On Facebook, click on the URL to see all 35 photos. When you get to my blog, then click the first photo and arrows to enlarge all photos.
The WP Weekly photo prompt is beloved.
To Get a Poem
(5 Quadrilles)
Leave the dirty dishes in the sink.
A dishwasher washes the poems away.
Allow cat hair to accumulate on the footstool.
Cat hair is a city for poems.
Let plants go another day before watering,
lest poems in the soil should be flushed away.
Let lie the crumpled sock a friend’s child
left in the sleeping loft.
Don’t destroy the poem of it.
Don’t bother to rake leaves.
Poems cannot live in neat piles.
Leave the soupstain on your shirt .
Tomato and basil are ingredients of poetry.
There is a poem in the confetti of paper on the bedroom carpet
and in the bread crumbs and the orphaned straight pins.
Bills in the “TO BE PAID” folder?
Each is the embryo of a poem.
Paying them now would be poetry murder.
In my living room, there is more poetry
in the blankets of dust on glass tables
than the burnished surface of the clay vase.
There is more poetry, more poetry, more poetry
than can ever be tidied up in this world or the next.
Falling poetry snarls in the weave of the hammock.
All of this raw poetry lies around us, primed for the collecting.
Messy poetry and dusty.
You won’t die from, but you could live on
poetry that’s hidden in the messy corners of your world.
For dVerse Poets. The prompt was to write a quadrille on the subject of poetry.
My Answer to the Question
I am a hand and forearm girl.
Smart kind eyes with that spark
you recognize when you see it
and then, when it is sadly gone, forget
until the next one comes along—
that special next one there have only been a few of.
This poem is a quadrille (44 words) for dVerse Poets.
As usual, Click on first photo and then arrows to enlarge and view all images.
https://bopaula.wordpress.com/2018/01/31/thursdays-special-pick-a-word-in-february-y3/
Found these and then forgot to publish! A bit late, but here they are.
For this challenge: https://ceenphotography.com/2018/01/30/cees-fun-foto-challenge-letter-x-x-needs-to-be-anywhere-in-the-word-or-shaped-like-the-letter-x/
Clinging to the wall
like an old wallpaper scrap
are the words
I want you, I want you, I want you, I want you.
Their refrain slides up and down
the musical scale—
an old country tune,
plaintive and clear.
Why do I want you?
The first time I met you,
there was something about the curl of your hair.
Your eyes, so familiar—puzzled, as though
you, too, were trying to remember.
After that, it was
the set of your shoulders—
the arm stretched between your seat and mine
with your hand on the back of my seat.
All of your restraint an aphrodesiac.
The truth is
that I pined
for two days after I left,
then went on with my life.
Still, that scrap
of wanting
comes up early in the morning
as I waken
and my mind walks,
looking for someone to pin it to,
and every time
it stops at you.
The prompt today is puzzled.
(Enlarge by clicking on first photo.)
There is usually at least one of these mammoth trees with resident herons in every little village around the lake. It can be a noisy proposition, especially if its inhabitants are night herons, but in this case, it is snowy egrets, another sort of heron, that inhabit Grandmother tree. For close-up photos of egrets and chicks, go HERE.
For the Sunday Trees 324 prompt.
Profuse Praise
She was not the sort of miss that flattery could turn.
Excessive admiration just made her stomach churn.
She had no use for sweet talk or raves that were prolific.
Compliments just bored her. Praise she found horrific.
She set out to tell him that his raves were quite absurd
and his fawning words profusive, but could not recall the word,
so she just said nothing as his copious adulation
stirred her to a level of nervous agitation.
She found his fulsome words to be shockingly unstinting
with his gushing adjectives, his adverbs unrelenting.
He said that she was perfect, her end result most lavish,
while she just found his flattery ridiculously slavish.
“Rich, sweet, slightly juicy, and never sour or tough,
with just a little crustiness.” He couldn’t get enough.
So finally she just gave in and with a little sigh,
picked up the knife and cut him—
another piece of pie!
The prompt today was profuse.
When the pelicans stayed away for the past few weeks, the frigate birds were out in full force. Usually, it seems to me that these birds soar high above, swooping down only to steal other birds’ prizes, but two days ago, when the pelicans and fish came back as well, they appeared by the dozens, swooping down on the beach to claim bait left on the beach after the fishermen cleared their nets. It was an amazing display. Here are some of the hundreds of photos that I took of them that capture their numbers and antics to a small degree. Please click on the first photo and then the right arrows to proceed through the enlarged photos and to read the captions that tell the story of their visit to civilization:
Circling Closer:
The Magnificent Frigate Bird
They polonaise up higher,
far above the rest.
Not once dipping to the land.
Do they ever nest?
I never see them fishing,
foraging or chewing.
As though their wings are made for art
but are not made for doing.
A gentle crease within their wings
looks folded and unfolded,
but keeps its shape no matter what,
as though it has been molded.
This rhyme is not so fragile
nor so graceful as these birds.
I guess such elegance as theirs
cannot be caught in words.
(I wrote this poem a few years ago and published it in a series of poems about La Manzanilla. It seemed appropriate to publish it again with these photos.)
The moon, a rabbit, a bottle of tequila and a simple Mayan figure of a woman convey to us many of the legends of Mexico as well as one theory about her naming. Eight years ago I created a retablo that conveyed this message, both visually and in a story that resides in a chamber within the box the retablo sits upon. I sold that retablo years ago, but luckily I have this photo and these words that describe it. In case you missed it last time, here it is again: https://judydykstrabrown.com/2015/07/11/the-rabbits-navel/
The prompt today was conveyor.
