The Poetry Marathon

Growth

Twisted, gnarled branches

Entwined in growth’s embrace
Supporting one another
In their small shared space
Like these trees are people
Supporting independence
When we’re little children
We need a mentor’s guidance
And when we learn a skill
We don’t learn alone
We help each other daily
Even when we’re blown
Over by the storms
We weather every day
It’s support which helps
Grow in any way.

So don’t say it’s only you
Even if it may feel bleak
While together we are many
Alone we become weak.
There’s always someone out there
You can lend a hand
Don’t toss aside support
When you can make a friend

Some people are like snakes, a joke comes with a hiss
While other bray like donkeys, muleish tones oft remiss
You however intrigue me, your voice sparkles like champagne
Effervescent and evanescent, transparent and bubbly
Where are the songbirds summoned by your reaction?
The princess sidekick is M I A
Yet you make the world sparkle like diamonds
When you send a chuckle my way.

I wish your world was silly
Full of bubbles like your voice
So your humor would spring often
From that well of effervescent voice
Yes, I want to hear your ribs burst,
See you catch your breath
I want to make you smile wide
To hear your every depth.

Goodbye my love, and farewell

I love you, I really do,
I rest easy knowing that’s true
But it was not meant to be
Our fates took you far from me

I love you, I really do,
But thanks to time, cruel mistress,
I am alone now without you.
You died too soon,
To save you I would need a time machine
And magic
Separated forever, before our marriage
It’s tragic.

I love you, I really do,
I could mourn you forever and a day
But you would not want it that way.
I can hear just what you’d say
If you saw me living that way

I love you, I really do,
You haunt me loudly but with grace
You hold me gently to your face
A sweet farewell, a chaste embrace
Goodbye my love, and farewell
I’ll see you in heaven where true love dwells.

How do I describe you
Innocently blue
Like song and sadness you do swoon
Jaded in time
They call you black when you’re blue-green
Iridescent cerulean-teal sheen
A corvid by any other name
You and other birds are not the same
You and your brethren each have names

I count your blessing as they come
Walnuts and washers, a stick of gum
You like to gather things and trinkets
Like your cousin magpie though far more tame
For you are not a thief nor rascal,
Just a crow, my yard your castle

Isolation

It’s been dawn for days now
Day breaking the horizon while Night fades
Until the end of time
I’m alone out here, in my cabin warm
It’s just how I like it
And in a week or three or more
(I lost the track of time)
Time will return for all intents to normal
While I still rest alone inside
Only leaving to abide
By the terms of our agreement
Checking on the time
And keeping the world turning.

Spam and Mac

I don’t eat much from childhood
Not that I don’t like it – The food that is
I just can usually eat better.
There is however a staple
From my 16th year
Which reminds me to stay grateful
For the job that I hold dear.
Spam, an easy snack, and mac
Makes a meal, like a dinner hack
That keeps me feeling full
While some folks shirk it and
Some just don’t think it’s good
Spam is often my comfort food
Spam and eggs is breakfast
Spam and rice for lunch
If I’m feeling really sad
Spam, just spam, a bunch
A snack for the ages,
Fry it up in slices
Chop it into pieces
Season it with seaweed
Or just nuke it for a minute
And eat that salt-mass whole
Fry it with the microwave
So you can fill that hole
Spam is just a wonderful food
That joined me late in my childhood

Mancala stones
Shining and pretty
Lovely little bits n bobs
Jade in color

I want to put them in my mouth
Swirl the rocks around my teeth
Like candy, though they could
Actually break my jaw with ease

Each little rock a seed
A row of plants encased
In metaphor from ages past
And while we play with stones
Not beans
The metaphor still lingers

In a way I fulfill their goal
As on my teeth they clack
Food for the winter, food
For the soul

Mancala stones on teeth

I have raised far more than razed, the dead
At night they call and I must heed, the deep

Necromantic dread. For none who lived and
Recall the life which brought them sorrow
Are content with ash and soil, threatened

By the afterlife’s turmoil. And so they come
In heaves and droves, to the necromancer

My name unshared, their prayers unanswered
I did not ask to be their hope, salvation under

Duress. I’m still unskilled yet hopeful for
I have raised far more than razed the dead

By the afterlife’s turmoil, and so they come
Undaunted, the deep the dark the dead they
Rise like forgotten wounds, scars afraid of

Nothing, yet everything, new recruits to the
Skeleton War, deserting their posts for mine.

Maybe we had love wrong

Maybe just a little.

It’s not the heart pounding

Butterflies in your stomach

Feeling that we had when we met

The anticipation of your lips on mine

For the first time

Maybe it’s not the hand holding

The dates and dances

Jumping in puddles in the rain

The feeling of you on me and me on you

Maybe it’s made up of these moments

Where we just exist together

The two of us

In the mist looking out on life

Separate yet whole

United against nothing, just comfortable

Happy to be ourselves.

Maybe we got love right in the long run.

Look at this meal,

Look at it, a wonderful meal, all for me

A feast fit for a king!

Here with you, honoring you with my presence,

You are also wonderful though, what with your face

I guess

So let’s bask in the moment together,

Enjoy a dish prepared by the chef to my

Explicit

And perfect instructions

Under my watchful eye

Enjoy yourself, you’ve earned it Captain

We finally get to go on that date.