Poems

Original Poetry by Warren Gaston

Reflections* of a Narcissist

Even though I’m perfect I remain humble. Try as I might, I find no fault in myself. I never trip, but if I do, I never stumble. Some say I am crippled by a lack of self-doubt and burdened with a tolerance for self-certainty. As for others trying to find fault in me, I...

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I Am a Small Boat

I am a small boat adrift on a vast sea, waves still as a heart between beats. Fish doze in their wet beds as pelican shadows swoop through their dreams. Through fog, a fog horn, bored blasting warnings, is glad the wind is rising. The wind increases, blows against me,...

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A Poem about Apples

This poem is a complete waste of time. You don’t have time to read this poem. I don’t have time to write it. And yet, here we are, me writing, you reading, occupying both ends of the literary teeter totter, a silent conversation up and down. Like me, you are curious...

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Shelf Life

After hearing a doctor commend the virtues of a healthy diet on tv, I read every word on the bread wrapper, and every word on the cereal box to inform myself on building materials I was using to maintain my body. I notified my blue collar stomach of provisions...

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A New Year – 2019

My first mistake of the new year, a slipup back in time, I write the new year wrong. 2-0-1-8 instead of 2-0-1-9. Time has slipped ahead but I have slipped behind. Some habits are hard to shake. I have 363 days to practice chronological corrections, and the same 363...

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December 30, 2018

written on 12/30/18 This is the inevitable day I’ve been waiting for. The almost end of another year. Twelve months in and very soon out, almost the beginning of 2019. The ‘not quite yet’ between now and then. Next year still a bit off, tomorrow’s tomorrow, looming...

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Turning Time

The earth turns, the sun arcs east west across the sky, the clouds blow whither they will, or so it seems, until the wind kisses your face with cold and you remember the power of what you cannot see. The moon dances a little in the dark among the black branches of an...

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Spilled Water

At night in the bathroom after brushing my teeth, I saw water spilled on the counter near the sink. I left it spilled. Deliberately I did not wipe it up. It will be gone in the morning, I thought. Natural forces. Warm air blowing from the vent, and six hours of time....

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Reading Chair

Winter, 2017. I trudge through a white crystal crust to feed the birds black sunflower seeds and suet. My reading chair in the garden by the rosebush and hibiscus is soft with snow. Last summer when I read there, the roses were in full blood bloom. The hibiscus in...

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