Back of the Fridge
Free from the air current’s rush and flow,
the fridge back’s where the spiders go
to spin their webs and catch their prey.
We should give thanks for them, ‘cuz they
trap flies that land upon our snacks,
dive-bomb our faces, roam our backs
and cause us all so much dismay,
so let your resident spiders stay.
Better in their hidden place
than buzzing flies right in your face.
Trolling for flies in the kitchen.
(Click on photos to see larger views.)
Things That Go Bump In The Night
On Samhain tiny goblins compete with tinier witches,
holding out their candy bags with pleading looks and twitches.
Trading in their own names like Sandy, John and Luke,
they go by their pseudonyms of Zombie, Ghoul and Spook.
They only have ’til midnight to cease their operation
of collecting candy, to their great consternation,
for it is at the midnight hour that real ghouls congregate
with witches, ghosts and zombies at the graveyard gate.
Old miners follow flume trails down looking for the gold
that seemed to evade them in the days of old.
Dead school marms lift their rulers looking for a kid to swat,
And zombies execute last haunts before their final rot.
Ghoulies swoop down from the trees and witches brew their brews,
vowing to force feed their glop to any kid they choose.
So best be in your beds before the midnight toll
lest you be absconded with by zombie or by troll!!!!!
Prompts for today are spook, twitch, *Samhain, *flume, operation, pseudonym,
*Flumes were wooden troughs elevated on trestles that ran down a mountainside to bring gold down from futher up the mountain. They were also used in the transportation of logs in the logging industry. We used to hike up the flume trail at summer camp in the Black Hills of South Dakota.
*Our Halloween evolved as a combination of All Souls Day and Samhain, an early Gaelic and Celtic harvest festival which contained many of the elements that evolved into the custom of dressing up in costumes and trick-or-treating.
Screwing it Up
The superlative woman never winds up in the middle,
for in other people’s marriages she has no urge to fiddle.
Not one fraction of her being is cunning or deceptive.
She belittles no one but is always most receptive
to helping friends with problems, and she always finds an answer
in combatting any problem short of income tax or cancer.
Has she any weakness? I’ve found only one so far.
She is totally hopeless at opening a jar!
Though she tries unscrewing it using all her might,
somehow every lid she meets is just screwed on too tight,
and though she’s never screwed up in anything she did,
it avails her little when unscrewing a lid.
Prompt words for today are superlative, belittle, deceptive, fraction, middle, woman and irrational.
Unlimited Viewing Possibilities
The very lovely playa was a playground for the rich
who lay around on blankets, wearing not a stitch.
When folks passed, salutations were snappy and most clever
with their eyes averted, for it’s certain that they never
wanted to be caught in the act when they were staring
at the certain body parts acquaintances were baring.
For no matter what their habitus, everyone was nude,
and to stare at body fat was considered rude.
But for sure some bikers were deserving of medals
as they kept eyes straight ahead, attending to their pedals,
limiting their viewpoint to a small straight-ahead niche,
avoiding the environment spread out on the beach.
Prompts for today are snappy, medal, salutations, habitus, environment, playground. Image by Shifaaz Shamoon on Unsplash.
Culinary Differences
(Coping with an Artistic Palate)
I’ll admit that I’m perplexed
for my spouse is sorely vexed
because he finds my menus bland
and untouched by artistic hand.
He finds my soup so pale and thin, it
needs a bit of color in it,
so I asked him how to do
more pleasing palettes for my stew.
He painted me a portrait of
a consommé he said he’d love
with so many veggies in it
and a ruby wine to thin it.
He’d like to wrap his mouth around
colors that are more profound.
to the point where I’m perplexed
over what I should cook next.
My color combination tends
towards browns and whites of various blends.
Might I aspire to red and yellow,
with pickled beets in lemon Jell-o?
He says my taste in food is static
whereas his is more erratic.
But, tired of his bitch and moan,
perhaps I’ll let him cook his own.
Alternate ending: (don’t read this one, Sam)
He suggests a novel dish
of tomato aspic around fish?
The thought of it makes my lips pucker.
Perhaps I’ll just divorce the -ucker!!!
Prompts today are red and yellow, pickle, perplexed, aspire, mouth, portrait and erratic. All of the images are from Unsplash.
Detente in the Animal Kingdom
The queen of hippopatamuses feels a bit perplexed
for she crossed the hyenas and now she has been hexed.
They’ve jinxed her favorite swimming hole so she has to swim
in a muddy tiny pond with crocs around the rim.
When she lumbers from the pond to have her usual binge
on grass, her favorite supper, she feels a little twinge.
It seems like in the puddle where she most recently sat,
waddling through the bottom mud, dragging all her fat,
she must have nudged a bit too close to a crocodile
and snagged a bit of hippo fat on his croco-smile.
He’s swinging there behind her, his tooth hooked on her tush,
creating a great disarray while crashing through the bush.
With her competing waddle, they’re an ecological threat,
destroying all the underbrush as they thrash and vet.
How will they resolve this problem that they cause?
First it’s necessary that they cool down and pause
to make peace with the hyenas so they can use their claws
to disentangle hippo skin from the croc’s sharp jaws,
thus restoring order and reinstating peace
so all this inter-species angst finally will cease!!!
Prompt words today are jinx, swing, perplexed,disarray, compete, twinge and hippopatamus. Image by J. Anders on Unsplash.
Defences Make Good Neighbors
My neighbor is gregarious but I never talk back,
although I feel I’ll detonate for rejoinders I lack.
They all swell up inside me because they come too late
to be used against her in a retaliatory debate.
If only I’d known what to say before it was too dated,
but alas, past tirades can’t be rejuvenated.
Her face and clothes are scrumptious, but her view of life is black.
She sees the worst in people, and it turn they see it back.
Every time I look at her, no matter how I try,
I only see a personage that I want to pass by.
So all her earthly beauty, her jewels and her clothing
cannot compensate for a world of mutual loathing.
Prompts for today are rejuvenate, before, scrumptious, detonate, look, black and gregarious. Image by Christian Wiediger on Unsplash.
My apologies to Robert Frost for parodying his last line of “Mending Wall.” (Good fences make good neighbors.) Actually, eight years ago I wrote a parody of his poem as well. HERE it is if you aren’t already tired of the topic.
Perfectionist Poet
How I love an audience to witness my successes,
although I think much less of them when they witness my messes—
fingers marked by fountain pens, hair pulled into peaks
by those elusive phrases that my wild mind seeks.
Please don’t view me in the market when I don’t mean to be seen.
When I’ve had no time to arrange thoughts —no time to plot and preen.
There are certain safeguards that I like to take
that are not in place yet when I’m barely awake.
So don’t observe me in the morning when I’m not in my full glory,
when my brain is tongue-tied and my thoughts are sparse and gory.
It’s my fervid wish to please, but morning thoughts are frugal.
My images are less like Frost and much more like Brueghal.
So, please come to my readings to see me at my best,
but avoid me in my daily life, please, at my behest.
I prefer you view me with every word in place
there upon the stage and with makeup on my face!!!
Prompt words today are audience, market, safeguard, fervid, glory, fountain pen, frugal. Image by John Tyson on Unsplash.
Elopement
The sky liquid amber and the hills mushroom brown,
we sail on love’s vapors right over the town.
Once we felt dirty, but now we feel free,
released from the rules learned at the knee
of parents who left us with nothing but scars
of guilt over kisses in back seats of cars.
We vow to forget all we’ve heard of their lies
as we flee solid earth to escape through the skies.
What was once key we admit has no power
as passion bursts out to bud and then flower.
Those flickers of guilt we shed as we fly,
leaving mere earth to soar up to the sky.
For The Sunday Whirl Wordle 571 the prompts are: mushrooms key liquid admit dirty felt flicks hear amber solid Image: Marc Chagall’s “Over the Town.”
Go swift to work but slower to thy glee,
and you will go with other, not with me.
*
If two by two in life you choose to go,
you never will regret if going’s slow.
*
Join hands with one who also squeezes back
or else you will forever mourn its lack.
*
Choose love by heart and not by merely face
and then regrets will never be the case.
Five heroic couplets on the subject of coupling for dVerse Poets.
