Tag Archives: Poetry

Because

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Saw this posted on Facebook…

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I feel this also applies to just about any and everyone in the creative field, but especially the writers.

We creative types give many, many thanks to our respective muses, imaginations, inspirations or whatever we choose to call that which guides us to create in whatever medium. And while everything we do is a piece of our truths, it’s not always our personal stories we convey.  A Clockwork Orange By Anthony Burgess,  Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote are first person stories told from the viewpoints of a fifteen year old boy who probably has Asperger, and a flighty young woman in 1940’s New York City, respectively.  Suffice it to say neither tale was told from the first person view of the author. We as readers seem to innately understand this when it comes to novels, without introductions, forwards or some other advance notice to clue us in. Yet not so much with poems. Unless the reader already knows, or knows of, the writer, the first person view-point is general taken as, well, personal.

While my drawings and paintings leave a lot to be desired, I do feel I have a fair hand at the written word, specifically my poetry.  Still, just because my writes are in first person singular, don’t always make them my first hand account.I mostly write in the first person, as in 95% of what I pen is from that perspective, and considering  some of the poems I have written, let’s just say be damned grateful those writes are pure imagination, okay?

Though I cannot help it if it is not read, I now make a point of adding a footnote at the end of my writes if I think there may be even the slightest confusion. At least now, if a comment is given under misunderstood information, I know it’s not because I didn’t let the reader know.

I write, you read, and if the correct words come together enough for you to feel something, then I feel I’ve done my job well as communicator. I’m not going to lie, it makes me feel good when I read that the things I write touch people.  If I manage to evoke a laugh, a quiet reflection, visceral anger or have your heart-break just a little, I am grateful. Just not a former sharecropper, or an unborn child, or a cutter or getting murdered or… or…

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Let’s see how others are communicating with what’s left of this lovely Sunday:

sol

Slice of Life Writing Challenge – Day 13 – Two Writing Teachers

 

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
dverse

Oh Cap’n My Cap’n

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The captain is dead, he is no more 
His boxed life wasted 
His crunchy remains

Scattered

Across the tile floor 
I should be sore

But instead I’m done in
By a toddling perp
Who knows not his sin
Munching
With that drooling
Cereal killer 
Grin

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Putting a memory to grin with a Quadrille…

dverse

dVerse ~ Poets Pub | Quadrille – 4

Take Me Home

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You run your hand just slightly over my curve as though wanting desperately to touch,
but just not quite ready to commit to the act.

Yet, before I can exhale from the kinetic energy that runs between us from that
almost touch, you take me in hand totally,
and totally breathless, I sigh.

Soft and pliant to your administrations as your fingers alternately
grip me possessively for I am no one but yours;
you knead me solidly until I can do nothing but yield and then
you caress me in tender mercilessness.

Completely without care you lay me down before any who care to witness.
Completely wanton I am spread wide for you as you layer temptations upon me
in what feels like a never-ending circle of desire.

I am lifted, transported and though expecting it, am still totally unprepared
when subjected to the full force of your heat.

Your fire that surrounds, fills me, fulfills me; until it feels like
every square inch of my body is bubbling in throes of the ecstasy I am.

Still quivering, you pull me just from the verge and I want to cry
from this cruel game you play, easily slicing into me knowing
I am too far gone to protest  as you take me in to your hands yet again lifting me.

Even if I could, any such dissension is immediately silenced by the sudden feel
of your hot breath across my fevered surface as you lower your tongue
to the tip, slow torturous circles testing, tasting my flavors.

And just when I think I can take no more, I am plunged into the ecstasy of your mouth as
little by little I am devoured by your desired until I am naught by a memory.

<><>

You question my hunger for the freshly prepared pizza slice in front of me that sits untouched.
I wipe the crumbs of the slice that is now memory from your lips and assure you that my hunger
is for something else entirely.

Seeing the expression on my face,
you raise an eyebrow quizzically, knowingly…
and I answer…

“Yes, take me home”

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Going off the eaten path this evening…

dverse
dVerse Poets Pub | OpenLinkNight 167

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

Namaste

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A far cry from the skyscrapered sky I call home these desert dunes stretch far and wide in hills and valleys that exude its solidness and its fluidity. A breeze blows, pushing the fabric of my shawl against my body.  Making a tangle of my curls. And I wonder, not for the first time, if this is a new breeze, or an old one. One that has circled for time eternal. One that ever circles these stretches of endless red sand that surrounds me only now coming back around.

In the timelessness
Of the middle of nowhere
Winds blow everywhere

A not-so-gentle notice that I should not stand here long, the wind goads me, pushes me. It wraps tendrils of itself to anchor my feet, only to then shift around in drifts loosening my stance.  I do not want to leave, yet I do not want to be here forever. I know these sands are very accepting of those who wish to stay, for sometimes the desert reveals the bones of those who have. And as large as I may be to some eyes, I am oh so small in this vastness.

For all that is seen
Much more is hidden away
In the sands of time

Watching as the setting sun makes magic of the sand turning it near indigo in the shadows of its deepest, furthest valleys. Shifting through purples, reds and oranges as the dune keeps the last vestiges of its natural color along the upper curves. This is the moment I was here for and I reveled in the majestic beauty of it. The camera in my hand should be attempting to capture this, but I can’t make myself lift it to place the viewfinder to my face. Knowing this moment for the gift it is, I want nothing to obstruct this view from my naked eyes.  Reluctantly, heeding the radio call to come in, I put the camera away and get in the truck as I take one last look around. Above me the stars begin to appear for their slow travels across the crystalline night. I start to recognize constellations before only seen in a book and I know I’ve done right by the universe. Namaste.

Some sights in life
Must be seen to be believed
By no one but you

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Thanks to Rajani (Thotpurge) hosting at dVerse  I’m finally trying my hand at a haibun for Haibun Monday. With travel as a prompt, and my recent trip to Dubai as inspiration, I’m enjoying a moment in a desert.

dverse

Haibun Monday #8

Such A Little Word

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I know he can hear me
I see it in his eyes
I feel the depth of his frustrations
With every tear he cries
I know he’s trying to rail,
Trying to scream, trying to shout
But try as he might, true words
That we all know, just can’t come out
A four-year-old mind trapped
In a fourteen year old frame
Each day holds very little difference
But they’re never quite just the same
Searching for the rare moments
Of complete cognizance
For that miracle of his smile
His soundless laugh with a little dance
Autism is such a little word
For the mighty struggle that goes on within
That my six year colloquially describes as
“Missing a part of what ought to be in him”
For a childish blanket statement
It sort of holds pat
But even at her young age she realizes
It’s a lot more than that
As cruel as only kids can be
They take stabs at her young soul
When teased about her big brother
Who has about as much control
On how some days he’s happy active
Willing to play, pretending to help sweep
Versus the several days at a time
When he’ll do little more than sleep
And I don’t know what is harder on us all
The bad days when he withdraws from all we meet
Or the really good days when we can spend hours
Without a sudden episode in the middle of the street
Those times give a false sense of hope
A hint of the child that he could have been
We endure instead, the echoes of silence
He’s forever trapped within

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Today at dVerse Victoria challenges us to write a poem in the first person. An extra challenge to write from a perspective not your own. My muse takes me to the heart of a parent of a challenged child.

dverse

dVerse Poets Pub | Meeting the Bar: Me, Myself and I

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

I Remember

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I remember
that first night
the feel of his hair
intertwined with my fingers
the touch of his skin
as I grazed against it with my chin
the yearning in my bones
when he held me in his arms
the pressure of his lips
as his tongue grasps with mine
the taste of his kiss
and the scent of his hair
the way his body feels
pressed tightly with mine
the heat between our bodies
invigorating, and passionate
the ripples of my flesh
as his hand glides over my breast
as my next pulse quickens
I’m numb to all
but the sense of pleasure
beneath his softened lips
as the growth of passion exceeds us
need turning my voice hoarse
as I realize the noise I hear
is naught but my moan of his name
the steam rising from our backs
the sense of power
flowing through his limbs
eagerness withstanding
the warmth of his breath
around my nipple, gently sucking
the trace of his tongue
as it glides down the slope of my stomach
the softness and the passion
as he brings me to heightened ecstasy
setting each nerve on fire
the firm grip of my hands
as I bring my hips to meet his
clashing gently in the night
to bring our souls home
again and again and again
feeling the nod of his head
and the arch of his back
under the strokes of my nails
feeling the beat of his heart
as it beats in rhythm with mine
we have had many
such nights since then
but that first night
yes, oh yes
I remember

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dverse
dVerse ~Poets Pub | Open Link Night #160

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