Does anyone write poetry?

I sometimes write poetry—not sure how to critique it though. I think reading (and writing) poetry helps writing fiction too. But I've not been brave enough to expose mine to the world

 

I write poetry, have done since my early teens - it's only more recently I've started writing prose. Here's my most recent poem, Selkie (it's quite long, sorry!)

whisper me seaweed and
gather these tides
in a palm, fresh like lilies and
cold as the earth
remember her
in the lines the moon pulled
from the deep
these are only oceans, a
salty
salve for a
sea-drunk man
when the song is as sweet as danger
soft as a kiss
that glides across briny skin
so blow her along, white horses
beneath blue reflected rain
and let them beckon her
with softness, siren sounds that
echo the wordless deep
she is…
she is not one for
promises on
salt-sung
lips
and open palms, the
constellations cannot read her eyes
for she, she
is merely oceans away
from that ancient, burning light
and yet
this skin, she shed
in remembrance of him
of a love that sucked the sea-fog
from
her bones
her lungs would breathe a
different kind of air
a different kind of knowing on this
sand-worn shore
but a kelp-drawn soul
cannot forget the wine-dark deep
and her song has taken her
down
down
where the moon is once again her
mother
so come to me with pockets of seashells
fresh from the storm
come, my child
press your ear to the conch
and listen
for that seal-song
of home

 

I do, yes, sometimes. Silly poetry, though, of the shel Silverstein School.

Hither, Thither, and Yon

This morrow at the break of dawn
I saw my neighbor walking yon.
With haste, he trod upon the road.
He seemed quite vexed and kicked a toad.

Then hither came the man to me
and asked me for a pot to pee.
"Thither take thee to the shed,"
I answered as I shook my head.

A gracious man, I try to be,
but lending out my pot to pee?
That is where I draw the line.
Ablute thou in thine, please not in mine.

My neighbor did commence to dance,
and like the Devil, he did prance.
A lurid line of words most foul
did paint his face into a scowl.

T'was thus that I did come to see,
good sense had set my neighbor free.
He was possessed of something odd;
hence, to the left his head did nod.

Then off he went on his strange way
without a word to bid good-day.
My eye pursued as he went thence,
and made love to a barbed-wire fence.

The moral of this tale most queer,
if in the tell was not made clear,
have a care past your front door.
The world is filled of strange galore.

(2013)

 

In the opening of the novel I'm working on, a guy is composing this poem:

A mother had lost her only daughter,
yet in the market she hears her laughter.
Believed her daughter dead to be,
finds her alive, married up to royalty.
Rushes towards daughter, a song in her heart,
but is roughly seized by the royal guards.
The daughter sees her, quickly turns her back,
she doesn’t know that poor old hag.
A mother had lost her only daughter,
yet in the market she hears her laughter.​

 

I write some poetry, nothing huge and mostly haiku, but occasionally in other formats.