Could I have written novels
How about short stories...
Perhaps non-fiction could have been my forte
True adventures, riveting biographies...
Really, I don't think so; I'm getting old
I wouldn't succeed at those genres, truth be told
Given my shrinking attention span
It's poetry or naught for this 'minuteman'
Categories:
minuteman, books, humor, old, poetry,
Form: Rhyme
*Image of Shattered Time by dreamstime
Broken Time
Its hands went frozen a warm summer June,
Bought it new when cool though it waned since then,
Days were young and fresh loved e'er so oft loom,
Vivid hues displayed stills toured page again.
Surged wave tickles feet, residual foams,
A swept updraft breaths as white floats thither,
A thoughtless lapse inside watery zones,
Checked, still ticking, stoppage, not a whisper.
An off-Broadway show, we took the backstreet,
Save being noted, the maddening crowd,
Numbers by one less the proper count sheet,
I look, it is time, lifts the curtained shroud.
Crumpled real, keepsake be, not a myth,
My minuteman whose Father Time, kept with.
2019 September 23
*2nd Place*
In the backstreets of my mind
~~Silent One: Judged 2019 September 26
Categories:
minuteman, allegory, america, analogy, appreciation,
Form: Sonnet
I am the minuteman
and I’ll lay thyself in a grave,
whether from distant lands
or if you’re just from down the lane,
Stand against freedom and
I will treat you all just the same,
God help you if
you step in my aim
I am the minuteman
and the weight, it falls upon me,
I must do what I can
to ensure my family’s safety,
my skin is worn and tanned
from stepping into the breech,
but I will take a stand
to stay free.
I am the minuteman,
I fight to save this land,
best not to force my hand,
or I’ll lay thyself in a grave.
We are the minutemen
and we cross frozen rivers at night,
to storm sleeping Trenton
and put startled Hessians to flight,
panic, it does grip them
as they leap from bead in a fright,
they thought us useless hens
who don’t fight…
We are the minutemen,
and we won’t be put off by freezing,
Valley Forge thinned our ranks
but there was a fight due come spring,
hardship has become a friend,
now no Red-coat seems frightening,
at Monmouth we showed England
quite a thing.
I am the minuteman,
I fight to save this land,
best not to force my hand,
or I’ll lay thyself in a grave.
Categories:
minuteman, america, conflict, courage, freedom,
Form: Rhyme
Security Breaches at USA Nuclear Missile Base
By Elton Camp
In Montana, Malmstrom Air Force base
To keep Minuteman missiles is the place
Each is tipped with a nuclear warhead
That can cause many folks to be dead
Since they can be instantly fired
Each is in a silo and a guard hired
Yet, a relentless invader’s got inside
Digging a tunnel he has been spied
Under silo’s protective fences he will go
Damages roads, fences, cables we know
Barriers to tunnels have been erected
However, they didn’t work as expected
The invaders continued to come on in
There seemed no way security could win
Laboratory tests have shown a new way
It will undergo tests at the base any day
Its success still remains to be seen
But security guards are feeling keen
Perhaps they will soon be sure
That the missiles are secure
These ground squirrels can’t dig
When the new barriers they rig
Thus the rodents no longer can
Come near to the Minuteman
Categories:
minuteman, humor,
Form: Rhyme