KENNETH NORMAN COOK

KENNETH

NORMAN COOK

UNRECOGNIZABLE

The Earth no longer knows me,

for I am unrecognizable to her.

My lined face creases with the dark

folds of pain, my dull eyes are

fogged from seeing far too much

of the grim, unacceptable truth,

and my mouth arcs downward

in a sorrowful bow, the fruit of a

life of walking through a world that is

slowly dying beneath my weary feet.

I no longer know the Earth,

for she is unrecognizable to me.

FORGOTTEN GRAVES

The still, silent empire

of the forgotten dead

squirms beneath unmarked,

crumbling headstones

and screams unheard

into the dark, empty sky

with maddening screeches

of countless rusty voices

as the sickening squeak

of decaying bones

and the dry cough

of ancient, leathery flesh

fills the thick, choking air

and drips from clouds

of nauseous green, while

the mouth of the graveyard

yawns an ebony cavern

and bellows out a dirge

to the brittle, bare trees,

while 10,000 ravens weep

a raspy eulogy for nobody.

LUNA

Like a massive white head

she floats in the dense

velvet blackness, tossing

down muted fingers of light

while quietly casting silvery

shadows on the sides of

the immobile old houses,

and waves of soft luster

across the dull silent lawns.

KENNETH NORMAN COOK

KENNETH NORMAN COOK is an American, born in the United States and raised in California in the 1960s. (English is his native language.) It was there in Southern California, in grade school that he began to fall in love with words, through a sixth grade English assignment to write a poem about Halloween. His entry was selected to be published in the school newsletter and that started him on a lifetime sojourn through the creative world known as poetry. After living away for many years, Kenneth is back in California, where he continues to write daily. He is a regular contributor to several magazines, including Wildfire Publications Monthly Magazine, where he is a co-contributor for a section on tips for writers. He has been featured in numerous poetry anthologies and has released a newly revised edition of his poetry collection, Shadow Walk With Me. He is also the author of a second book, This Side of Nothing, a third: a collection of haiku and senryu poetry, titled Theater of the Absurd, and a fourth: From Dark Corners and Dusty attics, which is a combination of older poems, both previously published, as well as published for the first time. Here is a writer with over one thousand poems in his writing arsenal. Be prepared for a literary roller-coaster of emotions, imagery and intense imagination, for this is the poetry of Kenneth Norman Cook.