#Prompt 5 – 2023
Turn the Key
Whoever said that when one door shuts
Another opens
Were wrong …
They can be reopened
But beware what you might discover
Some are closed for good reasons
So best turn the key
And throw it away
Vibrant Eyes hour 4
Vibrant Eyes
I ordered it online,
a roll-on eye shadow
goes on smooth
creaseless, flawless
innovative, so pretty —
sparkly amethyst powder
in a small glass bottle,
orchid metallic band,
faceted, jewlesque resting
below the slender black cap.
I look for the color –
it must be something elegant
yet bold, wild yet refined,
as captivating and unique
as the packaging.
I turn it, twist it, flip it
upside down and there
on the bottom a label
emblazoned with
80.
80. That’s it.
No exotic color name
just 80.
Not as in the year
I graduated high school,
the year Rubik’s Cube
came out and the year
I earned a new nickname…
Jack-n-coke-Pac-Mac girl,
the same year John Lennon
was shot and killed.
80, as in the year
of my first newish car,
as in the age my mother
looked forward to but
didn’t make by 60 days,
not my percent of correct
jeopardy questions,
not when I worked two jobs
to pay for my newish car.
80…
so I decide to give it
a suitable name, something
ethereal and mystical, brazen
but authentic, colorific, radiant,
irresistible. Think, ruminate,
contemplate, cogitate, muse,
meditate, ponder, deliberate,
cerebrate, consider, stew
yeah/nah, hmmm,
finally decide
80
is perfect.
~ J R Turek Hour 4
Hour #5: Take Warning
O moon, streaming moody,
I peer up at your blank face
lit by the reflecting sun,
showing off craters and dust
but no water, nor the color red—
no shouting red-headed, red faced
red eyes, red nightshade berries,
nor red skies at night.
Hour 5 – A Chilled Mystery
A movement in the corner of the eye,
Noise in the dark
A lost glove
A cold wind blew and the door closed
Today footprints in the snow
Curtains flutter in the empty house,
A small stain on the carpet,
Ice cream melted on the kitchen floor.
A melody indistinguishable from the howling wind,
A whisper in the walls
A garden walk
Soft on frozen snow.
Sweating even though it’s cold
A faint star in the night sky
Distant voices in the dark
A shadow of a man wandering on an empty street
Rose petals on the doormat
Dust in the air
A flickering candle
Just a ghost lurking in the house
Just a lonely soul that can’t let go
Until it is forgotten
Like all the lost gloves
And footprints
And stars
Like all the characters in the misty winter night.
Hour 5 – A Found Poem about a Crime
The Crime
Accused persons
Concerned
Commission of a
Crime together
in Fulton County,
Georgia.
Conspired and
Endeavored to
Conduct racketeering
in violation of
O.C.G.A. § 16-14-4(b)
Contrary to the laws–
The good order
Peace
And
Dignity
Source: The Georgia Indictment
Hour 5 text prompt – Whodunnit
They say the small town life is the quiet life
And word travels fast when something happens out here
But now that someone’s missing, someone’s murdered, and something’s been stolen
Everyone is claiming an alibi or to be in the clear
Now mister Buffet, eager to get to work
Has been brought in by the county clerk.
He says he knows what happened
But I know a snake if a snake there’s ever been
And Buffet… Buffet knows what hit him.
Death ain’t a piece of cake
Especially if it shows up in the bakery.
We barely narrowed the suspects down
Perp’ll be caught tomorrow.
Baited with something… Someone… Couldn’t resist
And maybe that’s all to this case
Or maybe there’s more than a fly in this small town sky
I don’t know, I’m just your average gruff private eye
Poem 4# Marriage: |Relic of Culture
Once I asked my celibate neighbour
“Why ain’t you married.”
Like a tidal boomerang he had thrown back the questions, “why are you married?.”
But while my response were building up like the whirlwind in prep stage,
He added, “begin with a definition of marriage.”
Memory lost won’t take as souvenir the Rememberance I had of how detailed I was answering him.
Had he not listened like a mountain to a flaming bushfire or an Iroko tree nodding only its heads of branches to stormy dam pour?.
Have you a knowledge of the effect of a meeting live wire? the sparks in his eyes at my summarised closure of marriage as ‘social contract’ goes miles beyond that effect.
He said so much, my prejudiced stinginess won’t allowed me to share with you all but, hear this, “contracts, that both contractors had no saying it its foundational pros and cons as marriage is but a Relic of culture!.”.
Hour 5
I watch the sun’s slant in the gloaming hours
energy soaks the wood planks on the floor
long after the last box has been loaded
but before the first memories folded
us out the door
Hour 5 – sonnet on shelter
I want to thank each person who saved me
from a tornado in my head. Those who
refused to entertain my resigning.
Those who offered me shelter, something new.
For every coping lesson, most just by
example. How do you build a tool kit?
I have learned bubbles are compulsory,
but so are tears, at least a little bit.
I didn’t know you could laugh through sirens,
making thunder a joyful song so long
as the sense of safety isn’t broken,
so long as you feel that you do belong.
Thank you for not letting me be the storm,
for holding me despite my savage form.
Hour 5 – The House
It is time to go.
The past lay hidden in the walls.
All other memories have been removed.
I can hear the echoes of our history,
They speak to me and beg me to stay.
But I must move on.
These walls sheltered me and kept me safe.
They hold my secrets and whispered fears.
But they won’t tell.
My life began within these walls,
And it was here that others’ lives ended.
But still, they remain.
I’ve grown and these walls began to press in on me.
Secrets from others threaten to overwhelm me.
But they will not defeat me.
It is time to go.
My future waits in a new place,
A place where fresh memories will be stored.
– Diana Kristine