Lea Whitso

“Poetry is what happens when nothing else can.”
― Charles Bukowski

“What is that you express in your eyes? It seems to me more than all the print I have read in my life.”
― Walt Whitman

“I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair.
Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets.
Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day
I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.

I hunger for your sleek laugh,
your hands the color of a savage harvest,
hunger for the pale stones of your fingernails,
I want to eat your skin like a whole almond.

I want to eat the sunbeam flaring in your lovely body,
the sovereign nose of your arrogant face,
I want to eat the fleeting shade of your lashes,

and I pace around hungry, sniffing the twilight,
hunting for you, for your hot heart,
Like a puma in the barrens of Quitratue.”
― Pablo Neruda

“Saints"

Thank God for all who give relief
for those who really care
Who put their arms around the weak
and plead for them in prayer

Thank God for those who hear the heart
and listen to the words
Who know a look or gentle touch
mean more than all the world

Thank God for those who lift the hands
and strengthen feeble knees
Who go about restoring souls
in quiet ministry.”
― Thomas L. Kay, The Road I've Taken