Mother Hen
His insidious preening as he eyes each teenage guest
makes me want to gather them in a protective nest,
to spread my wings to cover them and tell them to take care.
To go home and do homework and fiddle with their hair.
I want them safe away from this producer’s leering glance.
Away from all they’ll forfeit to try to get their chance.
For all the favors he hands out, with his other hand he reaps,
consuming all the sweet young things as though they were just Peeps!
Oddball
You don’t follow instructions. You will do as you may.
No matter what the plan, you always had another way.
No one could ever force you to form an even line.
You’d veer this way or that way and say that it was fine.
You waged a constant battle and staged a constant fight,
as though causing dissension was your main delight.
But it the end, it turns out that the others were the fools,
for they’ve labeled you a genius and are following your rules!
The words of the day are may, battle, force and delight. Here are the links:
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/05/04/rdp-saturday-may/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/05/04/fowc-with-fandango-battle/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/05/04/your-daily-word-prompt-force-may-4-2019/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/05/04/delight/
The prompt today is willy-nilly. Now, what would you say the chances would be that I’d have written a poem that already contained that word? If you are thinking practically nil, then you are WRONG! Not only did I write a poem containing “willy-nilly” over two years ago, but it is even in the title. The assignment then was to talk about a holiday created in my honor and to describe it all—music, refreshments, decorations and who would come. Here it is, warts and all:
A Holiday Most Willy-Nilly
My namesake day would be a dilly.
Simply not run-of-the-milly.
For the concert, I’d have Willie
and resurrect Milli Vanilli.
Kind of music? Rock-a-Billy.
For refreshments, I’d serve Chili.
Though the terrain would be most hilly,
they’d travel over rock-and-rilly
for races of both stud and filly,
and poets, fleet of tongue and quilly,
reading poems both sage and silly.
Let’s Pretend
“Let’s pretend,” the children say,
as they hurry off to play.
But that same action has often blown
up in the face of those full-grown.
Escape is easier these days
with all the various means and ways
we have to skirt reality
by what we listen to and see.
On television or movie screen,
we might pretend that what we’ve seen
is more reality than fact,
until we find that we react
so vividly to what is fiction
that it becomes a real addiction
that deflects our full attention
from that we do not dare to mention.
Escape increasingly is sought––
deflecting us from what we ought
really to be dealing with.
Instead of truth, we choose the myth.
Global warming, poverty,
Isis, the disparity
between the classes and the use
of meth and alcohol abuse.
Children wielding guns because
it is what every game now does.
Adults displaying their frustration
at our society’s obfuscation
of the truth of what goes on
in a society gone wrong.
Wealth governs us then shields us from
how far from truth we’ve really come.
We watch pretty fantasies
that entertain or shock or please
filling us with false elation
that is not of our own creation.
So life becomes vicarious,
distracting us from various
problems where we might have acted
if we had not been distracted
by the gross banality
passing for reality
of made-up people who act and preen
on TV or computer screen.
There’s something to be said, you see
in favor of reality
when dealing with the painful facts
of what it is one’s own life lacks.
The prompt word today was “pretend.”
The Prompt: Write a post in which the protagonists of two different books or movies meet for the first time. How do they react to each other? Do they get along?
I was a witness as Uriah Heep just happened to stumble upon Sylvester Stallone gazing at his reflection in the front window of a chichi little shop on Rodeo Drive. I admit that I loitered nearby, eavesdropping. I knew this was going to be good!
Rocky Balboa and Uriah Heep Meet on Rodeo Drive
Uriah sidled closer to get an autograph,
but he was intercepted by a member of Sly’s staff.
“Please do not loiter here, sir,” the officious flunky said.
Her expression was most haughty. Her eyes just cut him dead.
Uriah’s voice was cloying as he said, “My esteemed sir,
I’m just an ‘umble man. I didn’t want to cause a stir.
But it would be so gratifying for a worm like me
to get to touch the pants hem of a real live star like thee!”
Sylvester spun upon his heel, surveyed the quivering mess.
“It won’t hurt to please the little man one time, I guess,”
Sly thought as he bestowed a smile meant to relieve the tension,
at the same time, putting out his hand with condescension,
thinking he might kiss it, but instead that low man’s knee
was brought up to make contact with Sylvester’s fabled vee,
causing his pitch forward ’til in the street he lay.
And this is what Uriah said as he walked away:
“I may be sly and unctuous–a real pain in the ass,
but even a lowlife like me still has a little sass.
My humble’s spilling over ’til it doesn’t seem quite real,
and so I thought I’d show Stallone some of what I feel.”
How the great man is brought down to eating humble pie.
For once Uriah can look down to meet him in the eye.
As he writhed in agony, the star made not a peep.
Now Uriah is the Sly one while Stallone’s become a heap.
Note: Okay, I’m sorry. For the poem. For the sick pun. Everyone has an off day now and then.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 