For Becca’s Sunday trees
Solitary Wanderings While Listening to Kottke on Echo
I’m feeling rather whimsical in spite of guidelines given.
Somehow I can’t remain in the direction I’ve been driven.
I have to hitchhike elsewhere to somewhere I have chosen.
When I go where I’m told to go, I wind up slightly frozen.
I’m sensitive to music. Leo Kottke’s playing now.
Alexa found him for me, though I do not know quite how.
I needed background music that would not completely bore me,
so I gave her directions to play some Leo for me.
Then, feeling sort of friendly, and a little low,
when I asked her favorite music, thinking that she would not know,
she said, “Same as most people, it depends on how I’m feeling.”
With “Sweet Emotions” playing, her comment sent me reeling.
Since even cyber entities seem to have emotions,
I need to be more sensitive in my directive notions.
The afternoon is waning and my thoughts are prone to wander.
I wonder what they thought of as they rambled over yonder?
I guess I’ll never know as I am onto the next thought.
That’s why I never do these poems exactly as I ought!!
Prompt words today are whimsical, guidelines, sensitive, music.
Small Pleasures
That last sip of coffee when you thought that you were through.
A lazy sleep-in Saturday with nothing much to do.
A walk through fields with children or a late-night talk with friends.
When you know just where to look, the pleasure never ends.
That last square of chocolate. The popping of a blister.
Getting there to lick the icing spoon before your sister.
Summer nights with highway noises from a block away.
Knowing that you’ll take that road away from here one day.
Constant daily pleasures are a matter of the mind.
Some pleasures of the present, others of the future kind.
Like Chocolate? Here is a song by someone else who does. Me! Lyrics by Judy Dykstra-Brown, music and presentation by Christin Anfossie:
Today’sNaPoWriMo prompt is to write an ode to small pleasures.
I came down to my studio for the first time in a long time. Since I had my camera, I did a little sweep around the room to let you know what a collage artist’s studio looks like. It is very very small–5 feet by 20 feet–so every inch needs to count. Perhaps I’ll show you the inside of some of those drawers later…
A Requiem for Film Cameras
I’m sure not a single person’s debating
the merits of digital shots over waiting
a week to see whether the shots that you took
would be found to have merit or found to be crook,
but what is it digital cameras have not
that came with each new role of film that you bought?
Those nifty film canisters everyone got
that were handy for bobby pins, just right for pot,
that held your spare change and were toys for the cat?
Digital cameras have nothing like that!
They held rolls of stamps back when folks still wrote letters,
put sponges in others and they were stamp wetters.
The uses of film canisters knew no bonds.
We’d roll them down sidewalks and float them in ponds.
They’d serve as small coffins for dead flies we’d bury
and kept safe our lost teeth until the tooth fairy
whisked them away in trade for a coin.
(Different rates for each one she’d purloin.)
A dime for an eye tooth and quarters for molars.
They formed doll house tables and substitute rollers
for sisters to use in their ratted up hair.
Who could ever discover them there?
But now that film cameras are all passé,
children, I’m sure, have become more blasé.
They need Barbie Doll suites with push sofas and chairs,
hot curling wands to curl up their hairs,
Technical toys that move on their own,
tooth fairy pouches, intricately sewn.
But what do they use to roll down the bannister
now that technology’s banned the film cannister?
For NaPoWriMo 2020, Day 17 We are to write a poem about an obsolete bit of technology.
Rebuffing Human Nature
Nature is overwhelmed by us, regretting what we’ve cost.
We’re clouding up her atmosphere and melting all her frost.
She’s showing she’s indignant now by arming every gun.
Before we even see them, I fear that they’ll have won.
Her armaments are minuscule, but nonetheless they’ll beat us.
Weapons need not be visible in order to defeat us.
Determining their actions, our leaders often stumbled.
They find it hard to face they’ve been outstrategized and humbled.
When this mess is over, one more mess will be presented.
Mother Nature will not quit ‘til mankind has repented––
cleaned up all its messes, ceased drilling for her oil,
stopped polluting water and messing with her soil.
If we do not listen and stubbornly persist
in annoying Mother Nature, we may cease to exist.
Prompts today are overwhelmed, indignant, now, determine and frost.
Illustration by King Lip on Unsplash, Used with permission
Love’s Allusions
I fear that my Adonis became an Achille’s heel.
His charms were an illusion. He wasn’t the real deal.
His bombastic bearing was one I could not bear.
I plumbed his deepest psyche and found it wasn’t there.
His attempts to woo and win me were perfectly rehearsed,
We were Samson and Delilah, but the ending was reversed!
I was the one who lost my head. Thank god it was not literal,
for when he sought to wield his sword, his target was just clitoral.
My romantic Odysseys give precious little peace.
At times I’ve felt like Jason, seeking the Golden Fleece.
A female Don Quixote, with endless optimism,
If I’d met Dr. Jekyll, I’d have overlooked the schism.
I’ve felt passion ignited via heroes from the telly,
but then found out that my Clark Kent turned into Machiavelli!
My Bat Man became a vampire, which was most disillusioning.
So at least for the present, I swear off romantic fusioning!
I have a feeling that the prompt was meant to be about the illusions of life, but perhaps not, and since the prompt said “life’s allusions,” I took them literally and tried to fit in as many allusions from legend and literature as possible. The allusions are presented in boldface. The theme, however, dealt with my romantic illusions and the rest of today’s prompt words were fit in as well. Prompts for today were: life’s allusions, bombastic, precious, ignite and present.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 