we were
always burdened
by the
captivating chatter
discreetly hostel
last likely
a shew
proposition to
reconsider southwest
precook texarkana
thickened tangy
ambition crookedly
fluster and
recognizable flake
(Weekly Magnetic Poetry Challenge • August 31–September 6, 2026)
The plot thickened
Thinned…then
Thickened again
As idle thoughts perused the air
Each page a hero
Facing fear
Then a shift
Plot’s deviance
A character
That makes no sense
Inserted
As an after thought
Reshuffling the lies I bought
Lightening flashed
The book took flight
Monsters from all ages
Ran amok
And brought to life
The terror
Of the pages
I found it hiding ‘neath the bed
A place I knew quite well
For I had gathered woolies there
In midnight’s game
Of hide and shriek
It began as tone—
no origin,
no end—
a chord mistaken for a world made whole.
A held vibration gathered into shape;
harmonics thickened into edges felt,
and silence filled with structures made of sound.
A pattern looping through a field of noise,
hoping repetition made it true.
Desire tuned the body into pitch,
insisted on a key, a fixed resolve,
refusing dissonance its right to pass.
But slowly, the will releases intervals;
resolutions drift without a home, and rhythm slips its measure into air.
Overtones collapse to quieter threads;
no struck glass shivering into light,
no instrument remains to house the sound.
No echo left to gather into form
only the unheard,
unstruck,
unheld
a silence
prior to all music,
where nothing ever
needed
to be shaped.
Note about the poem:
Written, Agust,1 2026
For The Contest, “Eight By Eight" - Theme, "Fog"
Sponsor: Nette Onclaud.
The early morning fog thickened
as we climbed up the great mountain
one could barely see their own hand
but the air was pleasantly cool
The walk was slow for fear of pits,
snakes, scorpions, wild animals
After a while, we saw sunlight
beautiful thick fog was below
a stunning juxtaposition
the snows of June
days away from july
a blanking of thickened climatation
the something that is in the middle
the arrival of summer bought snow
werest the snows of winter
a summertime spectacle
------------------------------
"the thickened blanketed
snowy climation"
------------------------------
A poetic
metaphorical expression
describing an unnatural,
unseasonable return of
winter conditions during
the early summer.
It evokes the visual image
of a thick, insulating layer
of snow settling
on the summer landscape
------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------
Cabinets of plenty
Are only in dreams
For por folk
Of meager means
Sustenance becomes game
The one with the money reins
Obligation yields just enough
To wet the thickened veins
Movement around food
Becomes slithering on the board
If you are going to win
Subtleties can never be ignored
Hyper-vigilance at the core
Influencing the communication without
Never allowing true desire
To flaunt the heart about
This may be news to regular folk
Who have never known scarcity
To eat and drink without thought
Is truly a precious gift of rarity
Written by Trudy Schrader on 05-23-2026
I wear your handwriting,
fingerprints color my form
pressing poetically, buargeoning
on heaving breasts
and thickened nipples,
lyrical layers of cursive content
reflect rubaiyat scribbles
of "I love you"
across a bared belly
Notes of sweet nothings
linger abut
Warm hands
paint upon with
rapturous rhymes
rewinding,
brushstrokes bathe our bodies,
as I read you
hammering pulsation
of your heartbeat
comes alive,
as sketchings
adrift draft melting kisses
Tattooed tunes,
as pet names,
titillating resins
of a lovers gifts
You are in my skin
Hearty haiku pumpkin squash comforts
Flowery senryus fill my prism bowl perennially
For poets' hungry hearts who crave and share,
It’s creamy chowder congenially
Addictive from the first taste with inspirational flavor,
Aspirations of desire, longing colorful bites, I savor
Romantic rich bisques have me sighing with the saucy sonnet
Bursting is a cheesy limerick, with Blue Bonnet on it
Buttermilk noodles tossed and soupy
Diverse free verse, I’m a groupie
But as you know there is no such thing as a free meal
What’s stressed musters up expressions I feel
When metaphors thickened, stirred in, I'll pour
I loved, I lived, I sipped lyrics with many
Favorites and treasures plenty in the soup d’ jour
When the forget me not fades
it is caught in a soft valley wind like a sparrow
When the forget me not blooms
it rides the hard wind like a circling hawk
When the forget me not fades
it drifts free like a thin breeze
When the forget me not blooms
it is bound within a thickened wind
Murmuring the blurred and wavering nature of the forget me not
a yellowed reed releases a dark cry
Kindred in bound twine,
inseparably free by fiber,
torn by the heat from dual flames.
Chase and kick outward,
indiscriminately,
spiral—undone.
Bystanders are able to face blame,
even though disconnected from incident.
A Bastard those still may be,
if the case is taken up for them
like it wasn’t for our sake.
A landfill of waste,
a place where grace spoils
under a soil of turmoils thickened
by crude oils.
The semi-conductor to
man’s moral coil.
Unchanged by full or semi-sweet molasses mixtures.
Only taken on tour
and touch torch to name,
shining in a spanking light.
Change.
Limos stretch far past
The Vanishing Point.
Ethereal Limbo.
There, in decomposition,
In their lair.
Laughing down at the idea of fact,
which he protests to thee,
threatening its way
past thy door threshold.
With sand kicked up,
irritating the corneal scale
embedding deep within fine carpets
oriental pattern's detail.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
One iron spine piercing coastal fog~
a slow inhale across fractured granite,
salt-thickened breath clotting the beacon's eye.
Waves haul themselves against the rock's ribs
again, always again~
gravity's weary pilgrims collapsing below.
She laced her shoes and faced the dawn
A nurse's love? I'll say "be warned"
As hands this soft can change your fate
Where drugs and needles can't equate
With weary eyes she sees through all
With thickened coats and armored jaws
Behind closed doors she guards the flame
In times of war remains unnamed
When all has crumbled life goes on
A tearful moment can't be prolonged
A hero's cape though bold and bright
May sometimes look like scrubs in white
The grueling skies are darkened now
as heavy clouds clutch barren ground
through thickened fog there lies a bog
a silent menace, foreboding grog.
Yet now, against my wiser will
I slog, to view the slimy pit
that locks the suffocating water tight
no ripples flow, no fresh respite.
A strange attraction draws me in
to meld within this cursed lip of spite
it carries me down and out of sight
to solemn end, to depth of night.
(I had severe endometriosis that led to infertility. Through years of treatment and after a laser surgery, (not common in India at my time, so got it done in the U.S.) my condition improved and had two sons born to me after 12 years. But endometriosis came back with greater vengeance and at the age of 39, got my uterus and ovaries removed)
Ever since I became a 'woman', suffered from acute pelvic pain
After marriage, waited for years with rising anxiety, to fondle a baby
The boon and blessing of every mother, but for me, a bane.
With every menstrual cycle, I saw hopes withering away.
Running from clinic to clinic, doctors found endometriosis, my swain.
With laser surgery, the condition was more or less rectified
And two fledglings were born into our nest- two adorable sons.
Still the villain had his onslaught. In me, he continued to bide.
At 39, terminated the culprit that gave me constant aches.
Now with two organs missing, through life’s current, I peacefully glide.
At first his anger was hotter than July
Or, rather, he was plundered by the weight of
Sorrow —heavier than the ice of January;
The kind of stolid ice that thickened Niagara Falls
Like frozen soup.
He was tall and lissome, bespectacled, in
Dark suits, a brown hat, worn-out shoes of fraternity.
A folded umbrella accompanied him like a touring child.
No wristwatch.
He doesn’t wear them.
Asked why, he normally replies, “There are many public clocks”.
Stocks have plunged
Every expert he asked shared the same opinion?
Stocks are like seesaws —
They rise and fall.
Before then he had assumed that “rise-and-fall”
Was only for dictators,
And of course empires.
And every public clock he glanced up at
Had the same opinion on time? it ticks away,
Slowly, but perfectly.
And if you want to do time,
Then hurry over life importunately.
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