What separates us does not make us better. Even the thinnest layer of ice threatens to shatter all that we’ve built.
Words left unspoken, never allowed to reach the surface, only serve to strengthen the divide, remove the chance to heal.
Speak to me.
This is my response to Quadrille #168, the prompt from Mish at dVerse ~ Poets Pub, which is to use a form of the word ice in a Quadrille – a 44-word poem (excluding title), with no required meter or rhyme.
Which face to wear? Looking forward or back? The past, both blessing and weight, does not cease to be, even as what will be approaches. To know both is not possible, yet one gives insight to the other. I wear both.
This is my response to Reena’s Xploration Challenge # 264. It’s January, and Reena asks us to consider Janus, the Roman god of beginnings, transitions, and endings, who is depicted as having two faces.
Take a hike in the wild during a Missouri winter, and it’s a crapshoot. Bare branches heavy with snow and turkey tracks the only impressions in the white blanket that lies before you, or t-shirt weather with the sound of rustling leaves as you scuff them out of your way wondering what happened to the four inches of snow that shut things down just last week.
I may not miss the storms of New York’s winters, but I sure miss the snow of New York’s winters, where it knows how to fall and stick around until it decides to fall again. And again. Where the beauty of driving through a forest with a blanket of snow can be appreciated in spite of the inconvenience of slick roads or the need to clear your windows of frost.
As much as I may appreciate warm spells that are more frequent than cold, or the need to shovel the driveway all of three times, give me a New York winter, any time.
a trip to a place left behind always in my heart at home in two places past and present as one never gone
have I returned home when I visit the past or when the trip ends?
Senryū are similar to haiku, but they tend to be about human nature, rather than nature.
Gogyohka (pronounced go-gee-yoh-kuh) ~ a form of Japanese poetry pioneered by Enta Kusakabe in the 1950s ~ 5-line poetry ~ like tanka, but with freedom from restraints ~ no fixed syllable requirement ~ no conventions regarding content ~ brief lines in keeping with the tradition of Japanese short verse
I follow a light and the path it offers, the secret held in musical notes that float as they dance with sunbeams, stepping stones that lead higher and higher. The notes become so numerous they can’t be discerned from the light that wraps itself around me and opens my eyes to a new day, one of acceptance of all, by all.
This is my response to Poetics: Visionary Poetry, the prompt from Ingrid at dVerse ~ Poets Pub, which asks us to write a poem inspired by a vision or dream.
A haze struggles to dim a light traveling the distance that binds two bodies.
Our growing world of disconnect, challenged by invisible connections. Clouds shift,
strain to cast shadows, oblivious to the aura framing them. Different wavelengths of light,
thoughts conflicting, gelling. Powerless to impede, branches sway their hips to its pull,
the flow from one chamber to the next echoing tidal forces, defying the disconnect, absorbing
those wavelengths in a way not imagined but realized. The embrace of affirmation, a kiss.
This is from a reading at The Gumbo Bottoms Single Pot Still Poetry Society … Gumbo Bottoms Ale House, Jefferson City, MO (09 Jan 2023).
First appearing in easing the edges: a collection of everyday miracles, edited by D Ellis Phelps, The Intent of Moonlight and Ethereal Synapses is now included in my poetry collection, Glass Awash, published by Spartan Press.
Long held in self-imposed darkness, removed from all past pain, a heart boldly wills itself to open to possibilities, that light of day might reveal a world open to it, return to it a joy long lost, that it might once more know love.
This is my response to Q44 #167 – To BOLD-ly Go, the prompt from De Jackson at dVerse ~ Poets Pub, which is to use a form of the word bold in a Quadrille – a 44-word poem (excluding title), with no required meter or rhyme.
Traveling this lonely highway, occasional headlights the only break in the darkness, I count oncoming white lines as they flash before me, pass beneath me, each one as familiar to me as the numbers on my dash that measure my progress.
My surroundings may be hidden by the darkness, but I’m not lost. I’ve traveled this road so many times that every curve wraps itself around me. The rumble strip knows my name, warns me when the siren of sleep beckons.
Longing to reach the other end, I wonder if the road is all there is. Am I meant to be anywhere but where I am, passed by mile marker after mile marker, the road passing beneath me while I remain stationary, one more element in the night, yet never really there?
This is my response to Poetics: Are you listening? – the prompt from Merril at dVerse ~ Poets Pub, which is to write a poem that uses two titles from a provided list of podcasts, keeping all words in order and changing only punctuation, if necessary. My poem includes “Rumble Strip” and “Not Lost.” Also, I’ve used another podcast title, “I Was Never There,” as my title.