BARBARA EHRENTREU

BARBARA

EHRENTREU

If Voice Were A Season

If voice were a season it would be fall.

Fall is the luxuriance of color

Colors dominate the massing leaves.

Leaves remain alive even when they hit the ground

They smell like grass, sweet and alive with a hint of soil.

They're moist and sometimes after a rain mushy

or plastered over the ground—

as if cemented there.

Fall overwhelms the senses and takes them on a ride

until the leaves’ colors fade and meld into one color –

brown -- the color of death

Even then fall dies slowly until one day you realize it's complete.

The trees are bare - their youth is gone

You didn't realize the end was near, but hoped against hope

that this year would be different.

This year wouldn't end the same –

Bare trees stark against the grey late fall sky.

But you know the seeds of those trees

have already begun their life cycle

Deep within each tree's secret spaces.

life surges inside of them

hidden by winter's snows

and nourished by spring's thaws,

ready to explode when the warm sun brushes their coats.

Copyright 2019 by Barbara Ehrentreu

Aubade

Night disappears as your

golden rays paint the sky

peach and shades of pink

the clouds reflect your beauty

and create a backdrop

for your radiance

My supine body lies still

with eyes closed as you

shimmer into existence

and the dark slowly fades

to a grey and then blues

as the sky lightens from the sun

I do not greet you anymore

since I don’t want to acknowledge

the one who loved you is gone

his joy at your first stirrings

brought me to watch your rise

and glory in the splendor

Now, though, his presence

is no longer with me

the memories continue

and his announcement that

you had arrived is still pressed

into the synapses of my brain

as is his delight in seeing you.

Copyright 2019 by Barbara Ehrentreu

“I believe there are monsters born in

the world to human parents…. The face

and body may be perfect, but if a twisted

gene or a malformed egg can produce physical

monsters, may not the same process produce

a malformed soul?”

--John Steinbeck

Repugnant Monsters

Lurk Behind Cherubic Faces

Who knows where monsters lurk

Beneath a fair countenance could there be a monster?

Covered by the appearance of a normal person

could there be the disfigured soul of a demon?

Within the bluest eyes there might be the vision of

a psychopath who twists all events to benefit themselves

Though they might be the handsomest or most beautiful and deceiving of

your thoughts – the most charming – there is a darkness

inside of these souls that will destroy all in its path

if it is allowed to roam freely

Underneath is the craggy, pockmarked, oozing face

of an evil and despicable creature and if you were

to meet this face you would run away for it is

repugnant to all – if ever it surfaced

An invisible monster stirs within these delightful looking humans

and truly most would never know it exists

except these people have a fatal flaw

They do not like when they are ignored or thwarted

And they react in a tirade of unnatural acts regardless of who or

what has attacked them. They have no balance and will strike out

heedless of the place or person if that inner monster is awakened.

Histories of such people include the casual slaying of cherished pets

dating from childhood where crimes were never actually solved --

the mystery of the hamster strangled or the family cat fed poisoned food

all answered with the innocent smile of this cherubic looking child

They live disguised in this cloth of innocence and yet somehow

events happen around them in ever escalating order

implicating others while they peer from the sidelines with that

Cheshire grin – getting away with it all and pretending concern

Copyright 2019 by Barbara Ehrentreu

(Originally from: The Garden of Poetry and Prose)

BARBARA EHRENTREU

BARBARA EHRENTREU grew up in Brooklyn and moved to Queens. She has lived and taught in Long Island, Buffalo, NY and Westchester, NY as well as a year in Los Angeles, CA. She has a Masters Degree in Reading and Writing K-12 from Manhattanville College and graduated Phi Beta Kappa. She taught for over twenty years as an elementary and Reading teacher. Currently she is retired from teaching, and is tutoring and living in Stamford, CT with her family. If I Could Be Like Jennifer Taylor won second prize in Preditors & Editors as Best Young Adult Book for 2011. It was inspired by Paula Danziger for her children's writing workshop at Manhattanville College. Her second book, After, considers what can happen to a teen when her father becomes ill with a heart attack. It is based on her own experiences when her husband had a heart attack and the aftermath of what she and her family experienced. She is preparing the sequel to If I Could Be Like Jennifer Taylor. Barbara also writes poetry. You’ll Probably Forget Me: Living With and Without Hal, is a memorial to her deceased husband. Her poem, “ A WALK DOWN THE PATH OF MY MEMORIES" was selected to be in The Walt Whitman Bicentennial Anthology, Poets To Come. One of her poems,”TO CATCH THE UNIVERSE" has been displayed in a local library art show. Several of her poems are in the World Poetry Open Mic Anthology for 2017 and 2018. She is one of the US administrators for Motivational Strips and is on the editorial board of the new Motivational Stripszine magazine.  You can find her poems on The Garden of Poetry and Prose on Facebook. She has a radio show on Blog Talk Radio called Red River Radio Tales from the Pages every 4th Thursday of the month. In addition she has a blog, "Barbara’s Meanderings", where she interviews authors and posts her thoughts. She is a member of SCBWI and The Greenwich Pen Women Letters group.