2020 Poetry Marathon, Hour 7
Hour 7 prompt: Write a poem titled Season of the (fill in the blank). Write a poem that matches or interacts with the title.
Three years ago
Dear Amy three years ago,
Lost in an abyss with an undertow
Drinking didn’t work
Smoking mj didn’t work
The drugs didn’t work
What was there left to do?
So proud of you making that call
Finding God in California
But then a breakdown
A work intrusion
Tunneled vision
Didn’t know you could go back
To old playgrounds and play friends
Bipolar depression out of control
Anxious to continue life
Literally felt as if you could jump through your skin
Discharged
Sober
Sober for a few weeks
Then broken, off again
Feeling nothing through the summer,
Didn’t care if you lived or died
Approaching summer’s end
A call to a last resort place
A month at Starlite
A forever sobriety date,
It works if you work it
One day at a time.
Obtained clarity
But still had far to climb
Weekly sessions to breakdown
And excavate the past
Identified original wound
Worked with repair
Sometimes with God’s help when remembering to surrender
Lessons of
Trust
Faith
Courage
Integrity
Now three years later
Lessons of
Joy and Grace
It works if you work it
And you’re entirely worth it.
ABOUT A NOTHING SOMETHING
I have nothing from the old place.
I took a handful of clothes,
half a suitcase of books, some beads,
but the music had long died, the piano
figuratively smashed into pulp
after every visiting child had banged its
fist remorselessly on the keys, the ivory
turned irretrievably into cement.
I have nothing from the old place.
I have even forgotten how the insects
fly there, strangled by the screen doors,
how the candles woke up the dead
during power outages, how the trees
tore their own hair when the monsoon
screamed and wailed, how the moon
revealed rat trails in the open drains.
I will not take you to the old place,
where I left the old syllabary and verses,
where my poems in the forgotten tongue
were incinerated in an evening of rage,
the papers silenced because they cried
too noisily and forgot to be discreet.
I have forgotten the colour of the paint
on the high walls of the verandah.
There is nothing left of me there.
Season of the Woman
Cast away your support beams
Of fallen and failed ideologies
Save your strength for the new fight
One without guns or blood
Rather build up our young
And teach them to think
Without hate and greed and fog
Bring them to the front
With confidence and knowledge
Love them and empower them
To turn the world
Into a friend to itself
Monsoon
This is the time, monsoon.
Then
Loves the cool air, dislikes the mud
Loves the hot tea, dislikes the damp clothes.
Likes to stay under the sheets
Likes to see drops running over glass roof Loves to see rain from shelter, dislikes to get in the rain.
Dislikes to stay inside the class, dislikes to get sick.
Now
Dislikes changed to likes and nostalgia when i could no longer feel anything in mind.
Dear lost old days, know you wont come back
But I wish to be a little kid again.
Poem #6: Bouncingly Beautiful Beach Days
Waves crashing
Seagulls yakking
To each other or to us? Hmmmmm
Surfers thriving nearby
Families and lovers and solitary walks
All communing together
In such a fun and zen way
Hour 7:Prompt 7 Season of the Pandemic
Season of the Pandemic
We wash our hands and alcohol up
Never leave our house without backup
We walk our dogs, masks on our face
Look suspiciously at the whole human race.
No more travel, we work from home
No longer are we allowed to roam.
A grocery store, up and down the aisles
Follow the arrows, if you don’t no one smiles.
Six feet apart or two metres, you choose.
There is very few freedoms left for us to lose.
Hold your chin up, let a big breath out
The season of the pandemic will make you shout!
Sugar coated
What on earth made him do it?
Fall for her… of all people.
All us women knew she dripped venom.
But she bewitched him something fierce I reckon.
He went after her likes bees swarming a honey tree
Mamaw said you can sugar coat a lot of things and make them presentable.
Well I guess that must be so, because what I see when I am looking,
He is not seeing.
He is seeing it sugar coated.
Season of Healing
I don’t believe in God
I believe in the Keeper of the Stars
The thought of the conception of the universe
Terrifies me
The unknown
We are constantly being tested
Have come close to failing
But what does that entail?
Doomed to repeat history
Not sure how to create our own
Every little thing makes someone angry
It is not them who I worry about
It’s Him
We were given one task
Survive together
His message warps throughout the years
Everything we do in one day
Will one day come back to us
Unseen consequences
A butterfly flaps its wings
And the world ends
An unbelievable burden to bear
Studying for a class with no test prep
Not even sure when the test will end
I used to believe in good people
But we’re all a villain in someone’s story
A hero in others
Egos too large to leave any room for empathy
The right thing is a blurry abstraction
I am afraid of the unknown
But know that one day the test will end
And we will begin, The Season of Healing