ANDOVERS ARTISTS GUILD
A community of Artists from the Greater Merrimack Valley
Four Daughters by Betty Pogor
If I hold you and squeeze you tight
With my mother arms,
Will that help you come back to me
Each day?
My embrace has power enough to
Keep the angels in your midst,
I believe.
So while you are away, with your fast,
Young life
All around you, and your world is a series of
Dares and
Narrow escapes ,
Try to feel your mother’s arms surround you,
And the tiny angels
Tangled
In your hair.
Life by Betty Pogor
Drink in the early cool as tiny high flying birds plan their day above me.
Impending heat is staved for now,
Dew brushes my toes on the way to the baby greens in my garden
needing a drink.
Teenagers sleep away the hours in their messy rooms,
too
many
clothes,
most borrowed from rich girls and never returned,
mouths gaping,
dreaming of their last adventure in the hours after dark.
No more curfew, as adulthood promises false pleasures. If they could only stay children …how thankful they would be as the mortgage arrives due.
“If I only knew then what I know now” we say at parties with cosmos and
shrimp cocktail.
I would have done it better, sooner,
with more balls.
I would have done it,
period.
We take another dip of the fat free veggie tofu whatever and have another drink, sneak out for a cig, don’t let the kids see you, what ever you do.
Causes cancer you know.
La mia vita by Nella Lush
As in a landscape of colors
Distinct shadows
Some dark, some unseen to the naked eye
Recollections of hues
Forgotten by the time
Transformed in abstracts
By the ever wondering mind
Sensuous fragrances
Mingled with the strong
Vapor of the earth
Traveling endlessly
Into the circle
Of what I call
"My life"
Nella G Lush -@ 2006
To Potsdam
If I was to count
the descending white sparkles
could it be in the trillions
Could I then reach infinity?
They keep falling
reversing direction
from East to West
from South to North
Hard to follow their movement
they dance to their chosen tune
with rhythm, agility and lightness
the ones directed towards us
land on the windshield
swept away by the blade
The fortunate ones
keep dancing into infinity
until they eventually rest down
on the mounds of silvery white
meshed with the others
they become one.
by Nella Lush
(Written in the car during one of these trip to the North Country to watch my son play hockey)
Bugs
God made all the bugs, every itsy bitsy one.
I sometimes wonder why 'cause some are not much fun.
They bite and sting and make me jump and itch and run.
I get bumps and scratch and scratch every itchy one.
But itchy bumpy lumps do fade away real quick.
I've learned to stay away from bugs that make me sick;
Like fire ants , bees and beetles and the little tick,
And yellow jackets trying to get my corn for a lick.
God didn't make a mistake when the cricket sings.
Bugs feed the birds, skunks and bats and other furry things.
When I go outside to explore what this day brings,
I know that bugs will be among my biggest blessings!
Lying in the grass the flies buzz 'round my nose,
And soon a little ant is crawling up my toes.
I brush him off and watch to find out where he goes,
Down into a hole in the ground where no one knows.
I like to see the butterflies that brighten up my way,
And grasshoppers who jump, and jump so far away,
And when I see the lady bugs so bright I say,
"Thank you, God, for making bugs to watch this summer day!”
by Valerie Borgal
1996
Written to the honor and glory of God, our wonderful Creator,
for my K-4 class at Fellowship Christian Academy to sing
during the Bug Parade.
Pigtailed Girl
It was a wonderful day in the Borgal’s backyard as the sun was shining bright.
On the lawn dark shadows played against the dazzling sunlight
Even better than the warmth of the sun was the pigtailed girl who warmed my heart,
As she stooped and petted me, instead of doing her art.
Her kind hand smoothed down my fur from my head down to my tail.
It felt so good, so much better than catching a nightingale.
I rubbed myself up against her and purred to my heart’s content.
While her brushes and paper waited along with her pretty pigment.
I walked off into the tall leaves of the day lilies now gone by,
disappeared within the growth, I really don’t know why.
Soon I reappeared disguised as a floppy-green-eared-rabbit,
sneaking out from my hiding place, but she did not fall for it.
I noticed she was trying to remove all my fur from her clothes
She got it all off knowing it affects her mother’s nose.
She went back to her painting and I just relaxed in the sun on the lawn.
Another wonderful day as I lay and stretched with a great big yawn.
By
Valerie Borgal
Written 10/4/99, revised 3/5/2007
To the pigtailed girl, Katie Wuthrich
SKUNKS
Stinky, smelly, phew!
Keep your stink with you!
Up my nose your orders go.
Never a stench goes away so slow.
Keeps my air a noxious residue.
Stinky, smelly, phew!
By
Valerie Borgal
7/23/2008
After being awaken in the middle of the night, this poem came to me.