Performed by Val Cole

Read POEM:

There are many different children around the world,
some little boys and some little girls,
Different languages and culture,
But all have their peacocks and all have their vultures,
Finding beauty can be hard, before a lullaby makes a wish upon a star.
Earth yo...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

The ice is gone, the seas are high,
But hey, at least your stocks won’t die.
The forests burn, the rivers choke,
And billionaires? They buy more coke.
They told us, “Recycle! Do your part!”
While drilling Earth down to its heart.

The oil spills? Just close your eye...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

Faced with itself
humanity once again reveals its boundless capacity for destruction.
How hardened must our hearts grow
to endure the inhumanity we choose for ourselves?
The black clouds gathering in the east are more than a storm;
they carry the promise of a future...

https://youtu.be/OoVVNaKIMtU

Narrated by Val Cole

POEM:

Dear Young Joi,
Your body is not an apology…
Stop giving it away to anyone who tells you or tells you to feel sorry for or about yourself…

Your body is not a toy…
Stop allowing people to play with it as children do, without instruction ...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

September 29th, 2020

Air from Terra Rising
Quivering in the Mountains
Rocks Rumble Beneath Earth, & One’s Feet
Wind Blares Down on All of Us
Nature Plays Tambourines – Touching Each of Our Ears
Terrene Mother Drums her Hands’ Down on the Planet’s Crust
Manmade Iron ...

https://youtu.be/nEdWr4lIOFc

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

I don’t remember ever being beautiful.
Must have been, at some point.
Kindergarten maybe?
All I know is, by third grade,
My tummy was a tad too
Big to be beautiful.

But don’t worry. This isn’t a poem
About hating my body. Actually,
I’v...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

Look at the big, beautiful Moon tonight.
See the little red spot that is called Mars.
See the almighty Elon Musk take flight.
Launched from the earth through its cosmos and stars.

But lo, it’s only his robot doppelganger
on a mission to plant the American flag.
Oh ...

Narrated by Val Cole

POEM:

What should we make of a country that takes
Donald Trump as its leader
a second time?
The first time could be seen as an unplanned marriage –
that pounding head waking up the morning after in Vegas
married to the wedding singer moment.
But the second time? Knowing wha...

Narrated by Val Cole

POEM:

Am I disgusting for letting him strip my shirt from my skin so I can feel an ounce of what I think love could possibly be? How can I hate my body so much, but then also only believe a man could ever want me for my curves, a braless chest made for his hands. I want to...

Narrated by Val Cole

POEM:

April 1, 1946
Hilo, Hawaii

It was the natural thing to do,
send the whole class
to play on the beach.

Where else could you enjoy recess
on the shore but the Aloha state?
Reflective Popsicle green waves topped

with whipped cream, every child’s fantasy.
Even the tid...

Narrated by Val Cole

POEM:

when no one knows,
the wind will gust
again and again
until the final push
and the dead Elm
crashes in darkness –
and you won’t even know
it happened.

In darkness

Spring wind reforms
with pressure and gravity –
the touring planets
and conspicuous moon
cycles – the ...

https://youtu.be/m3VNkbFm6gc

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

I write my love to you
From the stardust
And the grains of sand along the beach
From the dew of the mountain air
An atom from within my soul
I write I love you
Using the drops of rain
I make a canvas of love
Written in the stars
So that...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

She told us, she warned us,
repeatedly through story,
through song and finally,
she showed us.

Even with the showing,
we did not listen.
Even when chaos reigned down
on us from above.

When fiery rockets of molten lava
spewed from below.
When oceans rose and dese...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

In pauper’s field, no flowers lie,
on our graves of chosen number.
How different is grief from public outcry?
There is no comforting answer.

Is God or the state our true gatekeeper?
Both took away our chance to say goodbye.
But which one silently buried us here,
...

Performed by Val Cole

Performed by Val Cole

Get to know the poet:

1) What is the theme of your poem?

political oppression in the form of suffocation

2) What motivated you to write this poem?

to draw an analogy between political harassment and the harassment of a mosquito

3) How long have you been writing poetry...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

Talking endlessly and without reason,
I should have something to say,
something to tell you that would help you on your way,
I pause,
ready to speak,
yet nothing,
not even something little,
not even something great,
just silence,
silence so small,
so cogent,
it ca...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

—For my mother

while night scoops down to transform silt in the veins
spilling into day a slow drowning in songs from the waters of life
stretched fraying before day breaks
to dying embers of temporariness
wind blows like candle flames struggling,
calling with moan...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

We were just boys,
and we had spent
the best hours
of the day,
committing ourselves
to children’s parades
and folly crusades
and lost causes.
And we came home,
hungering and ravenous,
and ate amongst ourselves
candies and red meats
and angel cake, till,
full as pigs...

Narrated by Val Cole

POEM:

People disappeared.
Not just people but our neighbors. All five of them. Momma, Poppa and the three kids with
thick black hair who played with our kids, wispy blonde blue-eyed, all three.

When they moved in, I remember
You were a little uneasy.
We only speak English...

Narrated by Val Cole

POEM:

Got in a bit of trouble
A few years back.
It cost me very dearly.

Grew up in a Godly home
Never missed a service
Or a summer church camp.
My parents’ faith it was,
Not mine.

A rough crowd lured me away
A little at a time.
Innocent enough it began,
Weed and beer and...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

“I’m so fucking broke it’s absurd,” Floyd noticed the tear inside his jacket pocket. There are miserable times and there are the best of miserable times. Weeks had gone by and his dog Sue had been eating from the hand that fed him, trolling along on a loose rope. An...

Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

The horses of Gaza—the stallions, colts, mares
the donkeys too—and mules, and jennies
who once tugged the people
on their carts, across the streets and intersections
for twenty centuries and maybe thirty,
now they scramble, the neighs, the braying,
the gallop in dru...

Performed by Val Cole

https://youtu.be/2S9NpUs-x9E

POEM:

The Maga will deliver what is owed
from a great hardware store
a department, the section
necessary fixtures and adhesives
for the job, guaranteed to cement
what’s so rickety, piles as they shift
rise majestic, up to high heaven
where Mag...