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Porch becomes an altar of anticipation~
another box, another small salvation.
Who knew joy could arrive so flatly packaged,
wrapped in tape and mild neglect?
We whisper sweet nothings to the delivery app,
tracking miracles like digital wise men.
Out for delivery—the sacred hymn
of last-minute repentance.
Without Prime, we’d be marooned
in the land of sold out and backordered,
forced to gift IOUs and half-hearted hugs—
a truly unholy end to December.
Heart paralysis reflects unholy yearning.
She has wrapped her love in soiled paper
and hidden it beneath forgotten works.
Specters in the house heed alarms and float
towards daily rituals that rearrange pain.
Distant transmissions crackle through nights.
She has wrapped up her love.
Once fond recitations swam on breezes and
brushed lip to skin with infinite colour that
tattooed devotion onto vein and pulse.
Embalmed silence sits still, pregnant.
She has wrapped her love in flowered cloth
and tied it up with faded ribbon.
Home was an adorned method scorched by
evening embraces and empty bottles of wine.
Rooms now echo flatly, devoid of a beginning.
She has wrapped up her love.
We ran away together; we ran so far with
broken radar and injured souls that our hurt
became skin and forgetting became dear.
She has wrapped up her love.
On the day of the Lord the human shall fear,
A terrifying god whom will Christians duly Peer,
The dead shall live again - the Christian tear,
A monopolising Christianity that cannot hear.
With, or without, all people are flatly, truly loved,
Without malice or tub, to jingle coyly ungloved,
Whatever the decade, decision, rubbed, tugged,
A transcendental god shall ring these beloved.
Talking clouds blown by earth’s graphic might,
Pose for the distant, scathed by a distinct light:
Enemies rise n’ fall as if tugging the dark night,
Offsetting the juggernaut of the ready birthrite.
A thought for people, bound, wet in eye-glare,
Principles, claims and chains won’t be the fare;
Nothing will work except behaviour and blare,
To suggest an ascent coloured by another wear.
All people are of inherent and fully equal worth,
God dies again for the decliner’s identity of birth,
Inside - not as proactive, with his mobile hearth,
A blacklist deceives those fleeing their childbirth.
Dominique Webb
I'm sick and tired of the so-called muses,
especially the one who always chooses
to make it clear that I don't work hard enough,
yet, when I ask for a little help with my stuff,
she's always the first one who flatly refuses.
My muse yelled, "Stop! That's prohibited."
I said, "What?"
"The behavior you just exhibited."
I said, "What did I do?"
She said, "You took some lines that didn't belong to you."
I said, "Jeez! Instead of helping me, you're making me feel totally inhibited."
Someone asked, "Could you write without a muse?"
I said, "Probably could, but I'd refuse.
Why? Because a muse is so good at showing
what to tell the audience and what to keep it from knowing
so that you can keep right on going with your wild-ass ruse."
I was having a hell of a time
with a poem that shouldn’t ever have been mine.
The muse had made a big mistake
by giving me lines that shoulda gone to this poet named Blake,
of which I could make neither reason nor rhyme.
A sweet young bank teller named Doris
Had a crush on her co-worker, Boris.
But one day while at work
The young clerk went berserk
When she caught Boris banging the manager, Morris.
Doris' secret admirer, Dan Danson,
Was swarthy, tall, and roguishly handsome.
But the next day while at work,
This clerk, too, went berserk,
Took an ATM hostage and held it for ransom.
Dan was embarrassed, didn't want to be caught,
And was going to shut himself up in the vault,
But Boris told him to run,
While Morris called 9-1-1,
And Doris flatly declared that it wasn't her fault.
When the S.W.A.T. team arrived on the scene,
They found everything calm and serene.
Boris told the S.W.A.T. captain that Dan
Had taken both Doris and Morris' van
And fled with the cash from the money machine.
Doris' version, when caught, was more exculpatory
And dripping with details more lurid than gory.
She'd plotted with Dan to create this diversion
To rescue her from that den of perversion,
And now Boris, and Morris, and Doris, and Dan
Are suing each other for the rights to the story.
This poet has most incorrectly checked
The little box which indicates "insect."
This poem, I therefore flatly reject.
I sharply reproach the writer.
A spider, never an insect, was.
I say this insistently because,
He should say "sorry." Until he does,
I remain a concerned spider.
Hey, little curly-headed girl
Why are you out here alone?
The darkness is no place for someone like you.
Little curly-headed girl
Why don't you speak?
What is making you so blue?
"I am not blue nor afraid,"
She flatly states
With an emptiness in her tone.
"I am forgotten,"
"Pushed down, buried deep."
"You decided you were better off alone."
I used to scoff at the thought
of Greek nymphs inspiring artists,
but those nine gals, especially
Calliope and Erato blees em,
have moved right in.
They’re a great help
around the house.
I have put them to work
cleaning, tidying, and doing the dishes.
I.C.E. raided my house the other day
wanting to know if I employed illegal aliens.
The girls, forewarned,
hid themselves in a closet.
Small problem,
while I sleep they fill my head
with fanciful gibberish,
lame stuff
which, the next day,
I then have to dump somewhere
and the city flatly refuses
to take them away with the trash.
I could prove a point thought misbegotten,
For long years packaged as Flatly Rotten,
I myself judged a spiritual loser;
Indeed, an Abhorrent option chooser!
But why, God had said so: "Esau I hate."
So, all his damned mistakes had flowed from Fate
"What's my birthright to me now that I'm dead?"
One, who just in the morning, had not fed!
"Right, agreed, you're Esau, then call Jacob"
Lion Jacob would have turned helpless cub!
Why hadn't Isaac Dad remembered this?
Lord God had that moment blocked Wisdom's kiss!
He fell so early from the image to the grime
And lay there, flatly oozing helplessness.
Anger, and something left of love combined,
Plunged to urge him free,
Wiped its hands and set back the idol high,
Only slightly out of plumb.
The shattering was mine.
The fiercest wind blew me away
and to the clouds, I lost my way.
The tinted mist clouded my eye
until I could not see the sky.
I was so lost in the dark of night
for in my wisdom, I clung so tight.
On winding road, I thought I was right;
Against the storm, I lost my light.
I fumbled flatly, right on plain;
I was trampled by the highest mountain.
With heavy heart, I lost my name,
and all my feats, they fell in vain.
The hardest rain washed me away
into the depth of deepest sea.
But the depth of sea caused me to see;
To Him I waived my vanity.
And somehow in time, I learned to flutter;
I flapped my wings and drowned the water.
My eyes were unveiled to see the sky.
His grace gave me a new way to fly.
He gave me wisdom so I would not roam.
He cleansed my soul and gave me home.
His love has brought me to a place
where I could grow along with His grace.
October 19, 2022
ER: Enlightenment Recovery Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Chantelle Anne Cooke
If the river wends its way on a path so very long,
and it can't make up its mind, just meandering along,
then a monsoon from the west blows the rains in hard and strong,
and the water's backing up till it's flatly flowing wrong,
and makes a lake where none was there to form a billabong…
When morning's interrupted by the kookaburra's song,
which echoes oh so merrily, like laughter from the throng,
as the rainbow eucalyptus flaunts its dazzling sarong,
and your cellphone has no bars, do you know where you belong?
A Kookaburra laughing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jW7A2glZbk
A land which doesn’t much nutrients wield
Will certainly not many grains yield.
This I had, flatly, told friend Daniel:
A farmer with more time for spaniel
While it had been Terrible Story
In a Rice Field of One-Time Glory!
And he had begun to with The Dog hunt,
While each time he was back I would be blunt.
Daniel, also, is finding it hard
Bidding The Firmest Farewell to card,
Wherefore he might remain in Shanty
To keep managing what is scanty….
Daniel with chance of glimpsing Yonder
Without having to up there wander.
When your mood is terribly shattered
When it cannot be properly bettered
Only remedy is chanting God's name
God will help you play wisely life-game
When you are by lethargy attacked
And when peace can't be tracked
The best technique is to just wait
And not flatly fall for fate's bad bait
When we feel sorry for bad results
Then we inflict on ourselves insults
Self-pity is a devilish practice dear
As that will totally freeze all cheer
Pick up courage and start afresh
Splash holy water on your flesh
Try to see the night-Sky for joy
Eyes and heart, you just employ
Fall never a prey for this sadness
As the end of sadness is madness
Boldly analyze the present shrewdly
Think of your noble mind proudly
Definitely peace of mind will arrive
Great plans through prayer derive
Happiness comes only via action
God is there to give satisfaction.
So many possibilities parade up and down the perimeter of the page.
Some wiggle their petootsies at me; one sticks out her tongue.
Being super confident, adorable, and quietly intrusive is the rage.
The word LUCKY gives me an Eskimo kiss, making me feel young.
Lucky what? My muse asks, as she lies on the edge polishing a nail.
She does not care if this poem works or flatly bombs, a total fail.
I pretend we are friends and suggest a few things to go with lucky.
She laughs her head off with a donkey kick, making me feel suckly.
I start making a list of what we could do with this pristine page.
The elves, gnomes, faeries, and brownies take over, they are all sage.
I write lucky penguin, sweet crocodile, happy peacock and tiny giraffe.
I know I am still being made fun of when I hear Trixie’s evil laugh.
So, what is your idea? I ask her, and she grabs the pen from me.
She makes whirls and twirls, dots, slashes, dashes, D’s, F’s and a B.
I study what she has done, and I have to be sort of kind.
Because after I read it I see that Trixie has a super brilliant mind.
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