24 Poems ~ 24 Hours
It seems I’ve fallen into
Someone else’s dream
Of nature’s glory
With blooming flora to cushion my steps
Where I can sleep
Under bright blue skies
and the shade of verdant palm trees
with a hint of sunshine peeking through
They’ve even dreamt soft clouds
Where I can pillow my weary body
And dream of peace
And serenity
But I want to embrace the storms of life
Endure the sharp stings of adversity
Survive intact while walking over the coals
Be strengthened by what I overcome
Battle of the Sexes
Next year,
we’re mostly gay.
Too dangerous to be straight female.
No choices.
Heterosexuality trends downward.
Safe sex is Lesbian sex.
More mass shootings
by frustrated men.
Fewer babies.
Population declines.
Human Earth Saved!
Thanks, Supreme Court.
My body has turned against me
even more than it has before
Now items from the humble wheat plant
are poison in my throat
I was told just to lay off
just a reduction will be fine
But subsequent experiences
have proven otherwise
It’s a good thing I took a picture
of my last gluten rich dinner
The Summer Book*
Stretched out on chaise lounge
Or bunkbed, beach towel, porch swing
You turn the pages.
Quickly at first
Delving in, devouring it
But then you notice
Oh, no!
There isn’t much of this wonderful story left!
How can you live outside of such a fascinating world?
So you try to read slower
Savoring the pages
Rereading the best lines
Over and over
But you can’t help it
The heroine is at peek crisis!
You need to know what happens!
Like you need water, air
And suddenly
There it is
Done
Now, whatever will you read for the rest of the summer?
*Yes, that is really the title. It is by Tove Jansson, and it is a lovely summer read!
The moonlight caresses the trees,
their tiny fruit becoming shiny.
Leaves are dancing and hopes are growing
when thinking about our first meeting!
Inkheart
Oh to speak with silver tongue
Reality into fiction
Fiction back to reality
The desire is there but magic…
Is sadly lacking here
And try as I might to coax it out
Reality is unchanged
No thieves or flame eaters walk about
No magical creatures
I cannot lift them from my books
Or put myself among them
Unless I create the works from scratch
But I’ve not truly won then.
I must satisfy escape
With new works and words upon the page
My ink-ed heart bleeds dismayed
By lack of magic displayed
Upon reading the written page.
Hour Twenty-three – Pick the title of a book that you love. That title is now the title of the poem. That poem can be about the book directly, or indirectly, or it can use the title as a jumping off point and be about something else entirely.
He was nothing like Ove, my dad.
He was never grumpy.
Handsome, uniformed, sometimes frumpy.
Ove would not get his Scotland and England mixed up.
Or prefer his tea in a handled, saucered cup.
Dad did. He often did.
His first visit here then.
Expecting men in white
at an oval green.
Heck, he expected to see the queen
stroll around with Bertie and Jeeves.
Instead, he marvelled at coos, gorse and fallen leaves.
He spoke to the local village shop lady
in his best fake Oxfordshire English.
He did the same when he went to get chips ‘n fish.
‘Dad, this is Glasgow, we don’t do posh here.’
(I almost said dinnae there,
you can’t live here and not speak some local).
Back in his own land, he introduced me as his
‘Daughter from England.’
Twinkling at my fury, he would
tease, with old familiar ease.
And make up a song about a posh Macintosh.
Ove would not do that. Oh gosh, no.
Ove had more gravitas.
But they twinkled the same.
These two darling men.
Cleansing
so high and mighty, four colossal chandeliers
unreachably distant, magnificent in their glory
each festooned with hundreds of tiny bulbs.
for the visitor, a majesty to behold
please consider, for the worker,
an interminable tedium to clean.
Sometimes a boy wants to flap his hands
Jump up and down
Chew
Alone.
There isn’t really alone in the city.
Autism attracts attention.
Differences do that.
Attention usually means stares
Sometimes glares
Scowls
The worst are comments.
1 in 100 comments will be confirmation.
Oh, I’m autistic too.
My sister is autistic.
I get it.
Most don’t get it.
You don’t necessarily need to.
It is great when folks understand
Have basic knowledge
But just allowing our existence
Without intervention
Ignoring what you don’t understand
Without comment.
That is a gift.
I can’t explain all day
Don’t want to
And you know,
The autism goes where we do.
No, oh in public now,
Autism powers deactivate!
Always being autistic can become always on display
Like the zoo animals
How exhausting.
Am I right?
“Lush and green,
Thriving with life,
The resilience of nature,
Fully shown,
In all its majesty,
But a single spark,
Of human greed,
Sets the once thriving forest ablaze.
The deer and tiger run together,
Fleeing this once placid land,
Of a balanced scale,
That was tipped by the extra ounce of human greed,
The forest now comes crashing to the ground,
The wildlife is butchered and so is the forest,
As the insatiable greed of the human grows,
And sick twisted laughter from the pleasure of profit,
Echo through the jungle.”