Fly Away

Summer nights
Nightfall's glow silhouettes
S'mores hung over smoky fire pits
Laughter dances on the breeze
Tears together on our knees
Friendship's kiln burns
Seasons turn
Ocean crashes ashore
Faithfulness constant roar
Kindred spirits talk
Shadowy figures walk
Embers and ashes
Christ's passion
Prayer's magic
Memories play
Hair turns grey
Broken jars of clay
Spirits fly away

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.

Stones

Stones

Star-gazer lily
Time passes quickly
Dreams abound
When there is no sound
Hope whispers
In loneliness of winters
Darkness drowns
Thorns crown
Shadows dance
Perchance
Dyes cast
Memories past
Broken glass
A first kiss's taste
Doubts erase
Spirits embrace
Blind eyes chaste
Beauty beholds
Faith's refined gold
Fire's embers
She remembers
Lives tangle
a candle
Words unspoken
Secret token
Heartbroken
She walks alone
Pass Kyoto's garden stones.

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.

Aslan's land

Aslan's land

Dreams awaken
Visions
Billowy clouds
Of a city, a world unseen,
Beckons
Rejected and forsaken
Cottony clouds
Greys shroud
Of a city, a realm veiled
Where angels tread
Do you hear the symphony?
Still strings of my heart
Lost chivalry
Codes written in art
Its thunderous roar
Unsaid words
Narrative lore
Sings caged mockingbird
Mourns what is not to be
Ashes and embers
Mirror what do you see?
Handwritten letters
Threads of life's tapestry
Red, yellow, blue, green
Hushed pageantry
Splendor and majesty
Ravens caw
A tear slips
Prophets foresaw
River trembles
Over pebble stones
Broken vessels
Flawed
Before Terabithia's bridge
Puffy clouds
Crimson light frames
Glimpses
Aslan's land
Beyond the moors
A song, I hear
Wind whispers
Winter is past
He calls
and
I follow.

By Shannon McKemie

The Gypsy Road

Darkness covers
Dawn breaks
Stars flicker like a thousand candles
Morning's breath hushs and paints the sky
A golden sun sits amidst pinks and oranges
Shadows dance
An ethereal melody plays
Unveiled glimpses
Reality bends
Dreams and visions
A sojourner's path
Trees rustle
Songbirds sing
Lovers' duet in spring
A lone traveler
Paxton's gypsy Shannon of July summers
Steps hesitantly
Trees whisper at her return
As the bluebonnet fields brings her to her knees
A snow globe falls out of her sack
An upside down scene plays out from the past
Memories like a faraway dream
Darkness covers
Dawn breaks
She travels onward.

By Shannon McKemie

Red Light

A whirlwind blows
sweeps the empty hollows
Past red light shows
As one follows
oranges, yellows, and brown
A shroud hangs
Over the dust-covered town
Nightfall shows its fangs
Dew-drop tears fall down
Shadows dance
Into a gray nothingness
A lifeless heap
Crushed and pressed said the witness
Eyes ablaze as crowd jeers, jests, and mocks
Stones held high ready to strike
Until the rabbi stops
The sinful harlot lays shattered
The rabbi writes in the sand
The crowd scattered
He told the harlot to stand
Illusion's mask they did not see
Death is what they breathed
Colors flow in painted dreams
A whirlwind blows
Sweeps the empty hollows
Oranges, yellows, and brown

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
02-17-2010(originally written)
03-16-2017 (edited)

Tears on the moor

Tears on the moor
Eyre's broken dreams scatter
Thornfield's gossip and chatter
Words echo in western wind
Memory's wake blood paints
Three cords twined
False pretenses taints
Lies confined
Heart dictates
Hope drowns
Love waits
Darkness sounds
Silence condemns
Grace extends
Laughter and scorn ring
The road ends
Beauty unveiled
Stars shimmer
Separation travailed
Bodies quiver
Morning breaks
Night claws
Emptiness's aches
Despair's paws
Dagger cuts
Tears on the moor
Eyre's broken dreams scatter

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
02-16-2010 (originally written)
03-15-2017 (edited)

The Blue hour

Ethereal light beckons
River ripples
Minutes pass in seconds
Train whistles
Peace in presence
Wordless riddle
Another lesson
Water trickles
Heart's confession
Castaway nickels
Darkness encloses
Lone vigils
Letters compose
On mountain ridges
She stands alone

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
03-14-2017

Tempest

Tempest within
Blows a whirlwind
Stones thrown
Alone
Salty tears fall
Plain and small
Never enough
Overlooks the bluff
Empty words
Sings the mockingbird
Floats a feather
Scarlet letter
Bonfires burn
Hope spurned
Wind whispers
Candle flickers

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.

Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain and little, I am soulless and heartless?
You think wrong! I have as much soul as you,--and full as much heart! And if God had
gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you
to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you!

--Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre

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The Child

Like a child afraid of the dark
How does one open their heart?
Like a glimpse of the heavens
The blue hour beckons
Like a child grasps in wonder
Doubts thunder
Like a veiled scarred reflection
Marks from society's rejection
Like a child comforts with their hand
A touch heals the wasteland
Like a child who speaks truth in the void
Builds what was destroyed
Like a thousand diamonds shimmer in the river
Kindness thaws the heart's winter
Like a child fearlessly lives
Surrenders and forgives
Like a child sings
Hope springs
Like souls touch unseen
Beyond the impediments that stand in-between
Like a child afraid of the dark
How does one open their heart?

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
03-10-2017

Rock and Stone

               At the river's edge
the sojourner sits
               amongst the carpenter's masonry
               stone
               as the billowing foam and smooth,
liquid crystal stardust bathes under
  light's dome

               At the river's edge
the sojourner sits
               the cobblestones glisten veiled
beneath
               as diamonds, sapphires, emeralds
whispering of the Jerusalem
to be ensheathed

               At the river's edge
the sojourner sits
               with quaking unspoken fears
and in trembling tears
               beholds the mountain steps to an
unknown land

               At the river's edge
the sojourner sits
   amidst the hues of death's destruction
and life's resurrection
       the soothing peace that
gentles the battling and breaking

               At the river's edgge
the sojourner sits
        in bridal expectancy for the call
to see what is cloaked in mystery

                At the river's edge
the sojourner sits
                cast away and alone
                     among the rock and stone.

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
06-22-2002

Bethels

I

Handwritten letters
Woodland adventures
Red rose petals
Morning splendor
A prison without walls
Fiery embers
Thunderous squalls
Soul trembles
A cage without bars
Broken clay vessels
Eternity's hours
Jacob wrestles
Blooms Texas wildflowers
Near my bethel
Winter whitens the ground
Spring awakens all-around
Lamentations and sorrow
Grace abounds
Each morrow

II

Silent playgrounds
Flies a sparrow
Darkness drowns
Red wheelbarrow
Justice arraigns
Shared marrow
Blue turquoise rings
Raven caws
Orchestra strings
A child draws
New chapter begins
A hushed pause
World spins
Absence gnaws
Silence sings
Under the expanse
I stand.

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
03-07-2017

Jubilee

Shadows, shame and pain
Night's tendrils
Thrash the window pane
Rose petals
Thunders the rain
Broken clay vessel
Entwined hands remain
Doubts heckle
A walk along the lane
Questions wrestle
Conversations sustain
As they nestle
Whistles the train
Crashes the sea
Sunflowers upon the plain
A silent plea
For this not to be feigned
If we
Turn the key
Hopeful and carefree
A quiet jubilee.

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.

11-02-2016

A Thousand Moments

Lights hush
A baton raises
Silence paintbrushes
An unheard beat lays
Worlds waltz
Strings obey
Drums haunt
Fingers frolic as piano chords play
Violins flaunt
His hands move in a ballet
Her tempos allure in thought
Tension pushes and pulls and betrays
Veiled realms are wrought
A thousand moments sparkle in praise
His hands thread the tapestry from ink blots
The arrangement and the composer.

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
07-10-2012

Hope's mirth

Lines and colors meet
A drumbeat
Fields of wheat
Shrouded fears
Silent tears
Hope's birth
Raiment and mirth
A stolen glance
Souls dance
By chance
Broken silence
Aslan's guidance
Lines and colors meet
A drumbeat
Fields of wheat

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
10-03-2016

Autumn Embers

Simple and plain
Orange, yellow, browns
Leaves dance
On a country lane
Hope drowns
A stolen glance
Thunder and rain
Embers fall down
By chance
Fire's tearstain
Empty playground
A gothic romance
Or is it feigned?
Cast down
Caught in a trance
Words unexplained
'Send in the clown'
Push, pull, bodies advance
Melodies unchained
Deep down
A dream perchance
Stars ordained
Voices cry touchdown
Echo in the expanse
Together unashamed
Whispers all around
Walls collapse
Hand-in-hand unafraid
Beyond rejection's burial grounds
Writes new maps
As autumn colors parade
Flint sparks a winter's flame.

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
10-11-2016

Letters

Darkness envelopes
Silent stars hung
Lanterns in a blue abyss
Shrouded hopes
Threads unstrung
Sweet first kiss
Traverses without ropes
Amazing grace sung
Otherworldly bliss
Steadfast oaks
Woodland canopy overhung
Tears' reminisce
Where poppies sprung
In this
Despair clung
A world amiss
Hearts wrung
Souls transfixed
Unspoken words on the tongue
Blood moon eclipse
An empty swing swung
Letters upon a new script

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
10-12-2016

Ruins

A nor'east's wisp
Threshold's kiss
Across a stage of dreams
Echoes in quiet streams
A thousand days
Cathedral ruins lay
Fog's mistral greys
Tomorrow's doorways

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.

Summer days

Protective hands unseen
Plays out a scene
Hand upon heart
Set apart
Breathless moments
Cross's atonement
Hesitancy and joy
Grace employs
Brillant blue crashes
Beauty from ashes
Hope beckons
Railroad tracks reckoned
What was and nevermore
brother and sister cross Jordan's shore
misty shroud hides
the turn of the tide
darkness drowns
abandoned mills and shuttered brownstones of downtown
mist shrouds
sacred vows
Conversations
lay foundations

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
07-13-2011

Where is the Rose?

Reality shatters
Darkness and light scatter
Broken heart
Moments depart
A dreamer's eyes
Hope dies
Love waits
Fate
Faraway smiles
through trials
Yesterday lingers
in pictures
Left behind
to find
today grows old
past is cold
tomorrow unfolds
a melody plays
Friendship's gaze
an endless search
an empty church
Grace finds
gives sight to the blind
Unspoken words burn
Fires dance as souls yearn
Laughter rings
Thunder sings
Where is the rose?
Lines that poets compose
Blood stains on blue
I love you

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.
Originally written: 01-19-1993 Rewritten: 02-24-2017

The Sojourner

Cross’s narrow road
Arms stretched out in love
To the sojourner
Beckons, calls, knocks
Friendship’s footprints
On the path’s inscription
Hand in hand
Love’s grasp tight
Storms splash in momentary might
Cross’s narrow road
The Rock
Justice, mercy, and grace
Beckons, calls, knocks
The sojourner
Heaven’s expanse stretched out before thee
The unknown yet to be
Cross’s narrow road
The sojourner
Mountains, valleys, deserts, wilderness
Hand in hand
With Eternity’s heartbeat

By Shannon McKemie, M.A.