I turned on the radio and heard this country song,
The melody was steady, the feeling sure was strong.
A steel guitar was twanging, like memories in the night,
It painted fields of summer, gold beneath the fading light.
A voice sang about a heartbreak down on some old dusty road,
Of letters never written and love that once had glowed.
He crooned about a front porch, a dog asleep at feet,
A gentle southern sunset and a world that felt complete.
The chorus told of freedom, a truck and open sky,
Of chasing distant daydreams and never asking why.
There was laughter in the verses, and tears within the tune,
Old friends and faded blue jeans, memories gone too soon.
Each word felt like a story I somehow knew by heart,
About losing what you cherish and finding a new start.
I turned up the dial louder, let the music take me home,
In every line and melody, I found I'm not alone.
So here’s to country radio, where memories belong,
And hearts find some comfort in a simple country song.
Howdy friend, I'm new in town.
I think I'll jot a few things down,
which, I hope, might take a frown
and turn it upside down.
OK, now let's play a game,
to see how much we are the same.
These are things that make me smile:
a new bride walks down the aisle
the radio plays my favorite song
a child has a place to belong
fish in a clear mountain stream
being part of a team
I'm weird, I like insects and bugs
but I also like kisses and hugs
a funny, animated cartoon
a cute face on a red balloon
a caring nod, a holding hand
the twanging of a rubber band
a sunny day on the beach
biting a juicy, dripping peach
riding the crest of a wave
climbing into a secret cave
I like to scratch my dog's fur
and the voice of Karen Carpenter
In the morning it is fun
to see a flower meet the sun
a kid on a hot day with a hose
a fly when it lands on his nose
I like to watch a top when it spins
and when the underdog wins
the smell of fresh baked bread
a good story to read in bed
to see the shining happy glow
of a child's face in a talent show
I like munching raisin scones
and wild animals that no one owns
please note, I am also smitten
by a week-old big eared kitten
She said, “I don’t like poetry.”
“Forsooth!” said I, “Really?”
Yet you listen, hour upon breathless hour
To rhythmic verses of country whine,
Endless twanging, chaotic musical notes banging.
In the background, white noise and lustful melodies clanging.
“I don’t like poetry.” He said.
“Forsooth!” said I, “Really?”
Yet you gyrate to the raging beat of violent rapping.
Husky lyrics flow melodiously off your cursing tongue
And spray the peaceful, quiet night with viral, hateful musings.
“We don’t like poetry.” they said.
“Forsooth!” said I. “Like, really?”
Madonna, Taylor, Pink, Katy …
you can’ t wait to download their latest offerings.
Poetry rules your life.
You lust for it.
You need it to survive.
It sets the rhythm of the universe,
And your childish beating heart.
Just because it’s set to music? “Forsooth.” said I.
Copyright Chula Schlesinger Fleming © 9.3.2024
I was in a slumber repose,
so tired- I wanted to rest:
then, a guitar vibrating grows,
I love the twanging of my guest;
bringing feeling that I repressed !
The tune is a dreamy cajole,
an enticement and seduction:
the music speaks love to my soul,
I sigh for my love's destruction;
recall our introduction !
I am in a place misty veiled,
hazy, dark, murky and shrouded:
I see headstones with etching paled,
and names engraved- the stones crowded;
oh, why is the sky so clouded !
I smell the fragrant lilacs bloom,
one day ... I planted these flowers:
he loved so their cluster perfume,
I could stand here many hours;
oh, weary- and now the showers !
We are winded and on the ropes. Backwater banjo boys
strum against us. Clouds feed upon a shoaling light.
A bad day for going out or staying in.
A time to be sleepless. We must live timidly,
or push deeper into a glaring daylight
toward the drugged dreams of the wide-eyed,
go shopping in the poorer parts of town
seek thrifty ways to survive among the striving,
give all our prayers to the birds; then eat them.
Some say they have heard the sky flap away
but many stuff fingers in their ringing ears
and gainsay both the seen and unseen.
There is no sanctuary in night's lean pantry,
the ransacked are laid bare.
Many pick the pockets of the anxious
rattle catch-penny cans on shoe-strings.
Misgivings trespass, tumble ever inward until
reason becomes the reason to flee.
Paltry inklings gnaw at ever longer nights,
and we wonder what ‘tipping point’ tipped
what lid flipped; what line was crossed
as an ever louder twanging strums on?
Joyful frog sat on the rock and bellowed his happy song.
His banjo twanging a rhythm that was totally strong.
Isn’t that part of a human? Isn’t it kind of wrong?
Asked a hippie-like toad who was lighting up a bong.
It might have been part of a human back in the day.
But it has been sitting in the sun, and it’s here to stay.
We must find comfort in whatever we find said a vole.
As he took a swan dive into the skull’s left eye hole.
I recall June dreams beyond seasons' past
which bring me down lanes where old guitars waft ;
his fingers twanging notes, our laughter screams
beyond seasons' past... I recall June dreams.
This man I adore as God’s prized token,
grunts at fairy books with scowls unspoken
yet hands would strum about mythical lore ...
as God’s prized token, this man I adore.
Lurks the night raven with venom impressed--
casting a fierce shock upon his dear chest
to drown rhapsodies from our lane's haven:
with venom impressed, lurks the night raven.
Ablaze in this heart, fiddler’s tunes I keep
where moments enchanted prance in my sleep--
Grandpa, not in time will we be apart,
fiddler's tunes I keep... ablaze in this heart.
Swap The Verse Contest of Joseph May
` included SQ in the title after posting`
6/13/2020
I sat outside the saloon on a bench
just watching the rain muddy the dirt street.
I was in for wet feet or a long wait.
I played my Jew’s Harp with a twanging beat.
My horse waited across the muddy road
tethered in front of Slates Emporium’s Stores
where I’d bought a couple of choice cigars
before having that drink behind bat doors.
6-16-18
I watched Shulamate dance, swirling, whirling
my intoxicated mind fast twirling.
Flame of Setif, Algieria burning
great lust deep within as I was drinking.
Legionnaire of “Sidi Bel Abbes”, bless
“Légion étrangère” with proper clean dress
Second Company, “Rien n'empêche” profess
Regimental sign: “ Nothing Prevents” yes
Music played poor ears with twanging sweet sound
Those beguiling notes making me now sway round,
beating rhythm, gripping me, on soul pound.
.She now made her “pièce de résistance”, and
pulling veil aside, then shows “derrière” bend.
“Vivi France,” “le coup de grâce”, my end.
Street players, dressed in poverty's finest,
beg for recognition and a few coins.
Their unique rhythm is intoxicating,
seducing me with its audacity.
Trumpets, offset by the twanging of strings,
harmonize, in a release of passion.
And setting the beat of their homespun jazz,
youthful bravado sets the night on fire.
Revelry and pathos, played in tandem,
one speaks to the heart, the other, the soul.
And a brass horn sways hypnotically,
as notes intensify, with every chord.
Paul met John twanging banjo, singing a medley
Awed at what he heard playing by The Quarrymen
Five became four struggling to reach a destiny
Boarding a plane on an eternal trip since then
CONCERTED STRUGGLE
Armed only with a thin baton to juggle
He faces an orchestrated struggle
Looks at the plan on the rostrum
Begins under breath with patrem-nostrum
Then a thousand tadpoles on telephone wires
Hundreds of blackbirds on barred barriers
Dozens of clothes-pegs on washing lines
He lunges into his defence designs
Fencing with the imaginary opponent mass
Stabbing viciously at the brass
Windshield wiper action for the string-strums
Thrust and parry over towards the kettle drums
Dizzy from the many-headed enemy
Hair is shaking, face is twitching - there’s too many
The noises continually blaring
Screeching, wailing, twanging, scaring
He finally concedes, stops the fight,
And they too give up the struggle for the night
After this cacophonous riot
There’s a little peace and quiet
I am...unravelling
Unravelling, unravelling,
Like the fraying Persian rug on my cold bedroom tiles,
Like the colourful balls of yarn in my grandmother’s knitting basket,
I am being unspooled,
Like a faulty cassette,
My heart strings twanging and snapping as they unwind
I am falling to pieces,
Imploding, collapsing, disintegrating
Shards of me crumbling to dust and blowing away on the desert wind
I am dissolving,
The tears evaporating from my cracked cheeks,
The blood melting to red mist in my flaccid veins
I am becoming invisible,
I am being drained of color, of life, of spirit
Darkness encroaches, an oily swirling grey,
Swallowing me whole,
Drowning me in nothingness so that I can hardly breathe…
Let alone call out for help
I am suffocating, asphyxiating, I am choking
Every gasp for air lodging in my throat like fish bones
I am dying…
…yes, soon I will be dead
A tangled heap of bleached bones, of strands of hair,
Of unraveled heart strings…of shattered love, strewn across the sand,
A dejected crimson mist
I
To wonder where you are
To wonder where you’ll be
To wish upon a star
To have you here with me
The wonder of the moment spent
In concentrated thought
Is witching at my crowded brain
And stretching twanging taut
Some things are as they are
Some things are meant to be
That doesn’t mean they are
Perhaps just meant to be
I have felt our love exploding exponentially
And the wonder of the feeling is still consuming me
There’s a dragon on my mind
Tipping scales are dripping charms
And god knows what I’ll find
Behind those swaying palms
So hold me closely sooth my fey
And let me live another day
Within your loving arms
For when the darkness comes
And vision fails to see
I’ll reach to feel
For what is real
To know you’re still with me
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