For this week, write a measured poem. I’ll let y’all decide what that means. Possibly the poem takes physical measurements or measures one person vs. another. Perhaps it is measured in syllables or stanzas.
Here’s my attempt at a measured poem:
“Tercets, Tercets, Tercets”
Three lines is plenty
if you know where you’re going
but maybe not that good
if you’re lost. I’m usually lost
or trying to be. I wander
down roads I’ve never traveled,
looking for nothing
in particular. A rusted metal sign
and a message from God
outside a church is all I need
to pull over and see
where I’ve lost myself this time.
*****
Follow me on Twitter @robertleebrewer
*****
Meet Writer’s Digest in April!
Attend the Writer’s Digest Conference in New York City April 5-7 at the Sheraton Hotel. Pitch agents face-to-face, take break out sessions on how to get published and write better, and meet members of the Writer’s Digest staff.
Finding Peace in Trust (Fibonacci)
One
Word
One step
Small movements
Forward must be kept
To bring the truce that words have slain
Broken and bloody, the words trampled beneath our feet
Can there ever be peace again?
Trust – to be rebuilt
Small movements
One step
One
word
I want
to run
away
and hide
so deep
within
my own
being,
to be
that me
I want
to be
without
another
seeing.
Here’s one I’m submitting at the request of one of my students.
HANGINGS
Tree
spell,
human
memory:
codes past intention.
Dead season for dark-skin sunset.
By Jo Lombard
Vivid images! The last line is a knockout and just keeps echoing. “Dead season for dark-skin sunset”. There may not be many comments here because there was a problem posting last week. This poem jumped out at me – hopefully this post a week later will post! Keep writing
Jo wrote her poem in response to hearing Glenis Redmond read her powerful essay in Orion magazine centered around the old tree in South Carolina that kept reminding her of the lynchings executed from its branches. http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/mag/issue/7144/
TWO FIBONACCI POEMS
KIM STAFFORD”S COUNSEL
Kim
says,
Let’s start.
As you write,
you remember more.
Empty memory starts to fill.
THE MEASURE OF TIME
Time
flows
slowly:
nights waking,
days of vertigo.
Writing again, words start to fly.
Pages written, sudden midnight.
So much time gone by!
Ask Einstein
how speed
bends
time.
Rosemary Douglas Lombard
Measured
I’m more of a whim kind of woman.
Nothing measured, researched, fretted over.
I decide, talk it over, look to friends
who’ve been there before, then
go full steam ahead. I find
unmeasured decisions bring good results
as often as the situations I agonize over.
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love.
But the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13:13)
Measure
By David De Jong
We measure all and all hope to measure up
Simple things we measure by spoon or cup
Each to their own scale seem to fit the bill
Others compared to ours we find lacking still
Our riches we count but never meet the goal
We’ll sacrifice our friends, family and soul
We measure our accomplishments at end of day
But ignore its true cost, working our life away
We measure our time in minutes, when we must wait
But have no time for others or we’ll be late
We measure our value in dollars, never enough
But always have plenty to buy ourselves more stuff
We measure our possessions by size of our spread
But their number is meaningless when we are dead
We measure our happiness with laughter and a smile
But we hide our empty brokenness just for a while
We measure our toil with bruises, sweat and stain
But our work falters, compared to fresh summer rain
But if we measure what we do with love
We accomplished our purpose from above
Love to our family, provides joys till we’re old
Love to the lonely, worth more than rubies or gold
Love to the broken, raises their fortune of soul
Love to the forgotten, carries hearts to the goal
What we accomplish with love will far out weigh
Any task completed for mere earthly pay
beautiful
Thank you
Elemental Starbuck’s
Crumbling is not an instant’s Act…
–E Dickinson (997)
Nor is drinking lattes…
–B Peters
You mourn when it’s all gone, the whole
steamed milk, espresso brown
event you savor in the tall
or grande size, pure swoon.
Then left without. Finito. Done.
A cup, a top, a slit
the plastic straw is wriggled in—
your morning sippy kit
kaput. There’s one thing you can do:
alarm is set, rise up—
the shop’s just miles away—then coo
and relish each hot gulp.
Time of Death
There now I see a water clock in the woods,
to a discolored water wheel a widow,
amid wild life confined to its fated lair
and an astray locomotive, scorched, stripped bare.
I feel my way, tender, now into the cab,
stench of grease…can’t be this…a fractured femur!
(Here’s nothing but silent dream of the dead sound.)
Here’s no one, but identity, lost and found.
Forms in my throat a lump, yet no night stars stare,
Bursts something! A distended cable maybe.
A cesious fire glints at once, crickets plead.
Primum non nocere. In maker’s name, read!
Yet the greedy death regurgitates, slowly,
memories, on my operating table,
with no witness to record a life, each breath,
and no doctor to read out the time of death.
Measuring Minds
As she lay awake
measuring his face inside
the tunnels of her mind
his deep breaths
lay down paths of wonder
for her mind to ponder
Breathing in and out
his silence meant something more
than the words that came the hours
they had shared before
Emotions of new
filled her up inside
her fantasies
ran away within her
flowing mind
As he turned away from her
she smiled so gently
knowing he was dreaming
of her and all he knew
She has skipped so many hearts
threw arrows in empty directions before
but now love had truly come
knocking on her door
Leaving her flushed
light headed and freely bare
her mind was a wondering dream
he was always there
As she measured all who had come before
who had stayed and went
he was her statue of concrete
no one else would compare
the time in which they spent
Size isn’t Always a Number
Wow, an A!
she yelled as she held
her test paper high
and waved in around.
Only an A,
she complained as she tugged
at the strap of her bra,
wearing a teenager frown.
Oops. Title was supposed to be Measurement isn’t Always a Number.
*waved it (not waved in)
Long, Short And In-Between
The long and short
of dogs is loyalty,
trust, and friendship,
no matter size or breed.
When Weighed and Measured
In all things,
show your true worth. For
when it’s time
to be weighed
and measured, it’s never good
to be found wanting.
WHAT SHOULD A POEM WEIGH?
Can a poem be too fat? Is it even likely that: if you put one on a diet
(just, perhaps, I ought to try it), it might whine – or better yet…
maybe snipe – like an ex smoker who craves a cigarette?
Can a poem
be too thin –
with its cheeks
all sunken in?
What might help it
fatten up?
(Adding adverbs
to its cup?
Heaping adjectives
on its plate?)
Maybe give its verbs
more weight?
(Don’t say “sad”
but: “melancholy”) –
or is THAT just silly folly?
Now, you understand my plight
(seems my fancy’s taken flight,
and I just can’t help but mull
if perchance it’s possi-bul:-)
…if someday Goldilocks might
write a poem (or some night),
would it, maybe, weigh “just right”?
Awesome!!! My kind of poem. I definitely wish I would’ve written this!!! ^^
Me, too. This poem rocks!
Shards and Shekels
Let’s measure time
in smiles,
not dimes. Let’s
make more love than
money, and consider
ourselves rich when
we color outside the lines.
Let’s look deep into each
other’s eyes, instead of
staring at screens. Let’s
remember that today means
being present, each
word a gift. Let’s lift
our eyes
our hearts
our hands
to help and hold
and heal. Let’s deal
more in dreams,
weigh only whim
and wind
and wishes,
sing our own scales
and walk on,
soft into a limitless dawn.
.
Tick Tock
(minute poem)
1 cup of rice, ½ cup of beans.
My skinny jeans:
That is the goal.
That crescent roll
adds to my own. The bleeding stops.
No more pork chops.
Good bye, French fries.
Must exercise
at least an hour every day.
Yes. Come what may,
I”ll lose this weight…
…‘fore it’s too late.
WordPerfect
Careening, crashing, tumbling, falling
Over you and me and all
Opinions, stories, brags and glories,
Dramatic, sublime or tall.
Always first or fast or last or perfect or totally the best!
Always leaving everyone, the pitiful, the poor, the rest
With none, not one, no single shred, of any chance to be.
We the bludgeoned listeners ask,
O Pompous Ones, we pray,
Stop. Wait. Ponder your words.
Let others have their say.
Hi. this is not a new poem. It is from my doctoral dissertation, but it was the most interesting experience I’ve ever had with measuring!
Stones
In Monasterevin
for the Gerard Manley Hopkins
conference, during a break
I walked into the laitres
and found the usual
commodes and sinks.
After washing my hands
and combing my hair,
I turned to leave.
But there
tucked into a corner
by the door
I saw the scale.
Shoes removed, set
side by side, stuffed
pocketbook, canvas
sack full of notes
and other books
left on the floor –
in my stockinged feet
I stepped on the scale.
The surface
depressed
beneath my weight.
The rubber mat
impressed my soles,
creased my flesh
like corduroy.
My eyes
locked on the needle
spinning inside the dial
like fortune’s wheel
snagging on numbers,
finally catching one.
Impossible! I thought.
Does it use metric measure?
Bending closer to decipher:
I read
Stones –
as imprecise as feet were
when the British still used
the literal length
of each new King’s tracks
as the rule, causing
a “foot’s” measurement to grow
or shrink
from one reign to the next.
After the break I sat,
my ears filling with words
spilled from the mouths
of Hopkins scholars.
My thoughts wandered
to my feet, now shod,
no longer feeling.
I’m not sure of the meter here, but at least I’ve got something that might work for the prompt.
Dusting 1-2-3
I will not do this thing I see,
A chore for me
With no reprieve.
I know! A sleeve!
But others would know if I left
Tracks oddly deft
In wordy dust clumps
And tell–the chumps.
When I see finger trails, I know
My inside snow
Must disappear,
Reveal veneer.
At My Father-in-Law’s House Two Days Before the Closing*
I’m sitting in an empty room
but there’s no gloom,
just echoes of
the past. I love
the stillness of this old abode
where time has slowed.
Some ghosts drift by.
I can guess why.
In just a few more days this will
be gone. Until
that happens, I
won’t say goodbye.
###
Yesterday, I went up to the old house to wait on a couple of service people to do some final, necessary things.
Tomorrow is the closing on my father-in-law’s house. It’s the house that Rich grew up in. It’s the house where we had my bridal shower. Over 40 some years, there were the obvious ups and downs – and if the walls could talk…well, you know. But how do you measure time? A laugh? A hug? A family dinner? My father-in-law has come to terms with it all (I think) and so has Rich. But that may be just brave words. I guess time will tell.
The Measure of God’s Love
(I pray you will) grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ. Ephesians 3:18
God’s love is wider than the Sahara
His compassion is longer than the Nile
His grace is higher than Mount Everest
And deeper than the ocean by a mile
“How much do you love us, God?” humans cried.
Jesus said, “This much,” stretched out His arms and died.
Lovely. So true.
A Folding Mirror poem, measured in two identical halves of words divided by a folding middle line:
ATM in the AM: Atacama Thought Mission in the Morning
high in the Andes
on an early morning sojourn
passing lakes of clear cerulean
nestled amongst snow capped zeniths
our bus plummets
through the moon valley plateau
into fertile Camanchaca
hydrated by marine fog agua
vizcachas bask in golden sun
follow the rays for fun
low on the Pacific
BRAINTEASER
Poetic riddle here for you.
Clues below, in lines of two.
I’m a red hot mama here,
And I braved a new frontier.
I was born in New Orleans,
But I can’t eat red rice and beans.
When I used to croon my tune,
Cops might show up in platoon.
Though those cops might collar you,
They could not arrest me, too.
Red hot mama? Yes, indeed.
But the “mama” might mislead.
Some who knew me in the day?
Two kings: Bolden and Bachet.
Is your party not a hit?
I could jazz things up a bit.
Music in a Dixie cup?
Stir me in – I’ll heat things up!
Tenses messing with your head?
Am I living? I’m not dead.
Living being, I am not.
Give inanimate a shot.
Have I managed to confuse?
Tune your brain; re-read the clues.
Can you guess the answer to this “What am I” riddle?
(This is an older one I wrote, for a game some of us used to play with our friend Darryl Hardt.)
P.S. Darryl used to require our guesses to also be posed in rhyming couplets. Feel free.
Marie, I think each couplet has
a pithy clue – I think it’s “jazz”.
SOOO close, but I’m looking for something a bit more specific. Turn up the heat, and you’ll have it, Bruce. Or look at the thread on my Facebook page. It took the better part of an evening and lots of rhyming couplet guesses, but Daniel Paicopulos guessed it.
For all the beats, for every band,
We raise our cheers for Dixieland!
Though I like your Dixie guess,
heat it up to get a “yes!”
Tortoogal, you are sooooooo close!
In case anyone scoots on back here to check, the answer is HOT JAZZ. Google it.
LOST LOVE
Against ther clock I raced
Facing the wild wind,
Catching rays of sunshine
Looking up, as if in a dream.
No longer would I have to prove
My long-lasting love that
I’ve held precious to my soul
Shaping the terms, setting the goal
Of an honest attempt of this emotion
From the beginning such serious devotion
Every day in every way
I knew I would have to pay
High cost, everlasting, measured by time
Never will it decline
But last forever in my heart
Created from a concrete start
Though no one knew except me
How solid could this love be?
One-sided but still tender and real
In this dream oly I would feel
LOST LOVE.
CALCULATING THOUGHTS
(a shadorma)
How does one
measure the value
of a kiss,
the weight of
a stolen glance from across
the room? They’re priceless.
Still Coming Up Short
Intellectually, I know you breathe no more
So why do I wake, trembling in the dark
Worried that I still don’t come up to some
Standard you’ve set, some unrealistic mark
Pencilled on a pad of paper only you can see
Wow. This captures exactly what my first husband was like (he’s now on wife four which probably says something). Impressive piece of work; like the image.
thanks Ina … it’s a weird thing, looking for approval where you know none exists
with you on that one!!
Lately, I more about not measuring up, or having excuses for why I haven’t met someone else’s expectations.
Fewer curtains, fewer secrets, fewer worries… I’m happier here.
throwing rocks at these glass walls
celebrating the shattering confetti
fresh air rushes in without excuse
life is so much sweeter when
you have nothing to hide
http://laughinghereonearth.blogspot.com/
An Hour Allowed for Dinner
My grandmother once said,
“Chew slowly,”
but I don’t,
because she’s not here.
I count out three dollars
to play three songs,
and I start counting the time
until my dinner arrives.
It will be six dollars,
and with a tip,
it will be eight.
There are two girls
sitting together
at a table,
and The Bulls
are ahead by ten.
I shovel down my food
to make it home soon
while I count the number of songs played.
My grandmother once said,
“Chew each bite one-hundred times,”
but I don’t have the time.
It takes five minutes
after I request the check
for the waitress to get it to me,
and I give her a ten dollar bill
and ask for change.
She spends two minutes
talking with an older patron
before getting the change back to me.
I thank her for rushing the order,
but sit and wait.
My three songs have not played yet.
An Hour Allowed for Dinner
My grandmother once said,
“Chew slowly,”
but I don’t,
because she’s not here.
I count out three dollars
to play three songs,
and I start counting the time
until my dinner arrives.
It will be six dollars,
and with a tip,
it will be eight.
There are two girls
sitting together
at a table,
and The Bulls
are ahead by ten.
I shovel down my food
to make it home soon
while I start counting
the number of songs played before mine.
My grandmother once said,
“Chew each bite one-hundred times,”
but I don’t have the time.
It takes five minutes
after I request the check
for the waitress to get it to me,
and I give her a ten dollar bill
and ask for change.
She spends two minutes
talking with an older patron
before getting the change back to me.
I thank her for rushing the order,
but sit and wait.
My two songs have not played yet.
Mike, This is tantalizing! Love the rush, and the wait.
I measured a glass of whisky
With my eyes
An indistinguishable dose
To cure my interminable ailments
And just enough extra
An additional oiling
To lubricate that door
Blocking my pen
Smiles! Thank you for the prompt!
http://wordrustling.wordpress.com/2013/01/16/measurement-poem-a-haiku/
Nicely played, good haiku!
the measure of love
by juanita lewison-snyder
the day i confided
that i loved you,
you asked that i
quantify
measure
weigh
break down
the price per pound
in order to gauge
the amount of tread
yet left
on this old goodyear
still beating within.
© 2013 by Juanita Lewison-Snyder
Awesome, Juanita!
Muchas gracias!
ouch … that might hurt – good to see your work tho’
EXCELLENT.
Small Increments
Inching, he thrusts himself
face-first along a line of leaf,
dragging his lagging past
into his present, launching
again, progressing negligibly,
past and future conversant
along his middle, accordion
self, measuring where he
walks by what he is, where
he’s headed by where he’s
been. I watch him move
for long minutes, admiring
his resilience in the presence
of birds, then resume my
estimation of myself,
of love divided by time.
This is really beautiful, great use of language. Kudos.
Love these words!
“dragging his lagging past
into his present,”
Spoke loud and clear to me!
This is phenomenal Jane
Thanks so much, Juanita, PQ, and Ina.
BE FREE
From dirty slippery puddles
And ignorant looks in the crowd
That make me so cold I’m Free.
I’ve learnt how to speak out loud
And not just to look at the things- but to see!
To see what really does matter
And what as noise considered should be,
To see when one can be little
And other only belittled to be.
I’m going far to the South,
Where I will be loved – You better don’t look for me.
From overwhelming wrong judgement
That comes from the top of your voice I now will be Free!
I’m Free, because I want to be!
Cinderella’s Step-Sister Complex
Truvy: In a good shoe, I wear a size six, but a seven feels so good, I buy a size eight.
–Steel Magnolias
The numbers make no sense beyond small, medium, and large,
and even that is suspect these days. I could bath a baby
in the small Coke cup at the movie theatre concession stand—
if, that is, I’m willing to cough up five bucks. And how can tall
be the smallest coffee size, the next sizes, grande, venti,
sounding more like a Texas ranch or a compact Chevy?
Why don’t shoe sizes match sock sizes, forcing me to read
the chart printed on the thin plastic bag in inscrutable type?
MIghtI escape to some other culture with standards
reversed: big feet—good; stability, balance. Big bra size—
bad; back pain, stretched sweater sets? No glass slippers
for me. Barefoot suits me fine. In some tropical paradise,
I might wear one-size-fits-all for pleasure;
then I might be fitted for joy beyond measure.
LOVE this! Bravo!
yes – wonderful and all of them things that have occurred to me but never as poetically, beautifully penned as always Nancy
My favorite of the prompt so far. Wow.
… and I LOVE Steel Magnolias.
Nice work. And, yes…why don’t shoe sizes match sock sizes? Seems like the logical way to go, doesn’t it?l
Yardstick
Always felt like she never
quite measured up.
Started walking late – and
talking late, too
(but she fixed that one by
never shutting up).
Always had this deep fear
that everybody else
would finally figure out that
she was a fraud, a wannabe,
just laying down the big con—a
poseur, bogus, counterfeit.
Had that knack of talking
herself up way too high,
(there’s that talking thing,)
up where she had no place
being. Just a big balloon full
of hot attitude altitude.
Then, feeling failure perched on
her shoulder, would hang on
with all her might to the knot
in the rope, and ride the
thrill to the next stratosphere—
never seeing bottom
in the blur on the way by.
Always loved the feeling
of the wind in her hair, blowing
past her ears, the voice of her
scream lost in the slipstream.
Always loved that last-minute
rescue from the fall, before the climb.
But what happens when your
talk gets tired, your tongue
tangles like a broken slinky—your fingers numb,
your arms succumb to weakness,
you turn your head and realize
that the fear perched
on your shoulder is a gargoyle,
mocking you as it
pushes you down so hard
that the frayed rope snaps
when it hits bottom?
What happens when
the pit that you’ve dug yourself
seems bottomless?
Well, she discovered that taking
measure of yourself, all
the different parts of yourself,
can be done anywhere.
In the end, the only
measure that matters
is yours.
All you have to do is show up,
and bring your yardstick.
Ellen Knight
(write a measure poem)
A Short Measure
Hemidemisemiquaver –
What’s to savor?
It’s much too quick,
not quick a tick-
ing of a clock. So what’s this beat?
A note that’s fleet
or fast? A blink?
When played in sync
within the context of a song
it does belong.
So after all,
it’s not so small.
###
I so hate when I make a typo. Grrr!
A Short Measure
Hemidemisemiquaver –
What’s to savor?
It’s much too quick,
not quite a tick-
ing of a clock. So what’s this beat?
A note that’s fleet
or fast? A blink?
When played in sync
within the context of a song
it does belong.
So after all,
it’s not so small.
###
Blueprint
I forgot this: measure twice, cut
once. See, your touch inched in
and cinched tight and I lost all
sense of direction, decorum, de
-light. I held the foundation in
my hands, but neglected to we
-igh the cost. And I lost.
.
SPLIT-SECOND SIGHT
BEFORE I WENT BACK INSIDE
The sun rose, a shy slow curve
innocent of warmth
but worthy of geometry and thermometer,
if I’d thought to put on gloves.
Freezing! I went to check the hose we keep
going all night so the pipes won’t burst.
I heard a hiss like harpies spitting
a fine spray (how do you measure harpies?)
instantly freezing against chain-link
fence, heaping ice caps/crystal-balls for sun-
light to sparkle-shimmer atop sheep-
droppings black as molasses.
It was way too immeasurably cold
for me to stick around for a second sight.
Let me say, my friends, please forgive me in advance. I just couldn’t help myself! ^_^
Mete your Measure
I’ve been in and out of
treble
since I was a
minor.
Too much sax and violins,
no doubt.
Let me take a minuet
to explain my
tone.
I’m a musician
and a music
appreciator;
I’m no lyre,
and I try not to
say anything off-key.
I really don’t want to
repeat
myself…
but here goes.
I will make my pitch
with no trumpeting of intentions or
snares to entangle.
I just believe,
with all my harp,
the importance of working
in concert,
and if anything
cymbalizes
my need to be vocal,
it is the fact that I always try
to reach a high note,
guitar act together,
and stay in tune
with what is going on.
Maybe I should just
give this a rest,
if you can’t Handel it, that is.
But then again,
if it ain’t baroque,
don’t fifth it.
Diana Terrill Clark
Awesome. I loved how clever this is.
^_^ And so fun to write!
You’ve warmed an old musical punster’s heart. Thanks Diana!
It’s always a joy to have fun with puns, but I am oftener greeted by groans than words as kind as yours, Walt!
Thank YOU. ^_^
Oh my WORD, Diana. This is fantastic. Thank you so much for the giggle and the smile.
Oh what fun! Long ago and far away I lived with music. Outstanding!
It’s never to late to come back home to music. ^_^
Awesome job, Diana!!
ARGH! (LOVE it!)
ina
Groupie Antics
gyrating lewdly in skimpy bathing suit
her sopping performance of sexual innuendo
was perfect accompaniment to his lecherous ego
coolly delivered, a roadie’s sharp pounding riposte,
back handed slap in the face formality,
between predator and prey
softened her craggy attitude.
lipstick waiting to be blood
but then again, she’s a leo
banished from the island of herself
bottomed-out shadows are all that’s left.
a fast-paced combustible atmosphere
nippy and aloof with shivery words.
a cranked up rock bands dressing room.
party time in gulps and twitches.
saucer-like eyes of other groupies
stare unfettered, askance of after show prospects.
around centered marble altar the intimate crowd
lines up to receive sacrament from samovar full of
ice cold electric kool aid and other party favors.
but the party favors others,
coldhearted notes pointing the way out.
I read this several times, to let the idea and creativity of it take hold. Loaded, and excellently disturbing.
The sex of our baby.
The day we found
the sex of the baby.
you were upset.
I cried for tiny toes sticking in my ribs.
I cried for lost sister giggles.
I cried for hockey sticks, and warm dirty kisses.
The day we measured tiny toes and
his tiny heart beats.
you came around in the form
of a name.
That day we found our son.
LAUREATE AT THE STAKE
Sacrificed on the altar of reason,
pages ignite; an incendiary conflagration
of words and rhyme – metered and meted.
Ashes strewn, windblown; sown upon
the fertility of a mind left wanting to be heard.
Every word burning like midnight oil to ravage
all this savage heart has toiled to achieve.
Like decayed leaves these poems smolder.
Line by line, they feed the fire; burning.
Learning that poetic purity is akin to obscurity,
remnants of thought filling the air
like sparks off to incite the masses and high grasses
in smoky simile; nothing is left unsaid.
Laureate at the stake burning, take the time to learn.
There is rhyme enough to burn.
* Note: On being selected the 2010 Poet Laureate for the April PAD at Writer’s Digest.com/Poetic Asides with Robert Lee Brewer. I seemed to be in a hurry to get there, and humbly find I still have much to learn and accomplish. Ever grateful for the honor and life lesson to stop and smell the proses, Robert.
I was aware that my offering violated the rules, but couldn’t resist the “Howdy Doody” time. I appreciated the definition of minute as being a poem in 60 seconds, because I wasn’t sure if the pronunciation should be “minit” or “mine-yoot.”
Red
We counted months throughout the year
that brought us here,
then weeks, then days.
We kept our gaze
upon the calendar, this prize
before our eyes,
marked out in red.
It’s often said
that love is blind. But it is strong
as time, as long
as dreaming night
as fast as light.
the last stanza in particular is so wonderful
MEASURED AND CALCULATED
He weighs his words; the gravity
of which is a burden, quite beastly.
It would be easy to blurt and blather,
work his mind into a lather
and foam at the mouth, but he doubts
that any would listen to his rants.
Flying by the seat of his pants,
was never his suit. Never one
to shoot from the hip. Thoughts sit
upon his lips until their purity
is assured. When they are heard,
you will know how they show
that thought was given to words
driven my inspired muse. Take your time,
to convey what it is you want to say.
I work for lawyers and this is an important trait to a good one. Good writers, like you, too, have this in spades.
Bravo.
I’m back! I’ve been in a creative funk for over a month now and trying to snap out of it. These “minute” poems got me inspired. (There’s an idea for a future form challenge, Robert!) If you don’t know, the “minute” is a poem of exactly sixty syllables (as in 60 seconds – minute, get it?) It breaks into three stanzas of four lines each in iambic meter, the first line with eight syllables, and the others with four, usually with a rhyme scheme AABB, CCDD, EEFF. The only other minute poem I ever tried was published in The Lyric poetry journal. Here’s a new one:
Chickadees
The January forecast: warm,
above the norm.
Light jacket’s fine –
it’s forty-nine.
A racket, chick-a-DEEDEEDEE,
from this oak tree,
those little birds
with winter words.
They seem to ask with some distress,
my friends all dressed
in white and black:
Will snow come back?
Or head to poeticbloomings.com where Marie and I are featuring it today!
http://poeticbloomings.com/2013/01/16/in-form-poet-wednesday-minute-poetry/
I figured that’s where they were all coming from.
Good to see you here, Bruce! Nicely done.
Measure me luscious,
not dismal;
the longer, the better
no waffling, just lots of butter please.
Yes please. I like real food too. ^_^
= )
Laurie, this is wonderful.
Thanks!
So that’s what you were talking about… smiles.
WE ARE THE MEASURE OF OURSELVES
Once upon a long fingered day,
people saying,
people pointing,
double jointed,
Gossip, chatter, chitter-patter,
tongues a natter,
fingers wagging,
whispers lagging
Behind every accusing glance,
and yet we dance,
we love, no mind
to those unkind
because –
we are the measure of ourselves
A MINUTE POEM
When I was small I could not tell
my Auntie Nell
the clock display
for time of day.
The hands and numbers puzzled me:
did ten to three
mean gamblers’ odds
or timely prods?
Frustration marked my days and nights
from dawns to lights;
my mien was moody
till Howdy Doody.