A New Spin on an Old Tale

Little Miss Muffet

climbed on her tuffet

to sit on a branch of an oak

With her curds and her whey

she watched butterflies play

when a spider dared give her a poke!

Little Miss Muffet

suffered a buffet

when she saw its four pairs of mean eyes

But she quick gained her wit

and before she got bit

gave the spider a bit of surprise!

Little Miss Muffet

told the spider to stuff it

when he tried to put her in his web

A lassoed arachnid

that does just what she bids

Makes Muffet a certain celeb!

submitted for Thursday Think Tank #103 Fractured Fairy Tales at Poets United

Queer by Frank Bidart

A tad late for LGBT Pride Month but wow, what a poem...

Queer
by Frank Bidart

Lie to yourself about this and you will
forever lie about everything.

Everybody already knows everything

so you can
lie to them. That's what they want.

But lie to yourself, what you will

lose is yourself. Then you
turn into them.

*

For each gay kid whose adolescence

was America in the forties or fifties
the primary, the crucial

scenario

forever is coming out—
or not. Or not. Or not. Or not. Or not.

*

Involuted velleities of self-erasure.

*

Quickly after my parents
died, I came out. Foundational narrative

designed to confer existence.

If I had managed to come out to my
mother, she would have blamed not

me, but herself.

The door through which you were shoved out
into the light

was self-loathing and terror.

*

Thank you, terror!

You learned early that adults' genteel
fantasies about human life

were not, for you, life. You think sex

is a knife
driven into you to teach you that.

Sometimes We Must

Sometimes we must destroy to build

Let go of the common to find the rare

Old structures upturned and new soil tilled

Though we may not believe we are skilled

We haven't the strength and do not dare

Sometimes we must destroy to build

So difficult to be strong willed

But inertia is too much to bear

Old structures upturned and new soil tilled

Though we breathe, the heart is stilled

We can not grow in stagnant air

Sometimes we must destroy to build

Create a place to feel fulfilled

Where one finds joy beyond compare

Old structures upturned and new soil tilled

Too many spirits silenced and killed

Find that thing for which you care

Sometimes we must destroy to build

Old structures upturned and new soil tilled.

submitted for Poetic Bloomings, In Form Poet, Villanelle 

and  Poets United, Vice Versa #4

Hell Is Empty

painting by Micael Chadwick

 submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Kerry's Wednesday Challenge, (Very) Old School

inspired by a line from Shakespeare's The Tempest: "Hell is empty and all the devils are here."

and Poetry Jam, Mood Swings

She Floats

  Photo by Zena Holloway

Waif upon water

Blondness rises, spreads like blood

Then she floats, just floats.

The Dude Abides

His given name was Jeff

but everyone called him Dude

It has been said that he was lazy and profane

and that may be true

But the Dude had a keen sense of fairness

and of friendship

and of how a rug could tie a room together

The Dude's belly and his smokes

were both pot

and he liked his White Russians

Too laid back for employment

he courted enjoyment

"bowling
driving around
the occasional acid flashback"

But when the need arose for action

the Dude responded

grudgingly and

ineptly

It may be said that he was a loser

and that may be true

But the Dude abides.

Jeff "The Dude" Lebowski from The Big Lebowski

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Fireblossom Friday, Get Famous

Walk On the Ocean

Lavallette beach, NJ

Slate grey sea, wet sand

Footprints beside seagull tracks

Jagged shells, smooth stones

My soul holds abundant calm

Hand in hand, lacking nothing.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Ella's Edge

and Poets United, Vice Versa #3

Dichotomies

image by Nata Ibragimov

I love our dichotomies

Your dark bristled face

against my fair cheek

Tender lips

crashing together in a violent kiss 

Your hardness

against my soft

And when our bodies part

sizzling droplets of sweat

become cool puddles on our skin 

tiny swells

under the turning fan blades.

Puddle, 1952, M. C. Escher

submitted for The Mag, Mag 122

and Poetic Bloomings, Burning Passion #60

Love Letter To the Turtles

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Kenia's Wed. Challenge (Poetry In Motion)

All Good Things

source

If all good things must end

then how to explain us?

I used to be afraid

to feel too good

Kept myself tethered

so the inevitable fall 

wouldn't hit too hard

Now 

I let my joy fly 

like a newly fledged bird

and I need not grieve

its ending

for each ending creates 

Space

for the beginning 

of something even

Better.

submitted for Theme Thursday, All Good Things

Trompe de la Coeur

Still Life, 1670, detail by Jean François de Le Motte

Last night I made a bonfire

with last season's leaves

and your love letters

You were a master with words

I believed every lie you wrote

because you wrote it so beautifully

and I want to believe

in beauty

A trompe de l'oeil painting

seems so real until

you look closely and see your mistake

Your words were a trompe de la coeur

a trick of the heart

I burned your words

with the dead leaves

The fireflies blinked crazy fiesta lights

around the fire

and I toasted a marshmallow over the blaze

It tasted so sweet.

submitted for The Mag,  Mag 121

and Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

The Short but Sad Tale of Tick Girl

submitted for Poets United, Thursday Think Tank 100, Eccentric (inspired by the poems of Tim Burton)

Circles

Circles by lolamouse

Spinning thoughts

on an exhausting journey

going nowhere

Stuck

on an obsessive mind carousel

Mad horses racing

to a nonexistent finish line

while the music plays on

and on

and on

submitted for Theme Thursday, Full Circle

It's Not Easy Being Green (Another Cautionary Tale)

image by Klaus Enrique Gerdes

Mabel's mother has always said

"No veggies, no pie, and to bed!"

But Mabel just balks like a mule

and finds dozens of ways 'round the rule

Ever since she was quite young

Not a vegetable slips past her tongue

Anything green is rejected

Her vitamin intake neglected

No carrots, no peas, and no cuke

If forced, it will make Mabel puke

It's even a battle of wills

Over her daily vitamin pills

Now her mother has just had enough

Says to Mabel "I'm sick of this stuff!"

Gives her veggies and says, "I can't bear it!"

"Here's your choice--you can eat it or wear it!"

submitted for The Mag 120

 

Low Down, No Good Jezebel Blues

Women 'spose be sistas, women 'spose be tight

Women 'spose be sistas, yeah we 'spose be tight

But you a twisted sista, you know you ain't acting right.

Thought that I could trust you, really thought I could

Thought that I could trust you, thought I really could

But you been sneakin' round, doin' things ain't no damn good.

You been sayin' I just don't know how to treat a man

You been sayin' I just don't know how to treat my man

Believin' no one else could ever do it to 'em like you can.

You talk behind my back, say I neglectin' my guy

You been spreadin' rumors I neglectin' my guy

So you open up your heart to him and then you open up your thighs.

Well, you can have him now and I wish you both well

You deserve each other; hope you burn up in Hell.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Sunday Mini Challenge, Blues Sonnet

Illusions

Pablo Picasso: Girl Before a Mirror, 1932

I try on words like

 clothes in a bargain basement

department store

Under the harsh lights

my bare feet on grimy, threadbare carpet

I imagine a perfect fit

Beauty

One look in the mirror shatters

the illusion

Excess verbiage

Underdeveloped ideas

Loose phrases hanging off the body

The words looked so much sexier

in my head than

on the paper

With a sigh, I hang them back up

with all the other rejects.

submitted for Poetry Jam, Painting a Picture With Words

Don't Poke the Tiger (A Cautionary Tale [Tail?])

Lady Ravendale, a Steampunk Girl by DPI Studios

Perhaps it was her uncanny feats of gymnastic swordsmanship

without messing her hair or popping her corset

or perhaps it was only fortuitous pheromones

but the moment young Felix Francis Fussbudget V lay eyes upon 

the lovely lass Lady Ravendale

he was totally and eternally smitten.

The feeling was mutual.

Luck with with the lad, as Lady Ravendale’s beloved pet tiger, 

Aloysius Fishbreath, took an instant liking to Felix,

for previous suitors had found themselves shredded

like cabbage heads for a carnivorous coleslaw.

Mrs. Millicent Filomena Fussbudget, long suffering wife of 

the Grim and Righteous Reverend Felix Francis Fussbudget IV, 

did not, however, approve of the impending union.

“The girl is haughty and proud, naughty and loud,”

 Mrs. Fussbudget decried. 

“And she dresses herself like an armadillo!  

Felix will marry her over my dead body!”

That evening, the Somewhat Less Grim but still Righteous 

Reverend Felix Francis Fussbudget IV performed the marriage

 of his son Felix Francis Fussbudget V and the Lady Ravendale.

Their pet tiger, Aloysius Fishbreath, was the ring bearer.

He was still licking his chops upon the altar.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Kerry's Wed. Challenge, Steampunk

Too Young

Little girls lost

Stumbling in the middle school maze

Dazed

Braces and bras

Awkward and powerful

Stuck between Barbies and birth control pills

Summer lemonade stands and summer lovers

Looking for suburban supermen

to fly us away

take us anywhere but where we were

Magic men
to perform an alchemy
transform us

We found instead snot nosed boys
with dirty fingernails
men with wandering hands
and dirty minds

The music promised

lipstick and leather

adrenaline fueled dreams

We knew the words like

our own heartbeats

Sang them like a prayer

a supplication

Waiting for a divine god, goddess

to answer as we waited
for our confidence to grow

with our breasts
We watched the wild ones
studied them with awe and envy
and a little fear
Denim and leather
Mullets and swagger
We didn't know if we wanted to
be them
or be their girlfriends
Barracudas or
butterflies
but we ached to be free.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Friday Music Prompt, Rock Hard (Suzi Quatro tribute w/ a bit of Heart)

Nature's Music

source

Serenity surrender to restless ruminations

I return to the feral forest where rests make music's metre

Wooden sun bleached boards carry me through sighing Cypress

Moments and measures play longer by the cadence of the creek

Waterstriders wade like tiny persons paddling

Raucous red bellied woodpecker spies russet red tailed hawk

Bullfrogs burp; spring beauties blush. Senses soar like swallowtails.

submitted for Poetic Bloomings, In Form Poet, Alliterisen (Complex)