Tag Archives: The Sunday Whirl

Dancing in the New Year, For Wordle 635

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Dancing in the New Year

One eye on the hourglass, sifting out the sand
belonging to the old year, yet swaying to the band
feverishly spinning in a shallow arc,
the partner that you dance with, caressing in the dark
shadows of the days gone by—three hundred-sixty-five.
Their pages scattered on the floor as you choose to jive.
Butchering the minutes that flutter ’round your feet
as your steps make light of them to the new year’s beat.
No aching gasps of nostalgia counteract the roar
of the new year’s entrance as you swirl around the floor.

For The Sunday Whirl Wordle 635 the prompt words are: shallow spin aching gasps scattered flutter shadows butcher hourglass feverishly eye

A Bah Humbug Primer: For the Sunday Whirl Wordle #634

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A Bah Humbug Primer

If a White Christmas isn’t your “thing,”
If popcorn is something you eat but don’t string
into chains for the tree, and if twinkling lights
and tinsel and candy canes are dreaded sights,
if you are weary of seasonal cheer,
lest a stray chorus should fall on your ear
of “White Christmas” or “Jingle Bells,” close tight your door,
seal up your window, or you’ll hear more
joyous renditions you feel you’ve heard
over and over until they’re absurd.

If you grow feverish thinking of shopping,
then break out in chills—back and forth, without stopping,
then put on the skids or else you might pop.
Don’t make me send over the Bah Humbug Cop!
With unwavering calm, put dreams into action,
lest you commit  a Yuletide infraction.

There’s no law that says that you have to do
holidays that you happen to rue.
Hop a bus, then a plane. Find a tropical isle.
Take off to Arabia. Sail up the Nile.
There are plenty of spots without holly and snow—
places where Santa Claus dares not to go.

Just because some of us love our tradition,
doesn’t mean you will be tried for sedition
if you neglect to put up a tree.
So perk up your ears and listen to me.
There is a truth that everyone knows.
The best gifts of all don’t come tied up in bows.
Friends we can trust and friends we hold dear
We celebrate every day of the year!!!

The Sundaywhirl prompt words today are: dream white joyous twinkle waver chains stray chorus might chill feverish sight

Dreamscape: For The Sunday Whirl Wordle 633

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Dreamscape

Unravel realms of slumber and try to bring on home
A beacon cast by memory. That fresh-turned scent of loam.
The dazzling icy glitter of icicles that drip
with hypnotic regularity as warm air takes its sip.
Memories of a lifetime, bittersweet at best,
yearning over losses and missing childhood’s zest.
We move our eyes in slumber over a different view
on the screen of nostalgia, which we seek to imbue
with not only reality but also with our hope
that we can remember with a wider scope
creating a new story, satisfyingly surreal
where a lifetime of memories can gather and congeal
to form another story in which we hope to  heal.

 

 

For The Sunday Whirl Wordle 633 the prompt words are: dazzling icy home realm slumber yearning bittersweet beacon cast unravel eyes try
Image of tractor and plowed field by Roberto Bernard. Other photos by me.

Evolution or Devolution? For the Sunday Whirl Wordle 632

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I moved the ammonite fossil from the wall ledge to the ground, where it was safer from nudgings by cats,

Evolution or Devolution?

Their footsteps  form a timepiece pressed into the rock:
portraits of a planet learning how to walk.
Bent on following a plan well out of their control,
instincts prodding them to race to fulfill their role.

Each tiny part of nature bound to do its part,
facing threats against the evolution of the heart.
What part of mankind’s journey waits around the bend?
Will our progress finally bring about our end?

 

For Sunday Whirl Wordle 632 the prompt words are: control rock portrait timepiece bent plan threats instinct race part footsteps planet

Rash Acts, For Wordle 630

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Rash Acts
Ashes from the burning house go swirling ’round the fire,
casting their debris and licking ever higher.
Corridors of smoke sent upwards in the air
starting in the living room and swirling up the stair.
The cat jumps from the window, dogs barrel out the door.
The man runs out with boxes in his arms. Goes in for more.
His wife pleads with him not to go, fashions a refrain
that she repeats in hopes she’ll be able to restrain
his further trips into the house, facing smoke and flame
knowing not the secret gift that he’s gone to reclaim.
His final trip completed, he’s safe from further harms,
as he rushes out to place their wedding photos in her arms.

This one is sorta corny, but the prompt words made me do it!!

For the Sunday Whirl Wordle 630  the prompt words are: fire arm fashion cat corridor debris gift secrets box flame ashes refrain.  Image by Jen Theodore on Unsplash.

Night and Day, For Wordle 629

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Night and Day

What sleights of hand our bored gods play,
meandering at end of day,
tricking out our daylight world
with creeping shadows  they’ve unfurled,
plunging us in darkness that
sends in the dog but draws the cat
out to wander hill and hollow
where no human dares to follow.
The timorous mouse must then give pause
lest it fall victim to its claws.

Beam of moon that lights the way
poor substitute for light of day.
The ship of night must trim its sail
lest it lists within the gale
that joins the dark to forge the din
that further serves to box us in.
Odd nature, thus, a puzzle makes.
With one hand gives, the other takes.
Mere mortal quakes within his bed,
prays for calm daylight in its stead.

plunge meandering shadow odd trim box gods tricks plunge beam lists hollow are the words for the Sunday Whirl Wordle 629

The Escape

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The Escape

Lips pressed against a crystal glass,
she gazes at the stars.
A prisoner, she scans the sky
from Jupiter to Mars.

Within this arranged marriage,
her future has been cinched.
Trapped within tradition,
her fire has been quenched.

Blind terror fills her body
as she thinks of what she’ll lose,
for it is another
she’d have if she could choose.

A pity that she has to take
this means of her escape,
as she tucks the lethal bottle
in the pocket of her cape

and drinks the draught in one fast gulp,
then lets out one long sigh
as she enters that dark tunnel
that leads from Earth to sky.

The Sunday Whirl Wordle 628 prompts are: blind lips body escape pressed pitied tunnel lose trapped fire glass stars (Image by Louis Galvez on Unsplash.)

The Arms Race (Becoming Grandma) for Wordle 627, Nov 5, 2023

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When I look in the mirror, I sometimes feel like I’m becoming my mother, but when I look at my arms, it is also revealed that I am becoming my grandmother.  By the time she passed away at age 96, any effort to assist her in rising or sitting up by grasping her lower arms could result in the skin actually tearing off in pieces like tissue paper, and although not quite at this stage,  At 76, I have grown fragile. My skin has become translucent, showing off deep blue or purple bruises from below  given birth to by slight bumps or scrapings against even smooth surfaces—the edge of a table or a door. Small beads of blood flow out from tears of skin caught in a cat’s claw or a dog’s questing paw, and the skin of my lower arms is dappled with these signs of affection left by even the most furtive advances of the smallest of my dogs.

At night, in bed, I am a highway for dogs jumping into bed to snuggle down for the night and likewise for the same dogs springing from the bed to investigate the slightest noise in the backyard or the street.  One bound, using me as trampoline, propels them to the floor, and one more, in a flash, shoots them out the door. Any stray possum or other late night intruder into their domain not driven off by their initial loud growls and following barks is dealt with in a snap of the jaw. No furtive ingress into my nighttime garden goes unnoticed. Then, the intruders dealt with, back into bed they bound, usually landing on one arm or the other, leaving yet another mark of their affection. They are my protective angels, these small warriors of the night, but I fear they are loving me to pieces, as one glimpse of my arms will attest to.

The words for Sunday Whirl Wordle 627 are: caught pieces snap flash angel stray furtive dappled flow skin translucent blue

Vixen

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Vixen

You are a crafty sorceress who holds men in your spell.
You clutch their hearts within your grasp where you squeeze them well,
then drain their living hearts of blood and leave them with a shell
with which to fend off, for a lifetime, loves which may be true,
but which they do not trust at all simply because you
have branded them for life with doubts  perpetually new
each time they try to ply love’s trade to find something’s amiss
as, still again, a rueful fog envelops each new kiss.
Thus, with sketchy prospects, loves two, three, four, five, six,
are extinguished by that first cursed love that blows out all their wicks!

 

For the Sunday Whirl Wordle 625 the prompt words are:  sorceress sketchy life , you, brand six, still, fog hold spell fend ply

Retablo  by Judy Dykstra-Brown

 

Jail Break: For The Sunday Whirl Wordle 623

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Jail Break

All these words are borrowed. They are not really mine.
They came all neatly packaged in an orderly line
where they were held hostage, gathered up and wrapped—
a lexicography in waiting with its power oddly sapped.
Words slack with grief, all gathered in a long veiled sigh,
as though lined up like prisoners, scheduled to die.
Bare pockets empty of bare change, stripped of all their worth,
words that once soared to lofty heights were now brought down to earth.
But here I am their savior, for it’s been left to me
and other hero poets to set their power free.!

The words for The Sunday Whirl Wordle 623 are: slack grief hostage gather bare heights wrapped words pockets long veiled sigh