Hour Nine – Home

Kool-aid jammers in the fridge
Leftover from a time when I was
Carefree and happy
When there was nothing bad in the world
You were a phone call away
And always encouraging me every step of the way
Now you’re six feet under the ground
And I have to figure out how to go on without you
It’s not fair
The world hasn’t felt right since you left
Nothing feels right anymore
Who do I call when I have a new writing idea
Who do I stay up until 2 AM with playing cards
Who do I call
How do I move on from this
How do I move on from you

Hour Ten: A Hungry Fox

Hour Ten: A Hungry Fox

Tonight I had to duck an empty tin can pitched at my head.
Can you imagine having someone throw things at you
while you tried to get some dinner?

I’m sure you’ve heard all names they call me:
tricky, sneaky, cunning …
“Sly like a fox.”

Well, sure, I’m sneaky.
Because I HAVE TO BE!
Would you announce yourself knowing a tin can will be thrown at you?

Look, I’m just hungry.
I prowl around your neighborhood
because it is surrounded by food!

Your trash cans abound with bits of meat,
uneaten fruit, leftover pie.
and there are veggies growing right next to your house!

Oh, and did you know because of all that grub
your place is surrounded at night
by plump little rodents and garden-nibbling rabbits?

So, honestly, I’m doing you a favor,
tidying up the place,
maintaining a balance.

And most of all,
trying to survive.

I’m not foxy. I’m hungry.

 

“Personify an animal. Switch its trait. Example: a disinterested lion, a polite gorilla, an aggressive giraffe…” – Contributed by John Dutton

Vivaah (Hour 10)

We’re surrounded by a blast of color and sound
A flurry of lehengas and sherwanis of every hue
The fast paced drum, drum, drum of the dhol
Perfect flower arrangements, our favorites, lilacs and roses
The clinking of wine glasses, the accompanying laughter
All our loved ones, and more, gathered in a single place

But my eyes are fixated on one, and only one person
The man in front of me
Who looks dapper in his tux, but is eternally handsome
Inside and out

I look at you, and I remember
The first dates in a Bay Area winter
The long walks in the San Francisco summer fog
The trips to Houston, and Carmel, and Vegas
Wine tasting in Paso, quarantining in Cupertino
And the lazy days, well most of all, the lazy days
When we would do nothing
Curl up on the couch, watch some casual YouTube
Just exist.

As we finish up the last of the wedding nuptials
I look back fondly on a weekend of fun
Today will be a lovely memory
But it’s what comes tomorrow on that excites me the most

Text Prompt- Poem 10 Our Dog Bingo

A Strange Zoo

On the thirty-second day of January

I visited the strange new zoo

so I could say, “I’ve been there, too!”

 

The monkeys were lazy and sleeping a lot,

The elephants were trying to hide

and as I walked by, the hyenas just cried.

 

The eagle was such a bore, because he would not soar,

The polar bear wandered into the tropic zone

while the whale and the penguin fought over my ice cream cone..

 

What a strange zoo, indeed!

 

By Nancy Ann Smith,  Poetry Marthon Prompt #10,  June 25, 2022

Nobody’s land

Nobody’s land

Nothing works here
There are constant excuses for the never ending power outtages
From one breakdown or collapse or the other
The future of the youths are traded on the altar of foreign loans
Debt servicing now the vogue
Adept at scratching the surface of the problem, never actually solving the problem
University education stymied…with students bemoaning their fate
Local currency almost useless, daily being devalued
Inflation at its zenith, for we cannot give what we do not have
Food production is threatened as farmers are either being kidnapped, killed or threatened
Peace is anathema here
Lawlessness, social vices apparently given free rein
Women are made husbandless
Husbands rendered wifeless
Children made orphans with gunshots
Worship centres are filled, with people daily crying to their gods
Youths…graduates roam the streets in their thousands in search of none existent jobs
The civil service is filled…to overflowing with the people who have ‘connect’
Quota system is slowly killing the morale of the populace as many feel very marginalised
Anyhowness describes this clime
Political prostitution now the order of the day
Desperate people…desperately and avariciously and sometimes murderously clinging to the reins of power
Almost as if it’s their identity…they cannot exist otherwise
Road travel now a death wish as it is now an easy trap for kidnappers
This marriage of convenience shakes…as calamities accompany it
Whither Nobody’s land?

Love Language-A Hakui

Love language brings hope
Love sees intimate details
Kindness will prevail

Hour 10 – Summer Camp

sticky
plastic mattress cover
crinkles with every breath
beneath the thick polyester
sleeping bag, unused
afraid to move
and wake the campers
the top bunk is hotter
even with the ceiling fan
that squeaks and wobbles
like its going to fall
a lost lightning bug flashes
crickets sing outside
someone keeps coughing
exhaustion exacerbates irritation
the humid air clings
sweat on every inch of skin
soaking pajamas and sheets
great
now the bathroom calls
and it’s a slow, careful sneak
from bunk to ladder to door
into the buggy outdoors
to reach the outhouses
a hurried walk
on slippy, mossy paths
and the same returning
to that gross damp
in hopes of finding
sleep

Perspective Shift

content warning: descriptive metaphors using mild gore and body horror

i bite my tongue.
copper-red and bitter acid
i make sure to swallow,
hold back.
my own toxicity, reconsumed,
jittering.

i have spent so many years
carving at my flesh.
i look into the mirror,
and do not recognize myself.

it is slow. and painful.
i speak, now.
the tongue that was there still remembers
and i taste the same
copper-red and bitter acid,
blood and bile and adrenaline.

i am gluing myself back together
piece by piece by piece
and when i open my eyes
i think i finally see me.

Hour 7: A Sparrow in Central Park

A sparrow drinks from the pooling water in a brass water fountain. Fallen parts of trees and flowers partially cover the drain as the water slowly recedes. He drinks in quick quivering gulps. Shaking his head, and droplets from his tiny beak. Someone walking by gets too close, their shadow passes over the fountain. With a ratcheting of brown wings, he retreats to the trees, vanishing in the engulfing green, then returns in half a second, to trot along the rim of the bowl and drink.