Oh, Stephanie
Here’s an unpublished poem I wrote for my father after Stephanie passed away. JPI’m the son of Patrick of Meadows.
Patrick Meadows and Stephanie Shepard Memorial Site
Poems inspired by, or written by Patrick Meadows and Stephanie Shepard.
Here’s an unpublished poem I wrote for my father after Stephanie passed away. JPI’m the son of Patrick of Meadows.
levittown awakened by thunder a bearded madman in splatterpaint pajama top chasing kids down a cool morning kicking a garbage can belonging to no one ### like mother like son toking up holding holding holding remembering my mother sunning on the sands of miami beach you think its easy getting a tan ### […]
This is an unpublished poem written for Stephanie in 2004 by JPMD and shared with her before she died. JPI’m the son of Patrick of Meadows.
it’s christmas day.the wind is up a bit,clouds are preparing a total invasion – it’s been blue skies for weeks.long live merrie, and happie kubrick already the days are a few seconds longer than last week;that always encourages me to get my wind up,to take a new chomp at the biscuit of significant living.like a […]
He sits alone in the room,The 1000 Days thick in his lap,still in his robethough it is afternoon.Behind him through the sliding glass doorsthe green of the gardenhas become a junglesince they are all gone. A sonIn his black Ford convertible,Eyes bright as ebony in the sunnow closed in self-inflicted deaththese twenty years and more. […]
The first oxygen goes to feed the fire that flames in the heart of us; that flares our gaze out beyond the near business of day to day. Like the bonfire which begins its own round grave, the center goes first into coals, then cinders, then smoking dust, a crater ringed by useless fuel. Burn […]
Mo 2 1 uhr 56, 29. 6.1992 I could not believe, I was totally unprepared for The sinking feeling Which hit me. All my insides seemed to drop through to the floor. My knees trembled, My hands shook. Then, walking, trying to pull myself together, I saw the color fading from the mountain, and either […]
A poem from Málaga, written by Patrick sometime in 1991, that begins with:
We stand in line, waiting our turn
with Destiny,
always more or less aware
that even Mr Nobody
enjoys a flash, before checking out:
That life was mine.
Here’s a poem marked “Malaga 1990?” so I’m arbitrarily setting the date to that year. PatrickPatrick Meadows 1934 – 2017. patrick-meadows.com
Here was a 1984 note from Pat and Stephanie to a friend (Bob? Fred?) in honor of their 60th birthday. I especially like the detail work in the flame. For the Record.an eagle,The heart;eyesof a hawk.what if we could reelcelluloid from the skull?.seeking magicin the role of sceptics(like us).the only alternative:believe everything.(seeing is notnecessarily believing;seeing […]
Poem displayed as a screen shot to preserve text formatting. PatrickPatrick Meadows 1934 – 2017. patrick-meadows.com
He bought a fresh loafThe baker swathed it in a square of paperpinched at the cornersgood to carry under the armIn the street he smiledfrom the depths of his seventy-four yearsand praised the arrival of spring. A new note, this, since a stroke of mortality (is it already?) four years ago he has touched gingerly […]
The church bell speaks twice. The cat seems to sense, and the dog, something in the wind. Yes. A flash out to sea clouds white as day. The trees will whisper, and the grass, in the night while we sleep. Dawn brings rain clattering into our dreams, but then, a song! Nightingale, we both say […]
I found this letter from Patrick in a box of stuff I’ve been schlepping around for 31 years, a letter he wrote back in January of 1981 when I still lived in Phoenix. It had been five years since I’d seen him, but we did correspond occasionally by post. JPI’m the son of Patrick of […]
The persimmon yet burns on the branch beyond our window, twisting in the sun. Soon the wind will plump it down. Your flesh glows in the post noon light while the sea wind clamors at our door. (Time collapses; it is spring.) You also are rooted in earth, out of which you soar. […]