Category Archives: Poetry

Poems in many categories: Loss, NaPoWriMo

Longing: Non-WordPress Prompt for the Day

9 Replies

jdb photo

Knowing this was the first time in over 4 years that I haven’t had a WordPress daily prompt to follow, forgottenman gave me this one.  If you’d like to join me, just post your blog and then give a link to your blog in my comments section. Being that this is also Open Link Night in dVerse poets, if you are writing a poem, you can also link it HERE. Be sure to use the Mr. Linky bar given on this site to link your poem.

I will list links to other new prompt sites as I discover them tomorrow.

Longing

This morning’s church bells’ constant bongings
woke me to familiar longings.
Coded as they were in dreams,
when I awoke, they split their seams
and spilled into my conscious thought.
Futile to yearn for what I’m not.
No longer young or lithe or trim,
no passions spilling from my brim.
No husband, mother, father, lover.
No guardians to watch and hover.
I’ve grown away from most of life,
connections severed as with a knife.
Still, I do not long for these.
I do not pray on bended knees
for what is past or what is lost,
for I know pining’s pain and cost.
My longing, now, is just to see
what life’s plot is left to me.

The prompt today was longing.

Travel Advisory for Marital Bliss

7 Replies

 

Click on any photo to enlarge all.

For dVerse Poets today, we were to compose a poem making use of the following street names:
Rope Walk, Potacre Street, Silver Street, Catshole Lane, Buttgarden Stree, Gas Lane, Coral Avenue, Dragon Hill, Baron Way, Mutton Lane. Well, I used them all, but don’t blame me for the zaniness of the following:


Travel Advisory for Marital Bliss

When I’m asked to walk the rope,
I am most likely to say, “Nope!”
But(t) Garden Street sounds more ornate.
I might pass through its flowery gate.
I won’t be Dragon up the Hill.
Don’t do inclines, and never will.
Silver and Coral? My confession
is that they suit my old profession
as a silversmith and vendor,
so if you are a generous spender,
I’ll go on a buying spree
and sell the results, then, to thee.

Don’t go for mutton. It ends in gas,
so on those two, I’ll have to pass.
There’s a barrier on Baron Way.
I can’t go there, for no one may.
Acres of potholes also mar
Potacre Street and so my car
must avoid both Catshole and it
lest we wind up in a pit,
damaging our undercarriage
and my stability of marriage.

Are we going there? The wife says no,
for she decides where we will go.
So, much as I would like to wander
up all those streets up over yonder,
dVerse Poets are not my boss,
so this adventure will be my loss.
And though I will not ace your test,
all-in-all, I think it’s best
to limit where I’m going to roam
and simply take the fast route home.

For dVerse Poets Pub prompt.

Broken Concentration

6 Replies

 

Broken Concentration

The words packed tight within my mind
seek the empty page.
They fly like hummingbirds and hawks
escaping from their cage.
But when all my empty places
I seek to fill again,
too many words rush in at once,
creating such a din
that nothing can be made of them.
I cannot restore order
in these alien syllables
that flood across my border.

I did not think these previous lines.
They just crept up on me.
I place words here upon the page
and thereby set them free.
They have no place within my head
where I had plans to write
a solitary love poem.
Instead, they spar and fight,
one trying to beat the others
to the front line of my mind.
Love words elbowing their way,
lined up in back of “pined.”

So “heartsick” steps on “passion’s” toes.
“Adore” runs out of steam
trying to reclaim the place
where words like it must dream.
I no longer know the purpose
that I set out upon
I fear the mood is broken,
my concentration gone.
The thought that any love poem
will come is now absurd.
Minutes ago I was in love,
but now I have been cured!!

 

For the WordPress prompt word broken.

Tomorrow will be the last day for the WordPress Daily prompt.  Please comment HERE if you want to try to help me to change their decision.  Whether you write for the daily prompt or just enjoy reading those who do, please help us try to stop this change for the worse. This is an extensive rewrite of a poem written over three years ago under a different name.

Juxtaposition

8 Replies
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Click on any photo to enlarge all.

Juxtaposition

Artistic types must juxtapose
these to these and those to those
just for the contrast, I suppose.
Somehow, each artist simply knows
to vary hues that they impose
upon the subjects that they chose
to depict first in line and pose.

Poets may likewise words oppose,
and so may writers given to prose.
Composers also juxtapose
in sonatas or do si dos
whatever music sweetly flows
from saxophone, fiddle or Bose.

Shoulder to shoulder, nose to nose
such contrasts form the undertows
that draw attention, lift our lows
stir lethargy and banish woes.

As all these contrasts come to blows,
so our imagination grows.
Time enough to nap and doze
when life draws nearer to its close.
For now, stay open  to the shows
of all who seek to juxtapose.

 

The prompt today is juxtapose.

After the Ceremony

19 Replies

After marriage, even after the mundane invades our life, hopefully, some of the magic remains.

After the Ceremony

Oh my dear,
caught in this star-studded cowboy boot world,
I love you more than an Oreo cookie,
more than bubble gum
or a dill pickle.
You are a full gas tank and my shoelaces.
You are both what keeps me going
and what I am reaching out for—
my goal and trophy rolled into one.
You are my ironing board and my blender—
what churns me up and straightens me out.
Everything in the world is caught up in you.

It is flowering, our ordinary world.
Zephyrus peanut butter
and turgid corned beef hash
are surrounded by rosebuds,
soaring heavenward in sartorial bliss.
The sewing machine is holy
and our Dodge truck dreamlike.
The fanciful and practical
are shuffled in our dream world
like cards at a poker table.
A washcloth and a comb soar heavenward.
Birdsong becomes a phonograph needle,
caught in its groove.
Verdant is the garden hose–
pulsating with a new vibrancy.

If I am a tax form, you are my pencil.
I am diaphanous in my kitchen apron,
a fairy in blue jeans.
I could sing an ode to your toothbrush.
If I took a measuring stick to our love,
the world’s breath would be bated,
waiting for the result.
Birdsong would issue from the teakettle
to chorus the announcement.
For oh, my love, our passion is a hammer.
A scythe that slices through the problems of the world:
the shopping lists and the crabgrass.

Love vaporizes our petty problems––
the broken dishwasher
and the broken fingernail––
I am thy bride, thy fairy princess.
Your pencil sharpener.
The trimmer of your wick,
the cooker of your sausage.

My dear, I am turgid in thy love.
You are what wrenches my heart
and nails shut the door
of every misgiving I might have had.
You are mustard to my sauerkraut,
pastrami to my rye.
Love in a Ziplock bag might seem less fairylike,
blander than white bread
and more Sunday School than magical;
but, you are my big zucchini,
my Dove bar and my Orange Crush,
and I am forever thy camellia and thy rose.

Remember me under lindens,
my footsteps filled with magnolia petals
and my cook pot full of stardust.
Heaven resides in our walkup flat, my dear,
and I pulsate every day
with the memory of that honeymoon
which was only our penultimate dream—
leading up to the chock-a-block,
stuffed turkey with all the trimmings,
overflowing Christmas stocking,
burst balloon filled with confetti,
blissful rest of that conjoined life
that with every morning alarm clock
will spill over us again
like a freshly split piñata.

This is a rewrite of a poem first written five years ago. The prompt word today was ceremony.

Fame

2 Replies

Fame

I don’t want to be Gwyneth, Julia or Pink,
Madonna, Shakira or Cher.
Their kind of renown is simply too much.
Much more than this woman could bear.

Though there’s no famous person that I’d rather be,
it’s not that I wouldn’t like fame.
It’s just that I want to be known for myself
and not by another one’s name.

I want to be known for my words and my art,
but not by my form or my face.
So I can dine out and walk down the street
without all the bother and chase.

I want to go out for a coffee or tea
and see someone reading my book.
And without her knowing, to study her face,
interpreting how she may look

as she reads every page, be it smile or tear,
I’d be known by my writing alone.
Like watching your child go out in the world
to establish a life of its own.

I want to stand hidden, unknown by the world,
to observe someone viewing my art.
To see if what registers there on his face
is what I’ve revealed of my heart.

Unnoticed, unphotographed and unpursued,
I could walk at my usual pace.
I’d get to the finish in plenty of time
without ever joining the race.

I wrote this poem four years ago, but it is perfect for today’s prompt word of  famous.

Modern Bride

7 Replies

 


Modern Bride

The groom’s family was titled and a bit anachronistic.
So when they saw the bride, I fear they went a bit ballistic.
Instead of white she wore a dress of scarlet oddly draped.
The mother of the groom grew faint. Her husband merely gaped.
She wore something archaic instead of merely old—
her grandma’s feather boa—a bridal statement bold.
Around her neck, a python, and her arms were densely bangled.
Her veil pinned to a tractor hat of satin, oddly-angled.
The brim turned back as though she were an umpire at a game.
In short, the bride’s ensemble was anything but lame.

As she hip-hopped down the aisle to a tune by Kanye West,
the groom stood fondly watching her in morning coat and vest.
Her lipstick blue, her bustier was borrowed and conditional
on return to its owner in a manner most traditional.
To complete her fashion statement, her combat boots were blue,
and if you’ve paid attention, you could guess that they were new!
Her bouquet was fresh dandelions bound up with some chives.
She held it in one hand and with the other, gave high fives
to friends all up the aisle as she jerked her way on by.
The groom’s mom gave a shudder and his father gave a sigh.

So did this modern wedding  forsake the antiquated
with customs much less stuffy, less predictable and dated.
The wedding fare was tacos, Cuban sandwiches and chips,
jelly beans and donuts, crudites and dips.
No caviar or salmon. Just ribs and Tater Tots.
The toasts to bride and groom were made with jello shots.
The wedding cake was chocolate with custard between layers.
Good wishes  voiced by ministers, gurus and namaste’ers.
In place of rice the bride and groom were showered with quinoa.
In short, it was a wedding to rival mardi gras!

 

The prompt today is archaic.

The Bee Keeper

15 Replies

IMG_0980

A fine poet and wonderful man passed away a few days ago, just a few days before the private launch party for his newest book of poetry, The Alphabet of Longing and Other Poems. Today, I attended the memorial and celebration of life for Jim Tipton that took the place of festivities meant to be his book launch. In all, there were two hours of tributes and readings from Jim’s work. For my tribute, I wrote this brief poem in which I try to wed a number of the loves of his life: bee keeping, poetry and his appreciation of women.

 

The Bee Keeper

A keeper of words,
he was a tender man with fine vision
and a honeyed tongue adept at sharing it.

A man who loved women,
but not a ladies man,
his heart could stretch to fit everyone.

He was the one among us who knew how to see the other side.
A champion of the beleaguered,
when most found fault, he always had a kind word to say.

Words lived with him. He set them free and always grew more.
Poetry buzzed around him like bees.
He was a man who knew both bees and how to be.

 

 

Because Jim missed this party, I wanted to include these photos of him enjoying the last party I saw him at—last September’s awards luncheon for El Ojo del Lago. As you can see, he was a man who knew how to enjoy life to its fullest. Those of us who knew him through the poetry or music world, his neighbors and his family will feel the huge space left by his exit from our lives. Fly free, lovely man.

Jim’s earlier book of poetry Letters from a Stranger (with an introduction by Isabel Allende) may be purchased here: https://www.amazon.com/Letters-Stranger-James-Tipton/dp/0965715922

His newest book, The Alphabet of Longing, will be available on Amazon in June.  It is presently available at Diane Pearl’s Colecciones  and Yves Restaurant in Ajijic. 

Loud Music in the Rainy Season

3 Replies

 

Click on any photo to enlarge all.


Loud Music in the Rainy Season

Up above me, such a din!
I feel my patience growing thin.
Cross fingers that they do not fall
as workmen scamper over all,
balancing on domes and peaks,
replacing roof tiles, sealing leaks.

They’re taking the old surface off
all my domes and drainage trough,
putting membrane down and goo
that will not let the water through
in June when rains beat hard and steady,
although, alas, they’ve come already!

The dogs are sent into a tizzy.
Looking up, I just get dizzy.
In this world that I love so,
down here in lovely Mexico,
now the grinder joins the din.
In a noise Olympics, it would win!

My thoughts all center on escaping
this chipping, drilling, pounding, scraping.
How I’d like to leave this all
for relative quiet at the mall!
But, alas, I must remain
a martyr to construction pain.

Ear plugs having no effect,
before my sanity is wrecked,
I turn up music to a SHOUT
to let Bob Dylan drown them out.
Now Caitlin Cary croons and sings
that she is “Sorry” and other things.

Eliza Gilkyson’s rough croon
is over oh too soon, too soon.
The silence that her true love speaks
replaced now by the sander’s shrieks,
I turn the iPod on again,
full force, to drown out all the din.

I’ve no sympathy for the neighbors’ plight.
Their damn dog kept me up all night,
and if my eardrums are to be shot
I would rather that it’s not
by machines like those above,
but rather by a sound I love.

The prompt word today is “thin.”

Mongrel Maven

15 Replies



Mongrel Maven

My bloodline’s scattered here and there—
a genealogist’s nightmare.
Racially, I’m broadly mixed.
The KKK would have me fixed.
My lineage being under-par,
I cannot join the D.A.R.
I have no claims to royalty,
so my name is title-free.
Who I am is merely me.
For this I need no pedigree!

 

The prompt word today is pedigree.