Tag Archives: Word of the Day Challenge

Death Knell

Death Knell

Living too near a factory
may cause distress olfactory,
thus magnifying baleful thoughts
in the minds of those “have nots”
of purdy sorts who need not smell
these odors from the fires of Hell.
Who cares what vapors invade air
in places where no rich are there?
The vile winds hum a savage tune.
Thus goes the world to pot and ruin

with mankind born, then gone too soon.
death knell
farewell

Prompt words today are purdy, magnifying, baleful and factory.
Purdy: disagreeably self-important (dialectal, England) or, alternate spelling of “purty,” or pretty.

Blood Sacrifice

Blood Sacrifice

The roar of the crowd
creates its own violent
poetry,

magnifying future pain
into a blood lust,
its hard edge
more than a mother could bear at times.

Its heart beats faster

as the football 
is launched and won,
carried like a communion loaf,
flawlessly,
swiftly
toward redemption.

 

Prompt words are hard edge, beat, magnifying, football. Image by Dave Adamson on Unsplash.

She’s Talking About Her Dog Again!!!!

Click on first photo to enlarge, then click on it to enlarge next photo, ad infinitum!

1 P.M. and She’s Talking About Her Dog Again!!!!

My pesky new apprentice assists me in my writing
with tugging and with growling and with nuzzling and with biting.
She sees my busy fingers as toys for her to play with
that no matter what I need them for, she’s sure to have her way with.

She demands my attention with her robust barks,
then sits upon my keyboard, leaving puppy marks.
She’s not a mere disturbance, but a 24-hour duty.
I’d do something to change this, but she’s such a little cutie.

In the area we’ve made for her, she has no urge to pee.
She prefers the dining room for her morning wee.
There’s no way to out-wait her and monitor her poops.

Why  do it where Mom wants you to when you can  prompt an “Oops?”

She’s such a cagey customer, there is no way to catch her.
When she is determined, no force on earth can match her.
When I slip out of my shoes, she slips her teeth into them.
Instead of learning to eschew, she chooses just to chew them.

I’ve tried to write my daily poem since roughly 6 a.m.
Which was the hour she chose to use me as a jungle gym.
With push-ups on my face, then tug-of-war using my hair,
she was my canine alarm clock extraordinaire.

First there was the feeding, then the pee and pooping,
the washing, disinfecting, the blotting and the scooping.
Then hours in the backyard with the other dogs.
With so much activity, who has time for blogs?

Then the screening of the porch so I can keep her close.
Otherwise, I know that her intention’s  “Vamonose!!
Whether perky little houseguest, scavenger or daughter,
In spite of changes in my life, I’m so glad  that I got her!

 

Prompt words today are apprentice, robust, oops, cagey and disturbance.

No Chip Off His Block

No Chip Off His Block

He cannot get a rise out of his insouciant daughter.
A woman on a tightrope, he cannot make her totter.
Cool as a cucumber, a lamb chop with no gristle,
teasing does not faze her. No insult makes her bristle.

He sees her as a puzzle he’s determined he will solve.
Where did she get her backbone and her strong resolve?
He’s had too many beers, but when he goes to get another,
it’s clear to everybody else she takes after her mother!

 

 

Prompt words today are gristle, mimic, insouciant, totter and tease.

Fatal Obsession


Fatal Obsession

My father is an ogre and rather hard-of-hearing,
but I had the silly idea I could rise above my rearing.
All my friends were human and I had a strange obsession
for screening them from tendencies I had in my possession.

The result was that I scored a beau inimitably grand—
the sort of perfect boyfriend I thought I’d never land.
Vibrant, handsome, wealthy and inordinately smart,
he was the sort of catch that would melt any ogress heart.

In short, I could barely believe that Avery was mine,
but when I brought him pridefully home with me to dine,
after the aperitifs, the soup and the tossed salad,
I noticed that my father was looking somewhat pallid.

I stepped into the kitchen to find him food more savory,
only to return to find that dad had eaten Avery!!
I cried, “How could you do this to one who’s so indelible?
“I tried to prove you wrong,” he said. “I thought you said inedible!”

 

Note: An ogre (feminine: ogress) is a legendary monster usually depicted as a large, hideous, man-like being that eats ordinary human beings, Ogres are closely linked with giants and with human cannibals in mythology.

Prompt words for today are vibrant, indelible, inimitable, possess and pride.

Payback

Payback

When Hal at the feed store hired a new clerk,
he was friendly enough, but a bit of a jerk.
He quickly filled orders for packets of seed
of a kilo or so, but he didn’t accede
to requests for help out with a heavier sack.
He had an excuse as he claimed a bad back.
Then later that rascal would  go to the gym
and work out with weights far heavier than him.
Of course word got around and was cause for his layoff.
Good news for his back which now has every day off!

Prompts today are layoff, rascal, friendly, accede and clerk. Image by julian-andres-carmona-serrato on Unsplash.

Squirreled Splendor

Squirreled Splendor

Why this crazy diadem so intimately curled?
How quizzical you’ve seen it fit to be completely squirreled.
If I decide to follow suit to don a furry coif,
will you claim a copyright and make me take it off?

 

Prompt words today are decidediadem,  copyright, quizzical,

Miss Malaprop



Miss Malaprop

A nubile young maiden, inchoately malleable
needs some instruction to stay out of trouble.
Her mother has warned against malaprop gaffes,
which in her innocence, she calls “giraffes.”
So if you are seeking to be this girl’s savior,
in adducing reasons for proper behavior,
keep your words simple and don’t try to teach
difficult words that are out of her reach!

 

Prompt words today are inchoate, malleable, nubile, adduce and gaffe. Image by Sherise on Unsplash.

 

Forms of Communication

 

Forms of Communication

Your thoughts
form a balloon
above your head,
as obvious as the look
that flits across your face
when you think I am not looking.

I recognize its message.
“This woman is too garrulous.
I could use a little help here
to obviate the flood—
truth, to be sure,
but too much,
too late.”

 

 

Prompt words today are balloon, help, garrulous, obviate and recognize. Image by Drew Hays on Unsplash.

Doorways

Doorways

The poignant memories of threads that I cannot rewind
lie all trailed out behind me, unraveled in my mind.
Decisions I can’t alter, choices without reprieve,
hours wiled away because I wanted to believe
but that yielded no return. Recompense was naught,
proving once again that happiness cannot be bought.
The future spreads in front of me. Will I win or lose?
As in the past, it depends on the doorways that I choose.

Prompt words today are thread, reprieve, poignant, that  and doorway.