“Let Me Call You Sweetheart”

(For Lolly)

A dozen years have sneaked up on me;
it’s really been that long since Twenty 0 Three.

Twelve years of living through pleasure, and pain;
gains, hopes, and losses are all that remain…
except the memories, the joyful anticipation, hope.

It still shines through:
sometimes reflected in crystal and tears;
in clear cups of tea, through windscreens, and rear-facing mirrors.

My stubborn Grandma is long gone… wasn't twelve years a blink ago?
Her 100^th birthday seems last week ‘though lifetimes have come and gone since then.

The family lost, the friendships gained…
It’s a dozen years, and the world has changed.

Ronda R. Scott-Marak 
© 17 May 2015

Life is a Wheel… for Sir John and Dame Cleo

 (With thanks and love to Sir John Dankworth)

Every day

my mind reels, my head spins with notions and emotions.

Every night 

the world spins, while storytellers spin their truths.

Every year 

around the sun we spin, trying to keep our balance.

Spinning mobiles 

over babies’ beds, 

Spinning tires 

under children’s bikes,

Spinning axles 

under bus and car,

Spinning wheels under seniors’ chairs;

Spinning hands 

on clock face dials

Turn, turn, turn… Our lives all spin.

Ronda R. Scott-Marak

©13 May 2015

Disillusion … “I know it doesn't matter just how hard I try”

(with thanks to ABBA)

Today, like many days, I am in a funk, bummed out, unhappy, non-clinically depressed.

I am exhausted, in pain, frustrated; insecure in my life, wallet, and future.

I am rarely alone, but I am frequently lonely; sometimes I feel invisible and inaudible.

I hate the admission of my neediness, self-doubt, the feeling of emptiness and dissatisfaction;
constant niggling anger at the lack of communication, compassion, and cooperation.

My tolerance for everything is at low ebb; I want my life back.

Ronda R. Scott-Marak
© 22 April 2015

“Blowin’ in the Wind”

 (with thanks to Bobby Zimmerman)

Grant us Peace… Sim Shalom

Exceptionalism?
We are at perpetual war:
Wars on crime, Wars on drugs, Wars on poverty;
have any been won?

Our go-to mode is violence:

Bombs, guns, fists, execution;
why never words, never détente?

We hate with will, with passion, with abandon;
harmony, goodwill, compromise are not in our vocabulary.

Why is the option never coming together for solutions?

Why is the first choice always hostility;
always a clenched fist, never an open hand?

Why are the roads to Peace always thought to be through War?

How many times must we march that road?

Ronda R. Scott-Marak
© 21 April 2015

L’dor Vador… Reprise (for Irmama)

“We are words and we are stories, we are pictures of the past; 

We are carriers of wisdom, not the first and not the last”

I walk alone;
but I am the product of my family.

I am my mother’s style, my father’s strength, my grandmother’s mind, my grandfather’s heart.

My tastes are my own;
but they are the result of a lifetime of influences and perceptions.

I inhabit my own body;
but my features are an amalgam of generations:
my father’s limbs, my great-grandparent’s facial bones, my grandmother’s hair, my uncle’s toes.

I know my own mind;
but my thoughts have evolved from years of nightmares and dreams, experience, and imagination.

We all walk alone;
but our past and all potential futures are always with us.

Ronda R. Scott-Marak
© 10 April 2015

The Truth -Addended for John Lewis and BLM

“This side, that side. That side, this side. What side? Any side. You can't side me” 

(with thanks to Conflict)

Some people fight with stones and mortars,
some with mortar and stone.

Some people fight with swords and bomb blast,
some with ploughshare and seed

Some people fight with fear and fortune, 

some with struggle and love.

Some people fight with lies and panic,
some with compassion and facts.

Some people fight with signboards and sit-ins;

some with tear gas and flags. 

Ronda R. Scott-Marak 

© 08 April 2015

Updated 27 July 2020

Easter - "Morning has Broken"

May the Christ, and the Buddha arise in all:
awakening empathy and compassion for those in need of understanding, and realisation of life's truths. 

May those blessed by the cosmic luck of being born or married into great wealth, or the pure luck of finding a life of abundance and fulfilment learn the lessons of hunger, homelessness, fearfulness, and need.

May they discover the Ways of those who's Needs outweigh the Others' ungrateful Wants. 

May those Others discover that there but for serendipitous, two-faced chance go their lives. 

May the surface blessed find the blessings within to aid those without. 



Ronda R. Scott-Marak

© 5 April 2015