Seer
Her statement that she’d had a vision
was met by general derision.
They went west though she’d said, “Go east,”
and thus were eaten by the beast
or, overtaken by the flood.
died soaked in water or in blood.
So, the moral of this little tale
is heed your mystics or learn to bail
or run faster than the beast
lest you become his morning’s feast.
For Weekend Writing Prompt #443, the task was to write a 66 word story or poem on the subject of “Vision.”
An Apologia for Poesy
My gardener’s broom goes whisking light
first left, then right, then left, then right
with touch so slight I barely hear
the bristles as they take their bite.
The birds were first up and about,
and then both dogs asked to get out.
Then that broom reminded me
of one more creature left to rout.
Searching for ideas and words,
I use the rhythm of the birds
and Pasiano’s sweeping broom
the braying burro, the bleating herds.
Noises fill this busy world
even as I’m safely curled
still abed, my senses all
alert and ready, full unfurled.
I hear the grackle far above,
the insistent cooing of a dove,
as in the kitchen, Yolanda dons
her apron and her rubber glove.
I hear the water’s swirl and flush
the busy whipping of her brush
around each glass I might have left,
careless in my bedtime rush.
Her string mop silent, I barely know
if she’s still here. Or did she go?
I find her in the kitchen still,
arranging glasses, row on row.
Then it is to my desk I trot.
Arranging glasses I am not,
but rather words I nudge and shift
here and there until they’re caught.
Glued to the page forever more––
be they rich words, be they poor––
nevertheless, these words are mine:
poems, stories, truth or lore.
We are not slothful, lazy, weak
because it’s words we choose to seek
instead of labors more obvious
like plumber or computer geek.
Words’ labors are most harrowing.
Our choice of them needs narrowing
and not unlike the farmer’s sow,
mind’s riches we are farrowing.
So blame us not if others mop
our houses or they trim and crop
our gardens for us as we write.
From morn till night, we never stop.
Poets, our lives may seem effete––
not much time spent on our feet––
but those feet are busy, still,
tapping out our poem’s beat.
Cerebral though our work may be,
we are not lazy, you and me,
for though we sit and write all day,
our writing’s labored––that’s plain to see!
The dVerse Poets prompt is “Noise.”
The Taste of Love
What we feasted on
in those first stages of internet romance—
when nine hours was too short a conversation—was words.
We passed on to the next stage of computer dating:
our first dinner date.
He watched on his desktop computer as I prepared a salad.
This was a long and lengthy process
I recorded as closely as was possible,
using the camera from my laptop.
A prisoner of his large unmovable console computer, I watched his empty desk chair
as he repaired to the kitchen to prepare his meal, hearing sound effects but little else.
When he returned to the living room, he laid his meal in front of his computer.
I had yet to see it as I, in turn, placed my salad in front of me and took my first bite,
watching closely my technique according to my Skype image.
I chewed politely and then smiled,
revealing the lack of lettuce shards on my front teeth.
I looked up. He was watching me as lovingly as usual.
Now, it was his turn.
What are you eating? I asked. Ham, he said.
He lifted a huge hunk on his fork, taking a dainty bite
and chewing happily.
What else? I asked. Just ham, he answered.
And so he demolished the entire pound of thick ham steak,
now and then washing it down with a healthy swig of rum and Coke.
Rum and Coke.
It had been one of our bonding experiences
to find that the drink of choice for each
was Bacardi Rum with caffeine-free Diet Coke.
How could this not be a romance made in heaven?
Culinary compatibility from 2,000 miles away
seemed to be less of a problem than it would be months later,
when we first made physical contact.
But, there was a resolution. He started munching on carrots and I had no objection to ham.
We discovered a mutual mania for potato chips, and true romance bloomed
when I found the full bar of Hershey’s chocolate atop his refrigerator.
Who says we need to concentrate on our differences?
For dVerse Poets we were to post a poem about internet romance in honor of Valentines Day
“All Lined Up”
Lined up at the show
and everywhere we go,
it seems like we spend half our lives in lines that move too slow.
It seems that half the doing
consists of constant queueing––
a penance that we have to pay for eating, riding, viewing.
At cafes, traffic lanes,
post offices and trains,
museums, subways, cafeterias, we make small gains.
Standing more than walking,
muttering and gawking,
our progress is so slow that there’s less moving than there’s taking.
As we go two-by-twoing,
like milkcows softly mooing,
waiting here in lines, we find that we are all-too-often ruing
leaving our house at all
to line up at the mall
I think I’d rather be at home than waiting with y’all!
Here are a few “LIned Up” visuals: (Click on photos to enlarge.)
And, for more “lined up” photos go HERE.
The SOCS prompt is “In Line.”
Burned Toast and Other Little Lies
A sneeze is how a poltergeist gets outside of you.
At night a different stinky elf sleeps inside each shoe.
Every creaking rafter supports a different ghost,
and it’s little gremlins who make you burn the toast.
Each night those tricky fairies put snarls in your hair,
while pixies in your sock drawer unsort every pair.
Midnight curtain billows are caused by banshee whistles.
Vampires use your toothbrush and put cooties in its bristles.
Truths all come in singles. It’s lies that come in pairs.
That’s a zombie, not a teenager, sneaking up the stairs.
The MVB prompt today was “Toast.”
Mismatched
When a certain fella has had a drink
or two or three, he’s bound to wink
at the little lady dressed in pink.
Her drink’s cubes give a subtle clink
as she decides what she might think.
Is he a stud or just a fink?
His clothes are sort of rinky-dink,
yet her long lashes, swathed in ink,
flutter in a come-on blink.
One fingernail is seen to sink
into her glass. He’s at the brink
of coming over to seal the link.
She checks her breath. It doesn’t stink.
She reaches down and dons her mink.
But then he stops and seems to shrink.
In this sure deal there seems a chink.
It’s clear that when she deigned to flirt,
she missed the writing on his shirt.
This is the message that went unread:
“Be kind to animals,” it said.
The SOCS prompt is shirt. Image by Marco Lastella
Cleaning Up
Toothbrushes remove gristle from
the area we whistle from
while brooms are used to clean and prep
those surfaces whereon we step.
And lest the reader balk and bristle
o’er its lack in this epistle,
I will not overlook the mop—
that device with which we slop
water on spills of the day
we feel the need to wash away.
You may deride my need to gush
over the likes of mop, broom, brush,
but still I choose to raise a cup
to laud those things that clean me up!
The prompt words for the Three Things Challenge M786 are: bristle, broom, brush.
Spotless
They say he was a bastion of the community.
Of what their youth should aim for, the exact epitome.
Mothers named their kids for him and he was so discreet,
his name labelled a shopping center and a city street.
Asked to speak at graduation, his words were most succinct.
Not one old lady fell asleep. Nobody even blinked!
Moral, staunch and upright, he was everyone’s ideal.
He always used the crosswalk. He didn’t cuss or steal.
No forensic laboratory ever had a label
or test tube or fingerprint of his upon their table.
In short, his reputation was one without besmirch.
He went to each town meeting, every Sunday, went to church.
He did not exceed the speed limit, use liquor or smoke pot.
Every single vice on earth was something he was not.
His genes were the best of genes. His relatives all lasted
at least until one hundred, and he dieted and fasted.
Ate kale and probiotics, whole grains and leafy greens.
He sponsored many charities and lived within his means.
So when he died it wasn’t from alcohol or drugs.
He did not die from violence—his own or that of thugs.
He did not perish from obesity or accident or whoredom.
In the end, they say that he simply died of boredom!
Thanks to Martha Kennedy. and ForgottenMan for contributing this cartoon.
For the My Vivid Blog prompt, Reputation
Ball Mortality Thanks to Morrie
He gores them and he punctures them and rips them on the bias,
demanding that we throw them from the pool or on the playas.
Every time we throw a ball, he’ll chase it and then snatch it,
and one time out of four, he’ll meet it in the air and catch it.
Then he will purloin it and we find when he is finished
somehow our tennis ball supply is rapidly diminished.
This radical behavior is supported by each caster
who realizes unthrown balls are the real disaster.
And so our local sports supply store profits from our loss
because we have to soon replace every ball we toss!
for dVerse Poets the prompt is Mortality.
Memory Aid
When lethologica rears its ugly head,
I give up and go to bed,
for when my conscious mind won’t stream it,
my response is—try to dream it.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 