Friday, January 27, 2012

FEBRUARY POETRY challenge to myself

February always seems to be a hard month, a transitional month, a wintry month, though it does contain Valentine's Day and my birthday and my daughter's birthday. . .it still seems to be a hard month. So, beginning the 1st of February and for the whole month I will daily write and "blog" a poem, which is rather intimidating because I cannot practice or predict what each will be. So, stay tuned for my own POETRY CHALLENGE to push the February blues away. . .

Now, I'm not saying they will be "good" but they will be "daily."

February 1st

FEBRUARY
Arrived last night
Right on schedule
Right past midnight

Sailed right in on
Silver grey seas
Silent seas

February came to niggle
And nudge the bulbs
And violets

Into action
No big applause
No trumpets or fireworks

Just quiet like always
Like every year
February came

February 2nd

SQUIRREL
The pleasantly plumped and plumed
Little rascal leaps lyrically
Bounding right up through thorns

On bare branches to lustily attack
The voluptuously rounded
Lusciously red
Rose hips

Then
With a turn and a leap sails off
Through the faded and faltering
Picket fence into the safety

And shelter of pine and oak
Filled with inedible bunches
Of mistletoe

February 3rd

THE CIRCUS
Has come to town
and is in my back yard

Mostly the aerial acts
Trapeze artists with
Feathers and beaks

Swinging/teetering/tweeting
Atop high wires
Amid ancient clothes pins

Flying perch to perch
Flying branch to branch
Flying with no safety net

February 4th

CUPS
Attract me
I like cups
China cups
Not plastic

I like white cups
And colored cups
Painted and printed cups

Whole cups and
Chipped cups even
Cups without handles

I like cups to hold or
To stack
As if sitting in laps

I like the shape of cups
The use of cups
The intimacy of cups

Mouth to the rim
Lips slightly parted
Receiving

February 5th

I HAVE A RULER
That measures not in
Inches but in bunnies

Four bunnies make eleven
And three quarter inches
Or exactly 300 centimeters

Would (do you think)
The world be a better place
If we measured in bunnies?

February 6th

MY CAMELLIAS
Are opening
Unfurling their full skirts
Twirling their own pink beauty

And I'm thinking about
The absence of fragrance
To round out their essence

Perhaps it would have been
Too much - Too thick - Too pure
Overwhelming the senses

Perhaps their scent remains captive
In heaven - released only on holy occasions
Such as birth or death or resurrections

February 7th

I'VE BEEN MISSING
My mom of late and
I'm pretty sure she's
Been missing me

Not the mom I knew but
The one I didn't

Not the daughter she knew but
The one she didn't

We're been missing each other
The one we missed knowing

February 8th

DID YOU KNOW
That by laying a square
Plastic travel clock
On its side you can change

Your perception of time
In such as way as to alter
The state of your mind

If you lay the clock on
Its left side what looked
Like 12:15 is actually

3:30 and I don't know
If this is important or not but
It is definitely something to be

Aware of and
Wary of clocks lying
On the wrong side

February 9th

The milky morning moon
Pale as underbelly feathers
Drifts quickly out over treetops

Moving right along its daily
Ordained journey giving light to lovers
Rousing morning glories and chickens

February 10th

MORNING CAFE

Light jazz tinkles in the background
Amid the clatter of cups and saucers
Snatches of conversations drift lazily

Infused with the aromas of coffee and
Sweet things with nuts and brown sugar
I notice friends - face to face - offering help

Lending advice and wise counsel
While the solitary furiously exercise
Their thumbs over tiny electronic devices

How fortunate to be a friend with a friend
Offering a hearing ear - a gentle touch
Eye contact

February 11th

SATURDAY MORNING

I don't want to get up
Just stay here in bed
While I gaze out the window

At the appearance of a wispy
Blue strip gently expanding and
Contracting between layers of
Grey and lavender and peach

I can see it is cold and I'm not
In a hurry coffee's been brewed
Here comes the first flurry

February 13th

CAMELLIAS

The stiff pink petticoats of
The camellias have gone limp
Drooped right down to their socks
Hanging like damp tissues

Yesterday they frolicked
Twirling and flinging out
Their fine pink beauty for
The universe to admire and behold

But last night the frost came
Froze the pond and froze the song
And froze the haughty blooms
Right where they hung

February 14th

SAY WHAT?

she smiled as she held out
keys and quartered persimmons

i didn't understand but was warmed
by her smile and the moist fruit

glistening in her hard-scarred
well-washed hands and i focused

on the fruit shining like
rosy red frog eggs puzzled

crammed together cheek to jowl
forgetting the keys I don't
understand

February 15th

THOUGHT BUDS
Generally form
Silently slowly
Swelling on slender
Twigs of brain
Circuits or some such
Electro-molecular filament
Until a slight bump appears
Niggling convention
Altering the universe
Forever

February 16th

Heavily knobbed
Branches tremble
As the woof of
The wind charges
Through

Upsetting
Trash cans and
Lawn chairs causing
Chickadees and sparrows
To seek shelter

Beneath long dead
Logs spent leaves
And brambles surprised
By the warmth and the
Brunch

February 17th

Most of what you hear or read
Remains inconsequential
Merely surface fluff unless it is
Purposely grabbed and implemented

Before flying off to join
The multitudes of high ideals and
Good intentions soaring above

The planet headed for Jupiter or Mars
Where they may be detained and implemented
By another more skilled in life than you

February 18th

"C"

As a floozy she surely wasn't
Skinny thing with limbs all akimbo
Pained and somewhat useless

Could hardly cross the street
Without the help of another

Her pimp perhaps yes
Perhaps her pimp got her there
Pained and somewhat useless

February 20th

BLUE STAR

I once bought a deep blue stained glass
Star for someone I won't name and I
Didn't give it to her but hung it on a fine

Chain from the ledge above my front window
Where it transformed white light to blue
Except for its center which was empty - no heart

Every time I pass that translucent star hanging
Lazily reflecting blue into my life I am reminded
That I should have released that heartless star
Long ago but daily I don't

February 21st

I SAW TWO DEAD SKUNKS TODAY

They were not near each other nor
On the same highway and I thought

How unusual or odd that two distant
Skunks would have been out in the cold

Last night not watching where they
Were going and got squished which

Reminded me of stories told by my mom
To my brother and me about animals

That talked and one was a skunk but
I cannot remember her name - the skunk

Not my mom and it is making my head
A little squirrely trying to remember

I think it was Sweet Pea but I'm not sure
And now that memory will haunt me

Until I call my brother and ask
And he will say

What skunk
Mom never told us stories

February 23rd

TULIPS
Are popping - marching
Right up from the trenches
Stout and tight in tidy rows
Obedient as stars waiting in
Formation for the word
Perhaps the sound of a nod
From above
"YES"

February 24th

OVERHEARD
I just want you to know

You must help Anna
She's in the freezer climbing
Up the shelves to get her soup
On the top shelf which is too high

You must move her soup to a lower shelf
Anna's not so young any more and
You don't want to find her lying
On the floor - conked her head

I just want you to know she's
In the freezer climbing
and you must help her
You must move the soup

I just wanted you to know

February 27th

THE LETTER "R"

Rouge red osprey purposely
Hover over rivulets running
Richly over amorous grovel
Rough ridges strangely stretched
Across rising resurgent overflow

Bruised Destroyed
Natural Failure

as you can see. . . I did not finish . . . but I did get several good ones to work on at a later date to put into my next book of poetry . . . coming out in the fall of 2012