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Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash. Leonard Cohen

Friday, August 31, 2012

Blue Moon In August

gretasday.com
 
The August heat will not wane for the night
The black crow sky embraces a blue moon
and so we too embrace beneath the stars

How many wishes made upon these stars?
How many secrets shared within the night?
How often were we watched by jealous moon?

I know you'll always be there like the moon
We lend each other brightness like the stars
The heat of you awakens me at night

Love rare as nights of blue moons, falling stars.


gretasday.com

Thursday, August 30, 2012

Letter From the Dead On the Side of the Road

Do you even see the damage you cause?
Open your eyes!
Look at your highways
They are littered
with the broken shells of our homes
Splattered
with our torn and twisted bodies
Asphalt painted
red with our spilled blood

Your glass and metal armor
turns us to fragments
fur, feathers, bone
Years of nurture and struggle
rubbed out
in a kiss with a radial tire

Look at us!
Can you bear it?
Will you say a prayer
for the Dead?
Do you even notice the ghosts
riding on your hood
scratching at your windows
pecking at your eyes?

(Saw yet another dead box turtle on the road today-it had gotten hit by a car. The road wasn't even a busy one; why can't people just pay attention and slow down?!!)

submitted for Theme Thursday, Eyes
and Poetry Jam, Letters

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

White Roses (Redux)

Mama Zen asked us to write a short poem using a "power image." I chose the white rose, often associated with death and mourning. I forgot that I was supposed to limit myself to 25 words, so my first attempt is somewhere longer, followed by a shortened version.

White Rose with yellow Shade 
Ivory roses matched her wedding gown
Juxtaposed against her tresses of brown
A single white bloom she now holds in her hand
on a chain round her neck, she wears his wedding band
Solemnity shadows the end of each year
as the names of the dead are read, she strains to hear
His name makes her clench up her fist on a thorn
With a blood stained white rose, she goes home now to mourn.

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She carried ivory roses on her wedding day
Now she holds a single white bloom
wears his wedding band
on a chain around her neck
her face, paler than the petals.

Saturday, August 25, 2012

Empty Spoon

Working Still by Borg de Nobel
  I hear your cries
like Spanish radio
in the apartment next door

I have no milk
I haven't eaten in three days

Ashes to ashtray
dust to rock
dreams to smoke

I cook my meals on a dirty spoon
I feed death to my bones

I saw your mouth move
like a hatchling bird's

My empty spoon
can't fill your hunger

I am nothing
I can give nothing

submitted for dVerse Poets Pub, Poetics, Borg de Nobel

Close Up

Calm, composed
Shall I look deeper?
Injured, stabbed
Rusted, scarred
Touch the wrong place and get jabbed
The surface is safe

Friday, August 24, 2012

Love Poem For a Place and a Girl


photo by Allison Tardio
She understands this place;
she understands me.
We walk the wooden boards in silence
and let Nature speak.
The creek eases past Cypress knees,
anchoring trees who have stood
peaceful witness
through lifetimes come and gone.
"Look," she says. "The paw paws are nearly ripe."
I inhale their tropical musk 
and reach for her hand.


Forgotten Roads

Big Sky Road by Ella Wilson

You love to walk the forgotten roads,
the ones with weedy, overgrown shoulders
and missing road signs,
orphaned roads
that let you turn down the volume
on the clatter and chatter,
 feel the earth under your feet
and watch cloud shapes coalesce above.

Forgotten roads
let you take time
to remember
your name.
They don't hurry you
to get anywhere;
they honor you
right where you are.

Even as the milky clouds 
grow ashen and somber,
you walk.
You walk 
as raindrops tease,
then course down in a cavalry of wet.

In the petrichor
you smell the birth of another chance
and feel yourself
cleansed of artifice,
shining like a new penny
on the asphalt.




Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Like Water

photo by lolamouse 8/12
You run like water
down the path of least resistance
to my lowest point
honing in
on the nadir of my insecurities
and doubts
Given enough time
even a trickle 
wears down granite
A trifle
becomes malignant
insistent and insidious
turning solid mass
tenuous
I believe it is time
to dam you
 to damn you.


submitted for dVerse Poets Pub, Open Link Night #58
and Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Open Link Monday

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

High Tailin' It Outta Here

Fear not, my little lovelies. The Mouse will return after a break from this wretched Southern MD heat. We will be visiting the lovely Pacific Northwest for about a week, and I will have little to no internet access, so things around my blogs will be quiet as...A MOUSE! (Boo, hiss)

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

August Hangs


I'm off to hopefully get some relief from this hellish Southern MD weather. I'll open comments back up when (if!) I return.

Friday, August 3, 2012

Wolves

source
Hold me tight
I hear the wolves at my door
Please don't leave me alone now
I do not have the strength to fight

I hear the wolves at my door
I knew they would come for me
But do not have the strength to fight
I am depleted

I knew they would come for me
Strong seeks out strong
But I am depleted
From taming your monsters

Strong seeks out strong
So I will face the fangs
Tamed, your monsters
Sleep now

I will face the fangs
But please don't leave me alone
Sleep now, but
Hold me tight.

submitted for dVerse Poets Pub, Form for All, Pantoum
Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, The Wolf Is Getting Married


Thursday, August 2, 2012

Kiss Mor Chiks

I'm bummed. I wanna show my support but I'm married to a great GUY! Anyone in the St. Mary's, MD area tomorrow wanna give a straight girl a peck?

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Maybe She Will

image by Zelko Nedic
She comes to me in dreams real as Earth
Divine succubus
Her silken wings become my blindfold
Her ebony tresses my chains
I, her servant of the midnight,
willingly succumb to her spell
From my mind's mad stirrings
emerges a wild hope
a plea I dare not voice
(Maybe she will stay)
Evil enchantress
She hears my thoughts 
 leaves her calling card-
 black dog with eyes of fire
Now I know that it is I
who will be going soon.

submitted for The Mag, Mag 128