Barefoot Elephant Run?

Posted June 11, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: elephants, Uncategorized
Tags: , , , ,

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This is not meant as a serious promotion of any shoe company, shoe, or non-shoe.  It’s just me waxing amazed.

About two months ago, when my feet were especially sore and bulbous (I have weird misshapen bones), I bumbled into some “barefoot” running shoes.  I bought them because any real running shoe hurt.

The barefoot shoes hurt too at first.  Getting used to them takes time.  They make you run on your toes/balls of your feet – a new sensation for plodding me, and difficult at first.

And frankly, even after giving the shoes time, it is hard not to be dubious. They are so thin, like a second rubbery skin;  they are ugly, like Hobbit’s feet; and they aren’t so great for just plain walking.  So, it’s a bit hard to believe that they are not secretly hurting your joints.

And yet, and yet, they are just so much fun.  Fun enough that they have turned me into sort of a runner–a slow, and not very far, but very light-footed (at least, I feel light footed), enthusiastic runner.

And so, I am waxing amazed – my friend up above too, who, unlike me, had to buy TWO pairs.

Incredibly weird, right?!

 

Comments: 10 Comments

“Missives Accomplished”

Posted June 10, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: poetry, Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , ,

Missives Accomplished

There is an entwining twirl
in the script of certain centuries, a circlet
of the deliberate that, like the spiked
trim of armor, serves
a purpose beyond the
decorative.

The crossed “S” of Sworn, the ribboned
“B” of Beloved, the Ionic pillar that
leads into Forthwith–an unwinding calligraphy that, like
a curl lodged in
a locket, binds us
no matter how difficult the general flow
of characters,

tethering us to the half-moon brow
soon to be lost in childbirth, the shifting smoke of
gunpowder, the blue-black breast of
a recorded slave, a quill
that once took flight;

even the parchment, like the globe itself,
(or time), refusing to stay flat
and simple,
the swirling letters dark
wicks upon its lanterned waves.

***************************************************

Agh!  The above is my draft poetic offering for Tess Kincaid’s the Mag.  Tess posts a picture prompt, and the picture is my version of the this week’s, a painting, Still Life, 1670, detail by Jean François de Le Motte.                                 .

Comments: 26 Comments

“All Too Many Multiple Tours”

Posted June 9, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: news, poetry, Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , ,

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All Too Many Multiple Tours

Pentagon announces 154 suicides so
far in 2012, a number that “eclipses,”
the Times writes, the
the number of deaths
in combat. I think leadenly
of “eclipse,” black shadow blotting
sun, and then of suicide, suicide as a
combat death–combat with self and all
else too. (Self
losing.)

Making a choice of sorts: but “it’s them
or us” doesn’t seem
to describe it, nor “kill or
be killed.”  Not even, “to be
or not to be.”

If you use something again and
again–take a horse–if you run it and run it and run
it, digging heels into flagging sides, knees into strained-
cord neck–and if it’s a well-trained horse–its eyes
will wilden, froth foam in laval persistence, hide soak, until
heart bursts, what’s broken
folds to ground, and you, who were so profligate with
your steed, we, who were so profligate, will be lucky to escape
with our own whole rider’s legs, our wastrel feet–

But still will not be able to blot out
ebon barrel to close-cropped head, pink
scabbard mouth, delineated
chest–the tunneled metal eclipsing
son/daughter, self, all
else.

Get them home.

****************************

The above is a poem (still really a draft) posted for the dVerse Poets Pub Poetics prompt, “choice,” hosted by the wonderful Brian Miller.   I’m not sure why this topic came to mind.  Pretty sorrowful news.

Comments: 40 Comments

“Juiced” – Belated Magpie

Posted June 8, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: poetry, Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , ,


image by Klaus Enrique Gerdes
 
 

Comments: 7 Comments

Differently Armed (In Hyderabad)

Posted June 7, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: poetry, Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , ,

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Differently Armed  (In Hyderabad)

A cart of bangles glistens like fish scales (if fish schooled scorched
above splintered blood-red wood).

Spindly fingers, knuckles barely bumps, lift the lattice of burqa to better see the flicker of plastic gold against a day so hot it curves and shimmers too; the comparative fullness of forearms rimmed by green, maroon, and gold (gold gold), black sleeves, as full as acolyte’s, accordion at elbows.

Escaping blaze, I tuck my own much-too-bare arms into the torso of loose dress—if I’m going to get burned, let it be through armholes only–so that now, a person trapped in rectangle,  I stand face above sandwich-board, unfiligreed, unlimbed-

while opposite, armed as richly as mummified goddess, they hover (so solidly black) spangled by glint, hand mirror, each of us pretending

not to stare.

**************************

I’m posting the above (slightly edited since first posted) for dVerse Poets Pub “Meet the Bar” challenge to write about an alien world/landscape, hosted by Charles Miller a/k/a Chazinator.

Comments: 18 Comments

Doorbell Rings Some Time Very Late

Posted June 7, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: poetry, Uncategorized
Tags: , , , , , , ,

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Doorbell Rings Some Time Very Late 

Fear upstarts–
quake awake shaking, bleared night silent

but for bell that should not be ringing,
dark but for lights that I’ve fallen 

asleep on, torn jagged– “Who’s there?”
my voice 
ragged
this side of door, which, shit, is not locked–
Fear tumble-rs through brain
paralyzed against making noticeable click

addresses

chain, a pretense
of metal, that shaking fingers slip

silently into slot.

I call back “No,”
taking hold now of true

lock as eye scope

smudges blurred guy blanking to greenish hall–

A mistake, all 
safe, still shaking–no,
there’s stillness
on skin itself,  the quiver
inner, as twist

in  chest/plexus

refuses to let go of 
fisted alarm, armed

against beating flow

of all other tisssued self,

scared stalwart.

**********************************
I’m back from brief blog break!  Not exactly rested – especially after being woken up in the middle of the night last night –but really missing my blogging buddies (especially all those great guys at dVerse.)  One lingering problem is, of course, that I’m not a poet!  If I am any kind of writer at all, it is of novels, but the kindness of the online poetry community is really hard to beat, and that kindess tends to inspire poetry even in prosaic types.

All that said, I am linking the above to Emily Wierenga’s Imperfect Prose.  Emily, another kind soul, has posted a poem of mine, “Thin Birthday,” on her other blog, Chasing Silhouettes, with a wonderful painting (by Emily.)  Check it out!

Comments: 9 Comments

Not Exactly “Dog” Tired…

Posted June 3, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: , ,

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A crowd of wonderful, but somewhat stressful, events has left me deeply fatigued.  Enough so that I feel like I need to put at least a short-term halt on anything that is not immediately mandated.  This includes things I really love – like blogging.

I am pretty springy, so my break is likely to be brief.   But in the meantime, apologies to all to whom I owe I comments and thanks.  That means anyone reading this!  Thanks so much for your ongoing support.  Take care. k.

Comments: 9 Comments

“Cautionary Tale” (Free or Trapped Villanelle?)

Posted May 31, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: poetry, villanelle
Tags: , , , , ,

Cautionary Tale

“It’s hurting me,” she said in half belief
as her hair caught in his passing shirt cuff’s play.
He offered nothing else for her relief
except untangling fingers, smooth smile’s teeth
(his eyes flecked with intelligence and grey).

“It’s hurting me,” she said in half belief
about a life that had grown spare, deplete,
(and cast him as the knight to save the day.)
He offered nothing else if not relief–
opened doors ahead, used credit like a thief.

As he refused her pretended tries to pay,
“it’s hurting me,”  she said in half belief,
(but smiled inside at all that seemed in reach;)
her greater youth would certainly hold sway;
she offered nothing else for his relief.

Game over when he pinned her underneath.
His weight, his age, his wealth, would have their way.
“It’s hurting me,” she said in half belief.
(He offered nothing else for her relief.)

************************************

The above is posted for dVerse Poets’ Pub’s “form for all” challenge from Samuel Peralta (a/k/a Semaphore) to write a “free verse poem” in a formal verse form.  Yes, yes, it’s a villanelle.  Yes, mainly what I’ve done is mix up the spacing a bit.  But maybe, perhaps, because it’s a bit of a morality tale, it’s just possible that the repeated lines read a bit more freely and ironically than in a standard villanelle?  Or, are they too caught/entrapped?

(Agh.)

Comments: 19 Comments

Dog, Turtle, Elephant (In Dry Scape) Kind of Day

Posted May 30, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: children's illustration, dog, elephants, Uncategorized
Tags: , , ,

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Comments: 4 Comments

“Short” Villanelle

Posted May 29, 2012 by ManicDdaily
Categories: poetry, Uncategorized, villanelle
Tags: , , , ,

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Short

I’m told that feelings hold a set place in the brain
like a house upon a lot, a grave a plot,
but mine short like broken circuits caught in rain,

guttering flashes pulling to the sane,
but not quite magnetized to well-formed thought.
I’m told that feelings hold a set space in the brain,

a location to be mapped just like a vein,
demarked as ‘happy,’ ‘fearful,’ ‘sad’—x marks the spot,
but mine short like broken circuits caught in rain,

misplacing light and darkness, wax and wane,
mistaking good for ill, full well for naught.
I’m told that feelings hold a set space in the brain,

then mine must be a jumbled tangled mane
where what should beam straight cross cramps into knot
and shorts like broken circuits caught in rain,

splintering all that’s whole, all would-be gain,
forcing what surely is into what is not;
I’m told that feelings hold a set space in the brain
but mine short like broken circuits caught in rain.

********************************************

Sorry – a very stressful time of late, combining with a day of storms, which brings me to post the above slightly depressed villanelle for dVerse Poets Pub Open Link Night, hosted by the extremely generous poet, Claudia Schoenfeld.  I urge you to check out the site.

 

Comments: 20 Comments

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