Category Archives: poems

Savoring Flavoring

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Remember Dagwood making those midnight trips to the fridge, piling his “Dagwood sandwich” high with most things edible that came into his vision?  Or slumber parties where you tried to do the same and everyone ended up ill, to you mother’s great chagrin?  We crave the memories almost as much as the tastes, and perhaps this is what continues to drive us out into the night from our warm beds—exploring the hidden depths of our refrigerators for something special to savor. 

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Midnight Light

I wear darkness like a second skin.
It is the cloak that hides my midnight sin
as I make my way, barefooted, through my house.
Silent, lest I wake my dogs or spouse.

This way I know most well and so I bridge
in seconds that long gap between my bed and fridge.
Pull open that snug door and hear the plop
first of the rubber gasket, then the top

of the carton that has been my goal.
Spoon out its richness without benefit of bowl.
This darkness both of me and of the night
something the fridge dispenses with its light

as tears of joy and guilt and pleasure stream
down cheeks distended with this chocolate dream.
For minutes, I stand caught up in the hold
of this trio of pleasures: chocolate, creaminess and cold.

Until some motion jolts me from their grip.
I feel its pressure at my shoulder and my hip.
My spouse rolls over, shattering my dream
of midnight tryst with frozen cream.

Its chocolate savor is one that I try to keep
as I roll over once again to seek my sleep.
Whatever course my next dream serves, I’ll try it.
For I’ve already been one long day on this diet!

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The prompt today was savor. (Yes, you have perhaps read this poem before.  I wrote it three years ago.) The photos were harvested from the Internet.

Sleight of Knees

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IMG_7755doll by Louie Gann, jdbphoto

Sleight of Knees

When the circus clown was lauded,
marveled at, praised and applauded
for hanging from the high trapeze
for 24 hours by his knees,
though he was admired for his moxie,
it turns out it was just epoxy!

 

The prompt today was moxie.

The Eighth Deadly Sin (Advice for Errant Males)

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The Eighth Deadly Sin:
(Advice for Errant Males)

Wrath and avarice and pride
can be safely kept inside.
So although we all may be them,
it is often hard to see them.

If you are a seasoned actor,
sloth will never be a factor
leading to your firing
or premature retiring.

Often envy, I confess,
is one more way that I transgress;
but even though we’re caught inside it,
almost all of us can hide it.

Lust is the sin that’s most unfurled
upon us in this modern world
in every book and magazine.
In movies? It’s in every scene.

And though sex is oft debated,
we only label them X-rated;
and though we profess to abhor them,
in solitude, we may adore them.

Gluttony’s the only sin
we cannot seem to keep within;
for everything that meets our lips,
alas, is carried on our hips!

Each is labeled “deadly sin”—
the one outside, others within;
but I’m inclined to add another
perhaps not taught you by your mother.

These deadly sins from one to seven
may be what keep you out of heaven,
but it’s transgression number eight
that will ban you as my date!

You may talk as you pour wine,
and continue as we dine;
but when I start to tell a tale,
heaven help the errant male

who utters “Me, too . . . ” then proceeds
to list more of his facts and deeds.
As music fades and lights all dim,
bringing the subject back to him!

I know that sinning is the fate
of many couples on a date.
So lust may now and then corrupt me,
but no one gets to interrupt me!!!!

 

Must admit this is a reprint of a poem I wrote three years ago, and although this eighth deadly sin is one that well-deserves burial, I think the poem written about it might well be resurrected one more time, so I am telling the tale again in hopes those it describes might recognize themselves and repent before it is too late.

And, for those of you whom I told were incorrect when they guessed that the photo I published yesterday was a bunch of parsnips, I apologize. I was told they were rutabagas, but when I consulted Google images, I discovered you were right!

The prompt today was bury.

(P)luck

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(P)luck

Those who count on karma to bring about their luck
might do better to depend on industry and pluck.
Carry your ambition ready in its holster,
for things like synchronicity are only meant to bolster.
Get an education, in school and in life.
Knowing what you’re doing can alleviate much strife.
Exercise due caution, but do not let fear stop you.
What you’re meant to stand on is not meant to top you.
Watch out for the blind curves and watch out for loose gravel
as you take the wheel to drive on roads you want to travel.

 

The prompt today is “pluck.”
I’m also using this for Cee’s https://ceenphotography.com/cees-challenges/cees-which-way-challenge/

Paper Shoes

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Paper Shoes

I’m folding me some paper shoes
so I can walk away the blues.
The love poems I cannot recall
I’ll scuff off as I pass the mall.
Someone will find my words all shredded—
how you wooed and won and bedded
one so young and so naive
that she could not help but believe
words pilfered from a Hallmark store
that you had often used before.

All those lovelorn lines obscured.
All that loneliness endured.
On Main Street I will shed my heart—
that part of me you tore apart.
All the lines I wrote about it,
all the times I grew to doubt it.
Your words the heel, my words the sole,
the sidewalks will consume them whole.

All the futile poetry
that passed once between you and me
ground into the pavement where
perhaps two lovers will find it there—
the words like seeds that hung around
hoping for more fertile ground.
Love sprouted from a used-up word
might strike some others as absurd,

But I like to think perhaps
our use of them was just a lapse.
Repeated by those other voices
who choose to live by other choices,
all those words that we now rue
might work for lovers who are new.

The prompt word today is paper. (Image from internet, photographer unknown.)

Sinning Lessons

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Sinning Lessons

I am a paragon of virtue. I have no other choice.
I do not have a figure.  I have no sultry voice.
I’ve no talent at kissing. The boys leave me alone.
I have no lovers calling me nightly on the phone.

I get my thrills from scripture. I embroider and I tat.
The creature that I cuddle with is an old grey cat.
Sometimes virtue’s chosen, but it isn’t so with me.
I’d rather spend my weekend nights on some feller’s knee.

But it isn’t in the cards. It’s just my Ma and me.
I guess I’ll just be buttoned up instead of brash and free.
My ma found a new hired man. He isn’t very tall.
A moustache but no muscles. Not swashbuckling at all.

But he has a good strong back. He carries water for me.
And for reasons I can’t fathom, he seems to adore me.
It’s one morning in the cow barn, milking Bossie, that I miss
the bucket with the milk stream when the hired man plants a kiss

on my neck as I bend over. It makes that old cat’s day.
He opens up his mouth and drinks as I just dream and sway
then turn to open my mouth, too, and see how kisses feel
when they are given mouth-to-mouth. It makes me almost reel.

But Hank the hired man catches me, sets me straight again,
and that’s the starting of my life as a paragon of sin!
Sinning’s not so bad at all. You can’t believe the preacher.
And it’s not so hard to do when you have a teacher.

Lessons started in the milking barn but ended in the loft.
The hired man got handsomer as he took his clothing off.
I think he liked me better, too, when I was in the buff 
for no matter how much more I showed, it never seemed enough.

We had a lovely time up there, the hired man and me.
As testament, now seven kids cluster round my knee.
The hired man’s beside me. As I sit and hold his hand,
he runs his fingers back and forth across my wedding band.

The old gray cat’s still happy, for sometimes he still gets lucky
when I’m distracted in the milking ’cause my husband’s feeling plucky.
Married life is lovely. We’re happy, him and me.
We are paragons of loving for perpetuity. 

 

The prompt today is “paragon.”

Outspoken

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Outspoken

When you tell your truths en masse,
what you may choose to see as brass
others might perceive as crass.
You may think you’re just a truthful lassie,
but what to you is cute and sassy,
the rest of us consider gassy!
Sometimes, just let the impulse pass.
You’ll be less of a horse’s ass!

 

 

The prompt word today was “brassy.”

The Reveal

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The Reveal

Even when she’s in the buff,
he feels she’s not revealed enough.
He wants to know her heart and soul—
to know her entire being, his goal.
But, alas, she cannot do it.
If she does, she knows she’ll rue it.
Much as she loves a certain sir,
there is a certain part of her
that must remain a mystery.
For in this maiden’s history
are other suitors it behooved
to have her secrets all removed.
But when she revealed it all,
one by one, they did not call.
And thus she learned a maiden’s rule:
Men are fickle. Men are cruel.
Lest you be put up on a shelf,
keep parts of you safe in your self.
To keep him interested in your stuff,
Most of you is just enough.

 

 

 

The prompt today was “buff.”

Five Days after the Accident

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This little fella has graced the dash of every car I’ve had in Mexico for the past 16 years. Soon he’ll have a new home.

Five Days after the Accident

I am infused with happiness—the most I’ve felt for days—
and hereby I announce that I have shed my dormant phase.
Since my poor car was murdered, I’ve been in isolation,
but now it seems I’m free again and feeling great elation.

I went five days without a car, just stayed at home to heal
while friends did all my shopping. One even brought a meal!
But now I can get groceries, take Morrie for his grooming,
rested from five days at home. Relaxed from all this wombing.
Now that I’ve got wheels again, I have no need to fret.
Simply alive and mobile is as good as you can get!!!

The prompt today was “infuse.”

Notorious Begins with “Not”

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Notorious Begins with “Not”

Though I’d love to be more notable
for poems that are more quotable,
I’d find it far less glorious
to simply be notorious.

Paris Hilton of video fame.

I’m in no sexy videos.
No married presidents for beaus.
I have no shocking tales to tell
of hobnobbing with the cartel.

I haven’t knocked off any banks,
or perpetrated major pranks.
I leave my bosoms in my blouse.
I’ve never “offed” my folks or spouse.

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Menendez Brothers & O.J. Simpson

I simply have no talent for
larceny or sin or gore.
So even if I yearned to be
notorious—it’s just not me!

“Notorious” is today’s prompt.

(The featured photo is of Bonnie and Clyde, perhaps the most notorious female/male bank robber team of all time. All photos borrowed from the internet)