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anniversaries

(Click through to get to larger and uncropped images, as always.)

Sandy River Delta (aka 1000 Acres) was gorgeous Friday. Warm weather and blue skies started the walk — and the temperature would beat the average by 14 points. it was warm enough to set the frogs anthem, and to call in a heron to stalk them.

(It’s inspired some thinking about frog poetry, which I have been thinking about without something settling in my brain. Sometimes I have to free write. Sometimes I have to let things stew, internally, for productive writing to take hold. I have not been able to figure out why or when those work best. It’s hit or miss with my fingers, my mind.)

Sport’s birthday was Friday. He’s a dog, although I can still call him a young dog.

Today is an anniversary, of sorts. I was laid off a year ago and continue to be “underemployed.” It’s a bit dismal of an employment outlook, at least in my current field, and I’m feeling very middle-aged and fuzzy-brained about what I ought to do.

But when I take a walk with my dog, feel an early spring, or at least a break in the winter — so different from what others experience — I feel fortunate. I just wish that feeling lasted longer than a sun break.

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the wallpaper project

Paper-thin Walls

I’ve never lived
with wallpaper
but I know paneling

thin veneer laid
over pressboard
formaldehyde and glue

medium fake oak re-
varnished every year
tacky tar washed

away and doors
slammed one room
over. Voices, hushed.

* * *
For a Read Write Poem prompt, which was terrific. I need a little more time with it, but it’s all I got for now. Thanks, Dave.

Find other ideas, here.

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wordless Wednesday* (*false advertising for there are notes)

Sometimes all you see is the light.

I am a fan of shadows. And reflected light. And shadows that should be lit for they are candles with unused wicks.

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January: Poetry x 12 (the year I was born)

January’s Poetry x 12 challenge was to pick a book published the year you were born and read it.

I wanted to find a woman poet and had some good ideas, but every book I found was published the year before my birth. So I went with Ogden Nash and You Can’t Get There from Here, illustrated by Maurice Sendack.

I was excited about the idea of the book, the illustrations – excited by digging into something new.

I haven’t been able to finish it.

It’s silly stuff.

I like silly, playful. Light verse means what it says. It’s frothy, airy, fluffy, puffy. But it is too much to read all at once. At first I thought, maybe I am simply trying to eat too many sweets at one sitting. Perhaps these are after dinner mints, or truffles. And perhaps, if they were written today, they would be. But these are petit fours, marzipan. They just don’t match me, or what I think is the taste of my time. They are grandmother’s stale candies sitting in a cut crystal dish.

The poems in this collection were previously published in magazines such as Good Housekeeping, Harper’s (Bazaar and Magazine), Look, McCall’s, The New Yorker, Saturday Evening Post, True and the Man’s Magazine. One Etsy reseller describes a vintage copy of Man’s Magazine as “This thing is loaded with good old boy testosterone, whiskey, car ads and Christmas gift-giving, man-style!”

The Nash poems are also loaded with man-style, even if sometimes self-depreciating. And they can be racist, referencing the Chinese by using coolie hats as euphemism.

I tried to write a response poem. Something in rhyming verse that would tickle me. But I couldn’t.

I’m sure I am missing the mastery of Ogden Nash. But if so, I need a teacher to help me. I don’t get it on my own.

That said, I am glad I tried. And I am looking forward to February, which is “Read a poetry collection recommended on a blog.” I think I will read A Walk Through Memory Palace by Pamela Johnson Parker. It’s this month’s Virtual Book Club Tour at Read Write Poem. And I have the book and haven’t read all the way through, yet.

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raising the dead

So we can start the game.

shuffle back everyday use, no want of a museum, theater trading in impulses

if you were a lines to mark a working family’s losses. high, no rococo ornamentation, a fad beacon where would you sit? in the crack like a dam, keyed into a take away supper to whisper what you need. all signs should of a boulder, the arc of a shoulder? it’s be sited on hilly terrain.

hoisted not like a window display.

retail’s complete with packaged spices.

tiny shimmering a wickedly sharp plan hatched a sphere and ink can be.

stopped up disguised as must. it’s only recess, play large panes, merchandise set aside from curtains that gape.

décollage the states and nations as if the world is tears, serrated then sutured, are trend to stained desks, learn to spell all of

This is what came out of The Lazarus Corporation when I stuck in one of my recent poems, and asked it to use the “cut up desk” function (with seven words).

Fun stuff. I’m going to play some more. Next I’ll try four words.

Spices.

tiny tears, stained desks, learn to game.

shuffle back to whisper what you need. a window museum, theater curtains use, no want of a only recess, play so we shoulder? it’s not like large panes, merchandise a working family’s shimmering a wickedly terrain.

hoisted all signs should be serrated then sutured, trading in sharp plan hatched to boulder, the arc of a sited on hilly are trend lines to mark display.

retail’s sit? in the crack of a and nations as if the ink can be.

stopped set aside from everyday ornamentation, a fad impulses

if you were can start the a beacon where would you up like a dam, keyed losses. into a take away supper high, no rococo disguised as must. it’s complete with packaged world is a sphere and spell all of the states that gape.

décollage

Fun! And there must be more to be had.

Here’s the original (which I have other renovation plans for):

Trading in Impulses

If you were a beacon where would you sit? In the crack of a boulder, the arc of a shoulder? It’s not like a window display.

Retail’s large panes, merchandise set aside from everyday use, no want of a museum, theater curtains that gape.

Décollage shimmering a wickedly sharp plan hatched to whisper what you need. All signs should be sited on hilly terrain.

Hoisted high, no rococo ornamentation, a fad disguised as must. It’s only recess, play so we can start the game.

Shuffle back to stained desks, learn to spell all of the states and nations as if the world is a sphere and ink can be.

Stopped up like a dam, keyed into a take away supper complete with packaged spices.

Tiny tears, serrated then sutured, are trend lines to mark a working family’s losses.

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Praying to Broken Gods

On Explore! December 21, 2007 #25 by Sepulture {mood disorder}

Praying to Broken Gods

Wander in the desert enough
you’ll find the land fill

An arroyo (as our own dispersed
might say, but you can call it a wash)

Ephemeral thirst quencher, it carries
or ferries a casual heap, rags rolled
in bones the color of washed denim

Predatory remnants, bleached
spines and bones form an Early
American relic — take care to kneel

Do not sit or rest, you may not
recline nor pause
………     …………..Balance isn’t

No rib, no leg, only the lightly bruised sky

A memory of bridges
the Zayandeh River
oasis no more.

* * *

Ah, process. A prompt from Nathan for Read Write Poem. But deeper than the beautiful image is (for me) the personal.

The landscape looks like Arizona, similar to places I was raised. But the photographer is from Iraq, so the imposition of Early American furniture (a style I am too familiar with — I roomed with it as a child) amid arid rivers run dry (the Zayandeh River, or Zayandé-Rud has been empty for a few years, and a notable bridge reflects empty) is too ripe to ignore. Add all manner of misunderstanding (not to mention Imperialism) and it’s all a muddle.

I am sure I don’t do these ideas justice. But thank you for reading, for Milad Gheisari’s evocative photograph. And for Nathan for bringing the image to mind.

Other responses can be found at Read Write Poem.

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tussled January days

(Click through a couple of times, to get close & personal.)

A few hours in the garden, yesterday, dirt under my fingernails, pruning the hydrangeas with their budding leaves. Always a hurt to cut new growth, but if I don’t now, the blossoms will bow even lower come August, on too long & spindly legs.

Poetry has been slow to show, the last week or so. Haven’t been working on new, have been revising a bit, organizing. Thinking about future projects, pondering. Always a bit of procrastination, too. But I trust growth will spurt again.

I have to trust process. Tiny crocus find their sun.

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muddy Oregon days

Having an young active dog, one whose breed has installed a drive to go and do, means I get out even if the weather suggests hot tea and a laptop or book.

Yesterday was a theme day at Momentile: “reflections.” But try as I could, I saw little image reflected in the muddy paths, puddles, brown streams. I did hear frogs in the 50 degree weather, and hints of buds to comes, swollen tips red and green. And reflected that I love my dog, Oregon, licorice ferns and walking in the woods.

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Sometimes I Miss the Old Jealous Goddesses

Sometimes I Miss the Old Jealous Goddesses

Your cold force
whistles…….through frothy
cracks and if I had one
…….one of those infrared-reading
gadgets…….all the seams
would glow
hot

like an enthusiast…….such as
Hercules…….hiding his children
from fertile madness

Questions of fidelity
render fat
from stones…….raised

in a complicated family
no simple begats from began

blunt those…….elites
who wonder is it nurture
or nature…….shouldered…….between
strong thighs the size of earnest
temple columns…….and frozen deities

Take the brunt of heredity…….please
smudge.the edges…….of this still life

a caesura reveals more about how
relationships cast shadows
than progeny set…….in sundered limbs

* * *
A Read Write Wordle prompted this poem, using the words:
brunt, drawing, elite, fertile, froth, enthusiast, Hercules, question, shoulder, simple, stones, sundered, and thigh. I do believe I used them all, glutton I am.

Want to see how many poems can be created from one or thirteen of these words? (You’ll be amazed.) Go here.

* * *
If you haven’t already, please consider donating to Yele Haiti.

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Behind 3 doors

Hi everyone, long time no talk to! (It’s me, Whirling Dervish again). I was in the hospital for a protracted period in November, and was heavily drugged. While I was there, I wrote several poems. They are all surreal and convoluted, and frankly awful. I’m not sure that I could ever be a writer who writes *well* under conditions of altered consciousness. But in any case, I have rescued a few of those poems and am trying to turn them into something worth reading. The version below is *not* that version, but it is a work in progress.

In Pursuit of the Door that Swings Both Ways
(or, for the love of dead springs)

Behind Door Number One stood a short Oaxacan man:
like Speedy Gonzalez he wore a sombrero
but he ate a lemon marscapone flauta
and seemed a bit fat for a hat dance,
Mexican or otherwise.
Andale’ Andale’ Andale’ he shouts
let’s get this show on the road, you and I
I’m rippin’ and ragin’ and rarin’ to go.

His accent: barely detectable in the cloud of
fried sweet cheese in his mouth.

He grins.

Behind Door Number Two lie mountains of pills.
The Rexall man stands atop a case marked “Thorazine” and
he hawks his wares.
Come and gitit! Major tranquilizers, anti-psychotics,
anti-depressants, anti-aging, anti-anxiety, anti-smoking,
anti-drugging, we’ve got it all folks! If you are an anti- type
of guy, I’ve got an anti-type of pill for you.
White circles, blue triangles, yellow squares,
white diamonds, grey rectangles, pink capsules

He’s wearing a red and white pin striped apron.
Like the Good & Plenty Man. But with class 3 narcotics.

Behind Door Number Three
sits a jellyfish. a monkey. and a daydream believer.
now skirt:
bypass the jellyfish or you will get stung
dart past the monkey or he’ll pants you. Or give you a noogie.
And the daytime believers?
Don’t ever listen.

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