Poetry: Love Sounds

Thorns are in gardens,
And colors from pretty flowers,
Rose pedal jellies are sweet.

This world of sounds,
Voices heard, long before birth—
Mother, father, sister, brother.

Sounds of nature,
So sweet and quiet,
Some warn of danger,
Others safe passage,
Voices of friends,
A love,
Some grumpy old men.

In time,
Life’s pleasures wane and wither,
Music comes not as before,
Beautiful sounds are
Nothing to waste.

Disallow atrophy
Of lust
For a wondrous life.
Be alert.
Sounds. Enjoy them.
Be aroused
By smiles and touches
Of troubadour drums.

Surround yourself with pleasures.
Hear every note
With silences between.
Waste nothing.
Mind our gifts.

Take care,
my love.
Some things shall not
Always be there.

Look both ways with eyes and ears.
Mind the gaps between notes and words.

Poetry: Sammi’s Weekender #165 (cavalier)

The Cavalier

Never been there,
but I’d like to go
to The Cavalier
in East Austin.

Located across an Interstate
divide, from the University of Texas
proper and the rotund
Texas State Capitol building.

In the
other side of town,
from the Colorado River,
to no farther than
State Highway 111.

It’s real weird as Austin.
No more impulsive days
of let’s go
check it out.

Look both ways driving through Austin, both east and west.
Mind the gaps, the differences, and the history.

***

Here is the link to them.

Friday Fictioneers 7/10/2020

Many thanks to Rochelle @ Rochelle Wisoff-Fields-Addicted to Purple for orchestrating Friday Fictioneers. The challenge is to write a story based upon a photo prompt, with a beginning, middle, and an end in fewer than 101 words. This is my second time at bat.

Photo prompt @ A. Noni Mouse (anonymous)

Genre: (Flash) Fiction: Romantic Drama
Word count: 100

Steven looked through the window at the next building as he washed dishes. His back was toward her.

Karen quietly picked up the butcher knife from the counter-top and walked toward him, the sharp tip pointed directly at his naked back.

When the point touched his skin, he turned around to face her, carefully took the knife, and slid it into the water.

Karen asked, “I didn’t frighten you?”

“I saw your reflection in the window.”

She slid into his arms. They kissed.

“Besides,” he whispered, “it’s a well-known fact, no man has ever been murdered while doing the dishes.”

Look both ways while doing dishes. Wouldn’t want to miss something.
Mind the gaps and sharp objects.

Here’s the link to inlinkz to join the party and read other stories.

Poetry: End Times

You spoke, and I awoke,
yet I fear
the time is near
when the dark depressing truth
of humanity
will take root on its tail
and then devour itself to
end it all
forever. Maybe
that’s our difference.

You claim
god so wants it,
I say let’s ask
him
or her
or it
whatever.

Look both ways.
Because you were alive yesterday does not prove you will be tomorrow.
Mind the gaps in thought and deed.

First Friday Fictioneers

PHOTO PROMPT © Na’ama Yehuda

This is my first swing at Rochelle’s 100 (or fewer)-word story challenge based on a photo provided by Na’ama Yehuda. Many thanks to both. If I did anything wrong, someone please tell me. My story:

Genre: Fiction
Word Count: 99 (including title)

Mourning Mystery

She told the turban-clad cabby, “Seventy-second and Central Park West.” As he pulled into airport traffic he asked if she was a fan. She said, “No.” But she claimed to be born on December eighth, nineteen-eighty. He looked and shrugged.

She stepped onto the Dakota driveway and walked slowly to the archway door. Then she walked across to the park. As she stepped onto the Strawberry Fields Memorial, she removed the Carter Arms .38 special from her purse, placed the barrel in her mouth, and pulled the trigger. She heard, let me take you down…nothing is real…forever.

***

Look both ways. Forty years ago from next December 8th, Mark Chapman murdered 40-year-old John Lennon by shooting him four times in the back with a Carter Arms Undercover .38 Special, in the arched entrance to the Dakota Apartments. One can walk across the street into Central Park and view the Strawberry Fields Memorial. Within days of Lennon’s death, several fans committed suicide. While this story is fiction, the emotions are not. Mind the gaps.

***

Click this Inlinkz link for more wonderful stories.

Poetry: Impossible Void

The concept of non-existing,
of never was and shall not be,
the nothingness of nothing,
debated for eons, remains
impossible to prove or even
conceptualize.

Philosophers and scientists
since their first thought
have failed to define
an incomprehensible unreality
of utter insignificance that
many claimed existed,
but which really means,
never was there nothing.

Always something within
science; this physical universe
breathing change to essential matter,
random, yet never created or destroyed,
vast beyond human imagination,
becoming something else,
but never was it nothing,
always something,
forever and ever. Amen.

Look both ways to see into eternity.
Mind the gaps of deception.

Poetry: Sammi’s Weekender #163 (unwelcome)

Unwanted Help

Invited to the Inspector General’s team
following years of experience,
known as the dreaded, unwelcome, I.G.,
our evil trope: “We’re here to help.”

Hated and despised, our team
of untrusted inquisitors and fault finders
were greeted with feigned welcomes,
red carpets covering fire and brimstone.

Treated well with subtle urgings, indirect bribes,
kindly disguised distractions and rarely,
outright hostility; like emotionless automatons,
“We are only here to help you do better.”

Fear and respect swam in the same swill.
We were as pleased to leave as they
to see us go.

Look both ways for the best and the worst.
Mind the gaps, therein are found hidden weakness.

Poetry: My Comfort Zone

I pass sweet scented bushes on my trek to hike trails,
I listen to songs. I see the cobalt blues and pinks
of early morning predawn skies. Then sunrise.

The familiar places, benches to rest, to drink,
to ponder, sometimes to listen
and to think about nature.

No talking. I write notes in my book,
a poem about this ravine I dare not cross,
about rocks for stepping or tripping.

About finding happiness outside my comfort zone,
as they say in the voice of cliché,
about what’s a name or identity. Am I what I did?

And the viper, that snake may not allow
my passage as he or she sunbathes
and the morning warms its cold blood.

Look both ways, but tread with care. Mind the gaps where vipers rest.

Three-foot rattlesnake blocking my trail.