NaPM April 08 2016

[Keith]

Leanne: A pleasure to actually read out loud. I loved the sonics.

I second that and then some.

---

@Teagan, bedeep and weeded, thank you for the encouragement guys, very much appreciated.

[heslopian]

This is gorgeous, Bilbo. You said that your poetry was getting worse, you sly goose

The Pennines.


As waves of rolling heather swamp the peaty moor,
purple headed stems whip and whisper to the north.

Waterfowl alight and skim on windy waters,
as rippled mirrors hold a thousand golden suns.

A Kitty Hawk that wheels on wing before its dives;
A shrieking shrew succumbs, a squeak or two then death.

There's life and death to rival one of Shakespeare's plays
on this moorland stage of reeds and austere crags

[Tracy Mitchell]

    Home Site

Slants precipitously toward the earth
what is left of the roof line - cedar shakes
eaten by moss.  The leafless trees of the grove
surround what is left of the walls
the wood of the walls bear the same
grey brown of the trunks of the trees.

What started from seed, the weed plants
by the house became trees when untended,
grown and gone the families known to trim back
the saplings, in their unseen march from seed to sky.  
It is these trees which hold the house upright
as each succeeding season makes it claim.  

Back in the grove by the river, an inconsequential
prairie stream, which winds past this ancient home site.

Gentle banks lured thirsty livestock  and impish kids
to the water, warm by August, frozen by November.

There may be an old woman or shriveled man
in a nursing home in Tampa or Sarasota or Phoenix
who might say to who might listen, in unhurried voice –
we waded to our chests and dunked our heads
and shook like wet puppies, and stretched in the grass
beneath the crab apples to watch the bees and sunshine
turn blossoms to fruit by late July.

The wood so appears like the trunks of the leafless trees
as to suggest there had never been paint,
that the wood knew no sense of color
other than that brought by dew, the morning sun,
and the white fluffing advance of late fall. Trees
grown up the walls, hold the house to its original form
long after anyone, but the squirrels, pay attention.

[Leanne]

Teagan, it's great to see you posting so many fresh, interesting pieces. Thank you

[billy]

ditto.

it's good to see some of the newbs having the balls to jump into the NaPM threads; as well as some older members of course.

[Tiger the Lion]

Dearest Sarah
 
She was a drifter at heart, our mother;
bent first toward her childhood,
but if not there,
not here.
 
I was twelve when we went out west,
so you were only five. We sprawled
out blankets in the cool cab of the moving van
mom had bought from some shady cousin.
 
Just down from the house we found
were sand dunes where we’d watch
the boys on dirt bikes do their gymnastics.
And at the south end
their were quicksand pits that bordered the loony bin.
Almost a moat.
 
But the mountains, Sarah,
The mountains infolded us all.
 
I wanted to remind you.

[milo]

In Bonniebrae a field is split by kills
and hedged by thickets on the southern side,
a vagrant patch of long untended graves
and then the darkest forest man has known.

On a Spring day with wind just strong enough
to bloom a sail and launch a skiff we gathered -

a score of us to test our skills at flying
kites like fauns perform a mating dance.
I brought the finest kite you’ll ever see -
a hand-painted red komodo dragon
with double wires and a twenty-five foot tail.

I slowly let her up and gave her reign
then deftly pulled her aft to paint the sky.
I spent two hours teaching her to roll
and slowly build to form a somersault.

Then sometime after noon we traded places
and I was high above and breeching clouds -
a just-fledged falcon drunk on swoops and dives,
I spun and dipped held only by my line.

But fickle kites don’t have the nerve for kiting
as men don’t have the buoyancy to fly
so who’s to say whose fault, the bridle buckled,
the guy wire snapped, I keeled and then I tumbled
back home, my body broke against the ground.

[QDeathstar]

My Surroundings

A white room full of color
where there is time to play out
surreal fantasies. A black hole sun.

With furniture of thorns that cut
deep enough to tell the difference
between reality and a bad trip. An angry chair.

Complete with a full set of chalk
white China, seven sugar squares
and the scent of baby's breath. And Pennyroyal Tea.

[NobodyNothing]

I can't say it enough.  The contributions this year have been a joy and a sorrow (in a good and human way) to read.  Fantastic.

[milo]

I agree, a great time to read poetry here. Feel free to jump in for a prompt or two.

[aschueler]

The most of a part sunken, broken 
cracker house weathers between 
inner and outer dunes.  A tidal pool curves in
making a flooded basement of clear water on
old pine boards softened brown and coarse with wet age.

Shells as paving stones proceed forth,
myriad in shape, color; of design surreal.
Alive they crawl, burrow, play in sand and ignore the
waves overhead.  

Warm water, salty water, deeper past the inner
dunes holds all the life.

[Achebe]

Many houses, one home

I have lived in many houses, 
one home, the one we rented in Lagos
when I was seven. There the back wall
was Potty Boyler, batsmen's scourge
whom I faced, Grmzwd Dmpsy, wielding a wooden cloth beater, 
against the ball bounced back
with a thwack from a wall grey as the monsoon sky.
The round, hard cushion in the living room was a log, 
for Boaris Kolmakuk sailing down the Dostbritz,
mother of rivers, child of the Doster snows.
And when the winter sun poured in 
through grilled windows, and sprayed off my tinfoil mirror
onto the distempered ceiling in missiles of light,
Theos and Halore were at war again.
With our lease, the lost battlegrounds,
the mighty Dostbritz; Gazooka, the living room divan,
and cricketers from planets in another galaxy,
expired, leaving their traces behind.
Even now, when life's disimagination hunts me out
I retreat into an alcove in my mind
where a rubber ball comes to me with a thwack 
and love from Potty Boyler.

[NobodyNothing]

I agree, a great time to read poetry here. Feel free to jump in for a prompt or two.

I finally realized that I was a hopelessly bad poet.  And absent the compulsion to write, what was left?

But I do so enjoy the art form, and even the constructive criticisms thereof.  I find that here, a certain freshness and passion in this way.

[Weeded]

Achebe nice!

[billy]

it's not about being good or bad, it's more about enjoying it and wanting to improve

I finally realized that I was a hopelessly bad poet.  And absent the compulsion to write, what was left?
But I do so enjoy the art form, and even the constructive criticisms thereof.  I find that here, a certain freshness and passion in this way.

[Achebe]

@Weeded - thanks! you've been at it quite religiously too!

@Tiger - the last three lines of your poem are a thunderbolt. Easily one of the best poems in NaPM so far, in my book. 'Shady cousin' is shady - please change the line before offering it burnt to Jupiter.