Category Archives: Poetry

Poems in many categories: Loss, NaPoWriMo

Last Ride

Last Ride

He was a motorcycle zealot,
so when his wife said he should sell it,
he protested, “It’s too soon!”
and headed out under the moon
in zipped-up jacket and leather boot
for a ride along that route

he’d ridden in his glory days,
but this time it was in a haze.
Those gorgeous hills and dales he’d ridden
somehow now seemed to be hidden,
rivaled by McDonald’s and
Target and Computerland.

Gone all the open road that he
had ridden when he’d felt so free.
His buddies ’round him in a pack—
Rowdy Bill and Badass Jack.
That place where they had raised such Hell
now turned into a Taco Bell.

He turned his bike back homeward then,
back to his place in Shady Glen.
Tacked a sign that said “For Sale” 
over his bike next to the rail
whereupon he hung his youth,
wild and free and so uncouth:

his leather jacket, his buckled boots
his companions down so many routes.
Hills and valleys away from home
where in wild youth, he’d gone to roam.
Finally knowing those days were done
now that he was ninety-one.

Prompts today are soon, zealot, gorgeous, rival.

Spring Brakes


Spring Brakes

Her freshman year at college, my sis brought home a guest
that dad said was a nincompoop–rude and badly dressed.

His pants were tight, his buttons opened half way down his chest,
but my sister made excuses for the crudeness he expressed
by saying he was sensitive and recently depressed.

He strode into the kitchen and jerked open the door
of the refrigerator and began to pour
milk right from the carton, down his chin onto the floor.
What’s more, when he was finished, he asked if there was more!
Well, I could sense Dad’s anger before I heard his roar.

“He can’t help his behavior, he’s parched!” my sister cried,
pleading with our father as he threw the jerk outside.
Where, by his own volition, the kid sauntered to his ride,
put the keys in the ignition and, gathering his pride,
put the pedal to the metal, but then the engine died!

To inject a bit of humor would probably be rude,
but I simply can’t resist expounding on the dude.
My parents called his parents who came a bit unglued
and gave the kid a lecture on respect and rectitude,
imposing a Spring Break spell of solitude.

And that is why my sister spent her term vacation
in a state of martyrdom and excess perturbation.
I chalked it up to part of her farther education
and gloried just a little bit in her situation,
trying to abstain from another smug oration.

And that’s part of the story of when sister was a fool
and chose a dud as boyfriend, but to dwell on it is cruel.
That year she learned more lessons that weren’t taught in school.
When it came to spring vacation, it became her rule
that mixing  dads and boyfriends really wasn’t cool.

 

Photo by Mark Decile on Unsplash, used with permission. Prompts today are parched, nincompoop, inject, bide and guest.

What the —-? Palinode for dVerse Poets.

The Invitation

“You are invited to a party at our house, Saturday at 7.
Please bring a dish to share and what you want to drink.”

 

The Reply

Pot Luck?
What the F—?

If I’m to bring a dish to share and also what I drink,
just who’s throwing the party? It sounds like me, I think.
If I’m going to cook a dish and also buy the wine,
I think I’ll just stay home instead, where all of it is mine!
The purpose for a party is for entertaining friends—
Not the other way around. This said, my poem ends!

En Mass Transit

En Mass Transit

Traffic comes and traffic goes,
but where they all go, no one knows.
They gun their engine, shift a gear
to be anywhere but here.
North goes south and south goes north,
driving, driving back and forth.
Wearing tires out, burning gas,
changing where they are en masse.
In New York, Paris, Pittsburg, Rome,
Nobody seems to just stay home!

 

The Word of the Day Prompt today is traffic.,

Goodbye Note to Harvey

Goodbye Note to Harvey 

I’m gobsmacked by your foolishness, tired of your guff.
Your tales of glory are too much and this girl’s had enough!
Your mercurial rise to fame, your hobnobbing with stars,
only bought you membership in a club with bars.
Now they are behind you, the power, women, booze.
I trust they’re not available in the cellblock where you snooze.

Prompt words are gobsmacked, mercurial, snooze, membership and guff. Image by Grant Durr on Unsplash, used with permission.

Ta Ta and Good Riddance


Ta Ta and Good Riddance

He wants to know what’s all this fuss
about being unscrupulous.
Honor to him is just a fable—
His every act meant to enable
a law or bill or legal tort
as a means to then exhort
his cronies to increase his fame
to pad his pockets and laud his name.
His vacant eyes contain naught

of what he did for  what he’s got.
A patriot for sure he’s not.
If I were forced to make a list
of all the ways he is not missed,
I fear the list would stretch so far
as Katmandu or Zanzibar.
And though I know them all by heart,
I do not have the time to start
at the beginning and reach the end.
So I’ll just say, here and anon,
that I’m relieved that he is gone.

 

Prompt words today are enable,  scrupulous, vacant, list and exhort.
Photo by Srikanta from Unsplash, used with permission.

Moratorium

Moratorium

I’m waging a campaign against your excesses.
You don’t need more shoes or jewels or dresses.
I’m sending a notice to wherever you shop
that your random purchases just have to stop!

Your profligate spending’s way out of control.
Abstemious behavior should be your new goal.
I abhor that I’m having to start this campaign
and hope that my efforts will not be in vain.

I’m not suggesting that you turn ascetic,
It’s simply that your present life is pathetic.
You buy and you buy and you buy and you buy
’til the Amazon boxes are stacked to the sky.

Then you head to the mall to buy a bit more,
’til your closet is fuller, I swear, than the store!
Now my salary cannot keep up with the strain,
so I must insist, dear, you try to refrain.

To help, I have cancelled your credit cards, then
tackled your charge accounts, closing all ten.
I’ve taken you off my bank account, too.
hoping to try to educate you

to the fact that life’s more than spending and spending.
I hope that my excessive acts will be ending
your own excesses, and that you’ll find
new hobbies to fill your acquisitive mind.

Prompt words today are random, abhor, abstemious, ascetic and campaign.

Eulogy

Eulogy

Men whistle, catcall, stare and stalk
and even vagrants stop and gawk.
Old ladies cluck their tongues and talk,
but I can’t help the way I walk.

My talent was not learned of late.
It’s rumored that it is innate.
My mom, a flapper in her day,
was zany, silly, clever, gay.

And now I ooze with her pizzazz,
her craziness and all that jazz,
or so Dad says. And long-dead embers
spark in his eyes as he remembers.

She’s only stories heard, a name,
a face within a silver frame
on the nightstand of my dad—
the mother that I never had.

She never held me in her arms
or schooled me in feminine charms,
but I have her spirit and her butt.
In this I am most fortunate.

So I resurrect her daily,
imagining her as I gaily
sway and flirt. It is a token—
a eulogy with no word spoken.

Prompts for today are pizzazz, fortunatevagrant, innate and frame. The photo really is of my mother, but the poem is fictional. My mother taught me lots of things, but not how to walk seductively!!! ;o)

Mad Poem: NaPoWriMo 2021, Day 26, Parody

Mad Poem

We’ve been pinned to our homes
for a year, maybe more,
and after a month
it’s turned into a bore.
We’ve stared at computers
or the walls of our rooms,
our social encounters
just tweets, Skypes or Zooms.
We’ve missed our Starbucks,
the beach and the mall.
Our range of diversions
has been nothing at all.
Restaurant after restaurant
called on the phone
has said they were closed
and to leave them alone.
When we called up our friends,

we had nothing to say
for we did the same things
for day after day.
We yearn for the freedom
that will come with a vacc.
It’s not fair that our elders
can get what we lack!

 

My poem was a parody of the Dr. Seuss poem below:

Sad Poem

 

The NaPoWriMo prompt is to write a parody of another poem. 

Baby Talk

 

Baby Talk

They are not merely drivel, these noises that you coo.
You accent their importance with everything you do.
Your waving arms and thrashing feet, your pooched lips all implore
that we try to learn your language to see what they are for.

I guess it is inevitable that our efforts fail
to try to learn your lingo beyond giggle, frown and wail,
for although we’re sympathetic, we do not get your gist.
So please forgive our ignorance of messages we’ve missed.

We’ll shoulder all the blame for this lack of understanding,
knowing all too well that by the time that you are standing
you’ll have learned our language, making you the fastest starter—
proving once again that you are by far the smarter.

 

Prompt words today are inevitable, sympathetic, drivel and shoulder.