Tag Archives: dVerse Poets

Borrowed Words for dVerse Poets, Jan 29, 2025

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MAGA

Nose to nose,
we meet as one.
Our cause?
To hide
the smoking gun.
We have not even
half begun!

WISH

If I were more than
a toothless crone,
I’d  gnaw our summer
down to the bone.

THE DEATH OF JUSTICE

Attempts to name it
were of no use.
Its means were silenced
by a swinging noose.
Justice arose
and is swinging loose.
Its long neck stretched
by long abuse.

On Track

Those nearest to us
cannot remove
that sure belief
in our mutual groove.

National Anthem

We crow its verses
to try to see
if they’ll renew
our liberty,

Lone Rider

We can’t assume
what we once knew.
Our van’s life passengers
(that sum of two)
no longer number
both me and you.

Buried Wisdom

We hide awareness
in deep dark caves.
The sea obscures them
in rushing waves.
The cream of sea foam
roars and paves
a ceiling over
truth’s buried raves.

 

The prompt for dVerse poets was to write a poem using one or all of the lines of words below, in the  order in which they appear. I composed a different poem for each set.

nose – one – cause – even
were – crone – our – summer
name – use – means – arose
near – can – remove – sure
crow – verse – see – renew
assume – once- van – sum
aware – caves – sea – cream

 

To read other poems written to this prompt, go HERE.

 

A Poem of Negation for dVerse Poets, Jan 23, 2025

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Why I do not Ham on Rye it

You cannot borrow steal or buy it.
Sumo wrestlers never try it.
Female starlets do or die it.
Vitamin makers fortify it
You never cookie, cake or pie it.
Pizza parlors terrify it.
Now and then I me oh my it,
but I hope I don’t defy it,
for if I ever hope to guy it,
I simply must stay on my diet!

 

For dVerse Poets, a poem of negation.

Meditations from My Room for dVerse Poets, Jan 9, 2025

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Meadow Argus / Photographed in Solomon Islands / Michael Sammut

Meditations from My Room

I share different  company in my isolation.
Dogs litter my studio floor,
and my backyard is
an in-between place for birds
passing as though at a freeway interchange,
this way and that.

A constant flutter of butterflies
stirs air around the orange and yellow thunbergia,
lush in this season that mixes sun and rain.
They soar down to the empty lot
and back again,
as though no creature can resist
collecting here in my domain.

Nature follows no rules of man.
It cannot learn obeisance or heed human leverage.
Our world, professional and polished—
how easily by nature now turned inward upon itself.

Our burnished world can hold no sway,
for nature heeds no golden cow.
Her empathy extended toward the broader view,
nature must change the things she can.
She has been patient  with us long enough. The time is now.

For dVerse Poets

To see more poems written for this prompt, go HERE.

Happy Holidays!!!!

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Remembering Grandma at Christmas

The years have chosen to abrade
the paper angel Grandma made
that year when Christmas cheer was thin,
because for weeks we were snowed in.
Even Santa ceased his action
for his reindeer had no traction.

Weeks of snow and sleet and fog
even kept the catalogue
from providing a Christmas doll
when Santa couldn’t come at all.
And so the holidays that year
did not reflect our usual cheer.

No tree, no lights, no heavenly choir,
our only heat a roaring fire.
We kids complained to Mom and Dad
and by Christmas Eve, they’d had
as much of kids as they could stand
and that’s when Grandma took a hand.

Her silver scissors nipped and flew
creating something that was new—
a Christmas angel feathery light
that floated that December night
above our heads in fire glow,
hung by a string, rotating slow

around the room with wafting wings
descending from above on strings.
And from the dark a heavenly song
prompted us to sing along.
My Grandma led, with timorous voice
that song that always was her choice:

“Silent night, holy night!
All is calm, and all is bright.
Round yon Virgin, Mother and Child.
Holy infant so tender and mild.
Sleep in heavenly peace.
Sleep in heavenly peace.”

One by one, we entered in,
our voices first halting and thin,
but when my Grandma chimed a bell,
our family choir began to swell
up to the ceiling, throughout the room,
dispelling darkness, cold and gloom.

Mom made cocoa on the coals
while Dad made popcorn, filling bowls
we strung on thread to deck our halls
from curtain rods to lamps to walls,
along with paper snowflakes that
twirled on their strings to tease the cat.

In the firelight’s magic glow,
they made things magical and so
every normal Christmas since,
we love our turkey and pies of mince,
Christmas presents to poke and squeeze,
bubble lights and towering trees,

but what’s most special is when Pop
puts Grandma’s angel on the top
of the tree covered in flakes
and popcorn strings the family makes.
And when we sing her special song,
if angels sing, she’ll sing along.

For dVerse Poets, the last prompt of the year is “Holiday.”

I wrote this poem 6 years ago. It may not be Kosher to run it by again, but then Chritstmas isn’t a very Kosher holiday at all, is it?  Happy Holidays to one and all..be it Hanukkah or Xmas

A Sci-Fi Poem for the diVerse Poets Pub

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The Prayer of the First Astronaut Poet

There is no Wifi in space
and so I send my words
out into the Universe
hoping that each syllable
will emit a ray
somehow connected
to all my other syllables,
and if quantum entanglement
is right, they will one day
find each other
again.

For the diverse Poets Pub the prompt is to write a Sci-Fi Poem

“Within” for Quadrille Challenge on diVerse Poets, Nov 26, 2024

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Within

Although they stand stiffly at attention,
these walls reach out
and hold me safe within their middle.
They stand guardian,
cushioning sound,
deflecting sharp edges.
Lucky me to have their protection.
Foolish me to leave their arms.
Yet the butterfly
soars over and away.

for dVerse Poets, the Quadrille Challenge prompt is “With.”

“Tree-hugger” for dVerse Poets, Nov 13, 2024

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            Tree-hugger.                 
Today my eyes teared over
as they bulldozed the tree
in the undeveloped lot next door.
It had to be cut. 
A house was being built there and
aside from the trash it dropped,
it blocked the view.
“I’ll tell you what,” Kazem had said,
“I’ll dig it up and plant it in your yard.”
But I didn’t want the mess of it, either.
I wanted the tree next door
where I could see it 
without  dealing 
with the fluff in my pool,
the pods falling off.
That tree was a resting place for  birds,
which I said goodbye to
along with the tree.
Then, while I was at it,
I said goodbye to my cat
who had drowned in the pool
a week before.
Goodbye to my husband
who had hoped to see that tree
and the view around it
every day of the rest of his life.
Goodbye to my mother,
who passed onto me
her love of trees.
Goodbye
to all loved creatures 
recently gone.
The tree was gone in a minute,
along with dry bushes, weeds.
The backhoe scraped the soil over
Coke cans, agua bottles,
plastic flowerpots and chips wrappers–
the detritus from houses on each side,
as well as evidence of years of workers
who sat in the shade of the lot for lunch.
For a year or two
of privacy lost, calm shattered,
peace surrendered,
I’d get new neighbors,   
perhaps a friend.
Clouds of dust billowed
over my newly painted wall.
They’d plant new trees, 
the builder promised,
as he bulldozed all.

–Judy D-B

For dVerse Poets Pub, photo by Aaron Burden
To see the prompt, go HERE. The prompt quote was:
—whose hearts are mountains, roots are trees,
it’s they shall cry hello to the spring.
–e.e. cummings

“Afterthought,” for the dVerse Quadrille Challenge

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Afterthought

I had this thought before you came along,
so whatever you thought I was thinking is wrong.
I wasn’t thinking  your dress wasn’t right,
although now that you mention it, perhaps you might
choose one that was made for a girl of your height.

for the dVerse Quadrille Challenge, the prompt word is What. You can see how others responded to the prompt HERE. Image by Fray Bekele on Unsplash.

Lampmakers, for DVP Quadrille Prompt, Oct 14, 2024

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Click on photos to enlarge.

 

Lampmakers

My husband
trapped light.
Sculpted it.
Forced it to his will.
Made art of it.
Made me
complicit in making it
more than something to see by.
We surrounded light
and channeled it.
Held light before releasing it
in the directions
of our dreams

 

For dVersePoets Quadrille Light Challenge.
See how others responded HERE.

“The Power of Words” For dVerse Poets

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The Power of Words

Words gleam with the meaning
infused with their first thought,
as we think of what they mean to us
instead of what they’re not.

Forming into sentences,
they collect more meaning.
All the smiles of happy words,
and all the sad words’ keening.

For some words grow our ecstacy
with lyrics that are lilting,
while others cast a deathly pall
that prompts our spirit’s  wilting.

 

2. Three little words – Sarah gave us this prompt based on what3words:
“ what3words divides the whole world into 3 metre squares with each allocated a combination of 3 words. These words pinpoint your location exactly.” The three words for my gazebo where my hammocks are hung, (the location on my property where much of my inspiration comes from) are: Gleam sentences wilt. We were to write three stanzas, each prompted by one of the words.