The missing letters are feared lost better calls shrieked into the mossy night where hovering the moon delights, in wolfish cries and another bursts the devil called and answered Ms. Hearst so while the nighttime day's mirror... cries are heard! They said that amber was a rock no more, for if serendipitously defined then hulking over the river is the divestment of the vines, but modern day America hasn't won the currency war, the Euro has it's place ensured, and though we wile through rows of corn our hearts aflutter as others mourn, be crisp beneath that blotted out apple tree, the asylum loves apple juice for free.
The blotted ink of sky engulfs my dream
While nightfall's soot and fog darken the shore,
And I , a tattered leaf, tremble midstream
Infecting my solace much like before.
Dreary this roam, this dreary roam so cold
Attended by a willow tree's limp veil;
Like ghastly air with sordid woes untold
Of slumber deepening... its tomb, my nail.
And in a haze, snow circles tainted blue
As forceful winds begin their groan, one howl
My tassels unraveling to imbue
This cry for life paling as woods befoul.
Yet, branches of hope , they rain down on me,
For spring redeems ...bright as eternity.
to become a masterpiece
it starts with c lu t te red
c
h
a
o
t
i
c sketches
paint-splattered smudges
bleeding blotted lines
failed impasto
in fractured form
but eventually,
the canvas begins to glow
through wet brushes,
drop and lift
subtle shifts
of calm chiaroscuro
bold, breathing bursts of colours
layer upon luminous layer
pigment pressed with patient precision
each stroke of calm caresses
until the vibrant hues
that softly kiss
the quiet
quivering glow
of your smile
are finally framed.
I'm learning not to embrace the frantic chase.
With things that are fleeter than me.
For things that wish not to be found.
For things that yearn to weave me to the frozen ground.
I'm learning to receive, graciously.
The things that may make you bleed.
Like love surrounded by white-hot fire.
Truth encased in blue blotted briar.
Peace is always worth the harshest sacrifice.
That doesn't mean I'll no longer engage.
To be that grand, golden giver.
It doesn't mean I've become a bitter quitter.
I'm still very much in the game.
I just lost the desire to keep score.
I'll be dispensing energy and shine more frugally.
Keeping company with dreams and gentle things.
Dodging the brutes and stained-glass boars.
Things that breathe just to bite and sting.
I pray the universe invites me to sample.
Its graceful rhythm and purity.
Of that sweet-sweet final sleep.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The third drawer down,
stuck sometimes,
resists like a child refusing supper~
then gives all at once.
Inside:
a landslide of faded cotton,
each square a surrendered flag.
Some still crisp with the ghost of starch,
others softened by years of fists,
damp with forgotten tears.
The blue gingham one
worn thin at the edges~
once blotted my knee
when I fell running toward her.
The white lacy one,
embroidered with spring flowers,
never used, as if saving itself
for a grief too clean to stain.
At the bottom,
one still folded tight
into a perfect rectangle—
the way she left it,
the way I won’t unfold it,
keeping her last touch
trapped in the seams.
related memoir vignette at: poetrysoup.com/short_stories/lavender_time_and_mother_13659
Force that turns glass shards to mists
and causes girders to bend and twist
flesh and bone cannot resist
nor mortal word can console this
pushed to the brink
with blotted ink
the buttons pressed
have secret links
to battles pitched
it might seem rich
for ribbon bars
as spirits lift
the bodies stiff
a cheek to kiss
for some they dare
not lift the lid
an endless list
of souls to miss
we ask the question,
‘is it just this?’
I began to coalesce
light, shadow became solid
leaving my past of regrets
forgiveness, all sins blotted
a new creature made of light
now seen fully, I am loved
I am precious in His sight
Turning over in a ruffled bed,
stark red numbers sear 4 a.m. into bloodshot corneas.
Nothing but darkness creeps through threadbare curtains, frozen in place.
A desolate silence becomes deafening, as birdsong no longer crescendos—
what would have been the breaking of dawn.
It's been six years now since our brightest star was thrown out of orbit,
exposing the frozen side of the sun.
No longer does our planet experience the warmth of its radiation,
nor the glow of its solar flares.
Within a fraction of a second, humanity was plunged into an everlasting night.
Temperatures plummeted; mass hysteria was at its peak.
Crops perished within hours to days,
as the new icy tundra eclipsed once-thriving farmlands.
The birth of a perpetual Ice Age was at hand.
Power grids crystallized and snapped.
Cities crumbled; small towns were blotted out,
disappearing off the map, never to be seen again.
Death's gelid hand spared but a few souls—
holed up in a scientific research bunker in the Arctic.
We are but the unlucky few who get to “live” in this glacial purgatory,
wandering aimlessly forevermore.
And when the shadow of a large boot blotted out the sun
I then knew my final day of reckoning was done
Now that I am on the other side
Free from pain and hurt I now reside
"The buds on my pear tree will become florets this day,
prettily unfurled a creamy white." by poet
On leaves of green streams down the gold
of a radiant April dawn,
and blotted out is winter’s cold
because sun’s here to warmly smile upon
the pear tree that is posing on my lawn.
The first day for her blossoming has come.
White pearled clusters now adorn my favorite tree.
A lovely fashionista this day she has become.
Can any other tree be more beautiful than she?
The calendar date, red-inked into alpine
white vellum: a blood-letting, a quilled line.
Old ducks [politically incorrect] featherless,
waddling like myself, fall neatly into line.
"It is time," I say to my left-brain, my right-
hand, "to auto write a poem in couplet line."
In my excitement I look toward newborn
paper and begin reworking the previous line.
My face soften, my fingers relax. Another
deception blotted off the eternal timeline.
Time marches on ... or, onward and upward!
"Upward?" the poet asks. "Oh, what a line!"
Blotted blue and green
Flying ‘round sunflower’s pot
Looking place to blotch
KECKSOGRAPHY ink blots
Doctor/poet Justinus Kerner
when his eyes began to blur
Accidentally began an art form nouveau*
as the inked quill blotted his flow
For Sotto Poet's E Words Contest
17 June 24
POTD. First Prize
-----------------
"Enthusiasm is nothing more or less than faith in action" -- Henry Chester
I cling to reveries of youth, the tender sentiment of plucking words from summer roots,
That in my journal hours when the red
of skies are agleam...phrases extend long long as straw.
I burn language the way one does in
a flamed trance--amused, enthused,
seduced-- reeling into a daze beneath
a new moon, a blur of penciled happenstance flapping like a winged feather on river of late afternoons.
I would still scribble in hay where syllables grow into racy tunes , my faith abiding in passion deep...
And I could not help myself but drown
my hands in raw and humid lines;
Bury my eyes deep in verses' jammed.
I'm loathed to leave my untamed story
when twilight fades. Still and all, letters
drip and tradewinds see blown paper
curling like blotted fingertips!
In my youth's frolic at King Lear and Pi
all my days were a Shakespearean tale.
Not algebra, not prose did edify
yet test and limits we pass lest we fail.
To learn and open closed minds to ideas
but I learnt before a fall comes a pride
with a conspiracy one alone bears
yet co-conspirators had much to hide.
For each lame alibi concealed misdeed,
each mad ruse and jape blotted my ledger
but we all do a true life lesson heed
when worn is a cowl or crown to measure.
Comic is the court and jester in school
but better a wise king than a wise fool.
Written: May 1992
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