Emotion

Poetry: The Shadorma and Fibonacci Forms (NaPoWriMo day 7)

My seventh day NaPo adventure is to write at least two poems structured in forms that have a specific number of lines and specific syllable counts per line: the shadorma, and the Fib.

A shadorma is a six-line, 26-syllable poem. Each line’s syllable count is 3/5/3/3/7/5.

A Fib, besides being a white lie, is a six-line form where syllable count is based upon the Fibonacci mathematical sequence of 1/1/2/3/5/8. I may reverse line syllable counts after the first six to 8/5/3/2/1/1.

In both forms, I may use multiple six-line poems to create one multi-stanza poem, provided I use six lines per stanza and the appropriate syllable count per line. Neither form is mentioned in any of my books on poetry, including the Third Edition of Turco’s, The Book of Forms.

Intimacy

dance with me
be my love partner
hold me close
i hold you
step with time to forever
let’s dance into love

forever
i am your lover
music plays
steps we know
we endure as years twirl past
we dance together

(Inspired by the songs “Dance With Me,” by Orleans; and “Dance Me To the End of Love” by Leonard Cohen)

Tree Hugger

All
Life
Is one.
Together
In this challenging
World of delicate us and truth.

Symbiotic mutualism
Will still save us all
Together
We are
One
Life.

(Inspired by this quotation, “It cannot be said too often: all life is one. That is, and I suspect will forever prove to be, the most profound true statement there is.” From A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson)

Look both ways in life and love.
We are not, and wouldn’t survive, alone.
Mind the gaps, plant trees, and be kind to animals.

Poetry: War’s Bitterness (NaPoWriMo day 6)

The irony of today’s prompt is that it comes from Holly Lyn Walrath, who wrote of prompts, “…they all suck.” She poses this one as simple.

“Go to a book you love. Find a short line that strikes you. Make that line the title of your poem. Write a poem inspired by the line. Then, after you’ve finished, change the title completely.”

I want to finish this assignment today, so I am amending the prompt slightly.

I have lists of lines (quotes) from books I like. Examples I considered from Bukowski’s poetry book, Love is Dog from Hell, (also the title of one of the poems) include:

  1. “Sissies have a hard life.”
  2. “I never quite understood what it all meant and still don’t.”
  3. “Human relationships aren’t durable.”
  4. “Just drink more beer, more and more beer.”
  5. “An early taste of death is not necessarily a bad thing.”
  6. “Hit that thing/hit it hard.”

I rejected them for a sentence from Tim O’Brien’s book, The Things They Carried. The protagonist is referring to his decision to be drafted and go to Viet Nam, rather than flee to Canada.

“I would go to the war—I would kill and maybe die—because I was embarrassed not to.”

I used each of these three independent clauses as the title for a quatrain. Then, I wrote the overall title of the combined poem, but I left the original lines.

War’s Bitterness

I would go to the war*—

Not to defend my country
or the Constitution, or our freedom,
or our way of life, to a war
I did not believe in.

I would kill and maybe die*—

Even my own countrymen would
condemn me and others who did
see themselves as defenders, many heroes
who would be wasted in a war they hated.

I was embarrassed not to*—

I cried. I didn’t want to go. I felt
that I had no choice. Could I kill?
Would I be killed or maimed?
Would I ever understand why?

(*Taken from the boat scene while fishing on the Rainy River in the book, The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien.)

Look both ways. Feel the pressure. Decide.
Mind the gaps, especially those in your mind.
You’re only a living, fallible human.

Poetry: A Pantoum

Morning Cat

Sometimes, in the morning I stretch like a cat.
It feels good to expand my arms into the air,
to feel my body push against itself,
to feel my life physically trigger another day.

It feels good to stretch my arms into the air,
quietly announcing my arrival before dawn upstages me.
I want to physically trigger another day in my life.
before dawn steals my self-awareness, that “I’m alive” feeling.

I enjoy quietly announcing my arrival while
admiring the cobalt blue and sunny pink sky colors,
as sunrise steals my awareness, an “I’m alive” feeling
that makes me want to make the best of the day to come.

I admire the cobalt blue and sunny pink morning skies
and I want to feel my body push against itself,
as I hope to make the best of the day to come.
Sometimes, in the morning I stretch like a cat.

Look both ways when you’re feeling a bit catty.
Mind the gaps. Especially the ones behind the eyes.

Sammi’s Weekender #197 (call)

Click for Sammi’s blog.

I wrote two poems because I liked this prompt.

Happy Raspy

The young, talented, beautiful Irish busker’s angelic voice,
unique and indescribable, called to me from Grafton Street.

Her glancing smile and raised brow calls all to pay homage
to the gift that brings me to resonated tears. My raspy old poem.

***

Yo, Billy Boy

When we said, “Call for me,”
we invited a friend, always a boy,
usually Jimmy, to stand outside and yell,
“Hello, Bill (or Billy)” loud enough
to be heard from any part of the house
and responded to, if anyone cared.

***

Look both ways on Grafton in Dublin.
Mind the gaps in such a marvelous voice.

Sammi’s Weekender #191 (crucible)

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Anarchy Unmasked

Let dogs of anarchy desecrate
this history of earned heritage,
as shameful palls shake
souls of long defended freedom.

Withstand this crucible of vile hate
set deep in mindless true believers,
followers waving flags of folly,
in vulgar disgust beneath daemons.

Let us all stand tall and proud,
defending democratic doors
and windows to fearless hearts, trust
this legacy; let it be, set it free.

“Stand ye calm and resolute,
Like a forest close and mute,
With folded arms and looks which are
Weapons of unvanquished war.”

Let tyrants dare, in agony of despair,
to dislodge righteous love for freedom.

***

Quotation is from The Masque of Anarchy by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1819).

Look both ways. Say never to tyranny.
Let us mind the gaps but withstand our tested love of Liberty,
that masked delicate lady in scrubs who defends life.

 

Sammi’s Weekender #189 (troglodyte)

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Favored Bonds

With nothin’ left to lose, they closed their doors.
Perennials, long past thirty-seven point eight median years,
they lived what’s left of life.

She, an unwilling anchoress,
he a happy troglodyte of hopeful health.
With preeminence declining,
they stood their ground.

They shunned from their bubbled bastion those
who denied reality or died in denial
of reality’s science, as plagues of nonsense
took many from loved ones.

Together, they danced ‘till the end of love,
touched by mature minds.
Happy to be alive in a new world, until
the end of time comes for them.

Look both ways crossing life’s boundaries.
Mind the gaps and keep moving.

Sammi’s Weekender #187 (niggle)

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Expostulated Love

“I love that man,” was what she said to me,
and “I hate that other one,” her follow-on, bait-switch statement,
that morsel of red herring to mislead my unwanted retort
to her bleating caterwaul. I knew this kvetch ranked
behind turd infected punji sticks in heart and soul.

Niggle not. Poetry is sycophantic art when inoffensive kindness
and socially sensitive ethics are euphemisms for hidden truth.

Look both ways, if he can tell it like it is, I’m also justified.
Mind gaps for expiration of truth.

Sammi’s Weekender (Dire)

From the Universe, I call down a pox upon them.
Dirae with Furiae shall tear their poisonous skin
to feed comrade vultures sitting in shadows of guilt.

Curators of dire curses upon innocents, dealers of death cards,
may shepherds of fools find woeful futures haunted
by those who paid the greatest price to dance with fantasy and lies.

Look both ways seeking answers, but beware
gaps of darkness are where truth is hard and lies come easy.

Sammi’s Weekender #182 (bequeath/bequest)

I Lied to Me

His first words,
“What will you get?”
With such words our brother
accounted for decades of silence.

“He can’t help it,”
I’d tell myself.
“It’s not his fault.
He was raised like that,”
I told myself.
“Forgive him.
He’s your big brother.
He should be your hero,”
I still tell myself—
Not some pitiful old man
Who’ll never understand why,
I told myself, again.

Our sister’s bequest
was that he suffer
as he caused her, but I couldn’t
let her love lapse, I told myself.

Look both ways with family and friends.
Mind the gaps, but learn to live without them.