bother me with sunlight today, streaming through windows this crisp cool day. Bother me with good news, happiness smiles and a baby’s grin. Bother me with a romantic tale full of daffodil cups, a good merlot and love tendered kisses. Please, do bother me!
Written for Quadrille Monday at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. Today De hosts, asking us to use the word “bother” or a form of the word in our poem of exactly 44 words, sans title. Pub opens at 3:00 PM Boston time – come imbibe some words with us! Also posted at Day 19 NaPoWriMo.April is National Poetry Writing Month and the challenge is to write a poem every day of the month.
Just before the world ends cockroaches, horseshoe crabs, velvet worms and millipedes shall gather in one place. Perhaps atop a tower of rubble, or a desecrated piece of earth where once redwoods stood. They are the superior ones.
Earth’s five remaining humans grovel nearby, scarred by cancers, and unspeakable genetic defects. Expected, given their disregard for the natural good. They drool pathetically. Neon spittle sans words, drips from radioactive tinged lips.
The superiors, once considered the vilest, issue only three words: You were warned.
Sincere apologies to Maya Angelou. Day 18 NaPoWriMo’s prompt was to take a chapter name from a book of poetry and respond to it in a poem. One chapter in Maya Angelou: The Complete Poetry is titled “Just Before the World Ends” which I used as the first line of this poem. For whatever reason, my mind went to the other side today. The creatures names are some that have existed for millions of years. Apologies. I promise, tomorrow will be sunny again!
Moon sliver slice of shimmer always brings a promise. Full moon’s glory will come then shall begin to ebb but never be lost. Moon sliver slice of shimmer always brings a promise. Full moon’s glory will come and so it shall continue as we’ve seen and and those will see after us.
Written for NaPoWriMo Day 17 where the prompt is to write a poem about or related to the moon. April is National Poetry Month and NaPoWriMo challenges us to write a poem every day of the month.
There once was a cat named Blue, male cats paid her no ballyhoo. So she sought a new and different view, into a church she flew. Bidding her old life adieu, she met Tom in a red cushioned pew. Playing the long-haired ingenue she purred sweetly to his bashful deep mew. Their relationship grew in this holy venue as they loved and lived in this special pew. And to this day, if you walk through you’ll find in this particular place, a glorious ethereal violet hue.
Written in response to the prompt for Day 16 in NaPoWrimo. We are to “relax with the rather silly form called Skeltonic.” The Skeltonic form has no specific number of syllables per line, but each line should be short, and should aim to have two or three stressed syllables. And the lines should rhyme. You just rhyme the same sound until you get tired of it! Quite an unusual form — but so appropriate on this day in April when Mother Nature fooled us Bostonians with snow almost all morning!
Sunny daffodils, wave your ruffled heads. Delicate cherry blossoms loosed by spring breeze, softly, silently, rain pink petals upon all below. Candy-cane red and white tulips stand tall beside double-layered pinks and yellows. Soon bleeding hearts will dangle gently over sweetly petite lilies of the valley. And lanes will burst forth with lilac blooms, myriad shades of purple perfuming the air. Bedazzle me, Mother Nature. I am so ready for your greening, most especially after this long reclusive year!
Written for Open Link Night at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. Today we go LIVE at 3 PM Boston time and folks have the opportunity to visit, put faces and voices with author’s names and read aloud if they wish. Come join us! Link is on the dVerse site, at 3 PM Boston time.
Photos all taken around our building here in Boston, at the Public Gardens and at the Harvard Arboretum….in past years. Spring is still trying to green this year!
Adopted tradition, forest bathing. Greening in serenity she lives her name.
Dedicated to my dear friend Kenji Kojima and written for Day 14 at NaPoWriMo where we are prompted to write a poem that delves into the meaning of either our first or last name. In German, my maiden name Gruenwald means green forest.
Japanese culture includes the practice of forest bathing, shinrin-yoku (shrinrin means forest and yoku means bath). I have always felt at peace walking in the midst of trees.
People have necks as do much of the animal kingdom. Tigers, sloths, grizzly bears, giraffes and turtles too.
Akin to giraffes are we. We stick our necks out leeeean way over to gawk, and try to stand out in a crowd.
To me, even zoo giraffes are majestic. Necks out-stretched, they stand tall. Calmly eat from high-top tables, drink from troughs on very tall poles.
I think some of us are like that. Neckwise, not staturewise. Some people live in zoos of their own making.
Cocktail party impressarios. Standing tall at high-top tables neck craned to see VIPs, they politely sip. No one looking? They lap and slurp it down.
I dislike most the raucous barflys guzzling pints, tequila and whiskey shots. Standing on sawdust covered floors, they sway beside sticky high-top tables,
craning blotchy necks. They try to catch a waiter’s eye or land an easy mark, belching as the crowd mills by.
And that’s the rub isn’t it? Standing out in a crowd, necks craned, leaning in or out, all can be done appropriately.
Who then is the beast in reality? Faced with a challenge, a time to stand tall. I see far too many humans pull in their necks,
retreat in their shells and hide. Unlike the turtle, they never enter the race. My real question then is this:
Who really comprises the animal kingdom?
Written for Tuesday Poetics where Kim asks us to write a poem in the first person, comparing some trait of ours with something animal. I kind of went a bit strangely with this topic. I guess I had these giraffe photos in my head, taken last year at the San Diego Safari Zoo, and wanted to somehow write about them. Also shared with napowrimo day 13.
Wade with me through windswept grasses. Stand tall against the gale gazing at nature’s palette, ocean’s waters. Myriad shades of blue blending, rippling from azure to ultramarine, royal blue to sapphire, turquoise to navy. Calcarenites protrude, their dark rough surface rocky, uneven. Each a sentinel of this island called Bermuda.
Posted for NaPoWriMo day 12. Photo taken a number of years ago in Bermuda. This scene is just a short walk from Tobacco Bay. Staying in St. George’s for five different years in the months of January and February, we often hiked out to this beautiful spot. And yes, the ocean truly looks like this! No photoshopping here.
My school days, saddle shoes, skirt and top. Their school daze, slippers, top and “cozy” pants. My school days, chalkboard in big classroom. Their school daze, computer screen and clicking keys. My school days, penmanship lessons with nun in long habit. Their school daze, zoom math with talking head, mute button and breakout rooms. My school days, long walk there in rain or snow. Their school daze, bed to desk with bathroom stop. My school days, so long ago. Their school daze, one big blur in one lost year.
Written for NaPoWRiMo, Day 10‘s prompt which asked us to recall lyrics to a song we know, then look in a junk drawer in our house and see what’s in it…and then come up with a poem that somehow weds the two. For whatever reason, I thought of the old song School Days which my mother used to sing to me when I was young; and which I sang to my grandchildren when they were young. The drawer yielded a ruler and I won’t tell you what else! I started thinking about this past Covid year and what it’s done to children in terms of their school days….and voila, here’s the result.
Box of colored chalk in hand, hmmm…. how do I do this again? First, pick the perfect sidewalk spot. White chalk, start close, draw one square. Yellow chalked rectangle on top, divide it into two and three. White chalk again, I like consistency. Draw square four, same as one. Green rectangle right above that, evenly make into five and six. White me a seven. Orange rectangle next, divide precisely into eight and nine. Sky blue ten crowns them all, all squares point to heaven. Brush straggly gray hair off face. Ooh yes, scratch nose where it itches. Small rock in hand, stand steady, stand tall. Neighbor man walks by and smiles, stares at my colorful cheeks and nose. “Hi” I say. “Care to play?” “Nah” he says, “but you go ahead.” So . . . stoop and throw . . . hopscotch through my private rainbow right on up to that promising blue.
A “List Poem” for the NaPoWriMo Day 9 prompt. Image from Pixabay.com
lillian the home poet 