A four tercet poem.

When we view the heavens at night it brings peace of mind and a since of belonging and our imagination takes fancy and we wonder what if I could travel on a moonbeam.

This story was first posted on Original Poetry last year, 2010, for their Christmas Stories and can still be found there. The events described is on of the Cotton Jones series of unpublish stories I have written over the years. I am working on a novel about Cotton Jones but this story will not be in the novel, perhaps later in a collect of stories about my youth it will find its way to publication.

A story of a memory about once long ago.

This is a pensive, reflective rondeau style poem consisting of 15 lines consisting of three stanzas; 5, 4, and 6 lines per stanza. The poem is straight forward and deals with my emotions, as two of my close male cousins ashes are to be returned to the earth.

Selena and I wanted to try something neither of us have attempted before and settled on a triolet poem, here it is, "My Soul's Truss."

"Time before Time" is a free verse acrostic poem, but not the ordinary acrostic; this acrostic is a hidden message within the message. To discover the secret phrase spell out the letters that are in bold; did you find it?

Night Shadow is a double-nonet poem consisting of two nine line halves (the bottom mirrors the shape of the top). A single nonet poem has nine lines with nine syllables in line one and then each line has one syllable less until line nine has only one syllable.  In this double-nonet poem the bottom half mirrors the top half and starts with one syllable ascending in the number of syllables each line has until the last line has nine, totaling eighteen lines.

This is an apocalyptic style poem written in the style of prophecy and is a lamentation.

This three quatrain poem uses alliteration, assonance, consonance, and cadence to convey its message. I hope you enjoy it.

This poem was inspired by a Vincent Moore's poem; "Alone in my Room".

free verse poem in quatrains.

Inhabitants of Disgrace was written for a post graduate class; the assignment was to experience homelessness and then write about it. Although it is an older poem I felt it deserved its own page.

I wrote this monostich poem the day after 9-11, and felt it expressed everything I felt at the moment, and it still fulfills my emotions. Love, peace, and freedom. Olan.

We are all offered challenges in life that come in many forms. They are there for us to surmount and conquer and place our claim that one of life's mysteries is revealed and what lies ahead are more challenges and more beauty. Love, peace and freedom, Olan L. Smith