A Rose From Thorns

A bud emerged in snowy steeple-white,
clear as champagne was the high-bred morning,
and the night peeled back, deliciously warming
the gossamer threads of the spider’s might.
A rose grew in dewy stained-glass temple
from sharp thorns that pierced a Savior’s pure brow,
and the garden was wildness constrained now,
cultivated flow’r to mind the simple.
Our lives were complex without the bouquet,
so we plucked each sweetly stained soul of rose,
and the summer wafted ambrosial,
nuances of physician’s tourniquet.
If only love would heal the fevered mind,
but oil from roses soothes the heart in kind.

Copyright © 2012 by Emily Isaacson. Used with permission.

Pedigree

The bright morning held its pedigree,
racing like a cool frost o’er the grass,
learning each bluebell, a memory,
leaning at the doorway of each mass,
making truth, of our hearts, the staple:
each choice the river running ragged
to silver pond with dark red maple.

Ladybug, dragonfly, hummingbird,
on minute translucent wing will fly
hovering o’er the garden of the wild;
at late noon, resounding o’er the cry
of nature, wrapped, a child at the breast:
in tattered colors of patchwork quilt,
degrading too towards the earthly rest.

The dimming light and last poignant hour
now has almost waved and said goodbye,
what sun illumined and held for power—
sweep of olden gold on fields of rye,
carving as in oak the darkening path:
we would once more raise our chant to heaven,
chasing down the solemn aftermath.

Copyright © 2012 by Emily Isaacson. Used with permission.

The Writer’s Neck of the Woods

I walked until I found one small sacred glen
where light from the sky was shaded by one still
mossy tree, blinking through this shadow world, kin
to all enchanted fairy meadow whirl, I took one quill
to note the moment’s verse, still unbeknownst at
this late hour, and those who tell the time shall spy
upon the imperative, their goodly cry.

I braided my hair by the window this night
while watching the owls rise into the trees, pure
snowy white, eyes blinking soberly at light
from each planet, star and moon, festooned demure
to hang in navy-black seas of stormy might,
the ships dip in the waves of mystic cursive
where I scribbled down each last thought within sight.

Oh here, by this small book where ink meets the line
of page, and sorrow meets joy, and humor, mirth—
come with me in this final hour, the world mine,
and find the journey home, the land uncursed
where spirit meets the soul of man and reads last,
his lantern lit over the tome, the ghost
no fancy of the literate mind, here glass.

Copyright © 2012 by Emily Isaacson. Used with permission.

Emily Isaacson was born in Windsor, Canada and grew up in Victoria B.C. She began writing at the age of ten and was first published at age thirteen for her poem, “The Wild Madonna”. She graduated in nutrition from Bastyr University of Natural Medicine. Emily Isaacson is the founder and director of the Emily Isaacson Institute for literature, the arts and medicine. She is a world-class poet and author with a fan club and global following of over 160,000 visits from 45 countries online. She has written over 1200 poems, and the three volume book of her select poetry is called The Fleur-de-lis. Emily is also a professional photographer and exhibited her landscape photography in 2010 at the MAC gallery in Mission B.C.

Visit her blog at www.sonnets.emilyisaacson.com
Visit her website: www.emilyisaacsoninstitute.com