The Poetry Marathon

Hour Fourteen

Ekphrastic

Screw class. Love is more important.

But I need cash.

Constructing our lives together by looking into a construction site through a diamond cut hole?

I watch buildings rise. What concrete? What mortar? What do I use as beams, without a foundation?

I’ll go to class, looks like just missed first period.

As my grandpa said, “Assess, reassess and aim high.”

I’m sitting at a construction site, watching a building rise through a diamond cut hole.

Where am I going? How do I rise up? Not by sitting on the outside. Building nothing of myself out here.

Aim high, school. DMW

Hour Thirteen

Children will bounce off walls if their dance teacher tells them. (We don’t of course!)

Adolescents won’t do but so much, they don’t want to get perspired in case “dreamy” happens to pass by.

Some adults will sponsor funds for children’s tights rather than buy a pair for themselves. (Patrons are cool with me, not complaining.)

“Seasoned” adults count like this during warm-up exercises-” One, two, three, five, …eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, eighteen, etc.” (We reach thirty is less than three minutes this way.)

Dance classes without mirrored walls offer the best teaching environment sometimes. The only body they see is mine and my smile at their effort is all they need reflected. DMW

PS Retired. Recently asked to consider choreographing a new piece just this week.

Ekphrastic response to mandala by Vidya Shankar.

Daiku’s follow a haiku structure with a Diane twist.

I

Each line memorized.

Wrist, fingertips, ink-flowing

I am just their tool.

II

More than symmetry

Mind and body altering

Release, learn and grow.

III

Drawn from inner thoughts.

Share our universal fate.

Yes, humanity. DMW

Ekphrastic using Tim Foster photograph.

When a body leaves a shine

wherever it’s been

Can’t help but wonder, good creature or creator of Original sin.

The leaves are not wilting, the fronds look bright green

Yet one can’t help but

wonder, are you a magician or a fiend.

When a body leaves a shine

And leaves are not wilting.

One can’t help but wonder

are you a body, a spirit or introducing some other semi- ethereal theme? DMW

Hour Ten: Ekphrastic using photo from Andrew Shaughnessy

My hoofs are killing me, they need a good soak.

My ribs show,

so that tells you. I’m not good/ready for slaughter.

Love this country though.

Fresh air, beautiful sky, clear cool streams to quench my thirst, sunshine almost always and when I need a cooling down, I head northward.

Good grazing munchies.

Just my hoofs are killing me, they need a good soak.

Did I take a wrong turn? Where is the rest of the herd?

My hoofs are killing me, they need a good soak.

Well, at least my inner compass is getting me back home-looks like

I’m here ahead of them, so quiet will be preserved.

that’s good because my hoofs are killing me, and I’d rather soak them alone. DMW

Hour Nine: Ekphrastic response to Diane Carmony photo.

Dialogue between Diane C. and Diane MW

Diane C. ” I’ll beat you home.”

Daine MW: “No fair, I didn’t know we were racing!”

Diane C:  “Yes, you did, you’re just saying that because I’m ahead.”

Diane MW: ” Nah, you’re cheating on that gust of wind.”

Diane C. Yeah, that’s true. So, join me.”

Diane MW: “Ok sis. Love you.

Diane C:” Love you too. DMW

PS Nice to meet you.

Hour Eight: Prompt: Music without words by Max Richter

Gentle patter.

Gentle quiet.

Ease your breath, I will come to you.

A caress is a caress.

Hope to a cry that will be answered.

Feel me? Yes, I sense and caress.

You are not alone.

I see you, and you are not alone.

Feel me with you.

Dry your eyes for now. I will dry them for you, one day, one day sooner than you know.DMW

Hour Seven:  Ekphrastic from Martin Torrez photo

Each one fights to push my swing. Their heads watch.

They have known me since childhood. They know my secrets.

They know who my new boyfriends are, they know my new girlfriends.

This secret place between nature and I is a special place.

I have grown taller than them now.

I still swing within their humming as the wind sings between their leaves. Since each petal holds a note, only here can I swing and listen to a never-ending childhood melody. DMW

Hour Six

I see myself simultaneously leaning over the edge on the other side.

We/I wave to myself/us/each other and in unison we say “So this is it huh? Should have known. we knew, wasn’t willing to admit it though.”

Then we both let go, float together to opposite sides and start all over again in the cosmos. As we brush against each other in passing we note the wide, vast, deepest navy/black canvass, the twinkling of messaging in Navaho code so glad to reembrace us again in this playground. DMW

Hour Five: A Mystery Poem: Utilizing both text and photograph prompts.

She, almost, wished for springtime again.

So, she bought flowers and planted them, reminding her of the season.

Now that the boughs are bare, they starkly remind of stripping bare.

The stripping bare as the police strip bare her wooden door with their knocking, knocking as she tries to escape. Tries to escape within the bare trees echoing the baring of her soul. She knows they saw her.

The flowers dormant now will bloom her naivete as they were evident witnesses to what she did.

The police now have their witnesses.

Nature bared her as they grew evidence, as squirrels found the evidence, as fake flowers add to the evidence. There is nowhere to hide.

Just ask the birds that remained to chirp and follow her, not south, but her and reveal through their conversations about what she buried in the Spring. DMW