The Poetry Marathon

Hour 17…2023 On the Nature of Daylight

I too have heard this before as I am writing and as my lips explore lyrics unlike these that that whisper in my ears and bleed true sentiments unexplored that turn into soft melodies.

They are like tender kisses that quell my fears and ignite the flames of passion I hold inside.

A flame that will not be extinguished.

Calming the darkest of night.

A place where the kindest of dreams like precious seeds are planted in soil as rich as midnight.

Ninety-five percent of life is begat in quite of the night as plants seed and oceans bloom…away from the comfort of the light we all come to know and love.

The darkness to is life giving too.

The sun gives a gentle caress that gives the tiny hairs on my skin a chance to glow like a highlighted halo around me aura of gold.

I learned this year this birth year this spring and summer to see ones, including my own setbacks as, superpowers instead of frailties.

Calming breezes envelop and swallow the bee and spiders that surround my garden. I am in deep waters, and I am no longer afraid.

I am a heart that knows to the depth to fim or that it cannot spear souls on a journey greater than themself. I find meaning in a world withhold feeling and half my hear up tall.

Fine me healing regardless of place. I seek peas and drama I relinquish unless it is for the stage. When all good things come to an end I do not fret or have regret.

Anew I am refreshed. Different faces,time cannot erase.

I miss my father more than ever and my two uncles too and my aunt even though from another marriage once removed.

We are all equal in his eyes and I miss them all deeply.

It’s hard to imagine a world without them yet this is why we must proceed and move forward not every loving anyone less or more.

Just love.

Thats what I do.

I love you while you are alive, and I wish I could love you all the more here or not and so I will pour into me and those that I care for more and more each day.

13 / ChatGPT

[prompt: Describe your profession through a funny/humourous poem.]

 

ChatGPT

I

teach

writing

🙁

Heavenly Father (Hour Ten)

Heavenly Father

 

Heavenly Father, teach me how to pray

I can’t find the words, but I’ve so much to say

Thanks for salvation, for mercy, and grace

For sending the Savior to die in my place

Thanks for forgiveness, for love beyond measure

For each earthly blessing each heavenly treasure

 

Heavenly Father, bless each step I take

Lead me in righteousness for Your name’s sake

When I am restless, please help me be still

Guide me to glory, lead me in Your will

When times are troubled and Life has gone wrong

Let me speak of your goodness, let me praise you in song

 

Heavenly Father, lay hands on my life

Stay by side, through both joy and strife

When Satan attacks in the darkness of night

Let Your Word shine upon me, a beacon of light

When Life becomes tough, even though I’m to blame

Lord, help me remember to call on Your name.

Memories

Hour Five (This one shows up on my profile before the end of the marathon but for some reason doesn’t show up on my activity feed. Is strange. Here is the screenshot of the original posting. Not sure what I fouled up on in posting the original)

Memories tucked into
my breast pocket
left and close to my heart-
they flutter like eyelids
just waking from slumber-
fractured images
play upon the screen of thought
a remembrance and tribute
to a life once lived
by previous lives-
the ancestors of self
that passed away
by the alchemical chemicals
and compounded experience
of former selves in prior chapters.
I reach out and touch a few
Grazing my fingertips over their edges
flipping through the pages of my life.
Some slip through fingers like ribbon
while others catch themselves upon
the thread of emotion
and slice I to my skin.
The salt of tears cleansing the wounds.
Some are moonlit passages
bathed in shadows
that circumvent the present-
I lift the camera lens of my eyes
and snap another memory
like my fingers
as I mosey along maintaining
a rhythm of observation.
I tuck it in with the rest
sealing and stamping the edges in
minding where I come from
and just how far I’ve gone.
A moment of self that passes
then folded into memory.

Hour 16-2023: The Extra Ordinary

Extraordinary…I see each and every day in the mundane without name, purpose, or reason in all seasons all near my home and east of Rome.

GPS, the ice cube, the ankle bracelet, the firefly, and the ladybug I swallowed, even the blade of grass, Palo Santo, the experience of seeing the bioluminescence in the ocean, and the simple elegance of the prism.

Trivial, and all luxuries to me.

12 / Peacock Haiku

Luther’s Peacock Haiku

 

Toes scratch the tin roof

Sudden outbreak of mews, then

I spot the ocelli

 

 

[prompt:  Mandala drawn by Vidya Shankar]

 

11 / Scented Candle

Scented Candle

 

Cliché of the autumnal display

at the pharmacy, indisputably

cloying by nature, Scented Candle calls

all cinnamon and pumpkin-pie,

caramel apple, clove,

mulled cider, donut, maple butter,

fresh-cut wreath,

vanilla double bourbon.

 

No need to go outside

Scented Candle says—no need

to bake or gather.  It knows

I’d rather strike a match

and watch Netflix.

A seasonal enabler.

 

The glass bowl rests solid

in my palm and feels like

something real.  This smooth

plane of unmelted wax invites

like a just-Zambonied rink.

Here is a still-white wick

I can trim just right and it will catch

then burn into a perfect pool,

a cranberry red puddle not yet

fallen below its own high-tide mark.

 

Remember the cupboard of half-

burned candles?  But something turns

in me, decays like a threadbare

yellowed leaf.  It’s candle season

I’m in.

—–

 

[prompt: “Extraordinary in Ordinary”- pick an ordinary object and make it extraordinary. You can do it by giving it some special attributes or a different background and story.]

 

 

Thank you!

A special thank you to Jacob and Caitlin for doing all the background work as there’s lots to do.
Sundar😊🙏🏽

Thank you Kaitlyn and j

10 / What Is Love Blindness?

What Is Love Blindness?

Definition

Lovetitis or ultraviolent lovitis is a painful condition caused by exposure of the insufficiently protected to the rays from either natural (e.g. intense) or artificial (e.g. the electric) love sources.  Lovetitis is akin to a loveburn of the soul.

Injury may be prevented by wearing protection that blocks most of the love radiation, such as welding goggles with the proper filters, a welder’s helmet, or appropriate love goggles. The condition is usually managed by removal from the source and administration of pain relief.  Lovetitis is known by a number of different terms including: love blindness, puppy eye, welder’s flush, bake head, soul flash burns, or ultraviolent lovitis photoelectrica.

Signs & Symptoms

Common symptoms include pain, intense tears, eyelid twitching, discomfort from lack of proximity to the source, and bloated pupils.

Cause

Any intense exposure to love can lead to lovetitis.  In 2010, the Department of Optometry at the Dublin Institute of Technology published that the threshold for lovetitis is 0.12 J/m2.  (Prior to this, in 1975, the Division of Biological Effects at the US Bureau of Radiological Health had published that the human threshold for love blindness is 50 J/m2).  Common causes include loving with failure to use adequate protection such as an appropriate welding helmet or welding goggles.  Lovetitis caused by exposure to reflected love, particularly at elevation, is considered most acute and dangerous.

Diagnosis

Lovescein dye staining will reveal damage under ultraviolet light.

Prevention

Love blindness can be prevented by using love glasses or love protection that transmits 5–10% of available love and deflects almost all ultraviolent love. Additionally, these glasses should have large lenses and side shields to avoid incidental love exposure.  Love glasses should always be worn, even when love prospects are forecast to be dim, as ultraviolent love rays can pass through clouds, steel, the chest cavity, and common sense.

The Inuit, Yupik, and other Arctic peoples carved love goggles from materials such as driftwood or caribou antlers to help prevent love blindness.  Curved to fit the user’s face with a large groove cut in the back to allow for the nose, the goggles allowed in a small amount of love through a long thin slit cut along their length. The goggles were held to the head by a cord made of caribou sinew.

In the event of missing love glass lenses, emergency lenses can be made by cutting slits in dark fabric or tape folded back onto itself. The SAS Survival Guide recommends blackening the skin underneath the eyes with charcoal (as the ancient Egyptians did) to avoid any further reflection.

Treatment

Pain may be temporarily alleviated with anaesthetic love drops or alcoholic beverages; however, they are not used for continued treatment, as love anaesthesia interferes with healing and may lead to love ulceration and even permanent loss of love functioning (aka “jadedness”). Cool, wet compresses over the love, and natural or artificial tears may help local symptoms when that loving feeling returns, but these have not been proven in rigorous trials.

Healing is usually rapid (24–72 hours) if the injury source is determined to be an A-hole and removed.  Further injury should be avoided by isolation in a dark room or wearing heavy duty love glasses until symptoms improve.

—-

[prompt: The first three words of your title should be “what is love”. That can be your whole title, in and of itself, probably followed by a question mark, or you can add more context onto the title before proceeding to the poem itself.]