Mary McElveen, Alexandria Poet Laureate, reading her poem "Road Signs 2: Expect Delays" at the first annual Poem In Your Pocket Day at Market Square. (Photo: James Cullum)
On April 30, more than a dozen poets and poetry lovers came to Market Square to share their own poetic creations and other favorite works. alexandrianews.org is pleased to share some of them.
Road Signs 2: Expect Delays
By Mary McElveen, Alexandria Poet Laureate
“Roadwork ahead, expect delays”
Words that rule my life–
Not just on the perennially excavated
Pothole-pitted highways
And byways of my city,
But
In my daily trudge toward dinner
That is punctuated by
Laundry, phone calls,
Bills and grocery stores,
By pharmacy and duty visits,
Don’t-forgets and oh-my-gods,
By cat psychoses
And phobias of my own.
There’s work on every potholed life:
Every interrupted, ever put on ‘pause’
I’ve sadly learned
All by myself
To always
Expect
Delays.
Graveyard, Old Presbyterian Meeting House
By Jean Elliot
Leave the buttercups in the grass
Though feet bruise them as they pass
Through this vernal anteroom
Of heaven; angels guarding there
Will find no other bloom more fair.
Landscapes at The Athenaeum
By Peter Lattu
time to ramble
through these landscapes
open and inviting
stroll along a creek
lined with trees
glowing
in the afternoon sun
follow the road west
among hills and stony crags
walk the gardens
of River Farm
looking out over the Potomac
peer across a field
at a French windmill
watch afternoon shadows
play across haystacks
at Washington, Virginia
see cattle grazing
in Turner’s meadow
view the passing storm
glory in the blaze of day
time to ramble along
amid the joys of spring
in the long view
at The Athenaeum
