Category Archives: Poetics

In The Back Woods

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I’m raised deep down in the country dues
I’m all chicken and gravy and liquor and blues
Don’t trust no man who know nothing ‘bout muddy shoes
It’s all good, in the back woods

We still a got general store back here the sticks
With saw dust on the floor ‘bout a half inch thick
‘Cause if it’s broke ’round here, it’s ‘round here we fix
For it’s all good, in the back woods

Some of us work the farm, some work at the factory
‘Till sundown comes or the ol’ mill whistle set us free

Seems like from the first cries announcing my arrival
It’s been one hand on my work and one on hand my bible
Dusk to dawn working on the land and my soul’s survival
But it’s all good, in the back woods

Oh, I work somethin’ hard and hard’s how I play
Takin’ a roll in the hay, spinning wheels in the clay
Lord knows I wouldn’t have it no other way
Naw, it’s all good, in the back woods

With its skyscrapers, and noise, and streets all gritty
I tried the living, but I ain’t cut out for no city

So it’s tailgate down, under the stars, when my day is through
Or swinging on the front porch with the fam for a spell or two
I’m gonna drink me some cold ones, yup that’s what I’ll do
Yeah, it’s all good, in the back woods

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At dVerse guest pub-tender Stacy Lynn Mar invites us to write our own folk poem.

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dVerse ~Poets Pub | Poetics : Folk Talk 

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National Poetry Month – Day 21

Mountainous Words

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On a mountain I want to cry
Searching for words to supply
Words that uplift or upend
I aim to try, find them by and by

Pen poised to paper I pretend
I have vast thought to append
Come noon no words yet to construe
Down this craggy end, I descend

I jot the only thing that’s true
These mountainous words to pursue
Try as I might the words won’t spill
Evening comes through, with words still due

My mind as blank as the moment still
Waxing poetic instead on this blank bill
I realized I no longer needed to try
And the mountain ill, became a mole hill!

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Lynn at dVerse prompts us with a “summit in sight”. My usually loquacious muse was drawing a blank with this, so I went with that as theme. And in a loose Monotetraiyet form.

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dVerse ~ Poets Pub | Poetics: Summit in sight

An Unkindness

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Since Edgar quoted me with “nevermore”
From sea to sea, from shore to shore
Stuck am I with the forlorn evermore

That is an unkindness

My midnight plumage my mark
Damns me with the dark
Never exaltations as a lark

That is an unkindness

A terror, a blight
That is all you see
Even my brethren feathered white are considered a fright
My bane, my plight
The passion of me
Do I dare then make sight, even I seek the light?

But oh, to all my feathered kin
Who share not in my chagrin
Know that I cringe within

When you say we gather in murder
If only it were an unkindness

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At dVerse De (aka WhimsyGizmo) invites us to “draw our poetic inspiration from the whimsical, musical, magical names given to groups of birds.”

Naturally, I take up the cause of my namesake. For while their near cousins, the crows, are quite known for killer gatherings, few know how much of an unkindness it really is for ravens.

dverse

dVerse ~ Poets Pub | Poetics : Poetry is for the Birds

Do You Hear Me Now?

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She starts with the hand open,
Near her mouth, palm toward,
But not touching her face,
Veins appearing on the back of her hand
Forming a claw
That moves downward past the mouth
Oh hell

I try not to smile

I watch the bend and flex
Of her wrists and joints
Her delicate bones
Making fierce gestures
As she tells me off

I try not to smile

She yells at me something fierce
Manicured fingers
Form intricate patterns
Punctuating the strong words
Silently speaking volumes

I try not to smile

I know she’s caught me
Her tightly fisted hands at chest level
Fly up and then open in exasperation
I gently grasp her soft hands
Holding her attention

“Darling you’ve just yelled at me solely in ASL again.”

The hand signal
She uses next
Needed no translation

I smile

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At dVerse “Mish” leaves in in our hands to conjure up a write about those most hard-working appendages – our hands.  My muse took me to one pissed off woman “yelling” at her not yet fluent in ASL spouse.

dverse

dVerse Poets Pub | Poetics – Poetics – Can You Give Me a Hand?

The Spirit Believes

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Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,
an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.
I begin again with the smallest numbers.
“Burning the Old Year” by Naomi Shihab Nye

Romans, Countrymen
Sons and daughters of Israel
The spirit believes
Where there was something and suddenly isn’t
The heart sees what the eyes belie
The soul comprehends He is risen

This cannot be, so many claimed
And yet it is, as many others knew
The spirit believes
An absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space
A new calendar of the divine
Marking a new era that time cannot erase

Grand strides began with
Faith the size of a mustard seed
The spirit believes
I begin again with the smallest numbers
Each morning’s new breath, my daily bread
And a nightly prayer before my slumbers

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Today, Mary is our host at dVerse Poets. She introduces us to writer, Naomi Shihab Nye, and challenges us to choose a line from Naomi’s poem “Burning the Old Year” to write a poem of our own. Overachiever that I am I chose an entire stanza to work with in a stylized Glosa.

dVerse ~Poet Pub | Poetics – Choose a Line
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Via Dolorosa

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I go where it began
My faith a spiraling question
Seeking answers

He passed here

My fingers lightly graze the warm stone masonry
At the Lion’s gate
I am as repulsed
As I am enthralled
In modern reverence
And ancient remembrances not mine

He was robed and crowned here

I look upon the heavens now
That surely looked upon this path then
And kneel under the weight
Of the millenniums twice beheld since

He fell first here

I hear those most ancient of sounds
And understand at last how
Simon’s act was hardly simple
I’ll share your load
In its truest meaning
As he and I follow the throngs
That once walked these cobbled streets
Worn smooth with time
Yet as torn as a betrayed heart
And a marker carved in stone tells me

He fell again here

Past and present collide
As somber robed monks walk the path
Singing songs
Alongside khaki clothed pilgrims
Marker molded in gold tells me
What in my mind’s eye I see

He falls for the last time here

Among the sun faded stones of then
Contrasting a gaily painted door of now
He speaks to this Daughter of Israel
Where I, this woman of the new world
Kneels down to kiss the sacred silver disk
Of Christ’s ending, Christianity’s beginning
Arising with a metallic taste
That tingles my lips reminding me
There is power in the Blood

He died here

No longer in question
My faith found answers
Where it ended
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Via Dolorosa, “The Way of Grief” in Latin, is a winding cobbled stoned street within the Old City of Jerusalem, belief held to be the path that Jesus walked on the way to His crucifixion. Dotted with “stations” that mark specific moments – Simon helping Him carry the cross; Christ speaking to the Daughters of Israel; etc. Many Christians visit Jerusalem for this pilgrimage, especially around Easter.

I personally have not taken this pilgrimage, but it is on my list.

dverse
dVerse ~Poets Pub | Poetics – Adventures in travelling

The Nightbird

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A man stands on the  rail gripping its notches
Notions crescendo in his heart once more
As Sol sets again in deep hued swatches

In the near distance the nightbird watches

He gazes at the still deepening skies
Heartbreak are words clutched tight in his hands
Gives a resolute shrug the heart belies

In the near distance the nightbird sighs

He looks down upon the street through his tears
Passers-by unaware he’s on the edge
The cacophony of sound comes to him as jeers

In the near distance the nightbird fears

From past dusk to near dawn as its stead
The nightbird sings its pleas with dread
The winds carries the calls from overhead

In the near distance the man knows not what was said

He balances on, his thoughts in muddled heaps
Reclamation from his sorrow long gone
A last glance to Sol rising then he simply leaps

And in the near distance the nightbird weeps

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In honor of Harper Lee, Kelly at dVerse invites us to tell a story in narrative poem. There is an added bonus for featuring a mockingbird, but my muse had other ideas.

dverse

dVerse Poets Pub | Poetics:  Listen to the Mockingbird

This Darkness Deep

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When I saw the break of day
I wished that I could fly away
Instead of kneeling in the sand
Catching teardrops in my hand
Norah Jones – “Don’t Know Why”

This darkness deep inside me steeps
Its grip upon my soul stings
But I don’t remember how to release
I want to cry, but tears won’t fall
Hidden deep inside past my recall
And thus it remains to my dismay
I can’t shake it in the face others’ misery
And I tell myself I should want to be free
Yet sleepless I shrugged feigning the blasé
When I saw the break of day

This darkness deep inside me steeps
It slinks around like a sentient thing
Sneering at dawn’s early light
Sometimes I remember this shouldn’t be
But then that hope is swept from me
This melancholy holding me in sway
I’m losing grip on my control
Yet I smile, I laugh, I play the role
Because I don’t know what to say
I wished that I could fly away

This darkness deep inside me steeps
Crept into my soul on silent wings
And taken up residence there
So long I’ve floundered in this brackness
I know not the way from this blackness
And when it’s more than I can stand
I buckle under feeling drained
As all my aspirations have waned
To sail, to soar, live a life grand
Instead of kneeling in the sand

This darkness deep inside me steeps
A siren’s call, my dirge it sings
And I start to think I like the sound
Wondering how long before I break
I pray the Lord my soul to take
This misery in mocking demand
For the silver lining I can’t find
Knowing it’s not just in my mind
Joy’s a thing I can’t understand
Catching teardrops in my hand

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dVerse ~ Poets Pub | Poetics

To Remember – To Forget

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I hope someday I get to remember

– Madame President and her First Lady

I hope someday I get to forget

– That a cross burning in America happened in this decade

I would like to remember

– All the Spanish I learned in high school

I would like to forget

– The taste of my own toes on too many occasions

Sometimes I forget

– just how old I am

But my two over 30-year-old sons help me remember

– just how young I’m not

I forgot…

– How to tie a real bow tie

I remember…

– Your knowing smile when I tugged it loose in one smooth motion

If only I could remember

– The exact day, hour, minute I became your woman

If only I could forget

– The exact day, hour, minute I became your widow

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At dVerse we’re asked “How we forget” as inspired by the poem of the same name by Loyce Gayo. I went off track and chose a more personal route to remember as well as forget.

dVerse ~ Poets Rub | Poetics : How We Forget

Cannicular Days

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The day’s just begun
And it’s a hot one
Step out with caution
An hour in the street
I’m already beat
Destined for exhaustion

Warmth first felt a blast
To winter’s cold past
But now no relief’s in sight
The summer heat rays
Cannicular Days*
That stifles most of the nights

Seeping from within
Crawling on my skin
Sweat leaving salt trails on me
Humidity’s bane
I pray for rain
Just for my own sanity

Yes, summer winds down
Seeing leaves turn brown
But from fall or this hot spell?
I live for the day
It all goes away
From these hot Dog Days of hell

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* Cannicular Days – Another term for the dog days of summer, coming from Canis – dog. The night skies proclaim dog days Orion’s dog – Canis Majoris, high in the sky with its brightest star being Sirius.

I learned a new (for me) poetry form! Welcome to the Alouette

The Alouette, created by Jan Turner, consists of two or more stanzas of 6 lines each, with the following set rules:  Meter: 5, 5, 7, 5, 5, 7 Rhyme Scheme: a, a, b, c, c, b

At Tuesday’s Poetics Toni (Kanzensakura) challenged us to write about the infamous dog days of summer, which I missed posting by thismuch. But it’s now Open Link Night so I submit it here.

OpenLinkNight-mic

dVerse ~ Poets Pub | Poetics : Dog Days

dVerse ~ Poets Pub | Open Link Night : Week 153