Category Archives: Poetry

Poems in many categories: Loss, NaPoWriMo

Family Reunion: Final Spin

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Family Reunion: Final Spin

The first couple on the dance floor were surely insignificant.
Bent-over spines and frosted hair made them less magnificent
than all the younger dancers who came out to surround them—
making them invisible as they grouped all around them.
The music started and the pairs all commenced their waltzing—
with glides and dips, extended arms, and all that fancy schmaltzing.
Soon, however, they backed off from something in the middle.
Voices hushed throughout the room until only the fiddle,
piano and the clarinets were heard in the night air
as all the others dancers watched a central pair
of waltzers gliding o’er the floor, eyes wrapped up in each other,
once again that little girl just dancing with her brother,
magically suspended in those steps taught by their mother.

The prompt words today are frosted, pair, insignificant and waltzing. And, the cat bit me on the tip of my little finger today and I’m wearing a bandaid, so forgive any typing errors. Especially regarding ‘”[{}]or/?  It may have been a very aggressive love nip or a hurry up and feed me nip or an excessive response to a really good ear scratch/neck rub, but whichever it was, it was very naughty and brought blood. Perhaps vestigial remains of the blood moon of a few nights ago.

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/01/26/rdp-saturday-frosted/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/01/26/fowc-with-fandango-pair/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/01/26/your-daily-word-prompt-insignificant-january-26-2019/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/01/26/waltzing/

Left

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jdbphoto

Left

We were a marvelous combination, determined to survive.
When we were together, each of us more alive.
There was no way to forecast what our end would be.
Never did I dream that love’s survivor would be me.

It’s best that love can’t forecast the future that is pending
We might not choose ever to love if we could know its ending.
For it is inevitable, after true love’s gain,
for one or the other, the ending will be pain.

 

 

The prompt words today are forecast, determined, marvelous and combine.

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/01/25/rdp-friday-forecast/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/01/25/fowc-with-fandango-determined/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/01/25/your-daily-word-prompt-marvelous-january-25-2019/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/01/25/combine/

Intervention

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Intervention

There is no need to instigate a further conversation.
I do not wish to carry on further investigation.
Your research notes are copious. You are immersed in piles of them.
Why must you accumulate miles and miles and miles of them?

Please, conquer your obsession. Let us get on with our lives.
Your number one obsession has me breaking out in hives!
I rue the day I prompted you to have a little look
at what I just considered an entertaining book.

I didn’t have a single clue–not an inkling that
you would quickly be obsessed with the Vampire Lestat!
A Discovery of Witches then joined your Zombie thing.
Every occult creature in graveyard or on wing

has seemed to colonize your mind, squeezing out all other
former occupations: football, hockey and your mother!!!
This is an intervention. I’m unplugging the TV,
seizing all your Anne Rice books. Replacing them with me.

Try to read me like a book. Look here into my eyes.
Vampires aren’t the only creatures who can mesmerize.
We’ll toss your zombies in a pile and stage a mass cremation.
Our sex life should improve a lot with their elimination.

I won’t need to bite your neck. My seductions won’t be gory.
They’ll be the furthest thing from an American Horror Story.
Things that go bump in the night need not all make you wary.
Let me raise your pulse rate by a means that is less scary!!!

Prompt words today are immerse, copious, extreme and instigate.

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/01/23/rdp-wednesday-immerse/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/01/23/fowc-with-fandango-copious/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/01/23/your-daily-word-prompt-extreme-january-23-2019/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/01/23/instigate/

Silver Platter

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Silver Platter

I would not have your heart, my dear, on a silver platter,
for it does not seem to hold the things that really matter.
It only holds the riches to which greedy men aspire.
It does not hold the sentiments that stir us or inspire.
Humor and humility you lack in equal measure.
I fear that life with you would be lacking in the pleasure
that is the spice of living—that gives existence savor.
Life with you would just be rich, but sadly lacking flavor.
So keep your diamonds and your yacht and stow your silver platter.
I’d rather spend my time acquiring things that really matter!

For Daily Inkling’s prompt Silver Platter.

Overheard In the Home for Retired Musicians

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Overheard in the Home for Retired Musicians

I’m stymied by your crepitus. Your embouchure’s divine.
If you don’t have your own tune, would you harmonize with mine?
Your tonality is breathtaking, your rhythm right on beat.
Your syncopation’s perfect. I fear I can’t compete.
As we play, our joints keep time. My knees snap, crackle, pop.
If our music were to lead to love, you’d have to be on top!

 

The prompt words today are crepitus, stymie, breathtaking and embouchure.

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/01/08/rdp-tuesday-crepitus/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/01/08/fowc-with-fandango-stymie/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/01/08/breathtaking/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/01/08/your-daily-word-prompt-embouchure-january-8-2019/

Home is the Sailor

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Home is the Sailor

Homecomings call for clemency and memory that is short,
for when a sailor comes back home to his favorite port,
he doesn’t like returning to atone for past mistakes.
He’d rather do his penance for the new ones that he makes.

This isn’t any riddle, no mystery is involved.
It’s simply that some other bad habits  have evolved.
He finds he cannot take the time to mend what he’s forgotten
when he has so many other newer habits ill-begotten.

 

 

The prompt words today are homecoming, clemency and riddle.

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/01/06/rdp-sunday-homecoming/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/01/06/your-daily-word-prompt-clemency-january-6-2019/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/01/06/riddle/

New Again

1 Reply

 

 

New Again

So, one more number to remember
now that we’ve escaped December.
Drop an eight and add a nine.
So far, I am doing fine.

But I can’t anticipate
what will come to be my fate.
Will I be skinnier or bolder?
What new duties will I shoulder?

What new enigma to be pursued?
Will I be shunned? Will I be wooed?
What new Kardashian of late
will they want me to emulate?

I cannot predict anything.
No telling what the year will bring.
All its mystery is free
and that is simply fine with me.

No resolutions will I make.
Whatever comes, I’ll simply take.
Cross my fingers, cross my toes
and hope its pleasures outweigh its woes.

This year will spin out as it will
Until we all have had our fill,
and just when we feel we’ve had plenty,
it will change to 2020! 

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/01/01/anticipate/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/01/01/fowc-with-fandango-enigma/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/01/01/resolutions/

Breaking Tradition

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Breaking Tradition

A tradition is a habit that we’re loath to break,
a memory that our hearts continue stubbornly to make.
It is our continuity, our chain link to the past.
We make a resolution that it’s always going to last.

And yet our lives must segue to what future we might grow.
We cannot drag the past with us wherever we may go
lest it become a ball and chain that keeps us from what may 
be an opportunity that may come our way.

Traditions are so comforting. They deal with what has been.
They make tiny departures seem a sort of sin,
but sometimes they just hold us back, keep us from being free,
and we must let loose of tradition to see what we can be.

Revenge can be tradition and one that’s hard to break,
causing backward facing hearts to fester and to ache.
As hard as it may be for us to turn around and heal,
it’s the only course that may enable us to feel.

When we peel away tradition, it gives hearts room to grow.
We plant seeds of new memories and tend them row on row.
The garden of our consciousness so fertile and so vast
that there is room for new traditions as alluring as the past.

 

The words of the day are segue, revenge, resolution and traditions.
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/12/31/rdp-monday-segue/
https://fivedotoh.com/2018/12/31/fowc-with-fandango-revenge/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2018/12/31/your-daily-word-prompt-resolution-December-31-2018/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/12/31/traditions/

Out with the Old

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Out with the Old

When I plant that New Year’s kiss,
just what is it I’m going to miss?

I certainly won’t miss the news,
which has not failed to unamuse.

I will not miss my aches and pain,
lest I invite them back again.

I will not miss the expense and cares
occasioned by my roof repairs.

I will not miss my aged appearance
or my young cat’s disappearance.

I’m looking forward, all-in-all
to having no regrets at all.

I’ll take my year unmarked, uncreased, 
with all past worries now released.

 

For Daily Inkling’s New Year’s Kiss prompt.

Stop and Go

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Stop and Go

My goals in life were nebulous. I didn’t know quite what
it was that I most wanted—except out of my rut.
A picket fence and cottage were never my dream.
I didn’t want to produce children by the ream.
I only wanted travel and to see who I could be
if I could search far enough to discover me.

I finally found a part of me everywhere I went,
but had to keep on traveling to know the full extent
of who I wished to grow into—how much I wished to find—
how much I could reveal of me and still have peace of mind.
But now I’ve seemed to settle. I’m content with what I’ve found.
The place where I have come to seems like holy ground.

Perhaps true wisdom really comes from knowing when to stop—
knowing when we’ve climbed enough because we’ve reached the top!

 

The words today were nebulous, cottage and goal. Here are the links:
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2018/12/28/your-daily-word-prompt-nebulous-December-28-2018/
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/12/28/rdp-friday-cottage/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/12/28/goal/