Scourge of the Universe
The blood of crushed magnolias stains the universe,
mankind ruining everything it chooses to traverse.
Leaving bloody footprints and the litter of our lives,
we exploit everything we see and kill all that survives.
Why can’t we learn to live in peace, preserving leafy bowers?
What single other species is as ornery as ours?
Wars and Dogs and Teddy Bears
Cynophilists and andarctophiles are experts at collecting,
perhaps because they’ve flunked at other methods of connecting.
Wars are staged by countries that believe in hoarding arms.
Ironic that the means for hugs also maims and harms.
My recommendation is that those who make the rules
should be those sent to battle. Arm the presidents and fools
who start the wars—the despots and the senators and kings.
Then let them see what personal riches battle brings.
Let them take the chances fighting wars waged in their name,
so they are the ones slaughtered or made maimed or blind or lame.
The things that one collects should be what they are about
and what we put into the world be all that we take out.
Prompt words today are war, lame, arctophile, chance and recommendation.
Andarctophile, in cast you didn’t already know, is someone who loves or collects teddy bears. The term for those who love dogs is “Cynophilist”. And the love for a dog is called “Canophilia”.
Cease Fire
It is not superstition, nor mere artifice
that leads mankind to finally declare an armistice.
It is the pure exhaustion that hating brings about.
Peace makes a more desirable flag for us to flout.
What euphoria the heart at peace must feel—
that silence now the guns are ceased, at last, for real.
Prompt words today are desirable, euphoric, superstition and artifice.
photo with permission by Hasan Almasi on Unsplash
War Games
I’m not an island hopper, even in time of war.
Didn’t your mother tell you that’s what a basement’s for?
Wherever you may wander, wherever you may roam,
the best place to dodge missiles is right there in your home.
So reinforce your bunkers, store up delicious rations
so you can withstand war games of the leaders of our nations.
Naughty little spoiled boys who cannot learn to share
will not heed entreaties of those of us who care.
Even our democracy is ruled by a throne.
He gnaws away at joints of beef and throws us all a bone.
With no other agenda than playing at his game,
he does not know the difference between infamy and fame.
So build up your defenses. Reinforce your door,
for he and his rich cronies would profit from a war.
And all the brave young soldiers sweating in the sun?
He’ll take away their benefits after they are done.
Once the war is over, they’ll rebuild the world again
with their construction companies while they sit drinking gin.
Counting profits from the opportunities they’ve found,
they’ll enjoy their hillside mansions as we hunker underground.
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2019/05/29/rdp-wednesday-island/
https://fivedotoh.com/2019/05/29/fowc-with-fandango-war/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2019/05/29/your-daily-word-prompt-wherever-may-29-2019/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2019/05/29/delicious/
Homosapiens and other Misnomers
Man was always venturesome. He wanted to be free
to examine that next hilltop, to sail upon the sea.
Adventure was his target for game or other food.
Always his first priority to feed his growing brood.
But he fared more poorly in trying to connect
with a brand new culture or with a different sect.
He too often made a target of what might have been a friend.
We have evolved from all of this and warheads are the end
of this long long story, for it has been always so.
Conquering is swift and understanding is too slow.
Though we are Homo sapiens, both root words are misnomers,
for we aren’t exactly sapient and for sure we aren’t stay-homers!
Words of the day are connect, target, venturesome and sapient. Here are links:
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/12/11/rdp-tuesday-connect/
https://fivedotoh.com/2018/12/11/fowc-with-fandango-target/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/12/11/venturesome/
https://onedailyprompt.wordpress.com/2018/12/11/your-daily-word-prompt-sapient-December-11-2018/
Rivulet
That tiny scarlet rivulet
descending from his bayonet
displays a horrid etiquette,
so minimal, it’s barely wet.
He lights himself a cigarette
with no remorse and no regret.
Overhead, he hears the jet
and speaks to it from his headset.
Mere days from now, a wife will set
out pieces of a wee layette
on the counter of her kitchenette
not having had the visit yet
that minutes later she will get.
Her country is much in her debt
for the end her husband met
caught in the enemy’s cruel net.
Her hopes and dreams they can’t reset
with military etiquette.
No lesser arms do to abet
tears falling in a rivulet.
The prompt today is rivulet.
Thanks, okcforgottenman for publishing it first and bringing it to my attention.
Big Toys
The act of creation is the greatest art.
You must think of the whole as you create each part.
Things put in conflict must balance as well,
or what was once heaven can turn into hell.
Every yin has its yang as dusk has its dawn.
Every awakening gives way to night’s yawn.
But why peace must be broken by violence and war
is something that tests one’s faith at its core.
When the world is unbalanced by warfare’s grim sin,
It seems perhaps nature’s starting over again
to create a world less given to baking
recipes of destruction that will be our unmaking.
These nuclear toys require such careful tending,
or it’s become clear we’ll create our own ending.
And next time perhaps our creator will find
a recipe that doesn’t include mankind.
The prompt for day 19 of NaPoWriMo is to create a creation myth poem.
If you haven’t seen the 2013 documentary “Muscle Shoals,” you should. The studio that spawned a lot of superior music is now closed, and when we passed through today, this is what we saw instead:
Be Here Now
Where once they made music, now buy a gun.
It’s so in style, join in the fun.
Sidearms your pleasure, armed with aplomb.
When you need bolstering, purchase a bomb.
Warfare’s a game. Come join in and play.
You can wage war for real when you grow up some day.
(Click on this Muscle Shoals link to see a trailer for the excellent documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auGUm2r0cLs.) In addition, here is an NPR story about Muscle Shoals Studio: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1437161
https://dailypost.wordpress.com/discover-challenges/here-and-now/
Reading through a heritage seed catalogue can be a bit like reading a Reader’s Digest of adventure and human interest stories. Take, for instance, the abbreviated tale of how one tomato variety came to be saved and how it got its name. Above is an excerpt from the Southern Exposure Seed Exchange catalogue that tells this tale. Below is the poem I wrote, prompted by this entry.
Aunt Lou’s Underground Railroad Tomato
So many acts of bravery lost
to history, but at what cost?
We concentrate on acts of war
in spite of what we fight them for.
Patriotism is what we say
we’re fighting for, while day by day
young men die for corporations
and win postmortem decorations
Their sacrifice of life much praised
so profit margins may be raised.
Consider, then, the other hero
whose decorations number zero.
This hero’s grave we’re loath to mark.
The soil above his grave is stark.
His collar bore no decoration,
His passing earned him no oration.
Unnamed, unlauded, he took a train
his life and freedom to regain––
pushed up from darkness like seeds to light,
by those engaged in a selfless fight
for fairness and equality.
One more man saved. One more man free.
Those who aided him also lost––
their names like ashes lightly tossed
to fertilize the soil wherein
small shafts push up where seeds have been.
Those seeds he carried his only fare,
passed to a woman who helped him there.
The fleshy meat––tangy and pink,
its juices running down the sink
a child stands over while eating it––
teeth tearing flesh, his face well lit
by sunlight streaming in the glass
where once a hand was seen to pass
a pocketful of tomato seed––
a humble gift born out of need
to somehow give a small bit back.
Those seeds he’d carried in his pack
saved now for posterity
by one man peacefully set free.
The Prompt: Spend some time looking at the names of heirloom plants, and write a poem that takes its inspiration from, or incorporates the name of, one or more of these garden rarities. http://www.napowrimo.net/day-five-3/
I think this poem is also appropriate for the WordPress daily prompt of Contrast.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 