Tag Archives: FOWC

Within

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Within

Now that we’re approaching the crepuscule of our lives,
memories swarm through our minds like bees working their hives.
We hope that we are smarter and the young ones that we’ve mentored
have been better off for it— directed and more centered.
Now that we’ve had ample time to get ourselves on track,
let’s hope a bit sticks with us if in fact we wander back.
Perhaps those rare wise children who are born into their lives
able to cut through knowledge like butter cut by knives
are only remembering the lessons of their past,
and unlike all the rest of us have wisdom that can last.

Perhaps we call them wunderkinder, prodigies or sages,
marveling at that knowledge which belies their tender ages.
Whether these intuitions are a blessing or a curse
depends on if they use them for better or for worse.
We can’t dispute the forces that balance out our world—
that nucleus of evil that seems securely curled
within the beauties of existence: the love and charity.
It seems there is a darkness that creates a parity
that although it is ironic, maddening and heart-breaking 
somehow has created us. It’s central to our making.

As we ponder now our purpose and prepare to leave this plane,
let’s hope that all we’ve learned in life has not been learned in vain,
and if we do return, we’ll be a blessing to creation—
an agent that builds fairness and beauty and elation.
This perpetual struggle that rips our world apart
perhaps can be solved best by evolution of the heart.
If within we make the progress that we have made without,
strengthen all our hopes and fight the fear and doubt,
we ourselves can be the change we seek within the others
and enemies and rivals can become sisters and brothers.

 

 

The prompt words were ample, mentor, smart and crepuscule. Here are the links:

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/09/18/rdp-tuesday-post-crepuscule/

https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/18/fowc-with-fandango-smart/

https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/18/mentor/

https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/2018/09/17/daily-addictions-2018-week-37/ample

The Pontificator

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The Pontificator

His ego is most copious, but alas, also fragile,
for his imagination is something less than agile.
He’s much given to adages that were coined by another:
prolific writers of the past, his preacher or his brother.
He’s not really a plagiarist. He just forgets the fact
that although he might perform it, he didn’t write the act!
His words, all gloss and polish, are lacking in much worth.
They seem to lack a kernel, though provided with much girth.
For all that they sound pretty—refined to a high gloss,
instead of rarest metal, alas, they’re merely dross.
In short, although they’re polished ’til they sparkle, glitter, gleam,
they ramble on without restraint, sadly lacking a theme.

 

The prompt words today are copious, fragile, gloss and theme. Here are the links:

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/09/17/rdp-monday-copious
https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/17/fowc-with-fandango-fragile
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/17/gloss/
https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/2018/09/17/daily-addictions-2018-week-37/theme

 

Not Prone to Marry

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Not Prone to Marry

I am a happy spinster—a perpetual “Miss.”
I cannot fathom sinking into a passioned kiss.
I am without an anchor. Obligations have I few.
No imperious husband tells me what to do.

I have no need to ferret out the reasons why I’m single.
It’s not for hate of men and I am not loath to mingle.
I simply like my privacy, have no need for a kid.
While others chose to say “I do,” I simply never did.

 

The prompt words today are fathom, anchor, imperious and ferret. Here are the links:

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/09/16/rdp-sunday-fathom/
https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/16/fowc-with-fandango-anchor/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/16/imperious/ 
http://www.inlinkz.com/new/view.php?id=797445 ferret

New Bachelor in the Neighborhood

14 Replies

 

New Bachelor in the Neighborhood

Eccentric little ladies bring him grubby little pies
and their dead husbands’ left-overs: their suit coats and their ties.
Their hopes that he will fill them is literally factual.
Their need for a fresh husband is absolutely actual.
As they woo him with their chicken soup, they tease with fading eyes,
flaunting assorted figures of every shape and size.
In caftans or in aprons, in capris that are disarming,
they troop up his front sidewalk in numbers most alarming.
When one attempts to pass by with footsteps that are swift,
another elbows her aside, starting an ugly rift.
They’ve been neighbors for a lifetime and best friends for most of it,
but this new man in the neighborhood seems to make toast of it.
He cowers behind his pulled-tight drapes, not wanting to look out.
He cannot face another pie, let alone another bout.
He grasps the want ads in his fist, retreating to his study.
He’ll find another rental or move in with a buddy.
He tries to move without a sound. He’s bolted tight the door.
He hears their voices on his porch—each minute there are more.
Somebody should have warned him—kindly clued him in
about what happens to widows too long deprived of men!

The word prompts today are grubby, tease, eccentric and swift. Here are the links:

 

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/09/14/friday-rdp-grubby/
https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/14/fowc-with-fandango-tease/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/14/eccentric/
https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/2018/09/09/daily-addictions-2018-week-36/swift

Water Fetish

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Water Fetish

From my time of birth up to my years septuagenarian,
if it were my choice, I always chose to be riparian.
I hate the sound of silence, for I find it rather static,
but I love the sound of water, be it tidal or erratic.

A little water rushing by or falling from a height
is lulling to my hearing and pleasing to my sight.
It contributes to my happiness, creates a sense of calm—
a sensory diversion that serves me as a balm.

So to add to my contentment, no need for feast or cake.
Just plant me by a river or a waterfall or lake.
There is only one thing that you need to know.
If you want to make me happy, just provide the H20!!!

Click on any photo to enlarge all.

The prompt words today are erratic, feast, riparian and contribute. Here are the links:

https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/12/fowc-with-fandango-erratic/
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/09/12/wednesday-rdp-feast/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/12/riparian/
https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/2018/09/09/daily-addictions-2018-week-36/contribute

Christmas Gifts

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Click on first photo to increase the size of all and to read captions.

With our Xmas dolls, in Betty’s green checked bedroom.
A teenage Xmas in the new house. Note the giant shell hairdryer.
Dressed up for Xmas by my older sister.

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My mother was the hero of Christmas. Decorated waste paper baskets from the church bazaar, that “Skunk” game I’d been begging for, played once and never again, that one last doll when I was eleven, purchased more for her own nostalgia than my need. The tree went up as the orange and brown of Thanksgiving was disposed of, and the jubilation of Christmas stretched on until New Years, when the tree came down.

For my dad, however, the end of Christmas was never quick enough. The tree lights hurt his eyes, he said, but I always wondered if there was more to it than that: some sparsity of the Christmases of his past that had broken its spirit in the heart of a young boy raised on a South Dakota prairie that furnished few rewards, let alone extravagent Christmases, but still expecting more, perhaps, than an orange in the toe of his sock. A pony, maybe, or a stick of hard candy, a jaunty new blue winter stocking cap or simply a mother  more given to Christmas than his own busy midwife of a mother, always off to somewhere else.

In our mad months of enthusiasm over tinsel, ornaments resurrected from the attic and the mystery of wrapped boxes, we overlooked the remnants of that little boy’s pain, but some part of each of us, detecting it by some subconscious radar, never gave up trying to heal those hurts of former Christmases with tiny Black Hills Gold tie tacks, new wallets and papier-mâché sculptures meant to prod him from his apathy. It never quite worked, except for that sculpture, ugly in its craziness, laughed and pondered over, then left to age and weather on their unroofed patio until its demise, giving one small hope of reviving a small boy’s wonder over Christmas and the unexpected. His forbearance over the years made him, perhaps, another subtler hero of Christmas, just in his putting up with it.

The prompt words for today are orange, game, hero, jubilation and quick.  Here are the links:

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/09/11/rdp-tuesday-prompt-orange/
https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/11/fowc-with-fandango-game/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/11/hero/
https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/2018/09/09/daily-addictions-2018-week-36/jubilation
https://dversepoets.com/2018/09/10/quadrille-64-quickwrite-something/

On the Bottle

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On the Bottle

Even though the likelihood I’ll do so might diminish,
the few times  I’ve been tipsy, I’ve still made it to the finish.
And though the fact I crawled the last few blocks made me most pensive,
you must admit my efforts to get home were comprehensive!

Okay, here are the real prompts for today: comprehensive, tipsy, diminish

https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/09/fowc-with-fandango-comprehensive/
https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/09/tipsy/
https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/diminish

If We Listened to the Birds

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On the dive,

Click on any photo to enlarge all.

If We Listened to the Birds

If I were a mighty bird,
fluent in both voice and word,
when the weather shifted colder,
I’d wing myself to royal shoulder,
have a perch and, I confess,
use all the powers I possess
to loosen up and leave my mark
on that stodgy matriarch,
to feel my presence and touch of wings
and know what necessary things
each creature in nature brings with it.
How each thing comes together to fit.

This I would find exhilarating.
By my presence, educating
the powers-that-be to think of nature
as more than just a nomenclature.
Perhaps I’d tell the president
that I have been heaven sent
to tell the powers that abide
that God’s not really on their side.
God would have us guard our earth
There’s more than money that marks its worth.
All of nature, without a doubt,
makes the world of man work out.

If those large personalities
who run our world would only, please,
take heed of what I have to say,
we’d survive to live another day,
another year, another eon.
We’d have a peaceful planet to be on.
The brother eagle that guides their flight
knows too well extinction’s plight.
The symbol there that marks their seal
is anguished over the ordeal
that fellow creatures of nature face
because of loss of living space.

Our national parks sold off for oil,
waters from which fish recoil,
oceans plugged with plastic waste
we idly cast off in our haste.
While politicians rail and bicker,
our society grows sicker.
Hospitals far out of reach,
schools encouraged not to teach
science, but religious fable
that makes the politicians able
to pull the wool over the eyes
of those who believe their disguise.

It’s true that often what we get
is exactly opposite
of what they promise, their rhetoric
stirring us to moods euphoric
when in fact they’re empty words
meant to bilk admiring herds.
Look deeper at what they profess.
They promise more, but give us less.

The prompts for today are bird, royal, exhilarating, possess. Here are the links, in case you want to play along:

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/09/08/rdp-saturday-bird/

https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/08/fowc-with-fandango-royal/

https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/08/exhilarating/

https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/2018/09/02/daily-addictions-2018-week-35/possess

Where Fury Drives Us

2 Replies

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Where Fury Drives Us

Rash words often generate a sort of tidal force
that set us on a feckless, anger-driven course
that minds no preset schedule, no life path we have chosen.
All of our potential null, we seem now to be frozen
in a pointless fury that drives us to an end—
that inevitable collision that waits around the bend.

The words of the day are schedule, rash and generate.

https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/07/fowc-with-fandango-schedule/

https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/07/rash/

https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/ generate

 

Interwoven

9 Replies

 

Interwoven

Life is like a tapestry, warp giving strength to weave.
Each birth’s celebration a potential loss to grieve.
We might wrangle living’s fairness, its giving and its taking—
one soul giving into sleep as a new soul is waking.
Its weave may seem circuitous, beginnings onto leavings,
all the energy of life–its lovings and its heavings,
yet the flaw within the tapestry is what gives it its beauties.
The pleasures of the life we live are leavened by its duties.

 

The prompts today are energy, tapestry, circuitous, wrangle.

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/09/04/rdp-tuesday-prompt-energy/

https://fivedotoh.com/2018/09/04/fowc-with-fandango-tapestry/

https://wordofthedaychallenge.wordpress.com/2018/09/04/circuitous/

https://dailyaddictions542855004.wordpress.com/wrangle