Monthly Archives: December 2021

Air Despair

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Air Despair

I get goosebumps every time I travel via jet,
but I haven’t  crashed and burned or perished as of yet.
Pedants say my chances of crashing are remote,
but nonetheless, if I could choose, I’d rather take a boat.

The revelry is greater and the distance to the ground
is cushioned way much better with water all around.
It’s easier to stretch one’s legs, there’s shuffleboard, a pool,
and every cabin has a bed with private sink and stool!

Although planes are faster, what’s the hurry? What’s the rush?
Consider airplane food, the tiny restrooms and the crush.
First class in planes has nothing on last class in luxury cruisers.
In short, I think planes were invented for impatient losers!!

Prompts today are revelry, jet, pedant and goosebumps.

FOTD, Cee’s Poinsettia Challenge, Dec 8, 2021

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Please click on photos to increase size.

I went back six years to find images of poinsettias For Cee’s FOTD

Happy Group

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This cheerful group of young ladies from San Juan Cosala visited me today to see my art boxes for inspiration for the ones they are creating for a competition I’m sponsoring.The show will be held a Isidro Xilonzochitl’s studio in San Juan on January 22. That’s Isidro in back.

These are the boxes  with bases that I bought to give to the participants.They will need to add a back before creating their own response to the challenge.

Here are a few of the boxes they saw at my house. These are all by me.

Click on photos to enlarge.

Circus Muses
Jaina Woman, Autumn
Jaina Woman, Spring
Our Lady of Notions
Frida:Painterminable (Pain, Painter, Interminable)

And here is another one by Belia Canals:

Can’t wait to see what these young ladies plus the four women who couldn’t come today create for the January show. This will be the first in a series of challenges and workshops I hope to conduct this year.

Forest Myth

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Forest Myth

Will-o-the-Wisp and Turtledove for a lady vied.
Will-o-the-Wisp declared a troth the turtledove decried.

“He will be here, then he’ll be there. He’ll never constant be.
I am the only one who’ll be eternally with thee.”

And thus he was the one to win the love of that fair lass.
He wed her in cathedral grand and at their wedding mass,

“I will not change” to his new bride, the turtledove had sighed.
For thirty years he kept this vow, but when at last he died,

he left her mourning down below as he soared up above.
Thus death makes sinners of us all who vow eternal love.

 

Prompt words today are turtledove, plunge, sleep, change and not,

India Shot Lily: FOTD Dec 7, 2021

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For Cee’s FOTD

Purple Prose

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Purple Prose

  Grandma grinds plums in her conical grinder, shredding the flesh from the pits. Under the table, my little brother sits, purple around his mouth from taste-testing the plums he no doubt earlier helped her pick. A stream of sugar on the table is a roadway for tiny black ants.

  My father pushes a cooling cup of Postum closer to my grandmother as he resumes the story I’ve interrupted. It is another “Deafy Sterner” story, and he emulates the high explosive accent of this man from his past that I’ve never met, yet know so well.

  I dash to my room, having just minutes to prepare for the dance before my car full of friends arrives, honking the horn. My Grandmother begins another story about the old country as I tear off my school jeans. I dress in their stories—patterned and purple as night.

Below is the dVerse Poets prompt today. The quote we are to use in our short prose piece is by Kimberly Blaeser from her poem “When We Sing of Might.” Image by Engin Akyurt on Unsplash.


Photo of Kimberly Blaeser from University of Wisconsin

“I dress in their stories patterned and purple as night.”

Incorporate the above quote into a piece of prose. This can be either flash fiction, non-fiction, or creative non-fiction, but it must be prose! Not prose poetry, and not a poem. And it must be no longer than 144 words, not including the title. (It does not have to be exactly 144 words, but it can’t exceed 144 words.)

Advice to Reticent Romeos

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Advice to Reticent Romeos

If you are greeted with, perchance,
 a flirtatious lady’s glance
in a cabaret in France,
Hedge your bet, bolster your chance,
square your shoulders, hitch your pants
and ask her if she’d like to dance!

If in a tropical lanai
a  cute wahine meets your eye,
do not simply pass her by.
Adjust your smile, straighten your tie,
and claim your portion of the pie.
Use up your life before you die!

Around the globe, it’s my conclusion
that this advice is no delusion.
Confidence with no confusion
that it  may be a mere illusion,
bolsters chances of a fusion!

 

Prompt words today are conclusion,   bolster,  lanai, hedge and cabaret.
Image by Jiang Xule on Unsplash.

India Shot Flower, Budding Out: FOTD Dec 6, 2021

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For Cee’s FOTD

Summer Block Party: The Sunday Whirl Wordle 530

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Summer Block Party

So many trillion burning stars form the signs of night.
Most of them so secret that they are out of sight.

Others are so numerous, they form a sort of haze,
spreading out a Milky Way at which we like to gaze,

lying spread-eagled in the grass, during summer nights,
cockleburrs’ sharp edges and mosquito bites.

The chattering of mothers on our screened front porch,
feline yowls and dog barks, Father’s questing torch,

seeking out the faucet to turn the water off.
A roar of laughter from the men, a smoker’s raucous cough.

All the familiar voices of our little hive—
the neighborhood we live in, cozy and alive.

All the roles we choose to fill united for this night
when the stars have chosen to bless us with their light.

For The Sunday Whirl Wordle 530  The prompt words are: edge, stars, roar, burn, role, chatter, hive, sign, feline, curse, haze, secret. Image by Andy Holmes on Unsplash.

Neighborhood Shopping Spree

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Neighborhood Shopping Spree

I can’t abide the wantonness of my neighbor’s wife
and how it encroaches upon my family life.
And though her husband seems content to overlook her ways,
believing her disinterest just a menopausal phase,
when she goes out for groceries, I watch her shut the door
and know that she’ll be shopping for a single item more
than bread or milk or celery, for as she leaves her house,
I hear my back door closing and know it is my spouse
off upon some shopping spree—some sudden hungry whim
that guarantees her shopping list is bound to include him!

 

Prompts today are encroach, wanton, content, abide and grocery.
Image by Jessie McCall on Unsplash.