October 2, 2009
Untitled
Each year the saddest month
Approaches like a thief
Robbing my tranquillity
Leaving me with grief
I need not tell directly
The truth within these lines
Thirty-one days of sorrow
Held in it’s design
The first full month of autumn
The leaves began to fall
She left that cold gray morning
I can vividly recall
The tail lights fading quickly
Her car speeds up the road
My eyes are deep and misty
A tragedy bestowed
A kiss absent is fading
That was our last good-bye
I thought it would be different
We vanished with a sigh
For we talked of reuniting
A tomorrow coming soon
Discussing the arrangements
For the moment opportune
In our youth we didn’t notice
The wishful thinking of our hearts
Now our memory is fading
The dissolution starts
In short time we simply fade away
She’ll rarely cross my mind
Until the anniversary
Finds me to remind
Early on the sixth day
My life’s dramatic turning
Though time erased the suffering
My heart still feels a yearning
The month within the stanzas
Of the poem you just read
The sum is a solution
Of my final clue imbed
Copyright © 2001 by Jake Olden Shy
March 21, 2009
Father’s Day
You are strength when I am weakness
A guide when I am lost
My vision through the bleakness
O’er troubled waters crossed
Separated by great distance
You were always there
Your love was my subsistence
An answer to my prayer
Your footsteps have I followed
On a path yet all my own
Hard lessons have I swallowed
Your support was set in stone
I cannot begin to thank you
I am all I ever want to be
Nothing more need I live up to
If my dad is proud of me
Copyright © 2000 by Jake Olden Shy
January 24, 2009
Home Again
Home for the holidays
Quiet mountain felicity
And snow on Christmas Eve
A family gathers
Three generations
And the rest
One absent and one taken
A bittersweet element
Stirs the sacred mixture
Leaving a sour taste
To fresh fruit pies
And hot chocolate
Shared smiles and laughter
Children make the memory
An unforgettable pleasantry
Copyright © 2000 by Jake Olden Shy
September 28, 2008
First Love Lost
Lonely on this corner
Heart hangs on my sleeve
Taillights are diminishing
As I watch you leave
Never before in my life
Has there been a love so pure
At first sight it was unseen
Years later it endures
A tragedy split apart
My heart beat to explode
A lifetime crashing in on me
Isolation my abode
Oceans flowing from my eyes
Air in gulping breath
Love becomes a world apart
This loss becomes my death
Copyright © 1999 by Jake Olden Shy
September 25, 2008
Beginnings
A moment etched upon my mind
The time of our retreat
I hardly knew you at the start
I loved you when complete
Trapped within assembled masses
Anxious to be alone
A lifetime waiting for the chance
To steal away on our own
Sunshine fills the cabin room
Our endless conversation
Angelic face in palmer’s kiss
You hold my adoration
Through the forest hand-in-hand
The birds chirp and sing
Sharing our first awkard kisses
Feeling Cupid’s sting
A swim together in the lake
Alone in time and space
Holding you within my arms
Floating in embrace
As darkness falls around us
Your smile lights up the room
Liquid-brown eyes hold me fast
My devotions they consume
You’ve touched me like no one before
I’ve quietly acquiesced
A friend, a lover, so much more
My soul at last is blessed
Finally, the weekend had to end
Time can’t be outrun
Finding ‘You and I’ had parted
‘We’ had just begun
A quiet moment bittersweet
A last touch of our hands
Anticipation of tomorrow
As our love expands
Copyright © 1999 by Jake Olden Shy
August 15, 2008
Love of Song
My spirit finds itself renewed
In the kinship of a song
Answers to my questions posed
Hidden for so long
Flood into my consciousness
And help to make me strong
An interesting turn-of-phrase
Beyond normal convention
Bends the mind toward new thinking
The soul begins ascension
Insight the final destination
And the poet’s sole intention
So much can we learn today
Peace is soon at hand
If we only stop to listen
To the music of the band
Their words can bring enlightenment
And our problems they’ll remand
Heartaches will soon dissipate
Healing can begin
A forgiveness freely given
Will release you from your sin
If within a melody
You find yourself akin
Do you see this in your life?
Can you feel my passion?
These thoughts and their appeal
Will not fall out of fashion
From this world you’ll find escape
And within your heart, compassion
So, come with me this very day
It’s time to move along
Let the rhythm fill your soul
You’ll find where you belong
Within these words my dedication
For the true love of a song
Copyright © 1999 by Jake Olden Shy
July 22, 2008
The Ride Home
Driving down the quiet Alabama road
The town growning smaller in my mirror
I remember the store where my cousin and I
walked. We bought candy on Summer afternoons
Borded-up and abandoned
I remember the old men playing checkers
outside. How they’d humor us and let us play
Frustrated when we’d beat them
I remember my father learning to
drive. The close call at those railroad tracks
Almost forgotten
I remember passing the wooded land my family
sold. Littered with mobile homes
My heart was broken
I remember my brother and cousin’s long walk
home. We stole their motorcycles for a lark
We couldn’t stop laughing
I remember the first time I played spin-the-
bottle. In that old barn.
Awkward kisses
I remember how nice it was to be there
And how much nicer it will be to get home
Copyright © 1999 by Jake Olden Shy
July 13, 2008
Remembering
Waves merge together and kiss the shore
As seagulls dance and cry
With peace my soul can find rapport
In a soothing azure sky
Grains of sand pour through my hand
An hourglass upon the ground
The essence of time I understand
Represented in the mound
My thoughts race to a quieter time
To events of fun and folly
My life presents in perfect rhyme
Though it leaves me melancholy
But more I find where I belong
The surf rejuvenating
Like finding answers in a song
My troubles are abating
So, through reflections of the past
My mind wanders at length
The days I’ve lived have gone too fast
Reminiscing gives me strength
Copyright © 1999 by Jake Olden Shy
