Michael Shepherd Poems

Your bliss is not my bliss
and yet perhaps
if I tell you my bliss
there may be a place
...

and some other father at the club
says, has she flown the nest yet?
and it sounds so crude
you don’t want to answer.
...

Every poem is an invitation
for the readers to use their imagination

a vehicle licensed
...

A centre and an expansion
a life centred expanding
the force of the centre whirls
a life without limit but it says
...

Your friend is one who answers to your needs:
the field you sow with love, and reap with thanks;
you seek him for your peace, to hear his heart;
and when he's silent - still his heart you hear:
...

Straightway - it's the tone.
Even; quiet but clear; is it writing, or is it talking?
As if to family: you're being filled in
on what happened yesterday or last week;
...

O Great Spirit,
You who in Your form of the Chapungu,
the great eagle with sharper eye than any aeroplane,
watches over us and knows all things;
...

They were young lovers, and seated at the table in the window;
where in Paris they'd be watching
the passers-by watching them...
but no.
...

We see you every day
on the newsreels
a face like the worn map of tragedy
lined with a life of service
...

Everyone but poets
(who have their own allegiances)
would acknowledge it – you were, and I guess still are,
the most famous and popular poet of
...