Category: Poems

The Untamed, Unnamed in the Night

From a hill near our farm, on a cool autumn day, I watched the wild geese winging by,
I heard the bronzed leaves from the cotton wood trees, catch a breeze, which hissed a good-by.
I closed my eyes tight as I felt my cheeks bright, from the rays of the red, setting ball.
The beauty so rare, left me awed and aware of God’s Country, The North, in the fall.

A marsh just below, shimmered bright in the glow of a sky that reflected its charm.
Then rested my mind on a sudden strange find, that startled my thoughts with alarm.
There were prints all around, in the mucky wet ground, of the paws of the thirsty, untamed,
Who pranced with delight in the dead of the night, then vanished, unknown and unnamed?

The wind on the hill, felt suddenly chill as I sensed them speaking quite clear:
“By whose leave did you claim the right to remain, when you hold no privileges here?”
There’s many disputes, but these were mere brutes, with no rights to which mortals love best.
Still the hot truth remained, It was I who’d be shamed, taking spoils from those dispossessed. 

Their howls have oft times swept over my farm, long after the darkness would fall.
I wondered what love in the vastness above, understood or could answer their call?
The sun now had set and I felt no regret as I willingly relinquished the right,
To those left on the hill, whose rights are theirs still, unnamed, untamed in the night. 

-Doug Garrett

Waiting For Mail on Your Mission

(There is nothing worse, when you are far away, than hearing no news from home. That lonely feeling inspired this poem.)

Write a letter, big or small. Just one letter. One. That’s all. 
If you fear to write at all, then just phone and make a call.
We’ve been waiting since last fall, I really don’t know why the stall.
Even if it’s Alberta drawl, scratch a scratch, scrawl a scrawl.

Raise a ruckus, scream a squall, write graffiti on my wall.
Entertain or plain enthrall. Throw a punch, start a brawl.
There must be something you recall. Something big, something small.
Mailmen now refuse to crawl through the webs that drape the hall.
My mail box I must re-install, If I’m to get my mail at all.

Or better yet, here’s what to do. 
Send future mail to Kathmandu,
Now, now, friends, don’t pout or bawl.
It can’t be worse in quaint Nepal! 

  • Doug Garrett

Trails of Trials

Because we pass this way but once,
However long the years or months,
Better a trail of trials well met,
Victories and friends remembered yet,
And wisdom gathered from gullies steep,
Than all those trinkets some folks keep.

Those I would gamble in a single throw,
What consequence their loss. I’d rather know
That at trails end, is where I find-
Some load made lighter, 
Some wrong made righter,
Some life made brighter-
For having touched with mine.

-Doug Garrett

P Day: Far Away in New Zealand.

(When you serve a mission, one day each week is set aside as a “Preparation Day”: aka “P Day”. It is intended to be used to run errands, do laundry, buy groceries, and that kind of thing. While serving in New Zealand, my wife and I often felt like we were on our own. Who would ever check up on us and see how we were using our time? This poem takes a lighthearted look at our isolated situation.)

Everyday’s a P Day since we’ve been on our own,
We spend it on the beach or we spend it on the phone.
We send a fax or just relax and make ourselves to home.
‘Cause every day’s a P Day since we’ve been on our own.

Up and down the countryside, it never seems to stop.
We travel to the best towns and then its shop to shop.
Just like ruddy tourists, we have to pay the shot,
But every day’s a P Day and we don’t care a sot.

There’s little to do for us folk, but stand around and teach,
Unless the Bishop calls us up to fetch us round to preach.
We might get asked quite candid like. ‘Ere now, what’s to do?
So we tell them it our P Day, so there’s not to misconstrue.

Someday we’ll meet St. Peter, when time comes to cash our chit.
I do hope he closes both his eyes and lightens up a bit.
More sure he’ll say, “Wait up a bit, I recognize you lot.
You’ve used up all your P. Days mate. You’re off to where its hot.”

-Doug Garrett

The End of the Old Fishing Grounds

I’m bound to go down to the old fishing ground, where I swear every year is my last.
Still, I’m here and I’m bent after 40 years spent, now the fate of my future is cast.

I remember the days it took booms and the stays to get the day’s catch in the hold.
Now we load them by hand and its little we land, as we stand in the ice and the cold.

I said in my time, I’d never more sign for another year’s stay on as crew.
But I’d look like some fool, if I went back to school, when there’s no work and nothing to do.

So I’m called the ol’ duffer and my time is near spent. My hands are all gnarled and sore.
Still I’d rather go out with a shove and a shout, than stand and wave from the shore.

There’s ol’ Mac McPhee and the skipper and me, as we head back to St. Mary’s Reach.
Like the boats on the quay we’re all rusting away, soon we all be keeled up on the beach.

I’m bound to go down to the old fishing ground where I swear every year is my last.
Still I’m here and I’m bent after 40 years spent, and the fate of my future is cast.
The fate of my future is cast…

-Doug Garrett

My Elf/Self

Starkle, starkle, little twink,
How I wonder why we think?
High above this earthly state,
Where do thoughts originate?
Brilliant thoughts that fire the brain,
Shameful thoughts that sear like flame.

I have this voice that loves debates.
He’s in my head, articulates
All alone or in a crowd,
Mostly quiet, sometimes loud.
Alter ego? Spirit self ?
Who designed this meddling elf?

Here in utter solitude,
Between ourselves we always feud.
Analyzing all the facts,
He sorts my fantasy from facts.
Sometimes losing, sometimes win.
I’m forever giving in.

From all these seeming random views,
Carefully I pick and choose.
Some I think are really clever,
Some I’d never think, no never.
But if I ever think to lie,
He never with me would comply.

It’s always him who takes the lead,
Its always me who does the deed.
I’m the one whose always caught,
He’s always making sure he’s not.
He thinks that I should take the blame.
Why can’t we ever think the same?

I suspect someday I’ll know,
Face-to-face. Toe-to-toe.
At last I’d finally get to meet
This elf, I never got to beat.
What hilarious irony
If that little elf is me!

Twinkle, little star, I find
I’m glad my little elf’s is mine.
He’s the one who stands between
Me and God and keeps me clean.
If with God I get to be,
I ‘ll bet it ’cause my elf’s with me.

-Doug Garrett

The Fax Machine

My little fax beside me stands, upon my desk with dignity.
And yet between its plastic bands, a blank sheet rests for all to see.
Green lights brightly blinking shine, bringing courage to my heart.
I’ll wait for someone’s push online to send the signal, “talk, send, start.”

In silence I repeat the call to stem my wave of mounting rage,
Perhaps today I shall be blessed with writing on the empty page.
Should I send faxes? Perhaps by luck, like arrows falling who knows where,
Someone’s hand will find and pluck this random cipher of despair.

Come then, your destiny fulfill, seize the moment I implore,
Lest my dreary monthly bill remains unjustified once more.
Even you must know (and dread), the end of fax machines is near.
So write this on your empty page: “We’ll only need you one more year.”

-Doug Garrett

Olivia Constance

(This poem is dedicated to our granddaughter, who wrote to us while we were serving a mission in New Zealand.)

Olivia Constance said to herself, “What shall I do today?”
I have no school ’cause its cold outside and the cold won’t go away.
So into her toy box she put her hand to see what she could find:
A plastic doll, crayon and clips, and a piece of orange rind.

“Oh,” Olivia Constance said, “I know what I can do:
Write my Grandma and Grandpa a note to tell them everything new.”

So that’s what Olivia Constance did, with doodles, circles and squares.
About her life and important things like, how she didn’t like curls.
Letters like “G” and “M” and “D” and happy faces as well.
Olivia Constance found that she had so many things to tell.

Round the corner and into the post, off then the letter flew.
Up in the plane and away to the coast, down to the house painted blue. 

What a surprise to Grandma Shirl, as she read to Grandpa Doug:
“How do you do,” said Olivia C. “Please find enclosed, “ 1x Hug.”
As for the doodles and circles and swirls, the “G and the “M” and the “D’s,”
It was perfectly clear to them what it meant – and it made them perfectly pleased. 

-Doug Garrett

Flue Shot Junkie

Breathes there a man with soul so dead, who never to himself had said,
“Why should I to the doctor go, to have him on my arm bestow
Those singular and “iffy” shots, he says protects me from the trots?”

Oh, fickle, random parasite, which fain would keep us up at night,
Perchance confine us to our beds while throbbing curses ache our heads.
Still worse, I hear it can become Pneumococcus Bacterium.

This Russian roulette guessing game, has had its cruel intended aim.
I watch lest one cough becomes two. Oh, curse, I have the dreaded flue.
Next year, I vow, I’ll take the leap and bare my arm and silent keep.

-Doug Garrett