So Long… (12th Hour)

Your leave will only be for a year

But I feel like I should acknowledge you

It’s always fun when you come near

And an even greater pleasure when you’re through

I must admit, I will miss

Your hot kisses

Against my burning skin

If I’m to be honest then I must accept your internal glow makes me lose myself

And when you rain on me

Unexpectedly, without any warning

You leave me yearning

Soaring in the showers of your tenacious storming

I will never declare you as my favorite

But we had some good times that where savory

A few months of this seasonal love was more than enough for me

So like every year, take it with stride

Another will take your place to fulfill me with glee

You all have your special place

Slightly different glide but sort of the same

So…so long sunshine

So long sunny storms

So long Summer, we had a ball

But here comes crisp cool Fall

Hour 12 Wax On, Wax Off Government

12 2017 wax on wax off government
Wax On, Wax Off Government
by Paul Robert Sanford

I’m beginning to give up.
A third of a year of this nonsense in Washington DC
has me holding onto my balls for fear they’ll steal them.

This wax on wax off government in which one bunch of yahoos spends
all their time undoing what the previous bunch did
seems to me like a long road to nowhere.

Meanwhile, at just the wrong time,
vanishing species are protected less,
the waters are allowed to rise,
more citizens are denied the vote.

Immigrants are made unwelcome
on the assumption that people
who used to have good union jobs
will gladly go to work doing backbreaking labor
for a few dollars an hour.

111 words

Wax 2
to 4
a 3
the 4
are 4
on 2
(subtract 13)

FlapJack….

I’m the poetry man

well, I’ve never seen a U-Haul follow a hearse to a cemetery.

Judge,Lord Judge  take that

Flap Jack take that

Molva and Mohammed

You want my, well I betcha

Send me to the’lectric chair

Stay away from me I’m in my SIN you hear that laugh track

Flapjack laugh track pop that collar and holla

Judge the bootlegger with the pound of flesh

Judge Lord Judge

Take that puddin’ and fine fat brother

Send me to the ‘lecturing chair

For you will know my name is the ….

Stay away from Emc2

I’m in my sin laughtrack

Flapjacksprat, who lies to the BONE

Make it

sing

laugh

Track to outta my sight

Daddyya done broke out

Flap

Jack off on your wheels, fall up

I’m off, cockukacho

cuckukachoo

 

 

 

 

This Moment Now

In this moment

now

What is happening?

I am writing

I hear fireworks in the distance

not sure why (8/5/17)

I am thinking

about this wonderful experience

Thanks to Caitlyn and Jacob Jans

A random invitation

somewhere in the past

has given me

a new family

full of writiers

like minded individuals

Thanks.

Hour Twelve

What Dreams May Come

Lay me down by North Creek

where it moves stately as a wedding march

light as a jig.

 

Us, under the bridge, you said

“If we stay here any longer, I’m going to kiss you”

and I blushed and froze.

 

The tall grasses hide nutria (false beaver)

and real beaver too, and we got

such a laugh from that.

 

Under the bridge, you said you loved me

and were shocked I didn’t run

but said it back instead.

 

I lay in the dappling light, out of view

dream your arms around me

and sigh with the reeds and branches.

I haven’t seen him

Every time I wake up

I feel his breath around my neck

His fingers around my waist

His smile around my cheeks

Every time I dress up

I see him standing beside me

Beholding me like the very first time

Every time I cook for him

He stares at me like a little child

The way he looks at me

With those shiny eyes of his

Makes me fall in love with him all over again

The more I feel his hand on mine

The more I feel safer and secure

The more our glares meet

I feel he touches my soul much more deeper than before

Amazed by his surprise I often laugh

Making him fake angry

And then, suddenly, in just a kiss

My little angel is back to how he was

Yet…I haven’t seen him

Hour Eleven

I prepared for two whole days before this marathon. I reviewed my poetry already written, reviewed old prompts from past years and played with possibilities, wrote a couple poems for practice. I was totally on board and ready for today. Then I woke up with a very sore throat, ten minutes before the first one was due, and dragged myself to my computer. Despite everything, I could not stay awake and could not think poetic thoughts, could not feel any emotions aside from a desperate need to go back to bed. I stayed with it for three hours anyway. I am disappointed, deeply sad that this event that was so important to me could not go as planned.

After sleeping a few hours, I still don’t feel great, but at least I’m not falling asleep on my keyboard and waking up with seventeen rows of the letter N where a poem should be.

I have reviewed the prompts given, and the one that spoke to me the most so far was Hour Five, a childhood memory.

Redwood Cathedral

What do I remember most?

The smell of redwood dust

Every inch of ground was made of

Pulverized redwood from the centuries of rotting logs

It was a summer campground under tall, tall trees

Many numbered clearings formed the rented sites

Each with water, hookups, a ring of stones

Containing ash and charcoal

Daddy loved to build the fire

Mommy loved to cook over it

What is it about food cooked over fire

That tastes ten times better?

Every campsite backed up to wild redwood forest

Each with a character all its own

Each year, a different site we chose to occupy

Each year, new explorations to be made

The seeming-untouched wildness drew me

I a child of eight or nine or ten

Always in my thick soled flip-flops

Set off alone to see what I could see

Even as a little one I sensed, I loved

How spiritual it felt among the shrubs and ferns

So far below the roof of greenery, the redwood canopy

Perhaps the residue of happy times

Rituals of growth and gratitude and familial love

Practiced by the native peoples who once dwelled

Who worshipped everything they saw and felt

Emotions not unlike the way a child like me

Experienced the green

The sunwashed yellow green above

The dappled ground around me, undisturbed

By any human feet

Yet always full of motion, tiny changes

Full of unexpected wonders

A cathedral built of close set living redwood trees

Standing in a circle close together, so close they all were touching

The stump of long dead mother tree

Inside it, and one gap, one tree

That wasn’t there, as if,

As if to welcome a footed occupant

To come inside, stand against the mother tree

Look up and see

A redwood starburst shape

Converging on a pulsing, sunny center

Brilliant yellow green with beams

That shot down on my head and shoulders

Ever moving, ever changing, warm and sweet

Blessing me like God.

 

~~~~~~~~

Orangutans like tomato fries

the red red link
tomato sink
helping hand
orangutan

Row row rowing
down the sidewalk
of this neighborhood
entangling

Stranger strangers coming,
drumming, singing
running to Lincoln
Nebraska

Tornadoes have warnings
blaring and warning
turn away warning
Run to your basements warnings

Go strangle
a green triangle
poking up the way
away from the hay

where you could kick it
wick, feather
or air mat
slap

Slope up to the sky
with no alibi
today is not exciting
with the holes closed up

Wake up
three for two sicks one
mean doggie
combustible saliva spatter

Wipe your face
it coats the eyes
blink blink blink
cauterize

All it was
some vacation lies
silly tomato fries
big surprise.

Departing

In the darkness, I sank

it doesn’t make sense,

to lose one who cared

so sudden it’s cruel and unfair.

We didn’t say goodbye

no way to prepare,

On Sunday he passed

And Monday he wasn’t there.

In tears, I then grieved

for who’d understand?

the dark for he cared,

in darkness I’m cast

not sure where.

No one could say

no one could know,

one sure thing he’s not there.