Bar Stool Brush-Off
There’s not a ghost of a chance
that you’ll crack my code,
free-wheeling know-it-all
that you are.
But as your hand smooths
that errant strand of hair
back into its perfect place,
I’ll hand you this:
every time you check your reflection
in the mirror behind the bar,
it is clear no number of looks
will clue you in to yourself.
The prompt for dVerse Poets is “Reflection.”
Full Moon Indictment
The moon is just your implement, dismantling my defenses.
It rattles my conviction, plays havoc with my senses.
What is it in the moonlight that lowers my resistance?
It seems to swell to its full power just at your insistence.
For dVerse Poets, we are to write a poem about the moon. To see other responses to the prompt, go HERE.
Self Portrait
I am trying to escape the menagerie—
all those selves I hold in front of me
as well as the ones I have let escape.
Those that run ahead—
the ones that are my future selves—
are here, hidden in the portrait that you see.
Domineering, perhaps. But seasoned with
an awareness of what might have produced
all of the parts of myself I try to rein in.
This has created a certain slowness to connect.
The natural is seasoned with a desire to honor dreams
of what I hope to be. When I look in the mirror,
I see them all: my mother and my grandmother
and my sisters. We demand, are stubborn.
Sometime we are martyrs, stifling tears.
Then suddenly, I pass them by like memories
of nightmares: all the anxiety attacks,
illnesses and heartbreak.
We are all wonderful performers,
using bad luck to fuel good.
The belles of our own ball,
we push back the grim news
of what we fear we really are.
Headstrong, we reach for what we can be.
Utterly addicted to change,
Tony or no Tony,
we are the stars of our own lives.
For dVerse Poets.
Acceptance
Old age––
Can’t escape it.
We grumble about it,
but the alternative, for sure,
is worse.
The dVerse Poets prompt was to write a cinquain: 2-4-6-8-2.
See how others responded to the prompt HERE.
Helpmates
I’m the first to tell her what to do,
though each morning she pushes my button, too.
“Get out of bed,” I order her,
come back to reconnoiter her.
When she refuses to rise at once,
I sit in the corner like a dunce
and nag and nag until she’s up
to shower and dress and feed the pup.
I keep her clothing crisp and neat
with water mist and searing heat.
I’m a dangerous helper and she knows it.
Dire results if she ever blows it
and fails to heed my hiss and cough
and forgets to turn me off.
When my workday starts, I have no say.
Always ready as she greets the day,
I perk her up and fuel her drive.
She says she needs me to feel alive.
She takes me with her when she leaves.
When she kills the rest, nobody grieves.
I’m strong and flexible and black.
Cause eyes to open and lips to smack.
She holds me tightly every morning—
cussing, yelling, pleading, warning
others who get in her way
as she speeds into her waiting day.
She pushes my buttons and wheels my wheels
with clicks and groans and grinds and squeals.
I carry her inside of me
to take her where she needs to be
and wait outside until she’s done
in rain and snow and baking sun.
I wait at home in the cold and dark,
wondering when she’ll light the spark
that relieves me of my lonely plight—
chilly environs and unlit light.
I hear her footsteps across the floor,
light up as she opens my door.
She reaches in and relieves me
of can or bottle, then goes to pee
restoring me to isolation.
I don’t complain. It is my station.
She turns me on most every night
to wallow in my sickly light,
staring at dramas I provide.
Never does she go outside
to jog or run or bike or walk,
to meet the neighbors and have a talk,
to mow her grass or trim her tree—
she seems to live her life through me.
When at night she seeks her rest,
she always favors me the best.
I cushion her at end of day,
listen as she has her say
about her travails, aches and pains,
her setbacks and all her gains.
All her secrets I will keep
as she covers up and goes to sleep.
for dVerse Poets, the prompt is “I would love to know how you deal with setbacks in life. Share with us in the form of a poem, of course, are you the kind to bounce back, do you curse and rant when things go wrong or do you wallow in self pity. As always you are free to interpret the prompt in any which way.” Image by Jessica Mangano on Unsplash.
An Apologia for Poesy
My gardener’s broom goes whisking light
first left, then right, then left, then right
with touch so slight I barely hear
the bristles as they take their bite.
The birds were first up and about,
and then both dogs asked to get out.
Then that broom reminded me
of one more creature left to rout.
Searching for ideas and words,
I use the rhythm of the birds
and Pasiano’s sweeping broom
the braying burro, the bleating herds.
Noises fill this busy world
even as I’m safely curled
still abed, my senses all
alert and ready, full unfurled.
I hear the grackle far above,
the insistent cooing of a dove,
as in the kitchen, Yolanda dons
her apron and her rubber glove.
I hear the water’s swirl and flush
the busy whipping of her brush
around each glass I might have left,
careless in my bedtime rush.
Her string mop silent, I barely know
if she’s still here. Or did she go?
I find her in the kitchen still,
arranging glasses, row on row.
Then it is to my desk I trot.
Arranging glasses I am not,
but rather words I nudge and shift
here and there until they’re caught.
Glued to the page forever more––
be they rich words, be they poor––
nevertheless, these words are mine:
poems, stories, truth or lore.
We are not slothful, lazy, weak
because it’s words we choose to seek
instead of labors more obvious
like plumber or computer geek.
Words’ labors are most harrowing.
Our choice of them needs narrowing
and not unlike the farmer’s sow,
mind’s riches we are farrowing.
So blame us not if others mop
our houses or they trim and crop
our gardens for us as we write.
From morn till night, we never stop.
Poets, our lives may seem effete––
not much time spent on our feet––
but those feet are busy, still,
tapping out our poem’s beat.
Cerebral though our work may be,
we are not lazy, you and me,
for though we sit and write all day,
our writing’s labored––that’s plain to see!
The dVerse Poets prompt is “Noise.”
Where Have They Gone?
Where has it gone, that memory
that matched names to faces,
attached today
to the day of the week
by which we call it?
Where have they gone–
my favorite cape,
my car keys and my iPhone,
the lid to the butter dish
and my reading glasses?
Gone with that wind, perhaps,
that blew away last autumn’s leaves,
then snow from the sidewalk
and that errant downspout
from its final weak attachment.
Where went lost loves,
my parents
and departed friends?
Dogs, birds and cats
and other loved, once-living things?
Gone, too, with the wind?
If so, this final question:
where goes the wind
and someday,
where go I?
For dVerse Poets, the assignment is to construct a poem centered around the line “Where is?” of “Where are?
Game of Cards
I would pay a pretty tuppence
to invest in his comeuppance.
His smug assurance, his galling preening.
He’s like a babe in need of weaning,
sucking at the teat of fame.
What other mortal needs his name
written on towers around the world?
He’s Ozymandias, stone lip curled
in cruel splendor, sure in his power
reasserted on every tower.
But remember, as he counts each coup,
how all the mighty have fallen, too.
False knights wear armor prone to tarnish.
His Midas touch will lose its varnish.
We’ll laud the day when he’ll be dumped—
That day when he’ll be over-trumped!
The dVerse prompt is Power.
“J”abbertalky
Judy Jamison just jabbed Joe’s jingling jodhpurs.
“Jeez!” Joe jumped jerkily—justifiably jittery.
“Just joking, Jumpin’ Joe!” joyful Judy jabbered jejunely.
Joe’s justifiable joyless judgment jarred Judy’s jubilation.
Joyful June joint juggling junket journey just jinxed!
Jumpin’ jiminy—justifiably, jetlagged Joe just jettisoned Judy!
A Quadrille is a 44 word poem. The prompt for the Quadrille Challenge on dVerse Poets is “jabber.” Image by Zyana on Unsplash.
I must take umbrage over those words
that you have shared with all the world.
My deepest secrets, revealed, I thought, to you alone––
lie here, their magic lost,
trapped in tabloids––worthless
except as wraps for fish and chips.
A Cherita, for dVerse Poets Thanks to Matthew Reyes for use of his image on unsplash and to Forgottenman for his additional prompt “umbrage.”
See other poems for this prompt HERE.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 