Joyce Chelmo

Can’t stop looking at your picture,
hypnotized.
Your beauty a blaze from within.
The attraction would
...

the first time we saw
her was last fall
she was standing
in a patch of grass
...

i got carried away
cleaning winter dust
out of my front porch
& threw my back out
...

Amidst the dull maize sunset
and the chill of soon to come night.
I wait for darkness to descend, a welcome friend.
My muse rises from depths, a whisper
...

After a long day on the steering
end of her old canoe, when the
only light shimmering on the lake
was the vanilla moon of late July.
...

One night while playing
a game in pogo
in a moment of weakness
I actually chatted
...

Nearly reached your hand this time;
I know if you’re there,
it has to be a good place.
If we’d touched,
...

Memories of you enfold me
through the chill of lonely nights.
Every tiny bud has the right
to bloom.
...

There's a pain I live with
that's gently wrapped
itself around my heart
woven into every fiber of my being.
...

She captures the eye of the dark horse.
Something about the intensity
in which they glare
that hypnotizes her,
...

He walks reverent
on stone paths in
the Garden of Seiryoji
where nature’s
...

Leaning against the door frame
holding myself,
watching the coral sunset.
...

He likes to reconstruct
every poem he reads....
until it fits his style
of rhyme and meter.
...

my family used to visit
an old bachelor
who lived in a cabin
surrounded by birch trees.
...

...

A symbol of serenity,
camouflaged by the bush.
Graceful stride,
slow peaceful beauty.
...

As the sun set in the west
in blaze of pastels.
She faced the east;
dusk cast the world in blue.
...

A masculine voice
weakly said “hey.”
He must have known
instinctively I didn’t
...

Crumpled parchment
between my fingers
in piles of unsaved data.
Squished like cockroaches,
...

My life’s been huge,
still wondering
what I’ll be when I grow up.
...