Mary Angela Douglas

Mary Angela Douglas Poems

to Ray Bradbury, looking back, or forward

the names of things we held in our heart
when alphabets foundered and worlds came apart
...

to my sister, Sharon,
and all her glistening music

go deeper into the woods soothed my pages,
...

...
my memory's screen door opens to the stars;
there's my Grandfather in the yard
gazing up at the constellations
...

4.

we make useful things: things that won't shatter.
we make useful things, things that Matter.
think of a wave on the sea, I said;
...

song itself came to the back stairs of the castle
in a drenching rain
like the princess in old fairy stories, refrains
...

what if we wrote notes in the snow

here we were when the birds finished the breadcrumb trail
...

last minute drugstore gifts are best for pure excitement!
someone's sure to want just one more box of
chocolate covered cherries-
...

I wrote on a page of light;
it vanished.
then there was night.
...

once I loved a catalpa tree

because its leaves stirred heart shaped in the wind
...

[to God our Father]

this is to the One who caused, who causes
music to arise though He is denied
...

if I could have written on an endless sky
the beginning and ending of your fraught and mysterious syllables
and only in clouds that I knew would fade
Poetry, still I would have tried.
...

let the moon be bright and clear in my poem about the lilacs
though I know so many have written, have sung about them before

still they have not written my lilacs into their poems
...

to William Shakespeare and all the others..., to Poetry itself in all its finest hours

keep watch on the waters under the bridge
lest floodtide reach again that ridge
...

EPILOGUE

for Ilya and Emilia Kabakov
...

[once more, to The Brothers Grimm]

how marvelous it seemed to you then
the cobbler asleep at his bench
...

16.

standing before the space where
poems may come
you dodge the thrift of
...

not a poem, but just a heartfelt message to you:

I wish everyone a Happy New Year 2022.Sometimes I feel worried: what will the New Year hold? So many troubling headlines. Stepping out into the fresh snow of time what will we find? I hear the Holy Spirit inside me say: YOU WILL FIND AS IN ALL THE OTHER YEARS OF YOUR LIFE THE COMFORT AND THE STRENGTH AND THE JOY OF GOD WHO HOLDS TIME AND ETERNITY AND EACH OF US IN HIS STRONG HANDS. Fear Not, the Christmas angels sang. FEAR NOT.
...

(for the installation artist Ilya Kabakov, on a corner of his sky)
(and to Emilia Kabakov, who I think, surely must BE his angel)

if he paints the moon in a corner of the sky
...

nothing in the news for days.
Ilya Kabakov passed away just last Saturday
no obituaries anywhere
that I can see on a google search
...

for Ilya and Emilia Kabakov

one crystal angel
...

Mary Angela Douglas Biography

[PLEASE NOTE: All my poems are U.S. Copyrighted by date indicated at the bottom of the poem and all world-wide rights are reserved, including the right of translation into any language specifically to each and every poem and only to and for Mary Angela Douglas.] I love poetry past, present, and future. I especially love this website becomes it deeply welcomes all poets and I am very happy to be welcomed here. I have deep respect for everyone writing here. May you never stop writing poetry. It is one of the finest things that can be done in life, but then, you alredy know that, don't you? May your joy in poetry and your poems, every blessed word, live forever, as it is also, your mind, your heart, your soul shining out to others. To anyone and each person specifically who has ever read even one poem of mine or left a kind and beautiful comment, THANK YOU WITH ALL MY HEART. It means so much to me. And I feel like truly whenever I write a poem I am writing in communion with each and every one and together we are all one beautiful bouquet of poetry to the glory of God. We are published in Heaven anytime and everytime we write with our whole heart and soul. I am sure of that. TO POETRY. FOREVER. IN HONOR OF NATIONAL POETRY MONTH APRIL 2021 if I could have written on an endless sky the beginning and ending of your fraught and mysterious syllables and only in clouds that I knew would fade Poetry, still I would have tried. or gone up in flame like the least, scarlet leaf to find one gold remaining song from you in pieces, weeping on the ground- one singing fragment from the ancient past of you still singed. I traded in beauty the poet Sara Teasdale said who left your words to prove long after her evening star had vanished that she lived and suffered here; so had she anchored so many goodbyes. even in a banished Kingdom, in a mere and clouded handful of sighs we still will whisper your name: even in the Kingdom of lies, still shine with your truth: down to the last and ragged shore of our breath form of music; form of the quenchless tremulous soul eluding death lyre unquenchable through all ages: burnished, anguished, raging ineffable heart streaming with all the Maypole ribbons of your art world without end do not leave us orphaned at the core of all speech forever beautiful and just beyond our reach. touchstone, high watermark of God Himself may you prevail. mary angela douglas 16 april 2021)

The Best Poem Of Mary Angela Douglas

The Names Of Things

to Ray Bradbury, looking back, or forward

the names of things we held in our heart
when alphabets foundered and worlds came apart
and the clouds drifted over mindless borders

and were crucified.
the names of things, the orange and the lemon
the midnight zither and the bluebird plans

the tissue paper birthdays at a secret command
all disappeared, their ribbons curling.
all but the names we taught our children to revere and

year past year,
never to split the silver from the rains,
to refrain from negating the Soul.

and ever to stow the heirloom
jewelry of the stars intact.
and always to be looking back

at the green world when all its
colours were singing
and we were the Story and the story told

and we were the Tree,
and the leaves of gold.

mary angela douglas 3 february 2017

Mary Angela Douglas Comments

Ovi Odiete 02 July 2016

You are such a Vast, Versatile and talented Poetess.....

0 0 Reply
Kumarmani Mahakul 27 October 2018

On behalf of all fellow poets of PH Family and our Mahakul Family we offer a title of honour to poetess Mary Angela Douglas as, Empyrean Elegance. From today onward she will be known as Empyrean Elegance Mary Angela Douglas. This title of honour is offered to her due to her outstanding perseverance and contribution to the world literature. Her poems are deeply philosophical and valuable. We hope, all poets, visitors and people will like this title offered to her.

3 0 Reply
Ann Buermann Wass 06 July 2018

Was thinking about you recently and wondering if I could find you. Remember our days at Fontbonne together?

0 0 Reply
Prabhata Kumar Sahoo 08 May 2017

I love your poet'page.I am tempted to read more about your works after going thru a few.

1 0 Reply
James Mclain 15 November 2016

Few have the honesty As do you To have like you the truth As you speak in your Biography .. James

2 0 Reply
Mary Douglas 02 July 2016

Thank you for your kind comment Odiete. I believe that poetry and being a poet is from God. If there is any vastness in my poems it comes from my being happy to think about the vastness of God. We are all vast in Him I like to think too. My versatility comes from having a scattered, butterfly like brain that likes to flit from flower to flower in terms of topics to think about (why I always had trouble with writing research papers in school at the last minute; not from procrastination, just from liking too much to research and keep finding things out without drawing conclusions. Heaven will be at least in part, for me, I think, the joy of NEVER AGAIN HAVING TO DRAW CONCLUS9ONS! God bless you a abundantly in your continuing (and already eternal) life as a poet. Thank You. Mary Angela Douglas

2 0 Reply

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