Life

Defarge She is Not

lillian20 Comments

She be a knitter and weaver of love,
needles held surely in confident hands.
Magical work with rainbows of color
wee dresses, wool caps, and warmest afghans.

Strands of affection twist patterns supreme,
yarn disappearing at quickening pace.
Fingers so agile, loop thread over thread
artist sans easel, her lap as her base.

She smiles at her world and when she does err
pauses, examines and looks to assess.
What has been done? Rewind. Amend. Restart.
Good pattern for all, for life of success.

purple-yarn-1424788

Late for dVerse Tuesday’s Poetics. Kim asks us to write a poem about an artisan, using the form/style of the famous Irish poet, Seamus Heaney. I chose to emulate Heaney’s poem Follower: written in stanzas of 4 lines, each 10 syllables in length. Also, two of the lines in each stanza rhyme — most often ABCB.  This was a real challenge for me. Which is why I’m posting on Wednesday for Tuesday’s Poetics! I do enjoy a challenge…and always learn when I’m dealing with rhyme which I find the most difficult aspect of poetry. You’ve probably noticed that I mainly write in free verse. The title refers to Madame Defarge, the villainous woman in Tale of Two Cities who sits and knits, seemingly innocuously. In reality, she is knitting into the garment, the names of those to be executed.

Hoyle Be Damned

lillian10 Comments

This ain’t kitchen bridge.
An arrangement of tricks,
points scored below the line.

Kibitzers watch dumbfounded.
Self-sufficient suit
forced into dummy hand.

Duffer without finesse,
unbalanced distribution
trumps again and again

to win
the grand slam.

card-1298695_1920

A second poem for Dverse, Tuesday Poetics…using the word “bridge.” Apologies to Hoyle’s rules for bridge…..and yes — metaphor applies. For those of you unfamiliar with the card game of bridge: kitchen bridge is a social game with little emphasis on skill; all of the following are terms used in bridge and may be found in the Hoyle’s book of bridge terminology/rules:  tricks, points scored below the line, kibitzers (nonplaying onlookers), self-sufficient suit, dummy hand, duffer (bridge player of inferior ability), unbalanced distribution (has to do with the cards in your hand), trump, and grand slam.

 

 

Dementia Drowned

lillian4 Comments

Today is brewing, steeping.
Clouds blur within my head.
Grass pricks feet like shards
or linoleum with eyes.
They’re supposed to be on faces.
And that song, Tiny Bubble, goes with a ukulele.

It’s yesterday again, or Tuesday tomorrow.
I shall pad to the upstairs water closet.
Run ocean waves until steam rises like fog
and drains clog with long dulcimer hairs.
I will slip under the sea
to become an anemone.

No one can miss me.
Because i have not been here
for a long long time.

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Transplant

lillian54 Comments

City lights blink like fireflies, regardless of season. High rise windows shine where brick meets sky in a busy horizon.

Ten thousand steps a day are easy here. Church, mosque, supermarket. Post office, synagogue and hardware store. Restaurants serve Italian, Chinese, Ethiopian, French, Japanese, Greek, seafood, pizza, tapas, ribs. Department stores, yarn shop, coffee shops, and burger joints. Museum of Fine Arts and African American Meeting House. Beauty and nail salons, barbershop, shoe repairs, dentists, doctors, optometrist and palm reader too. Freedom trail and river stroll.  I am carless in the city. Well-worn walking shoes upon my feet and a cornucopia of things to do.

Iowa girl
fifteen acres
first-picked tomato
dripping down my chin.
Transplanted to cityscape.
I still carry heartland habits,
greeting surprised strangers
as they pass me by on city streets.

Written for dVerse, the virtual poet’s pub, where Bjorn is hosting Haibun Monday and suggesting a modern take on this form — put it into a city poem and the haiku that follows the prose may or may not be about nature; may or may not follow haiku form. Pub opens at 3 PM…come visit other’s views of city life! Photos taken from our 7th floor deck in our highrise in Boston.

Rotting Fruit

lillian9 Comments

i.
They ignored the name, blood orange,
plucked it from apples in the bin
and then they were surprised.
Layer after layer peeled away
through pock marked rind
through white pith,
only to reveal a rotten core.

ii.
They chose the brightest orange one
mr. jack-o-lantern
pre-carved, with the biggest grin.
Set it out for all to see.
Surrounded with goblins,
they left it on the porch too long.

Rot and mold began to take its toll.
They watched in great dismay
as it slumped and caved
into a misshapen ugly thing,
far earlier than the target night
it was expected to shine.

bloodocean07

 

Senior Moments

lillian36 Comments

There comes a point in time
when life doesn’t migrate,
it meanders.

Meanwhile . . .
morning alarms come alive
coffee is gulped, black and strong.
Commuter rails and trails
fill with busy bees,
drones and queens with tasks ahead.
Life moves on a conveyor belt,
bar codes intact . . .

while I roll over,
wiggle my toes
and let the day unfold.

sunrise

Shared at dVerse, Open Link Night, a virtual pub for poets. Folks share a poem of their choice on OLN. Pub opens at 3 PM Boston time. Photo: dawn in Provincetown, Cape Cod. 

 

Kaleidoscope of Life

lillian6 Comments

youth invincible
quick stepping through raucous times
kaleidoscope shifts
colored prisms less defined
pace slowed coming round the bend

Prism

A second Tanka shared with dVerse — although I’ve broken the rules a bit and added a title for this one. Tanka:  5 lines with syllabic count of 5-7-5-7-7. Third line contains a cutting shift; no punctuation; no capitalization.