This week let’s write a lament. With the current pandemic, I think we’re all grieving something, whether it’s a loved one or just the loss of what we considered normal life. Of course, laments have been written for millennia, we don’t need a virus to feel loss.
Post your lamentation in the comments below.
About Bartholomew Barker
Bartholomew Barker is an organizer of Living Poetry, a collection of poets in the Triangle region of North Carolina where he has hosted a monthly feedback workshop for more than decade. His first poetry collection, Wednesday Night Regular, written in and about strip clubs, was published in 2013. His second, Milkshakes and Chilidogs, a chapbook of food inspired poetry was served in 2017. He was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2021. Born and raised in Ohio, studied in Chicago, he worked in Connecticut for nearly twenty years before moving to Hillsborough where he lives and writes poetry.
Living Poetry 
placing her hands over her face
she feels ashamed
unaware all the same
such ecstasy is unreal
when remorse
when pain is evident
yet
there she is
reclined in the pose of splendor
yet no grass
nothing more
than the softness of dawn
and the awareness of
ecstasy
and she is ashamed
unknowing
she has reclaimed her life
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Posted by Lisa Tomey | May 11, 2020, 7:27 AMLove the “reclined in the pose of splendor” line!
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Posted by Bartholomew Barker | May 11, 2020, 5:48 PMThank you! I had fun with it.
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Posted by Lisa Tomey | May 11, 2020, 6:04 PMIt reads smoothly.
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Posted by Cassa Bassa | May 12, 2020, 6:40 AMThank you!
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Posted by Lisa Tomey | May 12, 2020, 6:44 AMFor we had time and no love
Tears with bulgy eyes too filled
For our faces were ravaged
This is not for the state we are now
But the losses we have had
To each a father, mother or brother
Now we have to learn to live alone
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Posted by feyintithepoet | May 11, 2020, 7:42 PMExcellent work! Thanks for sharing.
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Posted by Bartholomew Barker | May 11, 2020, 7:47 PMYou’re welcome
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Posted by feyintithepoet | May 11, 2020, 7:52 PMPowerful words!
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Posted by Lisa Tomey | May 12, 2020, 7:15 AMThank you
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Posted by feyintithepoet | May 12, 2020, 10:09 AMSorrow’s Whisper
My fingers tapping lines into your anxious heart.
They send music notes for the wren to sing by your front porch.
“Little birdy what story are you trying to tell me?”
You are slightly amused by its uninvited company.
If the wren could ever speak a human dialect,
it would surely whisper on your shoulder,
“A lover’s lament across the great dividing oceans.”
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Posted by Cassa Bassa | May 12, 2020, 6:38 AMYou had me in that very first line and a wren! This is lovely.
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Posted by Lisa Tomey | May 12, 2020, 7:13 AMI love wren too
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Posted by Cassa Bassa | May 12, 2020, 7:18 AMLovely!
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Posted by Bartholomew Barker | May 12, 2020, 4:11 PM