Ghost Stories

 

You share your stories filled with ghosts 

your “what ifs” and your “coulda beens”

that left you with a heart in pain.

I see you and I raise you one:

my path could not have been more clear, 

until the day it disappeared.

My coulda/woulda/shoulda beens

fell victim to the shifting tides

where hope and hesitance collide.

Now we dance around each other’s words

–avoidance is a practiced art–

and hold back sharing any truth.

To stumble, worse, to crash and burn

is meant for others in their youth.

Dissolved, those castles made of sand,

long lost, the prince and maiden fair...

our innocence has been replaced:

we know too well the hidden tolls,
each tick mark carved out on our face.

I think the reason that we tarry

and write of angst and hidden pain

is a fence we build to guard what’s left

of a love we carry that is gone...

~ We can't be 'hurt' if we don’t respond ~

© Ginny Brannan 2025

In the Empty Spaces

In the empty spaces that surround me

in the silent echos of each day

I miss the sound of breathing from another

the gentle touch of skin against my skin,

the warm caress of your arms wrapped around me

—kindling the passion deep within.

I’ve adapted, seeking to find comfort

in knowing there’s no longer any pain

My prayers aren’t heard, there is no bargain-making,

 still, I’d trade my soul to feel you once again.

© Ginny Brannan 2025

A Cold Day In Hell

 

Despite chill and April wind

and being soaked down to the skin

we stood out fighting for democracy;

a message sent to those in power

showing that we would not cower

nor give in to their cruel autocracy.

It’ll be a cold day in hell before we bend

or let some sorry puppet win,

we’ve worked too hard and know what it entails.

No rest until the stars align

and we’ve revoked all orders signed,

as we prepare to stand against gale

—knowing what it means if we should fail.

© G.B. 2025

Thorns

 

We chose not to eat from the poisonous tree

for those who did became caricatures of themselves

“Pod People” to the nth degree.

We knew what to expect

having seen “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”

but were ill-prepared for this reality

where gaslighting’s become the norm

where what you see’s “not what you see.”

I believe we can weather any storm,

still it takes certain bravery

to stand against prevailing winds.

Those rigid in their righteousness

will choose to break before they’ll bend

The world we know is fast imploding,

each of us must pick our fate–
safe haven feels so distant now

the laws and rules we held, corroding.

I choose to stand against the gale,

to set my face into the wind–

to hold onto my core beliefs.

Beware the “cat ladies” now reborn

it's we that hide the sharpest thorns.

© G. Brannan 2025

Only a Fool

   

Am I a fool to think that I

might share a month of poetry?

I don’t know…I guess I’ll try.

Am I a fool to think that I

without a writer’s pedigree

would seek such opportunity?

Indeed the fool to think that I

might share a month of poetry.

©Ginny Brannan 2025

Kind of a 'bastardized' Triolet. Certainly not my best, but a start!

Democracy Dies in Silence

 

When push comes to shove, what will you choose

as you watch what is happening–don’t you care what we loose?

Content just to drift in a fog of complacency, 

won’t you stand up and fight for beloved democracy?

For the home of the brave and the land of the free?

Ceding and bleeding, with each day receding

into the hands of the oligarchy

who want to dismantle all that we’ve done;

stripping away all that we’ve earned

burning our rights...watch them burn, watch them burn.

In silence, too many hope for the best

believing perhaps this is only a test.

Make no mistake, this is a regime:

picking their targets undoing the seams

of the fabric that holds “We the people’” together.

No one said it would be easy to weather the storm.

to keep safe from those with intent to do  harm

What can we do with such limited choices?

Perhaps use our words, perhaps share our voices.

Perhaps do our best to protest the insanity,

while we still can speak out against targeted tyranny

and those unelected who shape all we do...

There are no real heroes,

  just me and just you.

© G.B 2025

To the Moon!!

 

And it's official! At 2:34 a.m. today, March 2^nd,  2025, Firefly’s Blue Ghost Serenity Mission landed safely on the moon, and attached to the lander are archived works from The Lunar Codex, which I am so very proud to be a part of!

 

The Lunar Codex is the brainchild of Dr. Samuel Peralta, an artist, a writer, a poet, a musician, and yes, an actual physicist, who had the vision to preserve and archive the works of artists, poets, musicians, and filmmakers from around the world. It contains 250,000 cultural artifacts from over 45,000 artists, writers, musicians and filmmakers representing 262 countries & territories and 149 indigenous nations, launched in over 7 missions from Earth to space, the moon, and beyond!

 

The Lunar Codex uses digital and analog technology to preserve on nickel based NanoFiche, an archival medium that is expected to last hundreds of thousands of years, if not more. The advantage of using digital technology is its ability to record enormous amounts of data with a very small weight profile. They are stored in the LifeShip Pyramid that is part of the LifeShip payload, physically attached to the lander. The lander becomes a marker for the location of each Lunar Codex collection.

I am proud and humbled to share that The d’Verse Anthology: Voices of Contemporary World Poetry, Edited by Frank Watson and published in 2013, was on the Serenity Mission. I congratulate my fellow d’Verse poets. Who knew when we shared our voices for this book that we would be a part of something so much larger?!!

Much gratitude to Samuel Peralta, my fellow poet and a mentor at d’Verse, for working diligently to make The Lunar Codex, his vision and dream, a reality!