Sears Catalogue dreams, turn to shit placed in the outhouse.
Reams stacked high like people’s dreams, waiting to tip.
Cat clawed rolls scarred, piled in heaps.
Bits and pieces thrown in anger, confetti tossed in joy.
Like so much, paper’s all in the using.
De is hosting Quadrille Monday at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe! Today, we’re to use the word “paper” or a form of the word (not a synonym) within our poem of exactly 44 words, sans title. I had a bit of fun with this one.
She adored attending church, not to finger her rosary beads or murmur prayers upon her knees, but to wear her finest hats for all to see. Purposely arriving late she strutted down the aisle showing off her plumage, much like the Tall Crowned Crane and the Secretary Bird she visited often at the Diego Zoo.
We’re trying on hats today at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. First two photos are from the San Diego Zoo: first is the Tall Crowned Crane and second is a Secretary Bird. That old bird in the third photograph is me some years back. I always say, if you’re going to wear a hat, wear a HAT! Poem is fictional….I’m not Catholic, don’t use a rosary, and certainly don’t strut in church.
And so I wandered. Lonely as a cloud, seeking some break in the darkness you left behind. How did I get to this point?
Your proposal caught me off guard. I craved love for so long, my heart could not believe your words. We spent those next weeks in pure bliss. I asked to meet your family. “Soon enough,” you said. Then one day I came home to an empty apartment. Your clothes were gone. Your side of the bathroom, pristine. You’d stood there that morning, shaving off your beard until a fresh unfamiliar face looked out from the mirror. “I’ll have to get used to that,” I said. Did you want me to? They found me, wandering through the house. Incoherent. The darkness was everywhere.
I’ve spent years in this institution now, wondering if you were real.
Written for Prosery Monday at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. EXCEPT, today, we’re not writing poetry. We’re writing PROSERY! This is a form of creative writing, developed at dVerse. The prompter (today it’s me) gives a line or two from a poem of her/his choosing as the prompt. Writers must then write a piece of prose, think flash fiction, that contains the given line(s) word for word, within the body of prose. The punctuation may change….but the word order must be the same and it must be word for word. The prose must not exceed 144 words in length (sans title). As the pub tender/prompter today, I’ve selected the line “I wandered lonely as a cloud” from Wordsworth’s poem I Wander Lonely as a Cloud. The line must be used word for word within the body of prose (punctuation may vary), and the prose must be 144 words or less in length, sans title. Pub opens at 3 PM Boston time. Come join us!
With walking sticks in hand golden agers cross the field all in the golden afternoon. The aged aged man smiles, his love beside him today and all these many years.
Beach house waits patiently weathered bench outside. They stop and look and sigh, then reach slowly to touch initials carved so deep that day, when first they fell in love.
They sit, tremored hand in calloused one, gaze across the lake. Vision blurred beyond optician’s help, still they recognize shapes afar. A boat beneath the sunny sky prods his memory back in time,
remembering . . . . . . remembering . . . he pats her hand and smiles.
Written for Tuesday Poetics at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. Today Sanaa asks us to consider a Candy Crush Saga! One option we have for our poems is to choose three titles of Lewis Carroll’s poems from a long list she gives us. We do not have to include the titles in our poem, but our poem should be inspired by them and we should give credit to his titles. I was most familiar with Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland so this was interesting to see some of the many poems he’s also written! Pub opens at 3 PM Boston time. Come join us!
The Lewis Carroll titles I included word for word within my poem are All in the Golden Afternoon, The Aged Aged Man, and A Boat Beneath a Sunny Sky.
Gardenia laden breeze flutters lace curtains. Nightgown clad, right silk strap slips. Gentle hands reach slowly rest lightly on shoulders, wait patiently. She sits alert, but melting. His hazel-flecked eyes ask. No words. Just asking eyes. She smiles shyly, nods, and quietly murmurs yes.
Written for Quadrille Monday at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. Today Bjorn asks us to include the word “eye” or a form of the word, within our poem of exactly 44 words, sans title. Pub opens at 3 PM Boston time. Come join us!
Serenity, I walk in bliss. Trees breeze-whisper, nothing amiss. Soft ferns hushed, shimmer velvetly. Moist, fresh forest scent, nature’s kiss. Your lips come to mind. Ecstasy. I walk in bliss. Serenity.
Shinrin-Yoku is Japanese for forest bathing: bathing in the forest atmosphere, taking in the forest through our senses.
Grace is hosting Meet-The-Bar Thursday at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. She’s asked us to write a Sparrowlet, a poetry form invented by Kathrine Sparrow. Here’s the elements of a Sparrowlet: 1. stanzaic, written in any number of sixtains (6 line stanzas) I wrote 1 sixtain. 2. syllabic: each line must be 8 syllables each (Often written in iambic tetrameter – I didn’t!) 3. Line 1 and Line 6 of the stanza is written in 2 himistichs (I had to look this word up) 4. Rhymed, rhyme scheme is BbabaA. 5. The 2 halves of Line 1 are inverted and repeated as a refrain in Line 6. The lst line MUST be the EXACT SAME as line 1, just switched around. You cannot change any of the words. (Punctuation may be changed to accommodate the meaning.) RRA, RRB xxxxxxxxb xxxxxxxxa xxxxxxxxb xxxxxxxxa RRB, RRA
Luckily Grace included an example of a poem written in this form within her prompt. The example for me, was much easier to follow than the definition itself! Pub opens at 3 PM Boston time. Come join us to try this form — or just to see how others wrote with it!
Photo from a trip to see my niece in Ohio a number of years ago.
She picked one of the two. Not her roots in rural life, golden brick road more tempting. Drove it to wealth, fancy home in fancy heights prestige, black tie events.
Ignored the signs. Exit ramps, detours available, this way outs. Drove and drove, hard and harder.
Too late she realized, the road she picked? Sadly a dead-end street.
I’m hosting Tuesday Poetics at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets. I’m asking folks to choose one adage/proverb from a list I provide, and use it as their inspiration for their poem today. The list includes adages from Aesop’s Fables, Adagia, Poor Richard’s Almanack, the Bible. I also provide one line from a movie, which is the line this poem is inspired by: “Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re going to get.” Forrest Gump, the movie.
Join us at 3 PM Boston time to see the full list. Then write your poem and post it so we can enjoy together! Image from Pixabay.com
She was born in the fortieth century. Her lineage could be traced to earth, before it succumbed to supreme neglect. It is her wedding day. Carrying a bouquet of hybrid plumeria fertilized by star dust and carnage from deteriorated communication satellites, she slides between Ursa and its latest shard, to meet her chosen mate.
“Where is the payment I required for my body to wed your being?”
Handing her a package vibrating with energy he mouths “It is a moon wrapped in brown paper. As you mandated.”
Once unwrapped, it floats toward her three breasts illuminating them, and then seemingly melts into her circuitry. She smiles, knowing she is now impregnated. Her kind will continue. No longer needing this other being, her eyes turn iridescent green and devour him. She fades into the celestial skies, content to know she will multiply.
Written for Prosery Monday at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. Bjorn is tending the pub and asks us to include the line “It is a moon wrapped in brown paper” in a piece of fiction that is 144 words or less, sans title. The line is from the poem Valentine by Carol Ann Duffy, a Scottish Poet who was the Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom from 2009-2019.
Prosery: a form created by dVerse. A line from a poem is given for the prompt. Writers must include the line exactly word for word (punctuation may be changed) within a piece of prose (not poetry) that is 144 words or less, sans title.
Blizzard blind, vision veiled by shades of white. Snow accumulates, known markers entombed. She struggles to remember through haze of memories, her life without these days of whirling, pummeling storms. Frozen iced in daze. Time shifts. Skies clear. Sadly, somewhere in her mind, she remains buried in the drifts.
Although I am in San Diego for two months, I’m watching the weather channel, seeing Boston get hit with a historic blizzard. Somehow this poem came to my pen. Image from Pixabay.com
lillian the home poet 