Posted tagged ‘flash 55’

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Easter

April 5, 2015

Easter —

For me, the humanity was wrapped up
in the swaddling cloths,
that weaving of dust
that returns to dust,
warp of the born that must then
be borne, the thread-bared–
linen holding to its folds
like a clasp of fingers, ribs,
as if even the unsewn strived
for the shape of flesh, bone, forgiveness–

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Here’s another poem for April 2015, National Poetry Month (I think my fifth).  This one has 55 words and is posted for the Real Toads prompt hosted by the wonderful Kerry O’Connor.  The pic was taken by me of a stained glass window in New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

It snowed much of last night and all day long in the mountains where I live. The good part is that I went skiing.  The bad part is that I went skiing.  (I am a rather terrified skier, who also finds it trying to have to focus on keeping upright, when I want to go off in one of my habitual dazes.  But I survived!)  I wish you all a happy day. 

 

 

Categories: poetry, Uncategorized
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Comments: 16 Comments

Cross-country

March 4, 2015

Cross-Country

I follow laborious lanes, alleys of yesterday’s
skis, finding intermittently
prints–paws cupping blue,
sharp-petaled as
pressed-flowers–a coyote who preferred my flattened slants
to the deep snow, even sticking to
the loops of my backtracks–

I imagine that same blue
siding his moonlit lope, and despite the warmth
of fellow toil,
shiver.

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A belated blue 55 for Real Toads.

Categories: poetry
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Comments: 5 Comments

Waking In Winter

March 1, 2015

Waking in Winter

Where my flank rests
against your thigh,
I see the color
of closed eyes,
an undercover shade of leg
lidding buttock,
a grey marked
by morning–blurred purple
awaiting rumple–the space slow
to unstick.  Sky outside lighter,
though grey enough,
above the field’s bright sheet,
as it lays down
more snow.

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A poem of sorts in 55 words continuing the tradition of the G-Man, Mr. Know-it-all, for Kerry O’Connor’s prompt on With Real Toads; in this case, Kerry asked us also to think about a color.

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Comments: 17 Comments

Sounds of Snow Silence

January 3, 2015

image

Sounds of Snow Silence

What passes for silence
in snow–
the flicks of flakes, shush
of pants’ legs, trees’ creak (rocking against
sky’s floor), the ocean
that is wind, the freeze
of my chin, which would sound, if cold
resonated, like a bolt tightening, lightbulb
screwed in, or when I bend
into the current, the glow
of its undertow.

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55 (without title) for the G-Man, who lives on at Real Toads.  The image (as is normally the case on my blog) is some construct of mine.  (All rights reserved.)

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Comments: 23 Comments

Remembrance (Lessened) Of An Old Suffering

December 7, 2014

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Remembrance (Lessened) Of An Old Suffering

You caress the other’s face,
making love, but some curve
of your knuckle, back
of your hand,
brushes your own eyelid, and
you can’t tell, for an instant, what
has touched you
where–whether hand or eye
felt that stroke, and whose hand,
and whose eye–
remembering too can be
like that,
with luck, time.

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Here are 55 (minus title) that I hope are not too enigmatic for Marian’s Flash 55 prompt on With Real Toads. This poem has been edited since posting so maybe is a bit less enigmatic now. (The earlier version relied on the title more and just referred to remembering as “it” in the poem). 

I appreciate that the photo doesn’t exactly match the poem!  And that it probably is too “short,” cutting off trees. But I took it in my visually-impaired way the other day in upstate New York, and I very much like the crinkled ice at the bottom, the freeze happening on a windy night.

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Comments: 16 Comments

False Trade

September 7, 2014

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False Trade

Who will live in yesterday
slipping on the faux sleeve of tomorrow?
That us that can’t say yes, today,
to a present not pressed through the narrow–
the narrow I of our needling, my friend,
as we wheedle a bargain with sorrow,
our right-now breath lent to some other time,
time we pretend can be borrowed–

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Here are 55 of the somewhat examined for Mama Zen’s flash 55 on With Real Toads. (I’ve edited a couple of times since first posting–agh!)

Also, some news–my new (and only adult) novel, Nice, is out at last in print on Amazon.

PP Native Cover_4696546_Front Cover

The Kindle version should be also out very soon, if not tonight, tomorrow.  It will only be 99 cents, so I hope you can get it!   (I think a kindle version can be downloaded to a computer. )

And if any one is feeling especially kindly, I would be very grateful if you could read it and review it!

I will say more about the book in a future post, but I’ve gotten a bit tired waiting for the kindle version to make an announcement so am taking advantage of today!

 

PS – Kindle version is out now.  Here’s the link.

 

 

 

 

 

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Rosa Multiflora Gore

May 31, 2014

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Rosa Multiflora Gore

Sometimes, I feel a curmudgeon
bludgeoning bush, butchering
blood-red boughs,
snipping grounded throats, clippers straining
at my hip–
but this green deserves
demonizing,
an invader–

So, despite sure wounds,
I wage the losing war, wade in,
lending my mettle
to soft-speared grass, show-spiked
dandelion,
Queen Anne’s Lace, my liege.

 

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Rosa Multiflora, also called rambling rose, is an invasive species that has moved into my area of the Catskills.  The flowers are actually incredibly pretty and fragrant too, but it would, if it could, crowd out all the native plants, and make fields one big thorn bush (a  Sleeping Beauty mid-nap kind of landscape.)  Every once in a while, I undergo battle against it.  (The thorns are everywhere and sharp.)

The poem with title (and even hyphenated words, counting as two–HA!) is exactly 55 words–it was written for Hedgewitch’s Flash 55 prompt on With Real Toads.  (As pretty much always, all rights reserved on text and drawing. )

Categories: elephants, poetry, Uncategorized
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The Brain (how it performs sometimes)

May 4, 2014

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The Brain (how it performs sometimes)

It wants to be petted,
wants to be stroked,
doesn’t like
to be vetted/poked.
Don’t make it jump
repeated hoops
unless they are
high-fired loops–
Then the brain, hard-wired as moth to flame,
dons tiger stripes and lion’s mane,
describes arcs gold as melted butter,
all to hear the clapping after
of another brain.

 

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Here’s 55 (excluding the title) from a brain that likes to perform when the challenge/audience is there, but that is right now exhausted from a lot of traveling and socializing–not great for poeticizing.  I am linking it to With Real Toad’s 55 challenge, taking over from the G-Man. 

The drawing is mine–lion/tiger jumping through a fiery hoop?  

 

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Off-Season (Flash 55)

April 23, 2014

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Off-Season

Istanbul in our twenties, blonde
in the Blue Mosque, toes squishing
into piles of carpet smelling faintly
of toes faced
with overarching tiles, mosaics synced
in their mismatch, sprigs,
prayers, paisleys, but no eyes
except of the men
who watched us in and out
fighting about who would sell us
what we would not buy.

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A belated 55 for Mama Zen and also a poem for the prompt and photo of Lolamouse of With Real Toads. The wonderful picture, among others, was taken by Lolamouse at a shop in Portland, Oregon, but the blue amulets look identical to ones my daughter bought in Turkey a few years back, so I am guessing these are also from there. One process note is that it is my understanding that Islam discourages (or even prohibits) the depiction of sentient beings, which means that mosques do not have iconography of people’s faces but tend to focus upon geometric shapes or flowers or calligraphy. The “Blue Mosque” is a popular name of the Sultanahmet (or Sultan Ahmed) Mosque in Istanbul.

This is also some consecutive poem–23rd?–for April, National Poetry Month.

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An Impression of Motion Sickness on MTA (Flash Friday 55)

August 10, 2012

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Motion Sick On Train  (Well, Just A Little)

Fake wood encircles
stomach side of cloud=
spattered glass,
stall-start express; outside
sun gleam-shines
river’s shell,
mountains swell
from continental
mist and drift==
slow…halllttttt..(no station stop)…go–
“Watch the Gap” warns yellow-black
stick-fellow, inked leg
incautious==but on train still forever
try not to.

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I’m posting the above for dVerse Poets Pub “meeting the bar” prompt hosted by the wonderful Claudia Schoenfeld, about impressionistic writing (and, in this case, my impressionistic stomach).  (Since first posting I’ve edited heavily as I have trouble with my stove this morning and still haven’t had morning tea, so nothing’s right.)

I’m also letting the G-Man know since the poem is exactly 55 words.  (Yes, I cheated.)

The train I sometimes take travels along the banks of the beautiful Hudson River. 

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Comments: 23 Comments

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