The days I survive
It's the nights I dread
When faced with the emptiness
of our bed
The day I spend madly
running to and fro
coming home only once I've
exhausted every other place to go
Under the guise of being busy
Under the prayer, I'll quickly sleep
Stretched out in a space
unnaturally wide
I can't enjoy it
you're not by my side
You're out on the road
and not just for a small while
I'm faced with the reality
of not seeing your smile
For each eternity I lay awake
gets closer to the tears I'll shed
Yes, while your voice on the phone
makes the moment feel alright
once we hang up, it's just me
Just the emptiness, just the night
The days I survive
It's the nights I dread
When faced with the emptiness
of our bed
National Poetry Month for 2021 Day 7 finds me pondering the lamentations of a long-distance truck driver’s spouse in free verse.
Tonight at dVerse Lisa challenges us to play ‘The Opposite Game’ and Flip the Meanings of poems.
I chose to create a poem using the Diamante form which goes as follows:
Line 1: Noun or subject Line 2: Two Adjectives describing the first noun/subject Line 3: Three -ing words describing the first noun/subject Line 4: Four words: two about the first noun/subject, two about the antonym/synonym Line 5: Three -ing words about the antonym/synonym Line 6: Two adjectives describing the antonym/synonym Line 7: Antonym/synonym for the subject
As its name suggests, a Diamante forms a diamond shape when done.
Though often (mis)attibuted to John Lennon, the earliest certain source of the popular quote was by Marthe Troly-Curtin in her novel “Phrynette Married” (1912).
I used this exact opening a couple of weeks ago when I attempted to have a day vegetating. Today I use it response to a complaint.
“God! Every time I call! Why are always writing a story, or working out a poem, or you’re painting something. Pick something, ONE thing and be good, really good, perfect at it. Maybe you could make money off it and stop wasting your time.”
My pithy response: “I write and I paint because I like it and because I have no space for carpentry workshop and a kiln.”
Oh, there was so much to unpack with that loaded statement and her not understanding why I was offended by it.
What is with limiting a person to one form of expression? The whole pick one thing and be good/perfect at it nonsense, is in a word nonsense. Dion Sanders and Bo Jackson excelled in both baseball and football in their heydays. Venus and Serena Williams are both phenomenal tennis players and wonderful clothing designers. Several of Hollywood and UK actors also excel in other creative outlets. It’s Art. You know that thing like beauty is in the eye of? So who determines what’s good or God help us perfect creatively anyway? Who determines its clock value? Is the pursuit of a second passion for pleasure only limited to those those who can afford it? If it’s not making money, it is waste of time?
As I understand it Art students study other art to learn what’s good. Though they both use pointillism, no one is going to confuse a Seurat with a Lichtenstein, but they’re both good. Rembrandt, Warhol, Monet, Max, Michelangelo, Haring, Picasso, Van Gogh, Pollock, are all amazing artists, not one looks like the other and none of them did what they did to be “good.” The artists painted what they wanted, the way they wanted – period. That others cottoned on and made some of them renowned during their lifetimes was a lucky bonus. Some of the names mentioned were not famous, until after their deaths. It likely wasn’t perfect, to some of them. It may not have even been “good” to them, but you know what it was? Good enough to make them happy or they tried again until they were. They did it for they were inspired, because it pleased them. I am 10,000 percent sure someone had said to each them at some point “stop wasting time.”
Why must damn near everything in life sans breathing, and bathroom functions, can only be considered worthy of one’s time if it can also potentially line one’s wallet? Stop that nonsense! Elizabeth Barret Browning, Alex Haley, e.e. cummings, Arthur Conan Doyle, Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, Nikki Giovanni, Ernest Hemingway, Sylvia Plath, Octavia Butler, Stephen King, Diana Gabaldon, Andrew Wilmot, Amanda Gorman: none of them wrote their very first stories and poems, because they were out to make money, they wrote because they had stories to tell. It just so turned out that eventually others liked the stories as well. The rest is the luck, ill or otherwise, of the draw. But we know their names in the first place solely because they had a story they needed to tell. The story got told. It was not a waste of time.
We blog, and some of have regular followers, but the mass majority of us are not, nor have any intent to be “influencers.” Still, we blog because we have stories to tell, in words or in art or both.
I create because it pleases ME. The moment it becomes something I have to do to make money, it becomes a job. And knowing me – it will no longer be something I enjoy. I create the ways I do because I want to. I’m not trying to be good, I am having fun. That others enjoy it is wonderful, but is never the impetus for me to type out pixels or pick up my pencil or brush. It is always time well spent, even if I hate the result. On the outside I am an adult exuberantly expressing my creativity through mixed media. On the inside I’m a four-year-old happily making a mess scribbling and finger painting. Ask any preschooler…
We rise now in this fateful hour Once in thorns, now is nimbus crowned For He is risen, the blood has power
Knelt in prayers and tears dour Those of us who are still earthbound We rise now in this fateful hour
Some stare in awe, others cower None can deny, the sight astounds For He is risen, the blood has power
From our knees we grow and flower New grains to sprout up from the ground We rise now in this fateful hour
On this third day to now shower A faith anew with life is found For He is risen, the blood has power
We cling to the Almighty bower Spread The Word with joyous sound We rise now in this fateful hour For He is risen, the blood has power
National Poetry Month for 2021 Day 4
And today Easter Sunday I offer a Lenten poem in the form of a Villanelle.
The Villanelle is a poetic form composed of nineteen lines. These are arranged as five tercets (three-line stanzas) followed by a quatrain (four-line stanza).
There is no established meter to the villanelle – modern villanelles tend to pentameter, while early villanelles used trimeter or tetrameter.
The most striking thing about a villanelle is that it has two refrains (“A1” and “A2”) and two repeating rhymes (“a” and “b”). The first and third line of the opening tercet are repeated alternately as the refrains, until the last stanza, which includes both refrains.
With this, the pattern of the villanelle can be illustrated as as
A1bA2 abA1 abA2 abA1 abA2 abA1A2
where “a” and “b” are the two rhymes, and the upper case letters (“A1” and “A2”) indicate the refrains.
All that I need is time
To smooth these nipped edges
How much more can I take
I’m living a nightmare
While standing here awake
All that I need is time
To help me muddle through
These dreams of yesterday
Like popsicles in sun
They come then melt away
All that I need is time
You're still very much here
Not like I have much choice
Each breeze ignites your touch
As the wind holds your voice
All that I need is time
Just take it day by day
Small comforts slowly grow
Nothing lasts forever
This urgent pain will go
The Monchielle is a poem that consists of four five-line stanzas where the first line repeats in each verse. Each line within the stanzas consist of six syllables, and lines three and five rhyme.
Spring came with a quickening Belies frost from days ago The verdant grass thickening Wraps this love in rays aglow
Summer raised up paradise Ablaze in tender poses Focus on the edelweiss Blinds this love’s thorns in roses
Autumn felt the forbidden Narrowed eyes that look away From tears that come unbidden Cools this love gone so astray
Winter brought down Xanadu Once filled with hope so pleasing In apathy’s residue Leaves this love interred, freezing
National Poetry Month for 2021 Day 2
Has me trying a brand new form (for me): Ae Freislighe Poems
The Ae Freislighe is an old poetic form from Ireland. It has a quatrain stanzas (4-line stanzas) of only 7 syllables per line. What makes is interesting (and somewhat frustrating) is its rhyme scheme.
Lines 1 and 3 rhyme together, but they rhyme as three syllables (xxa)
Lines 2 and 4 rhyme together as two syllables (xb)
A unique element of the form is that the final syllable of the poem should be the same rhyme as the very first syllable of the poem.
An Ae Freislighe poem can be as concise as one stanza, or scale out as far as a poet wishes.
Calm
Peaceful
I slumber
In morning void
Of unneeded noise
Crash!
Rumble!
Thump! Bang! Boom!
That which man builds
Brings with it much sound
I
Wake to
Cacophony
Of construction
Morning peace now gone
I begin National Poetry Month for 2021 whinging in poem as this morning I was once again startled awake by the sounds of construction happening around my block before my alarm clock had the honors.
A nonce poem created by friend and fellow blogger, GirlGriot, an Arun is a fifteen-line poem in three sets of five lines. Each set of five lines follows the same syllable structure: starting with one syllable and increasing by one syllable with each line. 1/2/3/4/5 — 3x. There are no other rhyme or structural requirements.
I spent most of this day wondering how I would close this month out. March has, as it does each year, dragged and flew. At the beginning of the month I knew I would make it to the end. Granted, I also knew there would be some very late night close encounters, which there were. And 2021 will forever hold the asterisk for when I published yet fell asleep before I could post as hubris, but I did it.
Most of all WE made it!
Whether you made all the way through all the slices, or missed a slice or two, or more, as always…
🎵 I’m so glad we had this time together… 🎶
* tugs on ear * [Some of you will get this]
We have survived an entire year of Life in the Times of Covid! It has not been an easy year for any of us. But with the vaccinations happening slowly but surely we can finally see the better days coming ahead. I imagine next year’s challenges will be sprinkled with the things we get to do again compared to now and it will be great.
Being that today is Tuesday, it seems fitting as we know return to our usual Tuesday slices.
Raivenne-lations 