The Poetry Marathon

My brain Prompt 3

Cloudy with a chance of brain fog.

The CT confirmed my head is not normal;
I mean, like duh. People tried to prepare me for the Washington rain, instead my head has created its own storm.
Sleepless nights, brain zaps, data errors, forgetfulness, head pressure, seeing static when I close my eyes.
The electricity is off I said, it has always been but now I’m being told others can see it on pictures.
Strangers, Doctors, Onlookers will possibly see signs of pages torn out.

Cloudy with a chance of brain fog

I know it is, the static.
It trickles up my body and I shake uncontrollably.
It’s not ugly, I imagine it’s a painting I never gave myself permission to create.
I imagine the acidity of life is decaying my brain.
The trauma my brain wants me to forget, but I’m afraid of forgetting everything.
It trickles from my feet up instead of just staying in my head.

Cloudy with a chance of brain fog

I decided to build a playhouse.
Depending on what the doctors say, I may or may not be okay.
I’m not wasting a day without loving my kids even if I fail in moments.
When I am gone, if I ever leave while my body is still here I want them to remember the person I was and the love that I gave.
I am still here, we are all still here for now.

Poem #3: Honoring Maya Angelou: Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud

Focus on negativity
News overflowing with fear-mongering
Pandemic and still more pandemic
Scared to death and fear of each other and fear of going outside
Masks and violence and protests and unrest and brutality
Is there nothing good in the world?
Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.

Log on and you’ll see the worst aspects of human behavior
Listen to young people and they’ll share their heightened anxiety
So fear grows and grows. Is it overtaking the globe?
Trapped inside, mental health issues and violence expands.
We witness the worst parts of human nature. Over and over.
Will there be a second wave? Facing our own mortality.
Is this the end of the world? What is normal?
Judging others’ choices. When will there be a vaccine?
Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.

Shut off the news.
Spread kindness ~ to loved ones and strangers.
Exercise. Your mind as well as your physical being.
Listen. Focus on the good. What you focus on increases.
Experience gratitude. Know that we will get through this.
Optimism is the best cure. Hope transforms poverty. We’ve got this.
Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.

Waterloo

People said I was getting old

They said I had started developing wrinkles on my face

They even said my hair had started greying

That I was approaching menopause

That, I had to get married

I was reluctant too

Because I was getting set in my ways

I wasn’t about to be told what to do

How to do what to do

Reluctantly I conceded

And regretted it, almost immediately

For starters, my husband snores

He eats much too loudly

And belches even louder

The foregoing irritates me

Sets my teeth on edge

I wish I had’nt listened

To what the people said

The funny reasons

I wish I had dared them

Called their bluff

Then I wouldn’t be, in this waterloo

Goddess from Heaven

iii. Rainbows In the Sweat Sprouts

Sun wasn’t harsh, for the sake of the Girl

Wind blew slight chill, for the sake of the Girl.

Sweat sprout in her forehead,

Glittered in the sun and rainbow could be seen.

Oh my pal, who is that angel,

Not belonging here,

One among the young man wondered .

Plight of the Homeless in my Home

the town-crier said they said they will give the homeless shelter

they said the homeless should come around and register

they said each homeless will need a number

they said to get the number a homeless must bring his mother

they said whoever does not have a mother should provide his finger

they said otherwise the shelter will go to another

 

they warned that the shelter is for a limited number

hmm, the homeless scamper to get the number.

the town-crier said they said the machine reader

will not return from the manufacturer

so the homeless wait in their hopelessness

a potbelly prince promises to ease their homelessness

“give me your votes. I will build you a shelter. i will fulfill my pledges unlike the other”.

the next time the prince amble to the constituency in a black armour car

 

his private window prevents the homeless from seeing through the car

he drives off without a care for the score of homeless

now in the throes of waiting, they are still homeless

the homeless heaves a sigh and welcome another representative, a thief

the homeless allow him into their hearts, handing him the key to the treasury

he gives the homeless loans with usury

yet, he refuses to provide shelter. “I will look into the shelter matter”.

he tells the homeless as he drives away

 

another bighead comes and he removes the shantytown

in exchange, luxury nests wait for the mighty when they come to town

 

the hopeless homeless in my home are still waiting for their own

 

 

 

Doing the COVID-19 Bop—Making this Menace Stop

 

Listen to the swarm as we explore solutions to the world-wide plague,

That dastardly virus COVID-19, for which solutions are admittedly vague.

Centers for Disease Control and the World Health Organization do lag

on presenting-fixes to the pandemic’s problems while the economy drags–

no masks, then you must wear masks, the so-called authorities do proclaim.

Meanwhile, many disregard this sage advice—sans masks—with distain.

 

Oh, the COVID-plague makes the disaffected P. C. populace very restless,

And spiraling into a Deep Depression, it certainly makes the economy lag.

 

First, they said let us flatten the curve in a space of a few locked-down weeks.

Then, any uptick in the number of cases meant an extension of this deadline

else an upsurge of deaths rivaling the Bubonic Plague then perilously sweeps.

Moreover, the only sure-fire resolution that would make everything all so fine

was to distance safely those venturing out a mandatory six-feet-apart in line.

Of course, we were to wash our hands in running water, vigorously scrubbing

while belting out “Happy Birthday to You” else the apocalypse was coming.

So what could be the answer to this menace the wise now passionately seek?

 

Oh, the COVID-plague makes the disaffected P.C. populace very restless,

And spiraling into a Deep Depression it certainly makes the economy lag.

 

Follow the lead of public health medics those who fought the 1918 Spanish Flu:

Quarantine those most likely to die from the virus is what everyone should do—

The elderly, the morbidly obese, those with hyper-tension, and Diabetes Two.

In the meantime, improve everyone’s odds of making COVID-19 less severe—

Getting lots of Vitamin D, so they catch a less severe case within this year.

That is a common-sense solution of what every one of us should now do.

 

Oh, the COVID-plague makes the disaffected P C. populace very restless,

And spiraling into a Deep Depression, it certainly makes the economy lag.

 

 

2020 Hour 3: On walks during the pandemic

#3:  On walks during the pandemic

 

There is a cemetery across the street

And when this started, I’d walk there for exercise

Before the dead consumed us, these dead stood guard

Perhaps they knew what was coming but couldn’t warn us.

It was wonderful, wandering the steep paths among the quiet

Getting lost in the carefully arranged geometry of the departed,

With only the occasional interruption of reality

When the person coming toward you drifted to the opposite side

Out of fear.

I’d stop at the random grave, preferring the older headstones

Wondering who had died at nineteen in 1943

Or who had been lost at six months in 1890.

Was it just time and circumstance?

Sacrificed to a war, consequences of medical inequalities,

Perhaps victims of a crime?

Tombstones are elusive storytellers

That give us only the ending

So our imaginations run wild.

So what do these residents say to those who come to join them?

The cemetery was quickly closed

And we can’t see the surge happening behind the gates

We are no different than them

Our lives, once ended, as mysterious as when we began.

Breaking

Being a big boy from the start, my younger brother became the hero

to watch out for the frailer brother with the taunting bravado

gaining a reputation for fixing — liking that reputation a lot.

Built up his savings, to ensure helping his kids when he was gone

but Wall Street came to a precipice; so too his effort to be a full time Grandpa.

his back damaged by years of over-time fixing; his hero image dimmed.

Broken mirrors distort the view

Bro’s Grandsons were rowdy by nature; schools closed; daughter was overwhelmed;

Bro invited the boys to stay for the Summer, parks and back yard projects made it great

for a while.

The stock market is unstable, his investments are tenuous, steep losses are ugly.

How to fix it?

Temporary fixes in vape pens and such

Voices sound like Mom sometimes

driving him to hold on, but . . .

Broken Mirrors Distort

Sells off investments;  and  Grand-kids go back to their Mom and Dad

Spends the money the way Mom would have, if she had ever had a nest-egg.

Revived his yard; new fence for him, another for the struggling neighbor

Backaches prohibit mowing his own; hires neighborhood guys who need the work

Cut my yard, and cut that neighbor’s, and those neighbors too.

But his efforts somehow don’t measure up — hasn’t fixed the world, yet.

Needing a better mirror!

 

by Nancy Ann Smith,  Amherst, Ohio

June 27, 2020   Poetry Marathon

 

 

 

Grow Out

My last color was March 3, 2020–

seventeen weeks ago stylist Lisa

mixed and slathered white roots,

shined and glossed ends, washed

and blew dry ’till smooth, a swinging

golden mane, a date with my husband.

 

Salons are closed due to COVID-19

 

I could color it myself, or I could let

my hair go al naturel. My friend says

“You are going to be so beautiful.” I think,

Aren’t I already? But won’t it make me look

old? I shop for color online…the right shade,

is sold out. I order Apricot Jam. It sits in the

sink cabinet unused. On the path, I check

other women’s grow out. Their’s the same.

 

Salons are open 50%…no blow outs.

 

My stylist will not be back until July,

and even then, they aren’t certain she will.

Two inches of snow on the mountain; a skiff.

Dark baby hair, the little hairs at the temple,

my true color. I decide to take my chances

and schedule with a new stylist–Lauren.

 

Salons are open 50%…masks required.

 

 

Hour 3, Prompt 3 Evil Queen

This body, this ego, this soul –
I’m not sure which, but something is rotten.
Only the Evil Queen knows, but
she’s not making the same mistake twice.
She won’t send the woodsman with his pants around his ankles this time.
I wish she’d just come with her knife,

or maybe a sliver of mirror.

At almost 200 pounds, surrounded by ripe apples and quiet men,
I finally left their table.
Only the Evil Queen knows, but
she’s not sharing her apple cider vinegar spells anymore.
She’s taken every scale, tape measure, and mirror.
She won’t tell us who the fairest is.
We become ever-shrinking violets, our dresses hang.
As scarecrow shaped sirens, we call out for validation –

or maybe a sliver of mirror.

When I peer into my father’s wishing well,
I see now at 30 what I did at 20.
My self-induced lycanthropy, covered in polar bear’s fat and woman’s fear,
has shed. Only the soft white pelt remains.
I am afraid now, and only the Evil Queen knows –
what it’s like to be made of fur and fight, filled with pills, and carved

with a sliver of mirror.