Telling Stories-Wordle 299

"Wordle 299"

There's one tassel left
and one line formed on the right.

The speakers do love
their honor and pay
room and board according to
the ubiquitous
sign above the drum.

You gave a bouquet to praise
my work despite all
I did to stop you.
Orange poppies interpret
my current palsy.

I wish I knew more
about telling good stories
to the local crew -

but I really don't.

May 15, 2017 6:10 PM

On The Last Day - The Sunday Whirl

Wordle 195 offered by Brenda for The Sunday Whirl

On The Last Day

One single list will
render my inky ass down
to the right channel
despite the bad smell
of the boys we all condemn.

Generate a sense
of the end.

I will
capitulate or you will be
smashed and smeared before
you reach the mid point.
That won't help my swollen heart,
my throbbing ennui.

‎January ‎11, ‎2015 3:06 PM

Hmmm.... Can ennui throb? My heart says yes but my head says my categories are crossed. I suppose this is not the first time for that.

Old Hippies Never Die

In The Nursing Home
(or Old Hippies Never Die)

You said, "it's my turn"
and then you dedicated
all your sweet resolve
to shine like some new
reason to shelter my soul
and review my nooks
and crooks by design.

Once there was revolution
brewing and I'd sing
about that, hoping
we would win the streets this time,
a fallow belief.

Now I'm hung to dry
like a pair of worn levis
on green vinyl line.

‎January ‎4, ‎2015 4:13 PM

Backyard photo posted as a writing prompt by Tess for Magpie Tales
Wordle by Brenda Warren as a writing challenge on her Sunday Whirl

The Pink Shop

Image supplied by Tess for this week's Mag 251 If you click on this link you will arrive at the post which includes the Pink Shop photo and a list of links of the contributors.

The Pink Shop

I turned the corner,
(sigh)
a stray arrival alone.
I found the Pink Shop
with the silent chime.

If you pale or I, stumbling,
do -
on sale for high bids
but not with you, dear -
nor their fat laughing God spots -
those plain old holy
jokes.

This scar will remain
though I ingest words, your words
and all their grand words
too.

‎December ‎28, ‎2014 12:36 PM

The poem includes all twelve words in Brenda's Sunday Whirl, Wordle 193 If you click on this link you will arrive at the post which includes the Wordle and a link in Mr. Linky green to the list of links of the contributors.

Stage Fright - Sunday Whirl Wordle 192

Stevie Nicks early in 2014, I think.

Stage Fright

Stevie Nicks and me
backstage - your eyes snag the burn
in my panic sweat -
oh, I am so high,
I cannot perfom tonight -
five thousand stars shine
in ten thousand eyes.
Always my gal, my good heart,
my sweet talk and choice.
I cannot go on,
not before this crowd who loves
you, does not know me,
even with the help
you spill onto my dry face.
Ms. Nicks, be my lace.

‎December ‎21, ‎2014 11:55 AM

Had one of Stevie's albums playing. She is one of the best ones.
This poem utilizes all twelve words in Brenda's Wordle 192.
Click on the green link to go to the contributor page.
There, click on any link you like.

Space Opera 191 - Sunday Whirl

Wordle 191 offered by Brenda for this weeks Sunday Whirl. Go to the green Mr. Linky at the bottom to click through to the contributor list.

Space Opera 191

Your spacecraft killed all
thirteen angels God assigned
to hold the Moon's track.
That's why we renamed
it the Spinning Lunatic.
It was a tangle
at first, a loser
named the Flaming Endeavor
like it would dive down
past the photosphere
and there say a kind of Grace
which would spread the word
forever on ice
and all the rock beneath it,
stony cold planets.
Of course we all know
now that will never hold tread,
nor work no matter
what. That Moon's gonna
hit the Earth in three more days.
Kiss your ass goodbye!

‎December ‎14, ‎2014 10:59 AM

Opus 190

Image provided by Tess for her Magpie Tales creative writing site, The Mag. There you will see the list of this week's contributors.

Wordle 190 from the Sunday Whirl, Brenda Warren's creative writing site. Click on the green "You're Next" to access the list of contributors.

Protogeneia (literally, Firstborn) was married to Locrus but Zeus kidnapped her and took her off to Arcadia, to Mount Maenalus where he got her with three or four children, one of whom was Opus.

Opus = Work as in "A Work of music or poetry." Opus, a male, is related etymologically to the feminine words opera and operate. Remarkably, then, a medical operation is related etymologically to a musical opus, an opera or a poem so named.

These days, as Wiki says: "In musical composition, the Opus number is the "work number" that is assigned to a composition, or to a set of compositions, to indicate the chronological order of the composer's production. Historically, although composers have inconsistently applied the opus number to their works, besides numeric cataloging, opus numbers are used to distinguish among compositions with similar titles."

Opus 190
(in which Zeus complains to Protogeneia)

Fried filet of trust
spread a green heat to degrease
your cast iron pan
on my deranged stove.
It left an ash crust I must
scrape.

It will enflame
the rest of my days
like a red lined cape that's draped
on blood washed chains hung
from nails in my back.

Shall I exchange your dark browed
severity for
my own cleverness?

Or must I feign a journey
as I traipse along
the west boundary
of our soot streaked cave front home?

A haze lifts lazy
off the tonal strain
of this last composition
as I press sustain
with my cramped right foot,
crash the ebony clad keys
with both my bruised hands.

‎December 7, ‎2014 6:28 AM

The Story Of The Coming Rain

Bond of Union by M. C. Escher, 1956

Chosen by Tess Kincaid for this week's Magpie Tales

Thanks, Tess

The Story Of The Coming Rain

A true bent harvest,
the dry skin of the rattle,
a secular breeze
in the time of need -
splendor scattered good seed
on the plain faced hope
of mean times.

Gaze on
this: we are peeled in the breeze
the depth of canvas,
gathering all spheres
we are able on these days
that tell the story
of the coming rain
and the going of the dust
that was inside us.

I feel like that guy
in some print by Escher, some
parenthetical
paring of true love
or other symbol strung out
like far too much dope.

‎November ‎30, ‎2014 9:36 AM

This poem was also written incorporating all twelve words in Brenda Warren's The Sunday Whirl, Wordle 189

Thanks, Brenda

At The Mag click on any name to proceed to the creative writing.
At The Sunday Whirl you have to click on the green to proceed to the list page. Then you click on any name to proceed to the creative writing.

Searching For The Twins

Snowstorm by Maurice de Vlaminck

One of the principle painters in the Fauvist movement, de Vlaminck disliked Picasso for the way Cubism supplanted Fauvism. This painting is hard to date but appears to be most similar to work de Vlaminck produced around 1920.

I did a little internet research to write this as I have not heard of this Flemish painter (though he painted mostly along the Seine south of Paris) before today. He wrote fiction, some of it when a young man "mildly pornographic", was a violinist and teacher of music, and later wrote poetry as well.

Chosen by Tess as a writing prompt for Mag 247

Searching For The Twins

There are moments on
this road like pirouettes in
some neglected field
where resolute stoats
(forgotten in this toothed time
of children not found)
do scream of cloudy
spills of white. The wind flutter
of my decision,
black storm upon storm
this miserable, stains me
with sap from dread bark.

‎November ‎23, ‎2014 9:07 AM

This poem was fashioned to include all twelve of the words offered in Brenda Warren's Sunday Whirl, Wordle 188

To Right All Wrongs

Image chosen by Tess Kincaid for a writing prompt on this Sunday's Mag 245

I Wanted To Right All Wrongs

The crowd I ran with
would wrap themselves in the flag
and light it on fire, fervor of the dope,
the night - then would suicide
perhaps at crossroads and barriers set
by shine shirted officers
of the mud splashed law.

That crocus had thorns.

They plucked the long stemmed
rose to goad the flight of migratory
birds who flew from disrespect,
calling, calling out
surely chased by her,
by the owl who suddenly
dove below the tree
line to thread the scene
with serious concern for
all those dead and gone -

and me, I still grieve.

‎November 9, ‎2014 4:29 PM

To be fair - I insist that these amusements are usually fictions. I have in this one framed and draped my memory of times that have passed. Those days are a very long way from my concerns of today. I was definitely there. I am definitely now here. Yes. I do still grieve. It's complicated.




The poem was fashioned to include all twelve words found in Brenda Warren's Sunday Whirl Wordle 186.

Breaking Free - Wordle 183

Wordle 183 by Brenda Warren for this week's Sunday Whirl Click on the link, and then click on Mr. Lincky to find the others.

Breaking Free

The witchdoctor said
I'm crazy, not a martyr.
She called my soul out,
saying it should shine
bright white with stranger laughter
making your steel crack,
your childhood shake all
apart - its shadow turn gray -
your diamond dim
and change to drab sand.
I'm not shackled, prisoner
to your freaky whim
any longer, sport.
Just toddle off. Find your seer.
Tell him your secret.

‎October ‎19, ‎2014 1:02 PM

Don't Ask Me - A Sunday Whirl Wordle

Written utilizing all fourteen words in Brenda's Wordle 182, this week's Sunday Whirl. When you get there, tap the Mr. Linky connecting link to find the list of this week's contributors.

Don't Ask Me 
What This Means

Don't tease the chickens.
I mean come back to the trains
but find some other
rube for your gimmick.
Girl, if you must use torture
at least add lotion
and for sure liquor.

You were in some uniform,
flesh colored, gritty
and smelling of brains
fried in oil, can you believe.
You said lust drives us
all. I guess that's right.

(Hey! How do I know what brains
fried in oil smells like?)

Girl, ride your machine.
I'll sure hear it when you come.
It's hypnotizing
rumble puts the starch
in my battle happy flag.
It must be true love.

‎October ‎12, ‎2014 12:33 PM

Wordle 182

It's A Long Walk

Photo by Tom Chambers, provided as a writing prompt by Tess for Magpie Tales: Mag 240

It's A Long Walk
Back To The House

Broken poem, no
sense to the signs or the fence,
the rusted barb wire
strips still connected
to the posts -

and far away
you've hung your last name
and all those pewter
goblets.

I'm to think vital
thoughts and make a speech
in two days while you
hang yourself, hooked up
like sheets in the prairie wind
and fading, warble.

‎October ‎5, ‎2014 1:15 PM

I utilized all twelve words provided in Wordle 181 in Brenda Warren's Sunday Whirl

It's A New Day - Magpie Tales - Sunday Whirl

Jacek Yerka calls this one Autumn In Madeira,

Chosen by Tess for today's Magpie Tale

I am calling this one Sanctuary

Also, in response to Brenda Warren's Wordle 180 - The Sunday Whirl

It's A New Day

I sticks tight nearby
my new found identity
while you polarize
the ashes fear make
and pour them on the bare lot
next door.

Discernment
is required, selfless
love too.

You are no posey
day tripper looking
for joy in the flames.

At least we escaped the dread,
the dun rabbit run
and all the craters
the bombs left behind telling
us to dive, dive, dive.

‎September ‎28, ‎2014 12:50 PM

The Old Neighborhood

Getting High - The Sunday Whirl

In Newport, Oregon, 1976, preparing.

Getting High

Smoking an Old Gold
as is my habit, I give
you another joint
all the time seaching
for my damn shoes. It does seem
I've lost many items
to the crossed ocean
in the draped and dark front room
where we live and keep
high these days. Could be
I'm a wannabe miner
of your mind and heart.
Your expression just kills me
when your eyes go daft.

‎September ‎21, ‎2014 12:24 PM

A bit anachronistic perhaps. I had in mind while writing the living room of my ground floor apartment on South 8th Street in the San Jose State student quarter in 1966. By 1976 I rarely smoked dope, having already become a serious drunk. I was interested on this evening in prooving that I could still roll a great joint even after five years away from the dope.

Written for Brenda Warren's Sunday Whirl, Wordle 179. Use these words:

Surveillance

Tape recorder by TEAC offered by Tess Kincaid, a writing prompt for Magpie Tales

Wordle 164 from Brenda Warren's Sunday Whirl

As ever click on Mr. Linky stuff to get to the list of contributors.

Surveillance

Stomping on my existence,
no plain language here,
muffled by background -
my mind's not right, will sizzle
with paranoia.
Read the damn numbers
and get the times straight, between
seven and ten o'clock.
Right there, on that mark,
that's the place it starts, with one
big fat clear hello
from you, the single
sound, so much vocal power,
the rest no matter
how often I go
back over this antique tape
I can't get things clear,
I guess not ever.

‎June 8, ‎2014 1:36 PM