Love Story After Rain, for NaPoWriMo 2023, Day 25 and Wordle 319

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Love Story After Rain

If I had a penny for each
of all my thoughts of you,
my dear, I’d buy us lollipops
for one hand,
yellow tulips for the other

and as the rainbows disappear,
replaced by brighter clouds,
stay near—
together
as we have been wont to do,

everybody else
disappearing
except us,
your sunshine drying
up the puddles.

Do not seek to join us,
world,
We are enough—
sticky-tongued

with pollen
clinging
to our lips and fingers,
silly grins.

Love story after rain.

For Wordle 319 the prompt words are: sunshine lollipops rainbows disappear join stay near penny together brighter cloud everybody

Also, for NaPoWriMo, the prompt challenges us to write a love poem, one that names at least one flower, contains one parenthetical statement, and in which at least some lines break in unusual places.

Plumeria Near Water: FOTD Apr 25, 2023

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Click on photo to see the reflections in the water move.

For Cee’s FOTD

Stating the Obvious

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Stating the Obvious

We’ve hit a cosmic bottleneck and every day I rue it,
for I have the feeling that we will not make it through it.
They’ve indexed the world’s problems, but knowing that they’re there
seems to do very little in solving the nightmare.

We do not yield to pressure to try to cure the ills.
We only seem to kneel before the moneyed class’s wills.
We temper fear with hope that someone else will solve the puzzle
of the fact the whole damn world is staring down a muzzle.

Kids shoot other kids with guns but adults do not care
so long as the NRA sanctions the warfare.
We ban those from our borders who clean up all our messes,
then wonder why we’re drowning here in our own excesses.

Amazon sells refreshments as we all just sit and watch
as climate change keeps shifting the danger up a notch.
Meanwhile, the rich get richer and we ignore the poor
as the ones who need it least acquire more and more.

The polar caps are melting as California burns,
and in between, the drought and floods keep on taking turns.
Hurricanes, tornadoes and cyclones mount and mount,
raising the fatalities higher than we can count.

Nobody knows the answer for how to please us all,
yet we forget we all are one on this great blue ball.
If only we could find a way to even out the score
and give up some of what we’ve got so others can have more.

Sacrifice fossil fuel to give the world a chance.
Tear down the oil derricks. Replace them with plants.
Make sure the rich pay taxes on a par with all the rest.
Admit that we don’t own the Earth. We are just its guest!!!

 

Prompts today are temper, index, cosmic, bottleneck, kneel and refreshments.

To Martha’s Muse

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The muse of painting, on the Opera House in Guanajuato, Mexico

 Here is Martha’ Kennedy’s, prompt that came in response to my “Demused” poem:
“My muse got the word from yours that she’d like you to start at least ONE poem with, “Tell me O Muse” She just wants a little acknowledgement.”

I’ve never turned down a prompt yet, Martha’s Muse, so here is your poem of acknowledgement:

To Martha’s Muse

Tell me, O Muse, if it is you
telling my muse what to do
to spur me to get off my duff
and write lines that are good enough
to meet the current status quo,
instead of being just “so-so?”

If so, please let me know it’s me
penning the lines, and not just she.
So if she sickens, dies or just
loses her poetic thrust,
I can make it on my own
to write a poem that’s fully blown!!!!

This frees her and also me
from interdependency.
Frees her to leave me all alone
to find “amusement” on her own,
and once she’s off to do her roaming,
I’ll practice independent poeming!

Though in the past I’ve been bemused,
when on occasion I’ve been de-mused,
I’ll take my genius off the shelf
and write my poems all by myself.
(And though, dear muse, freedom is thine,
I’ll claim my credits as purely mine!!!!)

Though Martha’s muse probably ain’t
just one of words, but also paint,
I hope that she has room enough
for all my muse’s extra stuff,
for as she departed, slamming  doors,
she said she’s off to knock on yours!!!!

Egret with Fish: Monday Portrait, Apr 24, 2023

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Long-legged Birds for NPC #9

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Click on photos to enlarge.

From Lake Chapala to La Manzanilla to Alabama to Wyoming to the rainforests of Peru, I never met a bird I didn’t have to photograph.  Here are a few of the long-legged ones, as directed by the prompt!  Yes, I got carried away a bit.

For Nature Photo Challenge #9–Long-legged Birds

Salvia: FOTD Apr 23, 2023

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For Cee’s FOTD

Demused

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Demused

My muse is on sabbatical. I think she’s feeling surly
from  umpteen years of being awakened way too early
to find a rhyme for “rainbow ” that my readers judge sublime,
only to discover every single time
that I get all the credit for the work she does
each new day in succession. And why? Simply because
she happened to be sanctified and then assigned to me
to insure a steady flow of poetry
without making an agreement regarding who’d be credited
as author of the poems conceived, then written and edited.
So now I seek to rectify my decades-long misdeed
by saying that hereafter, I certify and cede
half the writing credits to my muse of inspiration,
hoping the result will be she’ll come home from vacation,
refreshed, newly-inspired and forgiving of my sin,
full of new ideas and ready to begin.

 

Prompts today are succession, surly, sabbatical, sanctify, arise and rainbow.  Image by j Jo Justino on Pixabay.

 

Still Life for Lens Artists Challenge 246

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Click on photos to enlarge.

For the Lens  Artists Still Life Challenge.

Unhoarded Treasures

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Uhhoarded Treasures

Those things seen on the surface
form the network of our world—
rain turned into rainbows
with their colors all unfurled.

This greatest spectacle
is spread out for all to see,
for the greatest treasures of the world,
blessedly, are free.

Even the biggest pessimist
among us must admit
that a bit of pleasure
may be derived from it.

Prompts today are surface, unusual, network, pessimistic, fee and rainbow.