Dispersed

A Turbulent Wind
A Fractured World
Seeds Fly
New Lands They Try

Dusty And Hopeful
Surroundings Scornful
An Alien Land
Growing In Sand

A New Life
Away From Strife
History Foretold
A Move So Bold

Minimal Nourishment
Little Encouragement
Shielded By A Red Rose
Thankful by A Prose

The Immigrant & The Illusion

There was a time
Landed on new shores
From Somewhere
A storied old space

Generations after
A new experiment
An old language, a relic
New culture of less culture

Newly created forefathers
New Holidays, New Music
New Schools, New Rules
Surreal Perhaps

One’s Own History
Became a Mystery
The Old Familiar
An Illusion, Not So Similar

Tumultuous Change
The Earth, Rearranged
The Immigrant
Are We Not All?

Joe Allen
12 27 2011

Human Less

We are what we are
We were what we were
We’ve been where we’ve been
We’ve seen what we’ve seen

Inhumanity and destruction
Appalling insensitivity and dereliction
History is not a lesson
Another Chapter another season

Life has no meaning
Killing and death, morally redeeming
A Child cries, we have no feeling
Not our own, some unknown

Poverty Cries out
Our iPod tunes it out
War and destruction on TV
Change the channel someone pleads

What a horrendous place
We turn our face
Humanity for some.
Humanity not for one.

Is this a human planet?
Or a lifeless Mars echoing sonnet
Inhuman are we
We are what we are.


Joe Allen
2/5/2011

Our Jerusalem

How can it be
Jerusalem by the sea
The Gem of Old
Adorned with Gold
Existence so Bold

Standing Proud
Draped in a Shroud
A marvel of beauty
A history of Cruelty
Everlasting Serenity

Never Forgotten
Never Silent
The Omnipresent
Ever so Vigil
Steeped in a Ritual

The body without a Heart
Humanity torn Apart
Incessant Dream
The Forgotten Stream
Never to be Seen

Nor Jewish
Nor Christian
Nor Muslim
Jerusalem so Tall
Inspiration to All

The Hills beyond
Civilizations Abound
A Lonely Tree
Swaying in the Breeze
So Free

The Shiny Beacon
Ever Forsaken
Alone on a Hill
A Golden Dome
Our Jerusalem Home


Joe Allen
10/1/06

A Fall, A Season

A Forest Stoic and Still
A Wind Meanders through its Hills
A Cornucopia, The Colors
Leaves Shower, A Fall Flower

Trees Towering, Each a Personality
Full of Life, and Finality
Bare, Rock Like Towers
Swaying, In the Wind’s Power

A Once Green, Hillside
Now Seen, Far and Wide
A Season Ends
A Change Pretends

An Earth, A Marvel
Regeneration and Survival
The Yellow, Orange, A Red, A Brown
Take Notice, On What You Found


Joe Allen
11 19 2011

A Celestial Star

Vibrant, Bright
Reflecting Light
A Sparkle
In Space, The Dark Marvel

The Million Years
Forever Unseen
The Mystery
The History

A Gaze, A Wander
A Thought To Ponder
An Iridescent Dream
The Bright Gleam

To Look, To Seek
Atop A peak
To Stare, the Distant Glare
To Wonder, What Compares?


Joe Allen
10 7 11

A Marvel, A Stone

A Slab of White Marble
A blood red vein branches through
The contrast, bold and unmistakable
A marvel of the force, the pressure

Deep beneath the Surface
Unseen, until disturbed
Brought out, polished and paraded
The past, disintegrated

Unearthed, scathed
An entrenched history
Formed In amazement
Deep, varied colors

An undeciphered language
That speaks volumes
The past, the present
The treasure

The human, the stone
Formed and created
Polished and decimated
Revealed and recreated


Joe Allen
9 27 2011