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 |    11.3k views, 2xBest Poetry Period. A nothing from nowhere cast words to a world wide wind. |
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T̵̢̝̗̰̪̠̹͗̾̾h̵̥͉̲̠̍̽͛̌͂̆̚ě̸̗͓̱̺̮̣̽͆ Ab̴̦̄̈͐̾̑̚͝s̸͉̻̃͘ě̸̗͓̱̺̮̣̽͆n̴̝͚͎͔̘̰̅ͅcě̸̗͓̱̺̮̣̽͆ o̷͍̥̣̺͋f̶̭̱̘͇͊͋̾̋̄͆ Wa̴͙͓̓̕vě̸̗͓̱̺̮̣̽͆l̵̩̘̯̪͋͒͒̉͒̄ě̸̗͓̱̺̮̣̽͆n̴̝͚͎͔̘̅ͅg̸̫͙̻̭͐͝ț̴̵̢̝̗̰̪̠̹̈́͌͆̑͋͂̅͗̾̾h̵̥͉̲̠̍̽͛̌͂̆̚ You get hungry as a seldom published author/poet/lyricist, so quit pedaling words and just enjoy the writing process. The bullshit ‘process’ of submitting is submission. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Writing: Like one of those adventure games—you go, questing, in different directions—don’t advance in the now, in life. Pretty are the offerings for experienced words in these failed pursuits, while self-correcting, give another go. Life misdirects, go back at the start, yet still quest—thirst—hunger undeterred. The game is in you. Words collected, diced up for hopeful—hardy stew to hopefully share. Yet, minced words—pungent. Arduous process, hunting, gathering, preparing a feast laid out. Appease? Or, lay the whole of you on the table? Insult—this offering? yearning, find one who partakes—break bread in that communion? Fill with kinship, with loyal love for others who find good company here. The beautiful mess made: I had a lover's quarrel with the world - Robert Frost | I'm sorry you got caught in the middle. - me This poet’s words collect, arrange on a kaleidoscope spectrum. The experience of discovery through writing is THE reward that allowed me to grow and learn who/what I am — what other people get naturally, immediately, as I stomp around in it. Been blessed, but pushing it — envelope, world, all inhabitants away. Push buttons, find boundaries to trip traps. No clue why cat curiosity, living in your dark. (Bored, perhaps?) Now and then, push dirt out of this hole; someone/thing/entity might envision me how I need be viewed (if I knew what that was). Cryptic, yes. Try living in my dark, find comfort amid strange, virtual, wonderful walls that tower above, tempt me to scale. Not the same as what I write now, more of a traditional flavor:
Been more than I could imagine or expect here. Pluggers: You are an icon here.  You suffer, but you suffer brilliantly. Wow, what a great writer.  And other people’s (reviewers) words…Review of "The Absence of Wavelength"  Your poetic muse is on fire!  Some great emotion, well-balance(d), lovely lyrical qualities -- even the ones that were written out of sadness or anger came through in a clever cadence…It's obvious you've put a lot of work into each entry and the totality of the blog has eye appeal.  Published four times with one a literary journal, including…  "The Tender Core (Sedona)"  I don’t submit—too much work with ADHD, OCD, low vision in condensate in mental prison of failing memory. I’ve seen a lot of smoldering and snow. Cynicism bred, work hard at openness and consideration. ![Merit Badge in Taboo Words
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Brian,
Congratulations! You won 1st Place in Taboo Words with your fantastic poem, [Link to Book Entry #1027659].
I absolutely loved this! *^*Heart*^*
Rachel](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Taboo_Words-2139481_13.gif) ![Merit Badge in Poetry
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Thanks you for supporting the [Link To Item #power] with an order to the [Link To Item #powergifts] ! We appreciate it. *^*Heartv*^* Keep writing the beautiful poetry. [Link to Book Entry #1027659] is an awesome poem! *^*Starv*^* ~Lornda](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/type-Poetry-2180.gif)  August 28, 2006 this blog opened ▼
No specific aim going forward (2014) ▼  Now: I was such a whore.   What Was NEW Who am I, you ask? My mirror knows that question, repeated daily. Just trying to create a little buzz, not boost my ego.  #amwriting #poetry #blog #contest #freeverse #award #bestpoetry #freyaridings #lyrics #music #video #YouTube Can you believe it took this long for someone to put a quarter in me and push the button GET ANGRY? Mud 4 My Eye:  Is that you, Poo? 💩 Secret Back Door ▼ | |||||||||
| Call Back... Random Newfeed post early January, 2023 before I got off the de-escalator: ...like driving a car around a corner on two wheels at perilous speed distributing just enough weight to avoid flipping over and not sending the car flat to four wheels (what fun in that) until the bend meets the straight away. even then, its tempting to keep going to see in swerving, free-wheeling mastery how far i can take my two ton friend for a walk down desolate, country highway without serving my brains to the asphalt. first thought (constructing) when I woke and couldn't go back to sleep until I arrived here to 'jot down', 'flesh out', unable to imagine a better forum to dispense hyper-extended, manic logic that serves like two pills for unwinding, over-processing head. look ma! no glasses. *Geek* need to hydrate The entry that preceded above, linked (I didn't re-read yet at this posting. Should be noted, I don't remember 90% of what I write. I just tap, tap, tap and on to the next or back to bed.) "abridged version of my morning" Rebel without a clue? It's probably rhetorical. I have no clue.  For the record, I really feel there was a time I would have tried taking a car on two wheels because of all the other crazy stunts I did pull off, whether or not I was trying (this is full disclosure, as always). I could have been out of everyone's hair at least 5-6 times before 25...maybe under-estimate. Revamped the old blog before she goes in the barn on cinder blocks. 7.20.24 nostalgic for a time...nah...ah...no...hmmm...nevermind P.S. - You know why I misspell by leaving letters out? blind spots. Roll On! |
I've got children hanging off either arm, two strapped at these trudging, bare knife-feet through a sun-deflecting cloud lake that denies effort... go any deeper, further toward dazzling horizon of possibility, or return to the shade of my chaise, eye-consume visionary dreams. Brown sugar granules adorn shapely visions. Inattentive, savor-sip, lip-chill-tongue coconut-rum freedom, blender-infused and never-ending. A mist-swirl hovers heft of drip-slip, frost-glass. Gravity levitates light, a well-worked torso sifting summer sounds and each empty displacement, hear echoes of Mike what he told mom, joking, 'how come you gave him my body?' Wasted on me. He would have done more. Many would intimate jealousy of an Adonis-archetypical anatomy crushing volleyballs, palm-rocketed. So I play on, in agitated, mud waters, drawn to ear-sweet laughter melting into fleet fear of their departing--sit alone in paisley orange trunks at the culvert-filled storm puddle across the street of our home when I open my eyes, lid to lid. Summer heat stick, my skin... thick sweat clings, cannot separate from twisted sheet knot that would noose the restrained appendages. One arm freed, toward the blocked window lee--ean... press the panel... air conditioner complaint low rumb-hums, as I drift over black top. Tremors of the uni-body, 454 C.I. Buick spitting, sputtering, drooling exhaust drip a long steel pipe. Float ride re-enters a starry night blur, skittering scenes loosing, sliding smooth into virtual-happy slumber. Dreams ninja-sidle, whisper inaudible something, something, to me not trained to decode. Lost, brain-fog mists creep in...every thing washed pale in aging, rem cycles sailing away from the soft summer lake scene. 7.17.24 45 lines what's the opposite of free verse? me?? written here. just stuff. five, 10 minutes. Edits aim for perfection |
| Beautiful suffering is still agony ~ intense fire passing through one's soul, a fire none can light nor put out, condition one manages to live with...
Put away the 10-foot stick. Give me a hug. I'll warm you better than anything you've ever felt. Organic, yet honesty and truth will not be synonymous. Truth is the lie lifelong sought, before we go down to the river bed. |
| The perilous adventures of Gibson and his fragile HeAdStOcK A Spastic Acrostic Inoperable, Hope that slipped from slick grip, when tilt-back head crack began at the nut slot, moved down the rigid neck. With its string pressure, yours, fine, still playable. Cosmetic fix, strums good again. Just a crack. You’re lucky. For Gibson, alas, broken forever. 7.11.24 I give to you the first ever (known) spastic acrostic invented here. Did you get that, Watson!? “Inoperable a crack isn't. If you drop a guitar with a tilt-back headstock on its head, it can cause a crack that starts at the nut slot and moves down the neck. This crack is held closed with string pressure, and the guitar is still playable. It's easy enough to flood the crack with CA, and have it completely go away, even cosmetically. To me, that's a crack. The typical Gibson headstock damage is a break.” Now that the truth is just a rule you can bend You crack the whip, shape shift, trick the past again. Written 15 years ago. Dystopian. I’m not the only one? |
| night crawler Humid black summer dusk, the valve opened, green fabric of hidden life sprayed, gleamed. Wormy criminals spotted in escape by steady gaze of Dad’s glove box flashlight. Known closing speed for the amphibian, his boy did fearlessly collect thirty stinger-equipped bumbles, Bell-jarred, from a flowering field of dandelions. In slime-grit emergence, the night crawlers wriggled, wiggling, twirling against flesh of a slip knot grip, eager to benefit the pail pocketing heaps of love for game. Determined hands somehow sensed excited nerve endings tingling messages of fate, soon fed as bait by a bespectacled, blond, 12-year-old absorbing pale moon glow. Ah, mystery of the adult hours, dark-shadowed, cloaked activity after bed time, given permission, when dad wanted bullheads for the frying pan. Anticipation, soul stirring. Midnight magic, romance he’d reveal with that reel — thumb-feel a strike, haul in nocturnal dreams from silt bottom of the Menominee. 7.8.24 redraft 24 lines, free verse Bullhead fishing - zen, mindfulness
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| Look at those cigarettes. Marie Condo a, 'Do they give you joy'? Or, you can substitute with words 'cancer', ‘bad breath', 'stained teeth', 'wrinkled skin', ‘smelly house' (according to others), or 'house afire' (never, ever take to bed). It Takes More Than One Smoking Gun Certainly, tobacco's aromatic supremacy a sensory component of attraction, or the sound of cellophane separating from brightly adorned heavy stock box. Slender red tape thumbnail sought, tugged, unseal the underlying easily, unclothe side-to-side just as a satisfying ninja throat slit. Twenty-four dutiful soldiers link, sequester shoulder-tight, deploy to the tender lip, teeth gripped ~ one hostage at a time, a smoking gun. 7.8.24 19 lines with the ‘all caps’ title tuck (coining it) freevee (yee-up) why does the title always need apply to the top, framework the read? Think outside the carton. My take: quote wrong, yes, but intended as mash-up. Undiagnosed with Aspberger's, to fit in, Abed intoning group argument with a sort of commentary, but be a part, offer a take, (hence smile, nailed it, need of Jeff’s acknowledgment) — share by modeled behavior via movies and tv condensed, ‘that metal lens’ that helps him make sense of a disordered world through ordered discipline of a medium. I have just revealed the boy who asked dad, “why can’t our family be like that?” (while viewing a maudlin 70s television episode) ‘It’s not real,’ he simply responded. End of discussion. The extraneous… For more value, google ‘gun a smoke’, ‘smoking gun’ for added value For WakeUpAndLive️~survivor  ~Interesting to know outcome of (your) smokes. I find hardest is to throw away something after making that investment, in your case, the (servile) security net. Crazy watching these shows (trope) where they get rid of everything that serves as reminder after breakup, or mom trashes all family 'junk' food (in ceremonial kitchen receptacle), then ladles some green, blended slop at that next meal. Condo parodied for her 'if it doesn’t give you joy, get rid of it' mantra ~ Gilmore Girls reunion episode, mom ordering people to haul everything out because it didn't give her joy after her husband’s death. |
| I’ve been a torch runner for sooo long, hoping to hand off this flame to another and now it’s an inferno inside of me, feeding on my oxygen, fueled from volcanic, oil-gushing torment (and this, just 20 seconds of my life). What am I made of, if not burnt down, cinder to ash to a wisp? Am I nuclear? Cold everywhere else, but no fusion. I’d do the math, but know…it don’t equate. 7.7.24 It could be eight lines, prompt, any poetry form you chose for me, or write this, what I feel, unincentivized. Feels like freedom, not revolution. Two minute write. Off my plate. Back to contemplation. |
| "Before Stars Fall Down" It's because of distraction and the remaining grief that a collection for the end of this month may not be ready at the celebration of life for my brother, so, what the family has expected and relied on from me in the past, a eulogy, but I'm reading a poem with it, this time. |
| Doin’ The Pogo Wit Charlie Nobody dances better than one-legged Charlie. Admire how you do that Pogo step, man! We admit, that leg lit fire! Settin’ sun sure don’t have his glow, flow. You know? Collar tight! Those eyes blaze, feelin’ his best, we know. Hop on in, and we’ll surprise. We feel you hop! The real, it’s hot! Charlie coolin’. His summer spot! 6.29.24 Ravenfly form, 10 lines Playing with voice and the opening sentence that popped in my head and wanted the two to play with the short, tight form, keeping summer in mind. I’ve been scattin’ again, comes easy with caffeine.  Wrote three other Ravenfly poems before this idea happened, including one with 'Carmen Blazing Hair', toying with creating visual characters. I'll add to post someday? Notion: making the best of your joy with limitations and the love you inspire that seems like a beautiful summer day coolin’ and the party just getting started. Me, without restrictions. Ideal: have friends join in. Poetry Jam, man. I can't tell what era I'm writing in. I mixed it a bit, possibly. |
| How I Peel Before morning could warm the dull, in its amber flight over the roof, out a guarded window memory of a boiled egg you carefully peeled with that deft hand, unlike my breakfast this morning. Flesh not easily preserved, its oval face had two eyes (perfectly placed), sinkhole mouth that exclaimed shock, yellow brain poking out. Hard yoke, frozen expression, knowing my mission, as the shaker lightly shook, salted filmy, open wounds from a savage. Front row view to unhinged, toothy craw, before black, when it went to a greedy gulp. Not perfection, like yours. I wonder now how you savored, if life tasted better in your hands, a true craftsman and devourer of eggs? I went Dahmer on mine and was about to move on... No, you give me pause to think, even now as I look out this window again, happy for a brief visit. I'll aim (next time) to undress the brittle armor, thumbnail placed just so to peel that skin back, each breakfast, when morning light hasn't hit me right. 6.24.24 30 lines, free verse vignette In part, using 'egg' as prompt for a fiction forum, found an unedited poem to cull this from and opportunity for another remembrance of a lost one staring back up at me from that white carnage plated. I had a Danish with coffee today. Seldom boil an egg anymore. formerly titled: Murdered Another Breakfast Memory ------------------------------------------------ TYPING w/o eyes You have to admit, that alone is impressive. Forthcoming: a YouTube vid of me sinking 50 (no look!) three-point shots inside an hour at gym without a rebounder (camera placement will be tricky. I sank 40 Friday afternoon in a din, up to eight balls at my rim careening. Nothing deters my focus, gets in my head. NOTHING. Stares blindly into middle space.) I want to find the biggest player in the gym today and be the wall he can’t drive through, or stop, as I’ll plow his skidding high tops across the hardwood.  I need a videographer. Rage Against The Machine, a taut chain link loops through my head’s gears for days now. ‘Ahhhh, helll, yeah! Can’t stop me now!!’Anyone want to camp with us in August in a large cabin in North Wisconsin woods? Can’t find dates right off. Can have writer’s retreat at scenic Camp Un-ah-Li-Ya, owned by YMCA. All costs my treat. Hot shower in cabin, outside too, with room for 20 people to pile on in. Just three of us, maybe four, so far. Fingers crossed a former poet laureate and mentor will R.S.V.P. |
| I think just once I'd like to hear someone say 'Holy, fucking shit,' when they read something I've penned, Dear Poet, You're doing fine. I fell back into poetry from fiction. I'm too abstract to write straight up story (especially omnisciently). Then, I read Toni Morrison and others and decide, why not both? Poetry is fiction but in short form with devices. If you like music, you have your rhythm. You're inundated with traditional rhyming poetry from childhood to greeting cards. So, you'll discover a beat, pacing, etc. And there is the metaphor, the all central thing tied closely to imagery and substituting or complementing theme, where creativity connects from similes to personification. Free verse is actually harder if you don't try traditional haiku or write iambic pentameter. You get ear worms from trying different forms, if just to read, like villanelles. Free verse structure tries incorporate all/some but just a dash here, a pinch there with deliberate line breaks or structures culling subconscious thought,. Words smooth out like natural expressions so they round the corners, instead of going straight through intersections. A pot clanging on the floor, some blackbirds acting like neighborhood security detail -- that's all in your fiction, in showing. It's frustrating to get a story to start, but with these events, we craft scenes. And those scenes can be poems, whichever way you hear it in your head, by whatever day you're having. It can be fun. Don't let it be work. It can release pent up frustration. It could be writing to god for divine wisdom, where it's hidden inside each of us. I have faith, whatever you choose, one or the other, or both, you'll find joy and a keener insight to the world and its function, to compliment yourself while you learn and grow as a person with craft. Drop a line whenever you want. I'll try not to blather on as long as this. No promises. Brian Now, I don't know if all that is accurate. But for me, it's seems true. And my blog references my take on what I call truth, if you'll observe. 6.20.24 ----------------- just a response to a response to a review from someone who feels uncomfortable with poetry, as a fiction composer. I don't believe this sparked discourse or any response. Not sure who I sent it to. oh, well. Having noted this entry link in Blogging Newsletter...  |
| Cruise Control Dad with the blinker on We just noticed, as kids, maybe once, now eternal, Dad drove everywhere the same speed — 45 miles per hour on M-95 to our camp. Through town, 10 miles over the limit. Mom: “Slow down John. Do you want to get a ticket?” He scoffed, mildly, derisively. On the cut off road, twists, turns, belly flops from dips — forty-five. It didn’t matter if gravel or blacktop, cruisin’ speed, steady-set, boot to pedal in that flat-green, Ford pickup, weighing needle scoring its usual number, 45. His ball cap tilted up and back, sweat on brow, breezes flew perfectly through the cabin — blowing my blond hair south, and east, and west, then briefly north drifted in again. He leaned into a hard wheel, shouldered a skinless frame. A few times, gave that brim a wiggle, loosed a few of his loud sighs. We asked if we could hang our arms out the window. He’d point to an old guy in a wagon passing, stub of arm hung on the frame. “That’s how he lost his.” We didn’t believe, but didn’t question, and so, behaved as children ‘seen, and not heard'. He’d still stop at Tastee Freeze, probably wanted ice cream, too. He gave me my dime, dropped on the white, weathered counter to order my chocolate cone. He preferred vanilla. To my brother, I low-whispered, “He probably lost his arm in the war,” and with darting tongues gathered the brown melts, quick slop rolling down those waffles. The freckled shrimp spit through two holes in his beat-red, wicked face — he already knew that. 6.17.24 revised 33 lines, free (prose-y) verse Story poem 3.25.22 48 lines, free verse, originally |
| Leaf-Shadowed Leaf-shadowed crossroads brighten the longer I pause -- indecisive -- but nearer a sun setting, knowing I'm prompted to choose when to push forward into that good night. It won't matter what road I travel. An autumnal tide washes me out of summer. Humidity shudders. Breezes brush lines of starch linen where the child played beneath her gathered skirt, a white envelopment in fading light. 6.16.24 When I finish with this one, I'll add it to the Memorial collection for my brother's celebration of life this summer. Former title: Frost Meet Dylan On Your Journey To The Sun Poem in another form was the introduction of a now deleted Quill nominated Autumn Poetry collection. It's a blog entry now with all the linked poems that still remain. Inspiration is a Frost poem from here:
I would have read both poems, but before approach knew that each poet embraced a different style and preferred Frost over Stevenson...which I grew up on, read to me by animated mother at bedside. |
| The Red Canyon Heat rises on a dust plain, distorts wilt-flowers, the dry fauna fading. My bones warm when your blooms reveal, soul-heal each limb lit by refracted, amber light. You offer a lotion-smoothed hand, place inside a weathered mitt. Exactly the way I remember the first night, when you walked upon your father’s stoop. Your gait, still easy. I lack amble function. We walk the length of a solid porch. Our haven, shade where we rock, glide side-by-side in silence, in knowing, all though these years. A moment arrives so perfect, I kiss you. Any flashback since the day I was born couldn’t compare, witness your arriving joy, like the cicadas, tremor from invigorated rest. You stand to refill our lemonade. My hand brushes the soft underside of your boot-cut denim. I beg, “Please, don’t be long,” grinning like the boy. With sunsets as red as wood-glow fire, in our cayenne canyon of soaring rock, time eternal to the vortex clock. Sky washes starry-black on the bedroom porch. No hunger for dinner tonight, wrapped in silk linen. The sandalwood aroma drift encircles cooling limbs entwined, when I hear tender beating beneath breathing. You cradle a tender man, soothed. Stolen glances absorb calm of irises, color sunrise, renew these pale eyes. Fuel, the warmth of that hand, heating a soul's canyon. ----------- 6.5.24 32 lines, prose-free verse 6.10.24 some major, hopeful final, edits. 6.13 tweaked a bit more, tightened. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Imagine many years from now in dry heat of Arizona, I’ll put boots up, she’ll drop capri-wrapped sticks atop, idle in our solitude. After all the years, having spoken all that need be said, transmissions eternal will send between two sated hearts via quieted souls. Prompt: “They might have aged 50 years, but when they held (hands), those hands felt exactly like they did the first time.”
Entered at another contest, too. I think judged and not placed, so hold on for those if you’re a loser contest…  |
| “Creep” Song Meaning “…about feelings of discontent with who you are as a person…struggling to find…identity…chimes "I don't belong here" and "I'm a creep"….the idea…subject is having trouble dealing with the social environment they are in, making them feel like a creep. The (part) about someone who is "So fucking special", and "just like an angel", isn't just a reference to feelings of unrequited love, and/or the pains of not always being able to have what you want. However, it is an allegory for how the subject sees everyone in the world as more special…sees…they all have places to fit into, which he cannot seem to find for himself. The subject wants to be like these people that he sees around him in society…” My subconscious works on me and keeps tapping me on the shoulder until I notice the underlying meaning in my words, whether they be poems, blogs, notes or email. It leads me to places like song meanings, thesaurus or dictionary, some cultural or historical information. Mind gets blown sometimes what I’ve been working on unaware. I’m hyper-analytical, don’t let stuff go until I can piece together enough circumstantial evidence to write a poem or story, chronicle my life these past 18 years. I just say highly functioning, OCDADHD, neurotypical all-the-way. Board wiped again and again. It just smears, getting harder to see my mind in the grease. dumb. No. disproven (how many years wasted listening to them? Instead of myself.) Impulsive, anxious, moody and depressed, but happy; alone, inside alone, inside lonely. It’s where I’m content, feel safest with these layers. If you’ve been under my coat, you are very special. This is why I either annoy, irk, frustrate, confuse or bore. Are ya sleepy now? What’s this button do?  But love, I have, receive in many forms…just don’t work to feed it like the naive, fresh faced boy chasing a cat.  ![Merit Badge in Write From the Heart
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| On audio book number 20, I could tell from her eyes she was still not home. Doesn’t listen to romance, close enough to spin to dance. I know she’d give the mystery up, if I offer my hand. But, middle of the day, sun burning, she’s far, far from my horizon. By morning, I’m late to get up. She’s had her first cup. I text, not sure if her ears will heed calls of the late bird, pleas of attention. ‘Whatcha on?’ ‘On to twenty-one’. Where is the fun in words you can’t see without words you read with your vision, decide right pronunciation, character direction, accent and tone and proper inflection? Read between the lines? Guess.What.The Writer let-be-known without stage direction? If something in the wings awaits her attention? If he offers a hand, fear for misdirection? What plan after 21? The night sets, and I fear the morning comes. Sleep as late as I can to find she’s moved on, with more land, water and sky to displace me to unihabitable, remote island, dared to send wisp-smoke signals high, sketch this sky before blur epitaph, ‘please come home’, as an exposed fire’s flames die. 6.2.24 {dropnote:"I’m just holding out"} Until words will spill out. It’s not hard to rhyme, afforded the time. Wish I had places to be, People to see. Limited Is me. Wo Yeah…no, be… Deliberately dramatic…poignant, sentimental, done ironic yet tragic (seriously). Satire no longer inspires… I just seem to get to do what I want nowadays. Where’s good ol’ conformity? I’ll sit in my cage. Okay…that…that right there…go any way you want. I’m bored. So, I just put myself in jail. She read the poem before this. If I link, she looks. Ask for a review, Not anymore. The poem before this … ‘I got a chuckle.’ Best comment in a while. Now, I leave it, her, kids, be. This is dad’s thing. Everyone, to your neutral corner now. TMI/don’t care Tell it like it is, get sat on I emote and write. I write to emote. Self-inflicted (book title?) Hmm. |
| Title, my darling: I’m not having a second cup of coffee because of your dad. When we visit, I have to take that small cup. From cupboard where I’ve stared, he extracts and places a small ceramic receptacle in my hand. I eye it from the ground with frown. By the Keurig, cold it stands from early morn, a near empty pot. But, want to top off the cold with new brew, via K-cup, temper temperature right. He’s been busy cleaning one dish in a standing soapy bath, dishwasher idle since Thanksgiving. Now, I’m in his hands. I must have a pillow-creased, dull expression, as he takes over the machine, because I press to send 8 ounces of Donut Shop delight. He says you want 10, it won’t fill. I say, I like 8. Press. He can hear me, in my space, but like he forgot our meet at the summit less than 30 seconds ago presses the 10 button again. That’s how he does it. That’s what is right. I have an opinion, but…keeee-errrrr -- it flows; down it goes. Not enough room for creamer, when it tops to brim. He’s moved on. I bend at the counter, siphon, lips to rim because of him. But still, spillage, and lift to discover my loss, loosed to glue-bond laminate. And, from over the sides more brown goes. Hard to stay kilter, if not always off. I sip and wipe, mop the cup round left to right, at least twice, to the flat under, and return sop wash rag to an empty sink moat. With one hand squee-eeze, rinse, hang flat a crochet cloth on swan-neck, water breather, only to see more brown puddle a work-space. One more draught, set it down, clean again before area re-zoned habitable for … After awhile, finally recliner-adapted and content, I decide...my first decision of the day of my own? Merge last of carafe with my luke-leftover, and nuke, and compliment the freshened brew … savor with elapsed time in cranial expansion — horizon finally arriving. Just, not…quite done. A brief respite from living room, before return … when my right hand pet dethroned?! I’m sorry. My coffee no there. To the dish rack, surmising before the realization: on left resides that cup, clean per standard. It’s nearing noon: mow the neighbor’s yard, bring in another’s mail, drive another vet to dermatologist with your wealth-of-heart, busy-body man. Never leave half your life blood in a container alone, at your in-law’s until it’s high noon. Strike that. Never. Ever. 6.2.24 6.8.24 edits, mostly structure, articles and small grammar changes 6.2.24 Okay, I can return to normal activity, after I get out of this Griffith jail. |
| I Was A Thumbsucker I was the kitchen gadget taught to peel potatoes, sacrifice tender epidermal, layers of youth, seasons-hardened. Growing hands gripped her paring knife, learned pressure, how sharp a blade — clean sever, cube neat — undressed tubers. Kisses salved a thumb. From forefinger to thumb, sharp slice vegetable not the beef of a brawn lad, summers spent on a hot sidewalk straightening nails for dad. before there were food processors, not a need for one, a fascinated, culinary-prep observer willingly lent hands and regenerative tissue. Still count ten whole digits, employed as human wattage, who spared a whirl-some, electric meter, and by pennies reduced the utility bill. 5.29.24 I wanted to insert some logic about cutting away rather than toward yourself. Potatoes didn't get done that way. Hand-cradled those puppies and split them like atoms? Forget the atoms part. Wattage, Brian? Equal to 1 joule per second...no, not julienne. Though, we did have a fryer. For the geeks (the electricians already know *shrug*): The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. |
| Neighborhood Murders If you asked me, crows have always been planning to murder. Have you listened how aggressive they beak-clap-caw communiqués? Not a hush-tone from limb of loft-leaf space. Deployed air crafts, they float, land, signal intent, calling out coordinate positions. Am I the only one from vantage of a kitchen window perch that suspects they’re plotting something? Optimized, cranial beacons eye-hunt the weakest of neighborhood denizen. Does a ▼ It’s not just grain; murders committed need protein, half a winter starved. Foul, feathered, wolf pack, they waddle, as if whistling, wings behind back with discerning wonderment — shoulder, skip, hop-step, wary of anyone and the whereabout. Quick-ducking under blossomed crab, night spawns in shifting shade. One lingers alongside parked vehicles — eyeing the street, gives an all clear, ready to advance, when I swing the door wide, laughing, witness the slick lot, chest flop two-claw pop back up, swoop-soar, hollering in flight. Back in flock of pine bow row, green-needled, their area masts mask — yet, quiet nevermore, the sense: they spy again where the next murder shall be. 5.29.24 37 lines (without dropnote) for Shadows and Light entry this round 47 lines total I had fun writing this, so much reminding of my mom and how she could animate stories in spoken word…her nightly performances at bedside. I am still in awe of those storybook treasures. |
| Terrestrial Blue Mystery At the epicenter, everything pain, is a be-strung man singing a refrain. whether he is free, he does not gloat. We may nod, emboldened, feign to free float. No nobler in the mind than you or me, away from the wreckage none ever see, on that highway flung apart carelessly from spark sung song, come echoes endlessly. Our fate-gripped wheel fool-held by two bound hands. Mind’s scattered, verse to verse, to distant lands, where we’ve been spun to the arms of mother from twang-tongue it hung, ‘you and me, brother’. Hills and valleys paved, strung miles of cable, ‘neath bedrock, o’er clouds, driven by fable, gather grey-clung to the asymmetry — blue terrestrial sounds of mystery. ‘Love better’, opined his drawl, if at all tight to her apron, we steer from that call. 5.28.24 Was going to be a traditional sonnet after I got started. Now an extended iamb piece that I can call Sonnet XL Idea: we don’t communicate well, but did when radio and music were influential. Since the advent of all things divisive from internet to rules of work/sports/engagement in judgmental gathering, comes voices that can’t agree (hold a hand up, too dumb or obstinate to gather info with labels, buzz words and made-up minds choosing either door A and B), and don’t step up like before, except for what’s obviously right/politically correct/rely on influencers to be ‘taught what’s right). We fail mother. This is not an all-encompassing, generalized suggestion, but another wake up call to talk, keep your mind open, don’t be quick to judge, shame or participate in shunning, by hate or ignorance, without due diligence to know what you are so sudden to rapier. Could it be, you’re just tired of it? Now, back to endless hours of streaming, virtual life-support. Thinking of a subject of a forum…yes, some people are more important than others, because they are enabled.. However, clean living will get you more money for that spare kidney…where there’s a market. |
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— 21
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— 29![Merit Badge in Shadows and Light
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A huge congratulations, to you!
You have won a very deserved Honourable Mention in [Link To Item #shadows] , round 112 *^*Smile*^*
Rachel](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Shadows_and_Light-1936078_14.gif)
![Merit Badge in Shadows & Light II
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Brian,
Congratulations! You won 1st Place in [Link To Item #shadows] with your fantastic poem, [Link to Book Entry #1037176]. Fabulous writing!
Rachel](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Shadows_=38_Light_II-1936078_14.gif)
— 9
MAY 
37![Merit Badge in Coffee Award
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Congratulations on placing 2nd in [Link To Item #2182602] with your poem, [Link to Book Entry #1031722]. *^*Coffeeo*^* Kindest Regards, Lilli](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Coffee_Award-2149524_14.gif)
APRIL 
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Congratulations on the third place win at [Link To Item #hpc] for your poem: [Link to Book Entry #1030482]. Thanks for making me laugh, and keep writing the funny stuff! *^*Bigsmile*^* ~Lornda A.K.A. The Queen of Comedy *^*Crown*^*](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Humorous_Poetry_Contest-1875103_14.gif)
MARCH 
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CONGRATULATIONS for winning 2nd place in [Link To Item #2254385] !!](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/genre-Contests-235.gif)
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Thank you for your participation in the 48-HOUR CHALLENGE: " Thank You by Dido ." Media Prompt hosted by [Link To User support] March 2022! We appreciate that you tackled this challenge... *^*Smile*^* *^*Thumbsupl*^*](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/WDC-WDC_Media_Prompt.gif)
![Merit Badge in Good Things Take Time
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Here's to a world where we wouldn't have to keep reciting the words woven in your excellent poem [Link to Book Entry #1027990].](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/Kudos-Good_Things_Take_Time.gif)
![Merit Badge in Gay Lesbian
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Thank you so much for your poem [Link to Book Entry #1026670]! Please don’t ever stop being you, both as a writer and a visionary of love!](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/genre-Gay_Lesbian-680.gif)
JANUARY 
18
![Merit Badge in Quill Award
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Congratulations on winning Best Medium-Length Poem, Free Verse in the 2021 edition of The Quills!](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Quill_Award-1375927_6.gif)
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Thank you for your generous donation to [Link To Item #quillhome] ! *^*Quill*^* Every donation is used to celebrate WdC while recognizing quality work and acknowledging community involvement. Kindest Regards, Lilli](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Quill_Sponsor-1375927_6.gif)
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Congratulations on winning 1st Place in the September 2022 round of [Link To Item #quotation] !](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/WDC-Quotation_Inspiration.gif)
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Congratulations on winning day 6 of The Daily Poem Sept 2022!](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/genre-Artistic-125.gif)
![Merit Badge in Problem Solving
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From [Link To User jayne] : With my apologies for the Redaction Poem prompt mishap. Thank you for taking on the challenge! I hope to see you next time for a redaction-free week of fun at [Link To Item #dailypoem] !](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/general-Problem_Solving-210.gif)
![Merit Badge in Inspiring Love For Poetry
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Congratulations on being our Honorable Mention in March of 2022 at [Link To Item #2216416] !
Blessings, Sharmelle](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Inspiring_Love_For_Poetry-2259846_14.gif)
![Merit Badge in Action Adventure
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CONGRATULATIONS for [Link To Item #2229211] winning place as an Honourable Mention in [Link To Item #2254385] !](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/genre-Action_Adventure-100.gif)
![Merit Badge in Bard's Hall Blogging Merit Badge
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For placing 3rd in the Bard's Hall Blogging Contest, June 2022](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Bard=s_Hall_Blogging_Merit_Badge-2094227_12.gif){kind=icon}
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Congratulations for winning 1st Place during the April 2022 round of [Link To Item #2268646] !](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-G_Specials-2271325_14.gif)
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Congratulations on your 1st Place win in the April 2022 Round of Chapter One! Great entry! *^*Smile*^*](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-Chapter_1-2251918_14.gif)
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Congratulations to our 1st Runner Up of [Link To Item #2254385] Round6.](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/general-Accuracy.gif)
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Congrats Team Pedantic Poets Platoon on winning [Link To Item #1803384] during WDC's 21st Birthday Festivities!! Well done!](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/group-30DBC_Winner-2064535_14.gif)
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A work of art which did not begin in emotion is not art.
― Paul Cezanne
Thanks for your participation in my 'art' challenge via my notebook feed.
Keep on being inspired! *^*Bigsmile*^*](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/Kudos-Every_Moment_Matters.gif)
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CONGRATULATIONS on [Link To Item #1145690] winning a place in "Honorable Mentions" in [Link To Item #2254385]](https://images.Writing.Com/imgs/writing.com/writers/badges/Kudos-Brilliant.gif)
