Short Shorthand Poems

How quickly life passes by
We wonder who we are
How we fit in 
We are small, mobile creatures on two legs 
Foraging, we use an odd mixture of concocted 
shorthand
to communicate
And often to miscommunicate...

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Being Taciturn
(TASS-uh-tern)
By: Miracle Man
8/29/2018

She’s often outwardly taciturn in a group setting,
Opting to be inconspicuous, “Like a fly on the wall.”
Being attentive to others while mentally vetting,
Often, her shorthand is chosen method of scrawl. 
...

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Alphabet Soup

Everywhere I look, I see acronyms…

A language all of its own for each category.

A shorthand of sorts.

Outsiders confused and aggravated. 

They requested clarification. 

Only to be answered with jargon shorthand. 


Sherry Emma-Pederson Barton 
April 13, 2024
...

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Hopping along in my Guggenheggly mind
I laugh my thoughts away, many unkind.
Keeping them to myself gives me the giggles.
I am fiercely powerful in this land of the wiggles.

Curiously but secretly stealthily insane
I juggle my thoughts in my poetic brain
Writing in shorthand so interlopers will not know
I am loonier than a Marshgiggle, don’t you suppose?...

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boring meeting.
faculty
we have them weekly
every Wednesday it takes me an extra ten
or twenty-five minutes to get home
mandated 
Even though it usually talks about
teaching math and reading
I teach neither
I begin to write poetry
A co-worker asks, “What are you writing?”
it is about her. She glances at it.
but can read nothing.
I am glad I know shorthand....

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some people type right into the computer
I never thought I would be one of them, but I am
At this second I am sitting my car, writing on a clipboard
As the words appear, I realize how Gemini I am

Words appear in three ways – cursive, print and shorthand
Wait. Four ways, some are abbreviated with periods
If I knew a foreign language, I am sure I would throw that in too
I am such a Gemini!...

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