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Posted: |
Jan 1, 2018 - 6:32 AM
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By: |
mgh
(Member)
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TO MY SON’S WEDDING
Newly single and alone,
I drove to my son’s wedding
and hit a fat black dachshund,
red chum spattered in a circle,
a ruby ring around my front tire.
The owner carefully offered,
“Not your fault. Female across the road.
Never could teach him the dangers
of these mean streets.”
His young son opened their screen door,
an older sister instantly retrieving him.
My sudden remorse for the boy’s strings
circling his flattened heart
elicited no permanent pity.
Next year a new puppy
will enchant his eyes, ensconce his heart.
Maybe sooner.
Driving slower now around normal curves
and smooth straight highways,
I ponder what to say, my son asking for last minute advice.
Hand him the ring. Proffer platitudes.
Let him discover soon enough a dog pound’s
renewable love purchased
for only forty dollars and a can of food.
DEATH OF DOXIE
For the first time in years,
my dog didn’t dash out to
dance his greeting around my car.
Unable to hurdle the barricade of pain,
only the drumming of his incessant tail
lead me to the corner where he’d dragged
paralyzed hind legs.
Called the vet, told the nurse, “It’s time and
I need to stay with him.” She snapped
“No appointments left, drop him off.
We’ll finish it later.”
She didn’t understand this singular dog
who was only mine, who feared a broom casually
leaning on a wall, who cowered from large tumbleweeds
summersaulting across my lawn.
So I sat in the office, holding his vibrating
body, waiting for the attention that
should be paid to one so timid and loving.
He would not have understood my absence.
The doctor muzzled his Doxie nose in blue Velcro,
unnecessary for a dog ignorant of cruel jaws.
As the syringe shot relief into his paw,
I held his face close, mumbling litanies, “Just look
at me, no more pain.”
His faithful eyes fastened to mine, and
then his kind heart stopped,
no glassy fading look, just
brown open eyes still trusting.
Only the silence of the stethoscope and
the protruding tip of his wafer tongue
signaled my invisibility.
At the desk, I paid with a check and my heart,
and left, trailing the loneliest objects in the world,
a disconnected leash and a collar circling air.
At my home, I tossed in the garbage
a warm, odorous dog bed and stained food dish.
At times I managed a smile when
thinking of his eyes that reflected no betrayal
because unlike Candy, I didn’t,
“let no stranger shoot my dog.”
Joanie,
You are not only a poet, but a damn fine story teller. If you ever need help writing fiction, please let me know.
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Geez joanie, poignant prose, but i could barely get thru the doxie one, made me too sad.
How about some bloody happy subjects, girl, before we all top ourselves with depression!!!. 
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Joanie, you keep going - i was just funnin wiv ya.
Theyre well-chosen subjects. Hell, the best poems are usually on poignant themes x
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Of flying, afraid, do not be.
Tis crashing of which you should be scared shitless.
@billcarsoncrappoems.com
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Ennio Morricone
Some say
He is
And forever will be
The "Maestro".
And yet perhaps
It is merely the fact
That Morricone
Cannot speak English
And hence the Italian
"Maestro"
Is the term
Which the Maestro
Understands.
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"Checking" translations
Is for pedants.
Viva la vida
Maestro Schmaestro
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Posted: |
Jan 1, 2018 - 11:30 PM
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By: |
joan hue
(Member)
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For the past few decades students in all grades including college have been asked to share their written work with their peers. It is called Peer Editing. It is tough for a writer to see his/her own flaws. (Even professional writers have edit groups.) It is also hard to share one’s written words; words are a part of one’s self.
ON EDITING
How can I show you
never be satisfied
with once?
Spare yourself
red ink pen umpires
and remember how few
are picked in
First Round Drafts.
Should I describe my
lilac bush that didn’t bloom
because I never pruned
last year’s dead parts?
No. Students won’t relate.
Instead, remember
your first kiss,
a maze of noses,
boulder lips,
clacking teeth,
meandering, tentative tongues,
and faces chagrined.
Be glad that kissing
is a plural act.
There’s power yet,
a softness in
meltings of mutual mouths
because you adjusted angles,
played with pressure,
and readjusted.
Then let others,
telescoped vision and
smelling liked new,
well-tuned cars,
read your writing.
They’ll find fresh freeways
for your pen.
You became slowly,
nine months.
Take time with your creation
proudly birthing
writing that finally has
Ten fingers, ten toes.
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I USED to write some poetry... I have a friend who was an English teacher, and one of the poems I wrote(About 18 years ago), he said was BRILLIANT. HOWEVER, if I were to post it here, I would be banned for LIFE! 
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Posted: |
Jan 2, 2018 - 5:25 AM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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Joan, I'm hugely impressed! I only write "proper" poetry on very rare and unlooked-for occasions when the muse strikes from nowhere. Our friends' cat, Boots, died a year or two ago. Sadly, our cat, Amelie, wasn't far behind, but rhymes kept popping into my head when Boots went, so I wrote them down just to see how it looked... For explanatory purposes, Boots was black with white feet (surprise) and Ameile was a tabby, and the two of them lived at numbers 4 and 6 respectively.
We sometimes liked to think that Boots
and Amelie were in cahoots.
That cats from numbers 6 and 4
collaborated on a tour
of duty to preserve the peace (except of course for birds and meece)
The pair would always leave a track – the stripey and the black
We liked it when you went away
because you’d often ring and say
“Could you feed Boots, morn and eve?”
That was easy, he’d receive
the visits. It was fun to do and made him seem like our cat too.
Of love and care there was no lack for cat of mainly black.
Boots was master of the hunt,
in his mind it was elephant
and wildebeest instead of mouse
he’d distribute around the house.
(Amelie is much less bold – a pussy, if the truth were told,
who likes her rodent take-out cold.)
If body parts are in a stack, blame the stripey and the black.
But feline lives are short and sweet
and black of body, white of feet
Will now no longer come to greet you, sitting on the stair.
The local wildlife have a chance, the birds might sing, the mice might dance,
But passing Boots’s house they’ll glance and see a shadow there
For while their spirit lingers on, no cat’s ever truly gone.
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