Daily Diary: Day 644: One of the gifts my father gave me was watching him carve out a creative career as a poet in his senior years after he retired. This helped me keep alive my own dream of writing a historical mystery series, which I have pursued in my own retirement years. Here is a poem of his about the joy he got in writing.
WORKSHOPPERS BALL
We are, while here, bold molecules of lore
who fill our lives with rhyme and measured feet
to tell emotion's tale with subtle beat
in sweet accord with Mother Metaphor.
Here new, or treasured, forms of words embrace
as in some physics or some chemistry
and school our minds and spirits to be free
to breast the tide of bits and words we face.
In lines white hot from wordsmith's fiery thrust
new forged with hammer blows of image clear,
we sense the power of simile, and fear
no heartless gripe, but honor honest trust.
These heady mysteries of magic thus
hold us in thrall, each one, is one of us.
--Joseph Locke