Someone broke my best friend’s heart.
They’d been together throughout the entire lock-down.
And even though it looks like we’re entering a freer time,
he said it felt like she’d become part of the claustrophobia.
Explanations can snag on nerves like fishhooks.
Categories:
fishhooks, 12th grade, break up,
Form: Free verse
I am cutting ties
that I knotted to a faraway soil.
Exiled no longer at the tiller
of a long beached fishing boat
that bobs only on the legends
of ancient waves.
Those fluent in soul-breathing,
the Celtic poets,
those wind-chiming lyricists,
are pulling me
to the bottom of Lake Erie
where drowned sea-captains still quote
what the Irish once wrote.
And here’s me, even today
caught by the mouth
from their linguistic fishhooks
yet cutting myself away.
I am a handmade citizen of a land
that is my own meat and gristle,
a subsoil am I
and my father and mother
the grubbing worm and the turtle dove.
Still Irish, but rootless
with no anchor in Galway Bay.
I have cut the trap lines
become a jobbing teller
of tall tales,
not a keeper of any traditions
planted by hands not of my own.
And if once in a while
I lapse into the sod and bog-speak
of my unlearned brethren
it is no literary affectation
of a better education,
for I remain this common creature
determined to be tied to a smaller rock
of my own choosing.
Categories:
fishhooks, poetry,
Form: Free verse
The tempest kiss of seaweed miss.
Her temper heard ~ his heart stirred.
His ship astern and fast.
The siren’s scorn lambaste;
Blind youth’s reality is blurred.
The satin hair of Whitney bright
A pearlescent veil, the tide ~
Calm! Calm! It’s all a lie!
Her body movement spry.
O serpentine witch, her smile, her glide…
Her bright white fangs aglow, move slow.
The magic of her song moored
In his terrified glance;
The seaman’s in a trance.
In former life, he would have scored.
She slowly sucks his soul, and then,
One by one she tenders them.
The fishhooks through their eyes,
Amuse her with goodbyes.
Rehearsal of fatale la femme.*
2/5/2020
*femme fatale order of words was switched to aid rhyme.
A poet’s prerogative:)
Categories:
fishhooks, dark, fear, sea,
Form: Rhyme
When I was young
I could cut three holes
to wear a black garbage bag
as a mini-skirt over
torn fishnet pantyhose,
with fishhooks in my ears,
and I was totally-totally fashionable.
I do it now
and invariably someone asks
if I'm okay
and do I need help.
Categories:
fishhooks, age, fashion, girl, humor,
Form: Free verse
Waterfall splashes
falling through eyelashes,
Crocodile, maybe real
not sure how to feel,
Neurotic or an actress
I'm mildly in distress,
Witnessing this sight
I could almost take the bite
from emotional fishhooks
I avoid and trust my gut,
Her streaming salty tears
won't make me swerve my steer,
Sticking firm to my beliefs
I ignore this principle thief.
Categories:
fishhooks, cry, emotions,
Form: Rhyme