24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
it’s the best one in town.
you’ll get soaked in all of it: the rivers and roads
the friendly townsfolk waving on the bridge as you pass by it
the backstreets that built this nation into what it is today.
it’s a great big world out there and you can see it all from the comfort
of your own seat.
the only downside is when it ends
but then again every ending is just another beginning
The corners of my mouth
lift slightly, long before
my eyes sense
the dance of daybreak.
Sweet voices
on my windowsill.
Younger ones
reply, eagerly awaiting
something squirmy
Ground beans releasing
their nutty aroma
Hiss and gurgle
into the pot beneath
Bacon spitting at
potatoes crisping
in a neighboring pan
Long, peaceful stretches,
no angry muscles
Puppy-love licks as
my feet hit the floor
Sweet embrace as I meet
my love at the
boudoir door.
Overnight hunger
banished, we clink
hot creamy mugs
Toasting a day
of celebrating
His eyes
wordlessly, not silently,
tell me he’d do it again,
remembers every detail
Quick, pack the basket
with warm, fudgy brownies,
Colby cubes, grapes, and
strawberries in cream
Water or wine,
whichever you please
– just hurry
We can’t waste
moments like these
A blanket beneath
watching ships on the sea
Sun fading in crimson
over the bay
Snuggling close
ends a perfect day.
seasons come and go
giving color, taste, and love
let’s enjoy them all.
@Mejia – Hour Seven
24 poems, “The Dinner Party”
Dinner Day: Prelude to the Guests
Gladly, the pie has set
and the soups are sleeping
and the exotic spices
are temporarily sleeping
first the canapes
in their moody forethought
Then the tagine
a wonderful display, I thought
sizzling crackling
and red-hot cast iron pans
a nose-happy bouquet
the odour, the room it pans
The goulash slowly simmers
and so too does my excite
all these delicacies in a row
giggling in their anticipation to excite
the salads are the final
for the essentially of freshness
textures of sponge and crunch
As I prepare for my own garlicky freshness
DeaBeePea 6-27-20
Amicable Aliens landed and were disgusted by what they saw.
Violence.
Cruelty.
Pollution.
And decided to take charge. Immediately.
Zap!
Anyone committing a violent act had to learn 100 happy words and use them repeatedly. If they couldn’t do that they were sent to Rancor of Russia. And never heard from again. If they were already in the Rancor of Russia, rumor has it they went missing.
Zip!
The cruelest acts were often unintended reiterations of past bad behavior. Hypnotherapy was used to free people from the clutches.
Zpp!
Anyone who swore had to do volunteer work such as picking up trash to help make the environment cleaner.
The streets of Manhattan had never been so clean. In Hollywood, you could eat off the freeways. Noise pollution helped fuel all kinds of other pollution and the world got cleaner.
The world still wasn’t perfectly kind, but this was a good start.
The old gals speak of three years
I see them in the cemetery planting geraniums
I need to water mine
This in-between happens to those left behind
Change of life that begins when a life ends
There are no hormones at play
That first year was boundless
No days of the week or hours of the day
Only the daily reminder that he’s gone
Friends asking how you are not waiting to hear
Protecting them you lie and say you’re getting on
Only those who know don’t ask
A second year offers routine
Cleaning out, giving away, changing numbers
The business that death offers
Now one year to go before another change
The old gals don’t tell what to expect
Trusting them you settle in
A new hairdo and maybe remove the ring
Not looking for a replacement
But getting ready to let go again
Inevitable (Brandy Goodman Poem #7)
Some people wail and cry
Others scream and shout
But a writer writes
To get it all out.
But what do you do
When you set pen to page
And every possible emotion
Fights for center stage.
All these warring emotions
Confuse more than the brain
If the muse is all muddled,
Attempts to write are in vain.
So what do you do
To sort through it all
Because holding it in
Will cause and inevitable fall.
How do you push past
The pain and the fear
What are the steps
To get your path clear.
Can you force it out
Without losing control
Or do you let it boil over
Then try to become whole.
Feeling so much at once
Makes you not want to feel at all
But if you go numb
You are bound to fall.
writing days
robins’ trilling calls me into consciousness,
singing faint, slotted light –
pale infusion behind the dark.
warmth against my skin on sturdy sheets
protect me from
cold ridges of hardwood
waiting for my warm, soft feet
on the way to colder, harder floors.
finding comfort in the fibres of slippers warmed by the heating duct.
water streams gurgling down water pipe throats
splashes cold droplets across the top of my hand to lake water memories
smelling of warm algae-coloured water in
summer bathing suits trapping the fragrance of freedom in fibres of synthetic –
synthesis of then and now in a sound, breath, and memory.
freshly ground coffee beans smells like addiction feels
so that on days when I fill the coffee bean canister,
I shove my nose in the foil bag,
huffing coffee oil air like a dying fish gulping for hope,
remembering how it’s possible to love a fragrance almost more than a child
sometimes.
those early, alley-lit, winter mornings or
whispering dawn summer ones,
I curse the humming, gritty drone of the coffee grinder –
today, though, the whispering light prays louder than the grinding,
creating solace in silence once more.
winter morning candles leak light into darkness;
in summer, they trade heat with early sun-reaching pink fingers into pale blue sheets of paper skies –
scrawling onto pages,
like me,
in this soft light,
forgiving to my blue bic ink
on the smoothness of paper strong enough to hold my heavy words
some days.
on school days,
beginning with robin or chickadee trilling prayers to start the day,
I cradle my abalone shell –
all at once smooth and noduled like an old tree’s hands –
filled with white sage, tobacco, and sweet grass
healing me with pungent-sweet smoke,
after surrendering to flame’s helping heat,
hovering smoke around me to put me right for the day.
on my best day, though,
the smoke hangs on me,
on my paper,
until hunger pangs lift me from my hard, wooden chair.
cramps in hands and legs are worth it
to spend hours
smelling south breezes through bright windows
next to my white, coffee stained writing table.
© r. l. elke
I put two more fat balls in the feeder, he says.
Did I say you could? I laugh.
Nope, he says, but I did anyway.
Now we both laugh.
Inspector Jacques Clouseau
here in my writing room had already sussed it out.
Chaffinches were on sentry duty
atop the bird feeder.
Calling their dinner bell.
Sparrows, coat tits, great tits, yellow blurs
in the roses bushes
while the seeds dropped slowly.
On our patio errant seeds
grow unruly Covid locks. Faded,
dried out, clumps wasting away.
Miniature carrots have been known to raise a
root or two.
But to watch chaffinch, tit and sparrow mingle
at the feeder is plenty entertainment.
Sparrows feeding sparrows,
three to four at the feeder.
Upside down clings and perches,
side ways,
tops, bottoms,
talons wrapped, touching full circle
while they peck and balance
wings fluttering ninety to the dozen
faster than hummingbirds,
It’s then I miss those feeders and the call, chirp, hum,
sucking the sugar water dry.
I love to chat at our feeder.
Before the dogs came,
neighbours adding dogs to the family circle,
morning calls would be a tap on
our bedroom window
Or a survey of one window over another
The one that would ensure full feeding ahead.
Peanuts, wild birdseed.
Sometimes it’s 4:10am. and the gentle song
intensifies,
multiplies, in frequency and decible.
In these parts alarms are useless,
far better to heed nature’s call.