Entries to Express It In Eight from September 2020 to the present . |
The number of poems enforces the use of blog format with ten poems per page. |
Islands Islands beckon to us, mysterious promise luring us across the water with dreams of treasure or tranquility, requiring merely a boat or a floating log, some unlikely transport to a new world and paradise where X marks the spot and we can reign forever inviolate. Unrhymed Pyramid form: centered on the page, eight lines, syllables per line 2,4,6,8,10,12,14,16. For Express It In Eight, 03.11.22 Prompt: Beckon. Note: Rhyming proved a bridge too far. |
Of Cats and Mice When Caesar fell, lesser men fought, but greatness had departed. Lincoln saved a nation and died at the hand of an actor. When the cat’s away the mice should pray. Line count: 8 Free verse For Express It In Eight, 03.10.22 Prompt: When the cat’s away, the mice will play. |
A Word by Any Other Name I’ve been called pompous at times but never in the right circumstances. It was always in jest but would have been best had I lain low and not taken my chances. Shakespeare is a hard guy to follow, he makes what I say seem so hollow and worse when it comes to the rhymes. Line count: 8 Rhymed abccb dda For Express It In Eight, 03.09.22 Prompts: Pomp and circumstance (from Othello), lie low (from Much Ado About Nothing). |
Lot’s Wife Turned to salt at the waters’ edge, that last, staggering step frozen in the act, instinct extends a crystalline arm and the eyes seek the safe landing her saline nature no longer needs, the folds of her cloak solidified and sparkling in the reflected light, her journey proverbially ended. Line count: 8 Free verse For Express It In Eight, 03.08.22 Prompt: Photo “Ice Ghost at Lake Erie." |
Up the Creek Up the creek, where the trees clasp hands above, their littered leaves staining the waters dark and dappled in the scattered light, the air cool on the brow, damp from bright summer outside, there in the secret places up the creek. Line count: 8 Free verse For Express It In Eight, 03.07.22 Prompt: Up the creek. |
Green Onions Smooth as butter melted, rolling with the beat, guitar picking at the edge, keyboard’s nasal tones swing in mainstream, give way to guitar, coarse of voice, strident, reminds of green onions! Line count: 8 Free verse For Express It In Eight, 03.06.22 Prompt: Green Onions by Booker T and the MGs. |
Song of the Infrequent Flyer ‘Tis the gravity of things that keeps us grounded, that weighs us down, and reminds in time of the avoirdupois and serious mass that brings us gently to the earth when dreams of flying spring. Line count: 8 Free verse For Express It In Eight, 03.05.22 Prompt: Gravity. |
No Sh*t, Sherlock? Amy Winehouse is dead, a huge talent gone too soon, but I have found another - an Irish lassie of volume, sparkle, innocence and range, with style and sass to match, her name is Allie Sherlock. Elementary, my dear Watson! Line count: c 8 For Express It In Eight, 03.04.22 Prompt: Write a poem about something found. Note: Sample https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3DzeutUStg |
Horizons Out there, where the wind blows free, the world is bound by horizons, wide and limitless in open plains, swaddled by forest in the cooler north, and here, in the house, the world is my desk where concentration binds the limits around me, pierced only by a narrow portal, the net, and my horizon beyond Cassiopeia. Line count: 8 Free verse For Express It In Eight, 03.03.22 Prompt: Horizon. |
Memory “Fingerprints on an abandoned handrail,” * the fading trail of an accidental life, those unremarkable moments stored by a soul otherwise engaged, yet remembered in high definition, sharp, clear but still enigmatic, as though frozen instants recorded by a camera swinging wildly on a strap, yet now compelling to the aged mind. Line count: 8 Free verse For Express It In Eight, 03.02.22 Prompt: Illustration of a fingerprint. * Note: A quote from Bob Mortimer. |