Tag Archives: memory

If you find my journal

Posted on 2025-12-16 by Bartholomew Barker

If you find my journal Best keep the clasp tight not for any secrets sitting within (poets don’t write those down) but for everything that might spill out A stem of heather picked in the Ring of Brodgar on the … Continue reading →

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , , | 28 Comments

Heart of the Problem

Posted on 2024-04-23 by Bartholomew Barker

Things get stuck in my mind, dates, places, trivia. It was useful as a student, less so as a husband. Never forgot an anniversary or a birthday or a lie. Every time she said “no”, I heard “never”. I wish … Continue reading →

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , , , , | 25 Comments

Fraiku: That Song

Posted on 2023-07-14 by Bartholomew Barker

Drops me through a trapdoor onto a musty pile of memories— all that’s left of you

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , | 17 Comments

My Nepenthe

Posted on 2023-07-12 by Bartholomew Barker

Dying from thirst and memoryshe offers me a smilea cool smooth cyan liquidin a clear goblet Fascinating it dances with lighttwirls in my hand relaxinga stubborn sorrow falling awaylike clothes in sweltering summer Into her glittering pools I diveto drown … Continue reading →

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Happy Mudlark

Posted on 2021-11-30 by Bartholomew Barker

Happy Mudlark“A mudlark is someone who scavenges in river mud for items of value…” Tramp through the mudthe best job evermy boss is the tide I rediscover what’s forgottenlike this forty year old class ringthrown by an angry girlfriendafter she … Continue reading →

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , | 16 Comments

The Opposite of the Fear of Falling

Posted on 2021-07-05 by Bartholomew Barker

The Opposite of the Fear of Falling Memories like sparkling tethersbind me to my boyhood homemy first date with each wifemy car parked in the west lot With the merest scent of cut grassI’m tugged back to the side yardplaying … Continue reading →

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Three Bottles

Posted on 2021-04-14 by Bartholomew Barker

For today’s prompt from Robert Lee Brewer’s Write Better Poetry blog, write a poem inspired only by stimulus from where you’re sitting (or standing, if you write will standing). In the past, I’ve written poems about pencils, characters in books … Continue reading →

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , , | 9 Comments

Boy in a Hospital

Posted on 2021-01-11 by Bartholomew Barker

Boy in a Hospital I woke up empty—left eye swollen shutwhere they pulledout my memory A lady sits at my bedsideholding my handher eyes meltingunder harsh fluorescents Who is she— who am Ino longer a son or brotherI am alone … Continue reading →

Posted in Poetry | Tagged , , , , | 11 Comments