The Poetry Marathon

Emoji Poem

 

 

Emoji Poem

(based on my current favorite emoji’s)

 

Wave to us Tinkerbelle!

 

look at the rabbit

who looks at time

with two open eyes

 

loves to wave

rides the waves

 

but like a bumble bee sans flowers

can’t help but be unhappy

with such horror on the earth.

 

His inner eagle

needs to fish around to

find an angel with brains.

 

His starry-eyed smiley face will

then give a thumbs up to

the doctor who is a diamond

in this time of crying.

 

Don’t be a nerd,

give a shamrock

thank you to those

who wear masks.

 

 

 

Season of the Reckoning

 

 

Season of the Reckoning

 

 

Everything’s off rhyme

stuck in syncopated time

 

this season of the reckoning

is echoing the sickening,

sanity’s trembling is worsening

 

adrenalin is assembling

both sides told they’re trespassing

but disenchanting is awakening.

 

Threatening editing slides by

some who are unquestioning,

but to me it is unsettling.

 

Deadening, deafening lies are enveloping

our lives, but we just keep on messaging

while what they’re peddling feels like sentencing.

 

We’ve gotten used to crazy menacing

but like a loaf of bread with leavening

we’ll rise up to not feel second string.

 

His skeleton of embezzling

hypnotizing but we’re awakening

 

adding strength to what’s developing

together we’ll soon be reveling.

 

 

 

 

 

The Ideal Day

 

 

 

The Ideal Day…

 

I smell orange peels

past their prime

desiccated in sun…

 

cheers cascade down

on me like waterfalls

from everywhere…

 

I can’t get enough.

 

I’m not prone to pinch myself

but this warrants a pain

born of pleasure…

 

I finally get to scream goodbye

to the worst side of myself

manifest as President Agent Orange…

 

Reality TV had featured a peacock

strutting and fanning his wings

to the adoration of less and less…

 

until crooked politics

and internet circumvent

weren’t enough to keep him on our screens…

 

smell has a strong memory

but his septic tank of vision

fades like a sunset bright from pollution…

 

and I bite into a crisp Gala apple

to relish the taste

of something sweet

and finally… a twang of hope

 

 

 

The Lake

 

 

The Lake

 

shimmers like the dream it represents

distant lights of Coeur d’Alene

a beacon of trust – we’re not in this alone.

 

Like many things

it’s not always what it seems.

we bathe in calm waters

fed by rivers from the hills.

 

Mines made money for a few

provided hard working jobs

buried deep within the earth.

 

Trickle down waste

washed to streams

 

flowed to pristine lake

but is hidden from view

way down on the bottom

 

like trickle-down economics

as the gap widens between

rich and poor

healthy and sick

haves and have-nots

 

invisible as a virus

politicized until those at the top

realize they can’t imagine it away,

 

that reality is more than what they think.

 

The rest of us dive down to the bottom

and wonder why the water seems

a lot murkier than you’d expect.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dear Anonymous American

 

 

 

Dear Anonymous American

 

I know it’s not your fault.

You caught it by default.

 

He wants us to exalt

all his double talk.

 

From the top we get assault.

Our wounds are rubbed with salt.

 

You’re in a burial vault

of his askew surreal pole vault.

 

His mind flexible as cobalt

while your life was lost.

 

I’m sorry this thunderbolt

somersaulted your life to halt.

 

And if I say I’m sorry

it’s from one deep in worry

 

that you’re one of the many

his lack of caring had to bury.

 

 

Bunny Love

 

Bunny Love

(A Bop)

 

A hawk stares down on me

from high above, I see a dove.

Naïve bunny that I am

I bop along sunny bunny trail

grass beaten down just enough

to show me where to go.

 

Bunny love is funny love

but can also be a boxing glove.

 

Can I love myself?

Does it matter if I swing and miss?

Does it matter if I fall down flat?

Doesn’t the team depend on me?

My ancestors and descendants

stare down from the stands.

Pelt me in an indecipherable sound that

may be cheers, boos or indifferent chatting.

 

Bunny love is funny love

but can also be a boxing glove.

 

I need to figure out what to do

but there is nothing to figure out.

I need to be in this moment

as if the stands aren’t there

as if everything and nothing are the same

as if the answer is a little further down this bunny trail.

 

Bunny love is funny love

but can also be a boxing glove.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Recipe for Sanity

Recipe For Sanity

 

This cookbook won’t put up with none of your self-centered archaic antics.

Its recipes have a zesty tang to remind you that nothing exists but here and now.

 

After all, haven’t you spent enough time doing what was expected?

Why not add a spoonful of cayenne even though you don’t like heat?

 

Life would be boring if it all worked out exactly as planned.

Why not stand on the edge of a cliff and twirl as fast as you can, eyes closed.

Then take a step forward.

 

Well – you’re still here – so I guess it worked out.

 

Your reward is to be Michael Jordan about to shoot your biggest shot ever.

Millions are watching. You are in the ocean with waves lapping at your knees.

All you have to do is throw this big ol’ basketball and hit the water that is all around you. Can’t miss.

 

But what if a hurricane rages into your face just as you let go and blows that ball onto shore so you lose the game and dejectedly walk away amidst a medley of boos that drift into your marrow.

 

Can you realize that there are things bigger than you?

 

Can you accept that everything doesn’t always work out the way you planned?

 

Well… if you can… then you are ready to bake this cake.

 

It will only taste right if it is infused with love.

The kind of love not meant to make you feel good about yourself.

 

A love that is a form of art nonexistent until right now.

That’s right…something new.

 

And you are not creating it.

It is creating you.

 

Trashing all my poems

Dear Caitlin, Jacob and the amazing bunch of spirited writers at the table,

I am deleting all my poetry posts from the poetry full marathon 2020. i hovered over the trash button indecisively for three days, till i had the confidence of letting my poems go beyond the secured sanctuary of this blog. While Caitlin and Jacob birthed another poetry marathon, Annie and Amanda nurtured it for half of the time and now Shloka is here to immortalize it in an anthology. fellow travellers in this journey always gave a shoulder to rest tired thoughts. more fellow travellers of poetry shared their ubiquitous experiences of reading others’ poems. i have been enriched in more ways than one. but now i must walk alone, with a dream of publishing this set of poems, written in remembrance of my maternal grandmother who died of self-immolation and whom i knew so little; this set of poems celebrating three generations of women, my grandmother, my mother and me, who stand tall together, irrespective of their personal her-stories.

i take each one of you together in this journey, for the poems were born in your company, under one grand chandelier of purpose- to create poetry.

with warm regards and hope that you all continue to thrive in poetry

greetings from Austria

Susmita

 

p.s. there could have been a “CONCLUSION” in the Categories section. Just thinking out loud, you see.

Submit to the 2020 Poetry Marathon Anthology

Submissions to the 2020 Poetry Marathon Anthology are open now and will stay open through the 25th of July!

We our pleased to announce that our editor this year is Shloka Shankar. Shloka is a freelance writer, poet, editor, publisher, visual artist, and surface pattern designer from Bangalore, India. She enjoys experimenting with Japanese short-forms, visual poetry, and myriad found poetry techniques alike.

A Best of the Net nominee and award-winning haiku poet, her poems and artwork have appeared in over 200 online and print venues of repute. When she isn’t writing or poring over manuscripts, she dabbles in abstract/digital art and conducts online poetry workshops to spread her love for words and art. Shloka is the founding editor of Sonic Boom and its imprint, Yavanika Press.  You can visit her website here.

Read our guidelines carefully before submitting.

All submissions must include two poems, no more, no less.

All submissions must be made via the email address – poetrymarathonsubmissions@gmail.com

DO NOT email us at the email address we use for all other communication!

The subject line of all emails must be Poetry Submission. Poems must be included in the body of the email.

All poems submitted must be written during the 2020 Poetry Marathon. All poems should be completely edited and contain no major grammatical errors. Revisions are allowed and encouraged before submitting. Please check your punctuation. All poems should be single spaced. Any extra space will probably be interpreted as a stanza break. 

The first word of every line should not have a capitalization unless it is intentional! Word has an auto caps feature that you can turn off by following the instructions below.

You must indicate which hour each poem was written in. Only poets who completed the whole or half marathon will be eligible to submit. Also indicate your location. Please include a link to your page on the Poetry Marathon.

Thank you for following the guidelines! I know they might seem a little strict but they make it possible to put together an anthology in a few months. The anthology should be published this Fall.

There is no guarantee that by submitting your poem will be selected, although the goal is to include one poem by everyone who submits.

After the poems are published in the anthology all rights return to you.

Digital copies will be made available for free to any contributor. Print copies will be available for a reasonable price (last time it was nine dollars to purchase a copy) and any money that is made from selling the anthology will go towards covering the cost of the marathon.

Want to know what the 2019 Poetry Marathon Anthology was like? Pick up your copy here.

PROMPTS 11

 

Dear Emily,

What I miss 

Is far beyond any skies can hold

I need no hint

I do believe you were heaven sent

I miss the late night conversations

Which might lead to sexual relations

When I feel your soft brown skin,

That is all it takes to begin.

Oh how I so love your face 

And fall in love over and over again.

 I miss your smile and your brown eyes.

Even more how your evil look

 Could make a cat lose all nine lives.

I miss hearing your voice,

Me falling in love …I had no choice.

I miss how

 I use to walk up behind you,

and kiss you on your neck

Or how I be mad at you 

And climb back into bed.

I’d tell myself I could fight

But I was truly misled.

I miss holding you in my arms

Trying to protect from

 all your worries and harm.

I miss your back rugs

 and those really long hugs.

Oh yeah, 

I miss sneaking in your mom’s house,

trying to be quieter than a mouse.

Also, I miss my best friend.

Sincerely,

XOXO 4erUR♥️XOXO (more…)