over a long period of time.

Every society has suffered;

Drowning in its own pomposity,

Leaving it vulnerable to suffer its own consequences.

What will it take;

Absolute and total collapse I propose.

Imploding on our own girth,

Collapsing under our own weight,

Then being consumed by our foes.

When will will realize our fate…?

Not until we are reduced

To nothing but skin and bones.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

Wildflowers Grow (Tanka)

Wildflowers grow

Their seeds know no boundaries

Showing perfection

O’ the strength in their beauty

And the lessons we could learn

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

Does Grass Strain To Grow (Tanka)

Does grass strain to grow

Does the moon confront the sun

Does water struggle

Should we not be like all these

Conforming to our nature

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

Father (Acrostic)

Fish out of water we are;

Acting courageously in the face of the unknown.

The mother bonds throughout the nine months,

Her instincts ingrained at birth.

Even though we put on the bravest of faces,

Reality and confusion set in…welcome to fatherhood.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

Emperor Sun Reigns (Tanka)

Emperor sun reigns

Sculpting earth to hells vision

Turning flesh to bone

Coronated in heaven

As master of this domain

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

What Does Heaven Know Of My Dreams

What does Heaven know of my dreams?

Maybe nothing, maybe everything,

In its silence I believe lies wisdom and strength.

Our mortal senses confuse that which is beyond physical,

Trusting nothing which we can not see.

This betrays the spirit of man.

Something far bigger than myself is my guide,

Calling me to greatness when I’m willing to listen.

In the quiet of meditation I can hear the inner voice,

Mine or God’s I do not know;

Perhaps we are one and the same.

I pray this will be revealed when I return to my origin,

The being of spirit that I was before my mortal birth.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

 

Brother Fights Brother (Tanka)

Brother fights brother
Will expressed through violence
So death marches on
All for ideology
Refusing to live on peace
~
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

Though Wall Of Block, A Wisp I Spied

Mindlovemisery's Menagerie - Wordle #12

Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie – Wordle #12

Though wall of block, a wisp I spied

Through peephole–well not more than crack

Golden hair, skin of ivory eyed

While perched on crate, one two I stacked

~

Her features shone like porcelain ‘tis true

Vertiginous from height or beauty unsure

From my perch to the ground in a flutter I flew

Regaining my wits was certainly a chore

~

Meet her I must if the last thing I do

Her door I did charge feeling strangely at ease

I knock with brass knocker not one time but two

To the butler I ask, “fetch my lady if you please”

~

Loveliest of ladies scent of lilac and fair

Laconic I was in her all consuming presence

My mind like an eddy void of breath and of air

Giddy as most boys in adolescence

~

Most surely I appeared as the oddity I must be

Arriving at her door unannounced

With grace and with style she greeted me with glee

My fragile heart she cherished not trounced

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~

~

Prompt: Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie – Wordle #12