24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
Write a poem about a form of technology that is obsolete or is headed that way. The technology could just be referred to in passing, like a telephone booth, or it could be a CD that is the focal point of the poem. The degree of focus on the obsolete technology is up to you.
Holding tender bones bare of revulsion,
strole into final Sati flames
in sublime shining opposite – see!
Surrender engulfing come what may,
devote to the outer and flee when it fades.
Ambivalent to your coat, and I’m still here.
Glance into my eyes, exchange!
Lie dripping into each’s mouth,
squeeze stronger than your hands can,
disappear with me for that moment,
afflict each with rebounding misadventure,
fluid flow through us both.
Sitting back metaphorical cigarette in hand,
reoccurred this place and feeling before,
this time recognising our bond,
struggle to loosen in finger trap tight,
accepting something more to this plight,
discover what wrought wounds in invisible ink.
Trapped in the house for weeks
Only able to communicate through phone calls and text
Every Saturday night watching Verzuz
Jammin’ late night to DNice in Club Quarantine
Dancing to Sister Sledge
Watching virtual poetry slams
Sending each other hug emojis until we were able to hug again
State starts to reopen
Everything isn’t as strict
What’s the first thing we do?
Hang out, hug, laugh…
…oh, how I missed my best friend!
“Do you hear that?!” He said.
I looked at him and shook my head.
“Legally deaf, remember?” I grinned.
He went tu the window and lifted the blinds.
It was storming like crazy outside.
“You don’t hear that? The rain?” He asked.
“Babe, I haven’t heard the rain since I was 9 years old.” I would be 39 in 2 weeks. He started going YouTube channels of rain sounds till he found one I could hear.
The man gave me rain. The sound of rain. To many, that would be nothing. Laughed at, even. But to me, it was nothing short of a miracle.
He’s gone, now. I haven’t listened to the rain, since. But sometimes, on days like today, I look out the window at a storm, and I remember.
As even the Earth weeps.
i didn’t say it back.
i think that i thought that i felt it
& if i said it i’d mean it
but i wanted to give her more than words;
she deserved that.
so i wrapped my words in fear and hesitance.
and made a newly-inked to-do list
of proof i wanted to proffer:
an introduction to my parents
& an accepted invitation to meet hers;
space for herself in my room, not just my bed;
the book she’d given me to read, returned, broken-spined and well-read.
but
i was slow-moving.
she was moving away.
i didn’t say it back & haven’t said it since.
if i said it to her now
i would mean it.
i don’t know if she still does.
that is not the important part.
to find out if she wants any words from me at all
i would have to speak to her.
i do not know if that should be on the list
of things she deserves from me.
I see His nail-scarred hands
the crown upon His head.
Why was it He to suffer
why not me instead?
He was not of wrongdoing
but took the place for me.
He bore my sin and sorrow
That I could be set free.
He took the beatings and the lashes
and said not a word in vain.
He walked the road to Calvary
bearing my guilt and shame.
They spat, called names and mocked Him
they nailed His hands and feet.
As He hung on the old rugged cross
for mockers to believe defeat.
But NO! His death was a victory
a hope forevermore.
For you and me in eternity
As He opened up Heaven’s door!
by Del Bates
Prompt 16
My brain dissects
this urge to connect
to know someone
Inside and out
Is it not suicide
to let someone in
to the extent that
you cannot live without
prompt 15 hour 15 – air travel
Flying it is
I was used to Greyhounds
and the excitement of never knowing
who would share the next seat for
hours and hours of trips to places I was only half committed to go.
Planes mean business –
there is no half-commitment to journey by air:
you are there for good
without wings,
like Icarus after the fall
(all broken wax and wasted feathers).
Greyhounds can’t cross oceans,
even if they could swim that far
without being eaten by sharks.
Flying is safer than swimming –
all or nothing
in the endeavour to get somewhere better than here…
wherever here is.
Greyhounds never made me feel adventurous,
just resigned
to everything I was running to/from/around.
Flying it is.
© r. l. elke
If I choose to meet the current
I am no longer one, alone.
Instead, two galaxies mingle
drawn by a mounting gravity neither can control.
This is inevitable,
though I don’t believe in fate.
Meet me at my body
we are breaking ground
put your heavy arm around me
rest your heavy head
it’s hard to admit that we are trying
bodies converging
through the hopelessly entangled web
of furtive glances,
coffee shop catastrophes,
crashing crescendos of passion and negliegence
melancholy and softness
harshness and rage;
a deranged drama that unravels us
piece by aching piece – –
yet we keep hungrily pursuing the next act
chasing phantoms of our collective expectations
hoping for something real
somebody real
that we may feel the unified beating of emboldened hearts and honest souls:
unique fragments becoming a whole:
the crux of our lives