Christena Bryson Kern

Olmsted Falls, Ohio

Poetry of all types has been a lifelong love for Christena. Her first poems were written at age eight, and she is still writing as a grandmother. After college, she became an officer in the WAVES, stationed at a Naval Air Base during WWII. Later, she was a Special Education teacher, and a language teacher in the public school system. In retirement, she belongs to a Writers' Group, publishes in The National Library of Poetry, conducts a poetry- writing workshop at an adult learning center, and is currently working on a manuscript of "Performance poetry" for Golden Agers.

Soulmates

Born of the ancient sea we come... to walk awhile with willful wind...
To feel the gentle warmth of sun... the healing cool of rain...
And then at last to sleep our everlasting sleep with Earth.

And yet it is the Sea who seems to call us home again...
A soulmate from some lost primordial past,
Or from our own beginning... first awash within the womb...
Before we stood upright upon our newfound legs
And claimed our place upon the land.

And here, while standing firmly on the shore...ankle deep in sand...
And braced against the force of ebbing tide returning to the deep,
We feel this ancient bond of sea and soul
That pulls us out to join with that which first gave life.

And over and over on the shore,
The ebbing tide pulls at our feet...
And over and over the foaming waves
Surge in... and pause... and then retreat.

Mysterious, dark, and deep... the Sea
Calls to her children longingly...
Echoes her sad eternal plea...
"Come back to me...come back to me."