3 poems by Adrienne Stevenson

Target Practice

when as children we played games
we could always touch home
and be free

home the lodestone of our lives
sanctuary and comfort
welcoming, secure

now, engage empathy, consider
homes not all that far away
turned upside down

no longer shelter, warmth, rest
pinpoint-shattered peace
only rubble remains

lest we feel complacency
those same places turned unawares
into a rapid-fire future





 
Contrast

must peace imply a war?
surely there is a place
for simplicity and quiet
without the roar of guns
to provide the opposite

life is not a zero-sum game
there are other metaphors
to highlight peace by contrast: 
noise, storms, speed, brouhaha
all provide a foil for calm

peace implies pure quiet
the inevitable cliché
but a quiet and a calm
that arises from within us
divorced from war's alarms

no need for guns
no need at all





 
Rejects

lines were drawn in desert sands
disrupted mountain ranges far from passes
meandered through swamps and deltas
cut family ties, severed tribes
threw warring factions
in each other’s faces

meanwhile, tyrants flourished
oppressed their populations
the suffering of the many
enriched the few
most condemned to starve
in grinding poverty

small wonder then
that conflicts multiply
erupt like tiny volcanoes
where peace was thought to hold
elites now strive to guard their backs
against global revolution

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Adrienne Stevenson, a retired forensic toxicologist, lives in Ottawa, Canada. Her poetry and prose have appeared in over sixty print and online journals and anthologies worldwide. Adrienne is an avid gardener, voracious reader, amateur genealogist, and sometime folk musician. Her historical novel Mirrors & Smoke was published in 2023.

adriennestevenson.ca

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