August End

mist welcomes morning

as crisp apple chill sneaks in

summer packs her bags

***

Written for Haiku Friday 

hosted by LouCeeL

 

Stuck at Prom

            College loomed.

She was determined to attend, and had done everything she could to make that happen. Money was tight, and she’d given up a lot. But she just couldn’t give up her senior prom. And she wouldn’t.

“But we can’t afford a dress, honey,” her dad said.

“Don’t worry, Dad. I’ve got it covered.”

2012 Grand Prize Winners
Duck Brand "Stuck at Prom" Scholarship Contest

These kids each won a $5,000 scholarship for their tux and prom dress, which are made entirely of duck tape. They spent 127 hours and used 18 rolls of duck tape.

***

Written for Friday Flash 55, hosted by G-Man at Mr. KnowItAll.

The Puppet

.

Sometimes he's subtle

Except when he's not

He lifts a finger

And she dances a jig

Keeping time to his tune

Wondering what’s come over her

***

***

Written for Imaginary Garden with Real Toads where Mama Zen asks us to write a poem in twenty-five words or less, using a "power image," one we return to over and over.

.

The Vitriolic Vagina

Photo By Jaime Clark

Your point made;

You want control. Well,

Sorry, pal,

Not this gal;

Have control issues myself.

So just fu… kiss off.

*** 

This was written for Imaginary Garden with Real Toads (IGWRT). Sunday’s challenge was to write a shadorma, using one of several excellent extreme close-up photographs posted on IGWRT. Another new poetic form for me, a shadorma is an unrhymed, six-line poem with a syllabic rhyme scheme of 3-5-3-3-7-5 syllables per line.

A Metaphorical ¡Olé!

(Painting: Untitled by Raoul Dufy) 

After shoving everyday clutter beneath the bed,

stashing laundry in the closet behind the stair,

leaving Mexican take-out menus to stew in a pan,

she carefully slipped into a cool scented bath and

away from her boring reality she swam.

In the glow of a festive flickering candle and 

the frosty margarita she held in her hand,

she rode sweet salty waves to exotic far lands

where laughter played like a boistrous band

and humdrum one-notes could ne'er be found.

***

Linked in at Imaginary Garden with Real Toads
and dVerse Poets Pub

The Flight of the Valkyrie

As we reached the bridge that foggy night,

A mournful gull cried out across the bight.

And when you paused and turned to look,

I saw my chance; a good push was all it took.      

And over you went, like a harpy taking flight.

I won’t shed a single tear as I stand and watch you go.

This happy smile upon my face is all I have to show.

All these years, you’ve made my life a painful living hell.

So long, you wretched hag. Goodbye and fare thee well.

You’ll soon be singing halleluiah with the choir down below.

Under Windsor Bridge, 1912, by Adolphe Valette

***

Linked to The Mag 131.

Maternity Ward

green grass springs skyward

seed of winter’s frozen womb

hope is born anew 

*** 

Linked in at Haiku Heights, where the prompt this week is "Green."  This piece is a fix-up of one I wrote ages ago, before I had a clue what a haiku was.

Boomers

Picture, if you will, house

after house after house of the

post-war American dream, not

Levittown, but close enough, and not

geographically, because this was Houston, 

which was as far from New York as this
neighborhood is from anyone’s

notion of today’s American dream.

See them, these near identical houses

filled with near-identical families?

Watch the Chevvies and Fords carry dads

out of their driveways at 7:42AM each day

while moms prod their two-point-five kids

to “hurry, or you’ll miss the bus” before they sit

and plan their near-identical days of cooking,

cleaning, and coffee with Carol next door.

We didn't know it then, of course, but we were

to become famous, we 2.5 kids in those houses.

We were the post-war population explosion,

the near-identical babies whose arrival would be

felt from Madison Heights to Madison Avenue.

Back then, we knew only the joy of slipping 

through the dusk, hiding and seeking with our pals,
just waiting to claim our piece of the dream with a  

Boom!

***

Written for Imaginary Garden with Real Toads, where the prompt was "neighborhood."

Father Knew Best

She’d hated school from the first day her mother delivered her into the hands of the teachers.

“Give it a chance,” her father advised. “School will ensure your future.”

The day the planes came, she’d been on a school- sponsored trip to the country.  

Turned out papa-san was right. School had ensured she had a future.

(Photo: Kimimasa Mayama—EPA, Time-Lightbox)

***

 Written for Friday Flash 55, 

hosted by the inimitable Mr. KnowItAll.

Her Royal Highness

She walks with pride much like a lynx

Who knows she's more than just a cat.

When your eyes meet, she seems to wink

And seems to say "Yeah, I'm all that,

Quite clearly an aristocrat."

And in your heart, you know it's true.

This is no ordinary cat...

She is all that, and much more too.

The challenge today at dVerse Poets Pub is to write a "huitain." This is a poetic form of eight lines consisting of eight or ten syllables each, with a rhyme scheme of a,b,a,b,b,c,b,c.

When I sat down to give it a go, my muse took the form of the princess pictured above, who directed my efforts from her rightful place on my lap.

Soul

(Painting by Morris Louis, 1959)

ephemeral one

the force behind my heartbeat

my love, my life, you

***

Written for Haiku Heights
and
by special request:
Haiku Friday