Category Archives: Poetry

Waiting room poetry

Posted on February 25, 2016 | 7 comments

Last week I spent a lot of time in a hospital, most of it waiting, with a friend. I fell behind on many things as a result, but I’m pleased to have found something to show for all those hours.

On the ward at Mercy Hospital

They believe they are caring for you as they attend the fading
needs of your body, wash you, move your hollowed
limbs. But in truth, it is you who ministers
to them: you are translucent, radiant with grace that streams through
your papery skin to bathe them where they stand, sheltered
beneath the powerful sweep of your wings.

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Weather poetry

Posted on February 19, 2016 | 2 comments

More than once today a gust of wind ripped the car door from my grasp as I opened it. Luckily, I wasn’t next to another car on any of those occasions.

Weather advisory

the winds of March have come
early to clear the trees of old
leaves and dead wood and push
the stale pestilence of winter
ahead of them, leaving
hope in their wake

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Prompted poetry: an old photograph

Posted on February 10, 2016 | 7 comments

I drafted a couple of poems in response to an actual old photograph on the shelf, but then this popped to mind while I was killing time in a coffee shop. Sometimes it doesn’t pay to be too literal.

Lost and found

He doesn’t recall her
face, even in dreams. Their son brings him
old photographs, but he recognizes
no one, himself least of all.

What he remembers is burying
his face in her hair, the scent
and fall of it, the way his fingers
tangled in the curls.

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Prompted poetry: Dear Diary

Posted on February 4, 2016 | Leave a comment

I tinkered off and on with this prompt through the better part of a day until I thought to follow my own advice. I drew a couple of cards from two of my favorite decks, and the images immediately gave me an idea.

Dear Diary,

Last night I dreamed again I stood among tall firs, perfectly shaped, their branches weighted with snow. The trees covered a steep mountain slope, and through them I glimpsed other slopes and valleys, all blanketed with evergreen and white. My breath hung crisp in the air.

Beneath the heavy thatch of snow, needles living and dead absorbed all sound. I was enchanted; it was so beautiful and still. But a chill began to seep through my clothes, my skin: the silence was too complete. I was utterly alone in an indifferent wilderness.

My pulse throbbed in my ears, and then I noticed another noise, dim and muffled. It was the softest sobbing I have ever known, a weeping beyond all hope of being heard. I woke to find it was me.

Wizards 9 swords

(from Wizard’s Tarot, by Corrine Kenner, illustrated by John J. Blumen; Llewellyn 2011)

Trees 10 pentacles

(from The Tarot of Trees, by Dana Driscoll, 2009)

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Prompted poetry: diatribe

Posted on February 3, 2016 | Leave a comment

February_Writing_Prompts

Observations from the field

buttons and banners, bumpers and yards that sprout
the uncanny side shoots of this strange season

rallies, stumps, town meetings, carefully orchestrated
surprise appearances – the hooting and chest thumping

part of the mating ritual for that bizarre subspecies,
Homo sapiens diatribis, the American politician

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Prompted poetry: who are you?

Posted on February 2, 2016 | 5 comments

When I saw this prompt, I was reminded of a blog post I saw last week at Tarot by Tina. Each week, Tina, herself a writer, draws a card to interpret from a writer’s perspective.

queen2bof2bswords

The Queen of Swords

proclaims your creature
self to be mind as well as brain: remember
that squiggly organ is more than
the body’s maestro, and thought
greater than the sum of firing neurons

she decrees that your intellect serves
your whole person, a loyal retainer
vital as her own chief counselor
and as powerful, because you are
who you think you are

so who do you think you are?

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Prompted poetry: the comment

Posted on February 1, 2016 | Leave a comment

I recently found a wonderful resource for writers in South African-based Writers Write. The site has all kinds of goodies and support for both business and creative writing, including prompts, quotes, book reviews, and courses. I signed up to receive prompts for each month via e-mail, and February’s list arrived yesterday.

February_Writing_Prompts

Unexpected

the offhand comment is not painful
because formulated
without thought or consideration

the offhand comment is painful
because of astonishing
insight and precision

 

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Endings are beginnings

Posted on January 18, 2016 | 4 comments

Thanks to a software near-disaster at the end of October, the last part of 2015 was something of a scramble. I’m not entirely caught up yet, but I’ve finally reached a degree of behindness close enough to the usual that I no longer feel frantic.

Knitting Time

the old year sits by the hearth
in a basket, a Gordian tangle of half
finished projects in mixed hues and fibers, loose
ends to which the new year sadly offers
no resolution

IMG_1070

Photo by April Heltsley

 

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Birthday poetry

Posted on October 20, 2015 | 3 comments

The critique group I shared this with dubbed it the space pirate poem. Aye, then, raise yer glass to another voyage!

From a voyager’s log

full fifty times have I orbited
aboard this good green vessel, broad of beam
and sound, her crew a dodgy
lot at times, both boon
companions and bitter foes

the thousand intractable ills
of shipborne life have gullied me
soft though not yet stripped: I expect
the radiation of yon yellow star will render
me a rattling husk long

before the stellar wind sweeps
my dust to the cosmos

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Found poetry: book spines

Posted on August 31, 2015 | 6 comments

So what has happened to my Blog Elul poetry, you ask? I’ve been writing, but the poems have been either too drafty (rough, unfinished) or too personal to post. That’s a good thing, though, because it means I have material to work with later, when I don’t have a daily prompt to inspire me.

I spent a couple hours with a friend at the library today, and I can never resist the urge to make poetry out of book titles. So here’s something I cobbled together using words that jumped out at me from the stacks.

***

to whisper her name all day and a night
unbroken against the tide
white hot light of the world long gone
a life of joy in a heartbeat

burning once upon a river
too late to say goodbye
guilt by association
hidden places never far from home

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