Love

Parody Poetry: Older than before (NaPoWriMo day 26)

For NaPo day 26, I was to write a parody. I was to find a poem or song and write an altered version of it. A parody is also called a spoof, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on something, or a caricature. It is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or make fun of its subject by means of satiric or ironic imitation.

I decided to work on the song(s) “Old Hippie” by the Bellamy Brothers, a classic paean to male boomers that many of us related to. David Bellamy wrote three of these: one at 35, one at 45, and one at 55. Mine goes to 75 (the age of the other brother) and is more about me.

He turns seventy-five on a Tuesday
sometime late this next July.
Can’t believe his friends’ all dead,
but down the same old road he’ll  still try
to understand and to keep his level head.
But now he craves those crazy days
with his shoulders back,
his chin held proud and high.
He still looks at life and wonders why.
He stopped with church and never prays
but he never wonders when he’ll die.

He still loves old soft county rock,
his poems come from just such songs.
His only friends are now computer faces,
and medicine pros working to help him get along,
with medical-grade stainless steel heart parts.
But he’ll run no more endurance races,
Just the tips and bits on legs that hate him.

He’s an old soldier who wants to be
a hippie getting older every day,
with hair and colors and closet disco music.
An old hippie who knows what life is for,
still wanting to be her man, before
she goes knocking on his door.

He’s an old man who always hated war,
but seemed to know what it was for.
He’s been confused by a government
he both supports and finds disgusting,
and people who tell him to forgive,
while he decides to let them live.

He likes people but not in crowds.
He craves his tribe, but they’ve all died.
Spending quiet time at home alone,
his kids are still his universe,
and Texas is still his home.

He’s a boomer till the day he dies,
he now fears life more than death,
he’s looked at evil in the eye
believes in love and wonders why,
then drums to ten below his breath.

Look both ways and avoid reading the obituaries.
Mind the gaps in everything but believe
you’re this damn old.

Poetry: Fear of Poetry (NaPoWriMo day 18)

The eighteenth day NaPo challenge was to write a poem based on the title of a chapter, as a prompt, in Susan G. Wooldridge’s Poemcrazy: Freeing Your Life with Words. After reading the “look inside” on Amazon, I bought the book at 4 AM. Then I selected Chapter 51, “Fear of Poetry.”

Fear of Poetry

They say, poems find us.
They say, we cannot teach how to poem
words, to think one, or to write one.
They say, we are not all the same,
but we are all equal, or should be,
simply different I suppose. King
thinks writers (poets) are born.

I fear no rainforest, not electricity,
nor my own subconsciousness;
yet ocean depths, being too high,
or the worst of my fears, being a fool
can imprison me: body, mind, and spirit.

Unlike others, poems came to me ever since
I was forced to memorize “O Captain! My Captain!”
at age 13, long before I understood much of anything.
But I hid my love of it for fear of what
poetry might mean to me. Like repressed memories
or unrequited love, I hid from, ignored what I loved.

Now behind that mental dam of fear is stored
years of unexpressed ME (or is it I?) – poetry.
Only in demonstrative anger
or stoically hidden sorrow did I feel safe.
Since owning that,
since calling myself poet,
then writing and thinking,
I let them out. One poem at a time.

Look both ways to see where it began and where it might end.
Mind the gaps because it’s never to late to be completely you.

Poetry: Mello Bill (NaPoWriMo day 14)

The NaPo prompt for today was to write a poem that “delves into the meaning” of my first or last name. For me, that’s about family history.

Mom couldn’t remember her mother,
but her father lived much longer. I,
while given his name, never met him
or any grandparent.

Mom’s family propensity
for female progeny meant that I
could have been baptized Wilhelmina.
But the presence of a penis undermined
her best planned pronouncements. I was William,
after my maternal grandfather, yet Mom and Sis
often teased by directing that female alias at me.

For my name, more meaning
requires German or Norman research,
the discovery of which
has nothing to do with me.

Neighbors often called me Danny
after my Dad or older half-brother, but
I told them, “I’m Billy.”
They often seemed confused.
Mom said I was demonstrative (whatever that meant).
Wilhelmina probably would have been histrionic.
Today it’s curmudgeonly snarkastic, but they love me.

I don’t know if so-called meanings of my name
have squat-all to do with who I am, or this William.
It’s Bill that I prefer to go by although our first born
is also named William and goes by Billy
(or Bill when I’m not around).

As for that “strong-willed warrior,
protector, or helmet” stuff from the dictionaries,
regarding the meanings of my first name,
none of it has anything to do with me,
or who I am.

Yet, some who know would call me stubborn.
And there were all those years in uniform
for which people insist on thanking me,
as if I’d been an underpaid volunteer.
Maybe so, maybe not. I guess we’ll never know.

Look both ways and inward.
Does your name define who you are, or is it the other way around?
Mind the gaps in family history, you might not be who you think you are.

Poetry: Omar’s Morning (NaPoWriMo day 9)

Today’s NaPo prompt was to write a poem in the form of a to-do list for an unusual person or character. I made a list for Omar Khayyam using some of his poetry as a guide.

“Awake! for Morning in the Bowl of Night
Has flung the Stone that puts the Stars to Flight:
And Lo! the Hunter of the East has caught
The Sultan’s Turret in a Noose of Light.”

Today I shall make math in the morning,
After a bit of love, and some science
To make the wine taste much finer.
Then I will make time to mend this tent.

Today, I must check the new calendar
To see if it works well enough to
Decide if today is the day after
Yesterday and the one before tomorrow.

“Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse–and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness–
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.”

And love you I shall, until time for food,
And drink. Let us upset the local
Sufis a bit, they see me as atheist,
But they are wrong as this is heaven.

Then I must write for the art,
A bust of poetry as I lie with thee.
Who will know me in a thousand years?
I must get this damn sandal fixed.

Then I recall I must teach that class.
Oh, how to find the time?
Let us make a Sultan’s list,
As I’ll think of love and wine.

(Quotations are from The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, written by Omar Khayyam, translated by Edward Fitzgerald.)

Look both ways for Epicurean delights.
Mind the gaps with humorous and perverse exalting
gratification of the senses. Tomorrow we can decide what happens then.

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.

Sammi’s Weekender #196 (possess)

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Half of One

Her possession complete,
their synergistic power became
magic greater than ever.

Look both ways because life is short and comes with a price.
Mind the gaps for inspiration and answers.

(I have no idea if she is the possessor or the possessed. I was thinking the former, but the latter works too.)

 

Poetry: Mind Reading

Should you want to read my mind,
and I yours? Do our thoughts matter?

And what of dreams?
Are they in our minds, barely clear,
unseen reverie of thoughts, only real when we sleep?

If you could read my mind, could I then read yours?
Would we share thoughts, and each be of two minds?
I’m often with two minds while claiming one—
more conflicted than confused. Do you see through eyes
that are like windows to a witness,
seeing my thoughts,
or are they mixed with yours in me?

If I could read your mind, would a new universe
be revealed to me? One with background and rationale
to justify your thoughts. Would I understand you better?
Or is it true that you and I are what we do?

If you read my mind, do you see my thoughts
through the lens of yours? If not, are my words and actions
filtered through your mind and thoughts? Is that truth?
Are you able to separate you and understand me alone,
entirely without you, your life, your experience, your own thoughts?

“I thought that I heard you laughing
I thought that I heard you sing
I think I thought I saw you try”

“But that was just a dream
Try, cry, fly, try
That was just a dream
Just a dream
Just a dream, dream” *

Forget my mind. It’s crazy anyway.
Read my heart. Listen for my soul.
Judge me by what I do. Ultimately, that is who I am.
I am not a poet. I’m your poet. And you’re mine.

Look both ways. Believe the real, the truth. We are what we do.
Mind the gaps and the pullbacks, the maybes are filled with deceit.

(* Lyrics from Losing My Religion, R.E.M.)

Sammi’s Weekender #194 (beguile)

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Delusion of Truth

Were they so deeply deceived?
Is companionship enough?

She was beguiled by deception, he by
love and trust, they by knowing.

Truth was given freely, and the cost
was death, maybe. How simple.

The book deceived me, tempted
by eternal heavenly bliss,

Dishonored by knowing morality.
Then I read the book.

Look both ways.
Doubt lies, believe truth.
Mind gaps for deception.

Poetry: Sammi’s Weekender #188 (languid)

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Oi, Nineteen: Lust Laughs at Love

Normally chic, now
nearly naked, she lounged in his lap
slovenly taking in
the stunning sunset,

Lamenting his languid,
lackadaisical lovemaking,
leaving his heart listlessly
lost to his long love song.

Feeling inferior
yet yearning to reggae
he cajoled and coaxed playful
music to prove she danced
not too fast for him.

Their love withstood the storm.

Look both ways in love and lust.
Mind the gaps as perfection is myth.

Be lovingly entertained.