Something New(ish)!

Hi Everyone -

Maybe you've noticed it's been quiet here for quite awhile.  That's because I've moved.  I hope you will go check out what I'm doing at my new blog, here :  In Other Words.

Neighbors

    Image by Tess Kincaid

   
While the adage is true,
good fences make good neighbors
don't forget the gate.


For Magpie Tales, carried across the Atlantic.

*The adage is, of course, from Robert Frost's poem Mending Wall.

Tracking Time

Take

this day

It is your starting block

to hurtle into tomorrow and tomorrow

and ten thousand tomorrows.

More if

you’re lucky

Minutes, hours may drag

but the years screech past

relentless as a train

Meanwhile, you have these

empty days

to fill with

colors, bright or muted

music,

white noise or a

frantic cacophony.

You choose

today

Night Tones

    Nocturne in Grey and Silver by Jame McNeill Whistler

Dark walls of water

and sea-foam lace

reach up for a moon

pinned impossibly high,

while the woods settle in

to the bed of the earth

with a shrug and a yawn and a sigh.

Then you lean into me

as I reach out for you

and we bid all the specters good bye,

 at the edge of a world

where the nightmares are curled

and the stars fall away from the sky.

Over in the Imaginary Garden Hedgewitch asked us to write a piece in keeping with the Tonalist painting movement, "with 'no under drawing,' by tkaing an idea, a place, a persn, an event or a mood and quickly fleshing out a portrait of it in a blur of words.  Use language to mass light and dark verbal'tones' and build up our poem in dashes of description and image. The end result should be something immediate but 'misty.'  Or we could use a painting from this school to inspire our writing.  I'm not sure I achieved that first bit, so the painting is one from the Tonalist School. 

Fine Art

   Artist in His Studio by Remberant

Don’t you see

it’s the art that matters -

that’s what matters

they say,

not the artist

not the life

not the love

not the heartbreak

not the scars

not the anger

not the joy

not the long hours of boredom

not the sinking nights

not the coffee-infused mornings

not the growing pains

of body, or soul, or life, or death

that generated them

but the mill, the night watch, the philosopher in meditation

or the sunflowers, the irises, the olive trees

or guernica or three musicians or the kiss

...so long as it matches the couch

Sometimes I wonder about how we judge the value of art, and in this picture, provided by Bjorn at The Imaginary Garden, the size of the canvas relative to the aritst is what prompted this particular little musing.

Strung Along

Like a puppet

you have strings 

attached

dancing 

to another’s tune

until you are

tied down.

For Margaret's "Play it Again, Toads" at IGRT.  I went back to Mama Zen's Words Count.  She asked us to write about a power image (part art, part personal mythology, part creative shorthand part art, part personal mythology, and part creative shorthand...anything that a writer imbues with a greater meaning that it would ordinarily have and adopts it as a signature symbol) in 25 words or less.  I'm not sure this is really a "power image" by her definition, but it is a recurring thing in my writing.

Making Tracks

    Photo by Douglas Sailsbiry

My mind, my heart, my thoughts are racing;

it’s time to leave this land of lacking,

cause now it's clear, what I am facing.

My mind, my heart, my thoughts are racing

all night, awake, I spend it pacing.

With morning light to finish packing

my mind, my heart, my thoughts are racing.

It’s time to leave this land of lacking.

For the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads.

On Time

I have this skein of time

to knit into a 

life unraveling

faster and

faster each year

each season

each day

tangled at my feet

This if for Karin's challenge to write about some aspect of time, at the Imaginary Garden. 

Lil

    Image from Tess Kincaid

Do not wake me

from my green dreams.

In them we are blameless

perfect, and the garden is ours.

 The marbled world, blue and new

grows through me

like the pit of a peach

I cling to,

fruit sweet and ripe

and dripping

with juices.

No, do not wake me

from my green dreams.

Here are 55 words (including title) for the toads at the Imaginary Garden about the picture from Magpie Tales.  

Dylanw

    Photo by Tess Kincaid: Merchant Seafarers' War Memorial, Cardiff

Where

are we?

blinded and

betrayed by time,

endless skies press down

with the weight of water.

Sanded and salted, preserved,

we thought, like a pearl of great price

lamented but unfound and scattered

so my ribs no longer know each other.

Over at the Imaginary Garden Margaret asked us to "play it again" with a previous prompt. I chose a form called an Etheree, an unrhymed syllable counting form, beginning with a first line of one syllable, and continue for ten lines increasing the syllable count by one each line, as follows: 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9/10.  The image is from Tess Kincaid at Magpie Tales and is also posted there.  Please follow the links to both of these outstanding writing sites.

On Receiving Orphaned Kittens (or How Not Being Able to Say NO Can Lead to Becoming a Crazy Cat Lady)

    Photo by Mary Bach

Meditation time

is confined to the bathroom

and my Zen sand garden

is a litter box

tended between loads

of laundry.

My life is filled with

dry, crusty milk replacer

and grace.

When Karin asked us to write about grace in the Imaginary Garden with Real Toads I thought I could tell about recent events at my house.  My husband is a vet and we own a rural, veterinary practice that mainly serves farmers. And in our small community I'm known to be a push over for orphans and waifs, so every once-in-a-while when a farmer runs over a mother cat the babies somehow find thier way to my house.  My son insists we are one litter away from being featured on the show "Animal Hoarders," but in spite of everything... I still feel this (sort of) falls under the category of grace. 

Look at this adorableness!

I'll close with a quote: "Don't forget to spay and neuter your pets."  -Bob Barker (and me!)

Apology

In my dreams

I am brave and patient

waiting there for you, always,

to leave me.

I am a pillar

at the shoreline

not moving

not wavering
not receding.

Time does not exist

and we are caught

in the amber moment 
when shadows draw long     

and day becomes night

not inhabiting either,

but balanced between

the two 
together.


Over in the Imaginary Garden we are challenged to write 55 words, PLUS, if we choose, to use this image of Beta Beatrix by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, which I did.  We could also use the words of Canto 17 by Dante Alirghieri.  

Call Waiting

    Image by Sarlota Ban

There is no one on the line

no one to talk to

no one to listen

when I call your name

There are no more wires

no strings

attaching source to end point

sender to receiver

me to you

What can I do  

with these antiquated emotions?

Box them up,

in a plain brown wrapper

sealed with packing tape

to be placed safely in the back

of a rented, storage unit?

Or do I save them

to an external sorage device

forever safe

able to be accessed

at some future date?

Or do I write them out, longhand…

in cursive

on heavy, scented parchment

then roll it up

and slip into a bottle

to be stoppered

and thrown to the sea?

When I call your name

there is no one to talk to

no one to listen

After a VERY long dry spell I am glad to be back and linking this to Magpie Tales, the weekly, creative writing prompt.

Final Words

Over in the Imaginary Garden Izy presented us with the following writing prompt:

A few minutes from now, you will lose all means of communication with humanity.  You will not die, but will no longer be able to interact with the world.  What’s the last thing you say?  

Quite a bit, as it turns out!  I've been having trouble finishing up the 30 poems in 30 days, but it turns out with this prompt I came up with a couple of very different responses.  (And yes, I'm counting this as three poems for NaPoWriMo.)

The first thing that pops into my mind is the song from the Carol Burnette Show, “I’m so glad we had this time together, just to have a laugh or sing a song.  Seems we just get started then before you know it, comes the time we have to say so long.” 

Then I wrote the following:

If I couldn’t

communicate

with the world

anymore

how

would that

be any different?

   ~~~~~~~

If I couldn’t communicate

with the world

anymore

would I want to scatter

all my pearls of wisdom,

my humor

my clever, profound ruminations

that the world simply cannot live without?

Look out for the military-industrial complex

tell the people you love that you love them

but keep the people you hate guessing

be kind, be fair, be generous

use your parking brake on hills

remember the stories your parents tell you

time rules your life

be kind to animals

Earth is the only home we have

(so far)

show her some respect

Remember to water the plants

tell your gods to stop fighting

hang up your wet towels             

and the answer is

42

   ~~~~~~~

When I can no longer talk 

to you

perhaps it is time to listen

My Wish for You

Wistful and wishful

what more can I give:

a ladder to reach

and a screen to sieve

Then twine your fingers

through a meteor tail

and whatever lingers

collect in your pale

palms and drop through

your colander,

gather what’s true.
That's my advice 
for as long as you live.

Wistful and wishful

what more can I give?

Over in the Imaginary Garden we have been asked to write about fairy tales or with a "wishful" quality these stories often have.  The first poem is one I wrote today, and the second is several years old, but fits the prompt so well I couldn't resist adding it here.  The image is from what I believe is an open source, article.wn.com.  If you know this to be incorrect please contact me via email and I will remove it.

Bedtime Stories

Somewhere out in Nowhere Land a songbird waits for me,
and sings of things that never were, and that will never be.
I’m smitten with the music that he warbles sweet and clear.
He’s in the treetops high above, and yet he sounds so near;
and if I close my eyes and rest
I feel wings flutter in my chest
and magic places far away in space and time seem near,
like they’re more real than my home, and what’s around me here.

Princes bright and dragons bold fight battles round my bed,
and giant ogres want to grind my bones to make their bread.
Witches cackle, donkeys bray and cats wear leather boots,
Children run through forests, and play tunes on magic flutes.
Then knights and trolls and goats come out to skip across the floor,
and Irish women selling clams clap hands and call for more.
So bears and pigs and wolves join paws and dance ‘round in a ring,
and mermaids swim up to the shore to hear the sirens sing.
Old men grow young, and strong and straight,
whilst black birds argue and debate.

And it does not seem strange to me; I do not feel perplexed.
I shake my head and laugh and wait, to see what happens next.
Then the moon smiles down at me and asks me to come swim.
The stars agree. ”The air is fine,” they say, “so come on in.”
I dip my toe into the sky, and it does feel just right
and so I close my eyes and dive head-long in to the night.

Perspective

people of ash

despair in the wind

rituals broken

    ```````

people of ash

dance with the wind

ritual opened

For PAD Day #24

Food for Thought: Are You Pulling My Leg? or Does this Bug You?

Why my darling,

your legs are

long

elegant

glistening

succulent

said the spider to the fly.

~o~

I’ve

always been

a leg man

said the caterpillar

sadly

to the

butterfly

~o~

The average chocolate bar contains eight insect legs. –Yahoo Answers(and you KNOW it must be true if it was on the internet)

Over in the Imaginary Garden Karin has asked us to write about some aspect of  "last" and/or "legs". I really couldn't think of anything, so I did what I usually do in such situations - I went for absurd, gross, adolescent humor.  Really, that's all I could come up with, so apologies to Karen and the rest of the toads. 

The (Im)perfect Love Poem

Over in the Imaginary Garden we were given the formula to write "The Perfect Love Poem."  It is as follows: x (p + b + c + o), where P = Pattern (meter and rhyme,) B = Brevity, C = Comparison (describe the love or lover with a comparison), O = Obstacle (the difficulties inherent in a love affair), X = Mystery

But I was told there would be no math, so I didn't quite follow the formula. Instead I give you two imperfect love poems: 

My first love  poem is more like y(p+b+c+o), where y = humor.

Love Poem #1

Your love is like the bite of a tick

unnoticed at first, then making me sick

with fever and chills, aches and pains.

I hate that my heart doesn’t have any brains

when it sees this disease

that brings me to my knees.

If there was an injection

to stop this infection

I could save my heart from your rejection.

but I seem to be a philosophic waxer,

and a crazy, wild-eyed anti-vaxxer.

And my second love poem is sort of x(b+o)

Love Poem #2

You are 

the feel of wind

on my face,

the moon’s reflection

in my eyes,

the lens through which

I see the world.

You live

in the hollows of my bones,

in the lining of my skin,

in my dark center,

patient, waiting.

Poetics of the Road

     Image: Northern Ireland by Mary Bach

Step out my dear and don’t look back

adventures gather ’round the bend,

and they’ll make up for what we lack.

Step out my dear and don’t look back

with sturdy shoes and rain-proof pack,

a map, a compass and a friend.

Step out my dear and don’t look back

adventures gather ‘round the bend.

 Over at dVerse Poets' Pub we have been asked to write "poetics; of the road" in eight lines.  I've chosen the eight line form called Triolet, which is defined as a stanza poem of eight lines where the rhyme scheme is ABaAabAB, and often in iambic tetrameter: the first, fourth and seventh lines are identical, as are the second and final lines.

Half-Life

Here I am,

half way through

(if I live to be a hundred)

and what have I accomplished?

Not a lot…

a half-time job that

I only half hate,

a half-assed attempt

at a novel and a poetry book,

half a dozen children

and a husband who’s  

a half-wit,

but

gives me a full measure

of loving.

Meh…not half bad.

Alrighty then, over in the Imaginary Garedn Karin prompted us to write a poem that somehow used the word or concept of “half.”  Sorry, I was only half serious about this one. ;-)

In the interest of whatever interest there might be, I have taken some poetic license  in the above poem to incorporate the term “half,” i.e. I have two children, not six and my husband really isn’t really a half-wit.

Supporting Actor

“If you don't turn your life into a story, you just become a part of someone else's story.” 

-Terry Pratchett

She is a minor character,

the sidekick

the wingman

her job:

to serve as contrast, support.

she will never sparkle In the spotlight

but that’s ok.

She’s grown comfortable here,

in the wings

with less pressure,

less attention.

She comes from a from a family

of safety seekers.

Her dad used to say,

“Bid ‘em high and sleep in the streets.”

So she will stand aside,

and watch the big drama

splash across the stage,

lend support when needed ,

then disappear to the wings

during the grand finale. 


In the Imaginary Garden we have been asked to use a quote from either Leonard Nimoy or Sir Terry Pratchett as a jumping off point to inspire our writing.  I have used a quote from Sir Terry.  While I adore his humor and satire I didn't that direction with this.  Perhaps another time... RIP to Terry Pratchett and Leonard Nimoy.  The the world is a bit bleaker and weaker without you. 

Transforming Skies

   Wiki free images

Sun-shot, spun gold clouds

graze the morning sky above 

stratospheric flocks

                +++

Grey-stained spitting sky

crackles with power and life

sending out the winds

   Open source image

In the Imaginary Garden we have been asked to write haiku for Transforming Fridays with Nature's Wonders.  This is National Haiku Day, so go crazy in 5, 7 and 5 syllables!

Cosmic Egg Roll

    Cosmic Galaxy Egg by Andrew Logan

Time swirls across the cosmic egg;

what wonders will it hatch?

and what came first? the question begs.

Time swirls across the cosmic egg -

come roll with me on this next leg,

grab all the moments we can catch.      

Time swirls across the cosmic egg;

what wonders will it hatch?

Over in the Imaginary Garden Lolamouse asked us to write a visionary poem about an image from The American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore, MD.  I chose the Cosmic Galaxy Egg and wrote a sort of Triolet.  This is a stanza poem of eight lines. Its rhyme scheme is ABaAabAB: the first, fourth and seventh lines are identical, as are the second and final lines, and often all lines are in iambic tetrameter (though not this time).

AnOther Folly

I started my project years ago,

with great enthusiasm.

I began without a blueprint

but as time went on

I dreamt up ever more

elaborate and outrageous designs.

But it seems the walls were built

without enough support
or a proper foundation.

Corners didn’t meet and

dovetails didn’t slide together

but from a distance it looked so lovely

I couldn’t bear to tear it down

and start over,

so I’d just add the next bit,

assuring myself this part would be better

until the haven I intended

was empty and labyrinth-like,

echoing with the sound

of broken promises

and better times that never were.

I tried staying there,

but it couldn’t hold up to the last big storm.

It’s been condemned;

declared unsafe.

From now on

I think I’ll just rent.

This is for the Imaginary Garden where Hedgewitch asked us to write about a folly; the kind that is, "...a building constructed primarily for decoration, but either suggesting through its appearance some other purpose, or merely appearing to be so extravagant that it transcends the normal range of garden ornaments or the class of building to which it belongs." - Wikipedia

Noisy Neighbors

At

bedtime

I hear coyotes

through the open window,

whooping it up

like frat boys

In the morning

a chaos of chirping

migrates into my dreams

until I wake

to the

final stars

winking goodbye

First night of springtime,

sleeping with

the windows open

Day #14 PAD, just a wee bit late.

Waiting

"Time is the school in which we learn."  -Joan Didion

The waiting room attendant

is bright, chipper, relentless

as an alarm clock.

The room itself is filled with

soft muzak and soap opera dialog

competing to be white noise, but

at least they cover over

the florescent hum.

I sip elderly, burnt coffee

without really tasting it

as I recite silent prayers and promises

to learn the lessons of patience.

In the Imaginary Garden we were asked to write something based on a quote from Joan Didion.

Amphitrite

     Painting by Daria Petrilli

When I went

to the doctor about

the growing lump in my abdomen

no one suspected I had an ocean in my womb. 

But

that did explain  

the leaking and the smell.

My uterus has become a coy (kio) pond; 

I am retaining water.

Of

course

the doctors

recommended

an immediate hysterectomy. 

But they were not sure if it should be done

by an OB-GYN,  or marine biologist, or ichthyologist, 

or some other –ologist altogether

I

decided

to wait and see.

Meanwhile, I’ve stopped

eating sea food and developed a fondness for kelp. 

Also, I’m considering a tattoo – maybe compass points 

on my right thigh.

After all,

I am

Mother of the Oceans,

caring for my realm.

I am

Goddess of the Waters

deserving your devotions

I am

Queen of the Seas

favored of all daughters

and all your marine dreams

reside in

me.

*Amphitrite: In ancient Greek mytholog Amphitrite was a sea-goddess and wife of Poseidon.  Under the influence of the Olympian pantheon, she became merely the consort of Poseidon, and was further diminished by poets to a symbolic representation of the sea.  -Wikipedia