Bar Stool Brush-Off
There’s not a ghost of a chance
that you’ll crack my code,
free-wheeling know-it-all
that you are.
But as your hand smooths
that errant strand of hair
back into its perfect place,
I’ll hand you this:
every time you check your reflection
in the mirror behind the bar,
it is clear no number of looks
will clue you in to yourself.
The prompt for dVerse Poets is “Reflection.”
jdb photo
Longing
This morning’s church bells’ constant bongings
woke me to familiar longings.
Coded as they were in dreams,
when I awoke, they split their seams
and spilled into my conscious thought.
Futile to yearn for what I’m not.
No longer young or lithe or trim,
no passions spilling from my brim.
No husband, mother, father, lover.
No guardians to watch and hover.
I’ve grown away from most of life,
connections severed as with a knife.
Still, I do not long for these.
I do not pray on bended knees
for what is past or what is lost,
for I know pining’s pain and cost.
My longing, now, is just to see
what life’s plot is left to me.
For Lens Artists Chanllenge, the prompt is “Longing.”
New Boss
Lately, the ladies room at work echoes with gripes and sobs
and we’re checking out the classifieds for new potential jobs.
Our boss’s son is our new boss and though he has his genes,
he doesn’t seem to have his heart. He treats us like machines.
And even though his resume may brand him as auspicious,
our office staff is feeling rather doleful and suspicious.
It’s his frosty cold demeanor that has us feeling lost.
If only he’d thaw out, we’d be more willing to be bossed!
For MVB: the prompt is “New.”
Welcome to “The Numbers Game #90”. Today’s number is 212. To play along, go to your photos file folder and type that number into the search bar. Then post a selection of the photos you find that include that number and post a link to your blog in my Numbers Game blog of the day. If instead of numbers, you have changed the identifiers of all your photos into words, pick a word or words to use instead, and show us a variety of photos that contain that word in the title. This prompt will repeat each Monday with a new number. If you want to play along, please put a link to your blog in comments below. Here are my contributions to the album.
Click on Photos to Enlarge and View as Gallery.
Minds
like mine
are bound to
slip away into the
swells, blown away
through cracks in time
to where a poem dwells.
Fans of verse may lure me
into sitting on a fence picking
bones of words that together make
no sense. I sort them into towers, then
grasp more words to build trapped words
in frosted pyramids with messages well-chilled.
The Sunday Whirl words are: bound slip swells fan luring fence cracks bone tower frosted trap grasps
The photo, taken by me, is of a snow-covered venting volcano.
Feeling nostalgic for Cee’s FOTD, so decided to take a walk in my garden to see what is in bloom this Sunday morning.
For Cellpic Sunday
The Indigestibles
No room for mushrooms, can’t live with liver.
The thought of brains just makes me shiver.
Though I like pizza, my other law
is I don’t eat tomatoes raw!
Drinking milk’s against my wishes.
Fish is simply for the fishes.
I eat no veal or other baby,
and steak for me is simply “maybe.”
So if it’s your plan to invest
in things that I like to ingest,
I won’t make it any harder
for you to come and stock my larder.
All else you want to bring to feed me—
what edibles you wish to cede me:
Injera, curries, Thai, Chinese—
all are sure to tempt and please.
Except for one thing I just thought of
that in the past I’ve had a lot of.
There’s one more mouthful I won’t try.
I have no taste for humble pie!
For RDP, the prompt word is Mushroom.
Here are just 4 images from an incredible artist from Oregon who moved lakeside a number of years ago and since then has captured thousands of unique and heartfelt photos of the people and scenes of Lake Chapala. You won’t regret viewing more of his amazing photos.
Here is a link to his gallery of incredible photos: https://www.davidlorenzwinston.com/p957394933
Please let me know in comments what you think of his photos. (At the end of his gallery is a link to a site where you can see more. His output is amazing.) He would probably love to see your comments on his site as well.
Open Hand
Wings held lightly without crushing
survive to join the world’s wild rushing,
while love held by a tight-clenched fist
quells half our reason to exist.
Some laud passions most rapacious—
grasping, volatile, tenacious;
but this is not the love I feel.
I do not seek to swoon or reel.
The tenacity of a skin tight glove
might stay my soaring to heights above.
I need your love like an open hand.
Not for me the wedding band.
The bond I seek from you, my dear,
is not the gauntlet that I fear
but rather, fingers whose sensations
are left free to life’s elations.
Butterflies kept in a jar
lose that beauty seen from afar.
That grace of movement caught on air
is what makes their beauty rare.
I love it when your arms enfold,
but if you love me, loose your hold.
The measure of my tenacity
is that I’ll come back to thee.
jdbphoto
The SOCS prompt is “Hand.”
The SOCS prompt is “Hand.”
For Fibbing Friday, the task at hand is: These are characters in pantos or animated movies, but who would you nominate for the role (fictitious or real person)/
Note: Because I had never heard of Pantos before, I am going to write a description of what characters I can find on the Internet before I cast the role.
1. Widow Twanky. (Male) A traditional pantomime dame. She has a reputation of being a strict mother but neither son takes her that seriously. She runs the town launderette and is always complaining about being overworked but really she does very little. She speaks loudly and dresses the same way): D0NALD TRUMP
2. Buttons. (He is typically a male servant of the household): DAN SCAVINO –Trump’s former golf caddy (really), now deputy head of staff at the Whitehouse.
3. Cinders. (She dreams of attending the royal ball and marries the prince): MELANIA TRUMP
4. The Beast. DONALD TRUMP
5. Gru. (The main character of Despicable Me.): DONALD TRUMP
6. Cruella de Vil KRISTI NOEM
7. The Fairy Godmother RICHARD GRENELL presidential envoy for special missions since 2025.
8. Abanazar. (the primary villain, an evil sorcerer, in the traditional British pantomime version of Aladdin. He poses as Aladdin’s uncle to trick him into retrieving a magic lamp): ELON MUSK
9. Carabosse ( The wicked antagonist): PUTIN
10. King/Queen Rat. DONALD TRUMP AND MELANIA
Mr. Trump is such a fine actor that I had to cast him in a number of roles. Pretender to all, master of none.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 