Ships that met 
I looked up one day
And in he walked
A tall man with seeing
Eyes.
The room was dark,
The air unclear,
My vision had dimmed,
My thinking schooled.
He searched, he found
He asked, he spoke,
He thought, he fixed,
He hated, he changed.
I stood up one day
And out he sailed
The tall man with seeing
Eyes.
-B. Germain Reynolds
Washerwoman
Her arms are fat, her back is broad
Her feet are wet and poorly shod.
Diamonds glitter in her eyes, the sparkle of clean
Sheets and shirts, brighter than they have ever been
Washerwoman, washerwoman, scrubbing away.
The sun is her best friend, rain her foe,
Load upon load, stubborn stains her only woe.
Her duty is dull, her triumph is meek
The same subjects will be back next week.
Washerwoman, washerwoman, day after day.
Sometimes she hums, low and intense,
Singing words out loud, would make no sense,
Her charges do not hear, do not see or hear
And using up her air would make her task harder to bear
Washerwoman, washerwoman, with little to say.
She stops for a break, admiring the breeze,
Making sails and flags of her work with ease
In her mind, dances the idea of a machine master
That would do what she does – only faster
Washerwoman, washerwoman, you led the way.
-B. Germain Reynolds
[B. Germain Ryenolds, Midnight Musings, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: RoseDog Books, 2004]
[B. Germain Reynolds, Songs I Sing, Meadville, Pennsylvania: Fulton Books, 2020]
It is very instructive to keep in touch with contemporary Guyanese poets and poetry. Getting a good idea of what the output is like is not very easy to do at one glance because there is a wide range of writers both at home and abroad, many of whom are not in very wide circulation. It is, at any rate, quite interesting to see a sample of this work from different communities of poets.
