Best Gables Poems
I wrote a great book, part memoir, part novel
Shopped it around, I ain’t too proud to grovel
Got kicked upstairs to a big publishing head
He invited me in, and here's what was said:
This screed you call Crack House of the 13 Gables
Is one long rant mixed with recycled fables
It wanders aimlessly, but never resolves
Characters pop out of nowhere, then simply dissolve
But the symbolism, sir, allow me to explain
The Victorian parlor represents pathos and pain
In the attic are mothballed broken dreams and betrayals
It's gonna shift your paradigm right off its rails
It’s a thousand-page odyssey into the surreal
The hedge maze is where all 14 sub-plots congeal
Enough! The only reason I called you in, punk
Is to meet the lunatic who scribbled this junk
So I slunk away, not a little dejected
Ain’t much fun being literarily rejected
Trudged back to my grueling, stale coffee grind
Working 15-hour days, going out of my mind
Then one day I met an old pal for some beers
Hadn't seen him in quite a few years
I told him about my rejection slip wrangle
He said buck up, you just need the right angle
I like reading novels, now don’t get me wrong
But writin' 'em, man, that just takes too damn long
And what a huge risk, 16 years you devoted
For no payday at all, just your ego imploded
There's no need to pen the next Moby Dick
Try something short, now that is the trick!
So, I thanked my friend for his most sage advice
And took it to heart without thinkin' thrice
And now I am back as a voice for the ages
Except I'm makin' my mark in far fewer pages
I write sound bites and maxims and pithy remarks
T-shirt slogans and jokes, I just do on a lark
I bang out poems and lyrics at the drop of a hat
Dash off 17 syllables in ten seconds flat
Haikus by the bunch
Cook up a batch before lunch
Put that in your pipe
____________________________
For Humor Contest
Sponsored by: Carol Eastman
I live in a house of seventy gables
With twenty kitchens and as many tables.
It's good for both winter and summer weathers,
'Cuz, in Spring, it flies - it's made of feathers!
Pastures of greens meadow in this place,
Beau of white lilies,red and yellow rose covered it's grace,
Mocha colored trees stand handsomely on it's base,
While the pink hummingbird singing along it's nest.
Can you smell the sweetness in the air?
Do you feel the freedom even when it is bare?
Will you dance on Monday's morn till no end?
When another hay comes,do you care to spend?
Oh the sounds of the River Dale,
Melodically trumps in one's dream,
Peaceful of serenity conquers every tale,
Together they sing a beautiful hymn.
Oh the anointed love from Green Gables,
Mesmerized in the heart of loving couples,
The magical song that binds two together,
Will forever make them cherish one another.
Isn't it nice to think
that tomorrow is a new day
with no mistakes in it yet?
A new day with zero debts
and zero regrets.
Like a clean sheet of paper
untouched by ink..
nothing to shy away from,
nothing to rethink.
But...if I give you a clean sheet,
what will you write?
Will it be poetry? Will it be prose?
It could be fiction or fact, I suppose.
Will there be flights of fantasy...
or will it be rooted in reality?
If mistakes are made,
whether for good or ill, well...
when life gives you raspberries
make raspberry cordial!
Wysocki’s world always feels like a place paused in time,
and here the old house rises with its many angles~
gable stacked upon gable
like thoughts a century deep.
The clapboard walls hold the color of weathered memory,
a soft, seasoned brown
that seems to remember every storm
and every quiet morning after.
Windows watch from every direction,
small square eyes
that have seen too many seasons
to be surprised by anything now.
A cat sits on the fence
as if appointed guardian of the view,
tail curled in the calm certainty
that nothing important escapes its notice.
The yard is tidy in that Wysocki way~
grass trimmed, path swept,
a place where time moves slowly enough
for chores to feel like rituals.
Standing in front of it
I sense a rush of stories
that never needed telling~
a house content to keep its history
folded into wood and windowlight.
The house feels like a pause in time,
a place where the wandering mind
can rest a moment
and imagine the lives still echoing inside.