Tag Archives: #RDP

At the Movies

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At the Movies

Looked up too late and so I missed
the moment that the lovers kissed.
Taking a break, I closed my eyes.
Missed seeing how the hero dies.

Paresthesia setting in
caused me to take a little spin
for five minutes or maybe ten
to the lobby and back and then

when I got back, the credits started.
So as everyone departed,
I left as well, regretting so
how I had missed most of the show.

With old film cameras, when the bulb flashed,
it produced something that would last.
A photo mounted in a book
gave something upon which to look.

But movies are impermanent.
Moment after moment went
into the past, so if one blinked,
what they had missed became extinct.

That’s why next time I didn’t go
when invited to the show.
I stayed at home and had a nap,
my photo album in my lap.

 

Prompts today are look up, missed, paresthesia, bulb and old film camera.

Story Time at the Library

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Story Time at the Library

Cluster here around me. Cross Your legs. Open your mind.
I’m going to tell you stories of a slightly silly kind.

Or lie back on the carpet, close your eyes and try to see
all the varied images that are going to be.

We’ll be crossing to another land where we can be whatever
each of us may want to be: beautiful, brave or clever.

Light the bulbs above your head. Imagine what you hear.
For the next half hour or so, you’l be “there” and not “here.”

In imagination’s magic land, all your dreams come true.
Climb aboard my story train and I’ll share it with you.

And now as then, the crowd being both clever and magnanimous,
They decided they’d all come along. The voting was unanimous.

And so the children climbed aboard to hear a tale or two—
precisely the same stories in the past that I told you.

 

Prompt words today are cluster,  crossing, bulb, unanimous and carpet,

Forgotten Words

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Forgotten Words

Sometimes a certain word just doesn’t clink.
It doesn’t fit in in the place where we think.
It’s not in our lexicon. We can’t remember.
Not only won’t spark. There’s not even an ember
of inspiration to trigger a thought.
We only remember what it is not.

What could be therapeutic at bringing it in
from where it’s been ostracized. What about gin?
A good stiff martini might loosen our brain
and help us remember what it means again.

It hangs somewhere in back like a not-much-worn pendant,
covered up by more popular, less independent
words more ubiquitous, used every day.
More popular, funny and modern and gay.

But somewhere in the shadows, in the back of our mind
are words we’ve forgotten of the long-ago kind,
ready to pop out in most unlikely times
when we’ll use them in novels and stories and rhymes.

Then they’ll shake out their wrinkles and rub off their rust
And rejoin the world, leaving footprints of dust
in the minds of all readers, who for sure when they read them
will use them again when they happen to need them.

Prompts today are clink, lexicon,  ostracize, independent and  therapeutic,

The Comforts of Age

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Click on photos to enlarge.

The Comforts of Age

My Donnybrook days of parties and fairs,
of baltering frolics in passionate pairs,
are primarily over. Instead of wild rioting,
I spend my weekends just grousing and dieting.
What has replaced my past jubilation?
I hate to admit it is blessed hibernation.

Prompts today are Donnybrook, balter, grouse, primary and  hibernate,

Putting the Pot Before the Course

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Putting the Pot Before the Course

The imbroglio started in checkout line three
when the woman who stood in line in front of me,
after unloading caviar, prime rib and ham,
heard the checker say, “That will be ninety bucks, ma’am.”
I listened with care as she started to vent
that her primary capital had all been spent,
and the place in her purse where her money had been
had been emptied by purchase of fine porcelain.

Dinner plates, soup bowls, a lovely tureen—
the most beautiful Limoges that she’d ever seen—
were nestled in sawdust in the trunk of her car
(with what she called a cruse but what I’d call a jar)
so ancient and fine that when next I might name it
I had to take care that I didn’t defame it.
It was indeed tasteful, but hadn’t much use.
Who would bake beans in a pot called a cruse?

Of course all of our discourse was beside the point,
for she hadn’t a bean—much less a fine joint
to cook up and serve on her bone China dishes,
for in spite of all of her most tasteful wishes,
she hadn’t a penny to spend on the food,
and though it went unmentioned lest I be thought rude,
she left minus prime rib, coq a vin, and her knishes,
so hadn’t a morsel to grace those fine dishes.

Prompt words are cruse, imbroglio, primary, tasteful and capital.
*A cruse is an earthenware pot or jar. Images from Unsplash.

A Too-Modest Proposal

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A Too-Modest Proposal

Even though your offer is accompanied by a gift,
I think it’s fairly certain an acceptance won’t be swift.
Your statement is made bluntly without obvious affection,
as though you’re in a restaurant ordering a confection.

You’ve made a conscious effort to be proper and polite,
yet there’s naught in your proposal calculated to excite.
If you have hopes for any love affair to start,
it’s clear you need a lesson in opening your heart.

Prompt words today are acceptance, swift, statement, conscious and offer. Image by Ospan Ali on Unsplash.

Cruel Fate

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Cruel Fate

If you want aggravation, she’s a candidate for giving it.
If you have a seat picked out, it’s sure to be the place she’ll sit.
Encroaching on your comfort is how she gets her kicks.
Any plans that you suggest, for sure are ones she’ll nix.

She’ll likely raise your dander, whatever choice of topic.
Her taste in politics and art? Impossibly myopic!
And if you harbor any hopes that you won’t have to see her,
you can blame cruel fate that your next blind date will be her!

 

Prompt words today are harbor, raise, aggravation, encroach and candidate. Image by Obie Fernandez on Unsplash.

Zoe the Despoiler

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Zoe the Despoiler

My little canine daughter is inimitably bold.
She cannot be deterred by a censure or a scold.
When her goal is purloined plastic bags or Yolanda’s mop,
it does no good to tell her that it’s time for her to stop.
She browses for the perfect thing for her to steal,
then if it seems it will not make a satisfying meal,
it might be good for chewing, so she’ll add it to her stash.
Not one of us is equal to her thirty meter dash.
She thrives on such purloining. Can we blame it on her age?
With luck, it’s a preliminary temporary stage!!!

Prompts today are inimitable, little, browse, thrive and daughter. Just like any toys that make their way out of her bed, Zoe was intent on dragging her new mop toy back to her favorite place of repose.

 

Stealing plastic bags
Dragging the mop from the kitchen to where it belongs–her bed.

 Click on photos to enlarge.

April Rain

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April rain streams out from my neighbor’s rooftop.
Soaks the garden,
Collects on leaves,
Everchanging weather–either a blessing or a curse.
The runoff from last night’s rain shoots from the drain that pierces a high stone wall.
The clouds are gorgeous in the later afternoon
The cycle of life represented by the trees, sun, clouds, rain.

April Rain

As angry clouds clenched like a fist,
fade into gentle morning mist,
leaves curled on branches fall at last
from where they have been clinging fast.
Now  that the year is on the march.
water falls to quench its parch.
New leaves emerge to greet the sun
and doors open as one-by-one,
we, too, come out as April rain
brings back nature’s green again.

 

Prompt words today are march, water, curl and anger

Lovecraftian Loathing Lullaby

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Lovecraftian Loathing Lullaby

Eldritch horrors ain’t my thing.
I dread the nightmares that they bring.
Monsters, killing—all that stuff?
Years ago, I’d had enough.

Inflation, nuclear arms, pollution?
Fantasy is no solution.
I’m tired of the razzmatazz—
computer games and all that jazz.

Horror’s not just a game, you know.
Lately, it’s the status-quo.
Game violence a pretext for
prompting violence galore.

No wonder guns and bombs and knives
have complicated modern lives.
We keep getting dumb and dumber.
Modern life is such a bummer!!!!

 

 

Prompt words today are Eldritch, (oh, come on, now!) jazz, pretext, inflation. The other prompt word hasn’t been posted. Image by Robert Coelho on Unsplash. 

 

Eldritch is an English word used to describe something otherworldly, weird, ghostly, or uncanny. In contemporary culture, the term is closely associated with Lovecraftian horror.