[Hour Eleven]Rise
Slowly rising, steaming coffee
wends into cool morning air,
sourdough toast crisping with
sweet mellow butter melting
cold feet on a warm floor, and
slow big band sways.
NIGHT WANDERING
With the cold wind that is felt and the dew of the petals shimmer
While the birds are in the mood I wander leisurely in the cold
The pavement-noise echoes the scented flowers scream
I wander alone leisurely as if in a dream
The drizzle so cold made the night even more beautiful
And poets dream poets write as they stare at the moon
Under the street light so bright I stood undecided
Whether to go left or right or straight ahead
And still savor the moment, a magnificent feeling
And enjoy the serenity in every step beaming
Night wandering is my favorite night wandering is sweet
A nightly routine I enjoy doing and something I won’t forget
A step to unknown beauty and inexplainable moment of bliss
A thing I will treasure and something I will not miss
Prompts Hour Twelve
Text Prompt
For this year’s first formal prompt the challenge is to write a nonet. This poetic form requires that you write a 9-line poem. In the first line there are 9 syllables, in the second 8 syllables and so on down to final one syllable (ninth) line. You can learn more and read an example here, but it’s origin is unknown.
If a nonet does not appeal to you, you can always write a Shakespearean sonnet or my favourite form of late a zuihitsu.
Image Prompt
41 Years Later
41 Years Later
How can it be that
our high school graduation
was 41 years ago?
492 calendar pages flipped
and slipped through our fingers,
slick with holidays and birthdays,
anniversaries, funerals, births.
So many changes in 14,965 days.
At times, it seems so long ago
and yet, some memories crackle
with a crispness, so clear it could
have happened yesterday.
Reunited, we revisit hallowed halls
that echo with steps racing the bell
to class, praying for the bell for recess,
lockers crammed with textbooks
when technology didn’t include
google, smartphones, and no hiding
grades when teachers email test scores
to parents.
Our younger selves played outside
until streetlights sizzled on, then
home for family dinner, homework,
maybe some tv before bed. We drank
from hose bibs, water bottles not
a necessity everywhere we went.
We rode bikes without helmets
or knee and elbow pads, we jumped
into dirty lakes, and made friends
with everyone.
We grew into after school jobs,
took road tests, some a few times;
we got junker cars, piled in on
Saturday night, cruised to nowhere
so long as we were home by 11.
We dated, got dumped, dated, went stag
to school dances, got dates for the prom,
and never envisioned we’d be together
again now.
So, 41 years later, some missing,
some gone too soon, here we are,
a reunion of kids in dress-up clothes,
pretending we’ll never grow up.
~ J R Turek
June 26, 2021 Hour 10
Prompts hour ten:write about a holiday in December/ January
Happy Xmas.
A day of love,
The day Jesus was born.
A favorite holiday.
In the month,
Of December.
To bring in.
Jingle bell,
And Holidays are here again.
Receiving, and giving.
Lovely presents,
To call on his name sakes.
Happy Christmas.
To.
All,
Of you.
Gulliver’s Table, Reimagined
Hour 3, Prompt 11, Year 2021
It’s a warm summer day in Lilliput
The perfect day to use yellows
Gulliver splashes some yellow on white
Picks up his straw and blows
Behold! A beautiful canvas
Just a shape of yellow
Simple, like the Lilliputians themselves
Right there lie his headphones and his magnifying glass
Never used since he washed ashore on this land
This land that is nowhere on the map of his world
Where the people themselves are as big as these gadgets
Gadgets of another place, another time
But behold! A bicycle out of nowhere
A laughing child tips over the bottle of green paint
One color becomes two – yellow and green
Not unlike the flowers on his desk
Flowers from the King himself
A coincidence? A charm? An anomaly?
Well at the very least, it isn’t a surprise
Just another oddity in the land of Lilliput
“Well, goodbye now!” the child says
He parks his bike and struts away
No hint of fear on his face
They’ve all grown used to him by now
Gulliver chuckles as the child walks on
What is a work table for him
Is a massive wooden path for the child
Despite their different sizes and stages
It is a canvas for both
A bright golden opportunity to explore the unknown
Periwinkle Forest Ranger
Periwinkle Forest Ranger
A periwinkle forest ranger winks
from up high and lets out a yell
as he jumps off the roof
of a cerulean skyscraper
with marshmallow windows.
His silky marmalade parachute
drifts through an indigo cloud,
just missing the snow covered
parchment Space Needle.
His mulberry gumboots crash
through a jet black window
and into an alabaster storefront,
squishing dozens of loafs
of sourdough bread.
Being beat from the jump
he spreads out his arms
(into the croissant section)
and falls fast asleep.
Ranger Walk
We gathered our backpack filled with
hand lenses, plant ID books, water and our favorite
sourdough, peanut butter, banana, and fruit spread sandwiches.
Changing into gumshoes for the expected wetlands trails
we meet at a storefront near the trailhead before leaving
together for this early morning forest ranger guided tour of the flora.
We encounter the common periwinkle, a lovely purplish ground cover flower,
considered an invasive, problematic species brought over from Europe during the 1700s.
White people who control the skyscrapers of power don’t write in bios
their role as an invasive species in this land.
7 pm – “Let Me Listen to My Block”
Summer days on the block
Are meant for
Sundresses,
Smart mouths,
Nutcrackers &
Smiles.
High noon heat
Has the music blasting Papi’s anthem
while playing dominos
sweating as much as my bottled drink
It is home.
Can you feel it?
Street veins burst with water
For the whole neighborhood to play in.
Me & my homegirls
Ready for trouble.
There’s nothing
our attitudes can’t handle.
“Don’t come for us, if we don’t send for you”
It is power.
Especially if you have the nerve
To step to us with two left feet
asking for a dance to Bachata.
Our stares will roast you
quicker than Island sun.
But the laughter & love in it
Works as revival.
This little block be church for us.
Sunday service.
Each day, el dia de Dios.
Es la Verdad.
Fatal–Hour 11
his uniform was the color of gumboots
as long as gumboots are green
this forest ranger was in a predicament
as the red spread redder and wider across his shirt
and his insides protruded like sourdough
the storefront of his glasses clouded over
he heard the bear scuff across the porch and away
Carl found the cradle of his elbow and rested
and dreamt of leftover rhubarb pie