It’s a thankless job.
The coffee pot usually wakes her every morning like clockwork—four-thirty a.m. Some days she’d like to sleep in until five but it’s a luxury that comes with a price. Because if she did get in that extra half-hour, she’d miss saying goodbye to her husband, and have to hurry over the paper and breakfast. So she would rather not.
How can I tell them about the cold?
Here, such a penchant for rain
we have,
and such an unhealthy love of snow
we have,
We have hopes
made of steel and icicles.
And it’s strange—
Hey, here’s something cold and gray:
night falling, snow falling, eyes falling
asleep,
eyelids like a sagging roof,
and me like a crooked bend
in the highway.
And it’s strange—
But don’t you think it’s strange?
Oh, don’t wake me
from the cold and the snow and the rain.
On the table a candle was set, flickering and dancing. The flame gave forth enough light to see the faces around the table. I sat next to a man who was young and had appearance like myself, Will, by name. Across from him was another man, John, who was tall, bearded, with merry eyes. He held his hand to his forehead with his elbow resting on the table. And directly in front of me was a man with scarlet hair, Martin. His lips were pinched in frustration, as he leant back in his chair with his cloak tightly wrapped about him. Such was Martin’s disposition.
They come to Him in prayer.
followers of the Creator on their knees
They’re asking for His care.
And rain is falling.
They ask Him to sustain
as they fast, eyes on Him
and choose to trust while in their pain.
And rain is falling.
Hearts of stone, of pride
He brings back from
the one who lied.
And rain is falling.
(A writing exercise that had to use all the words in the title)
“Teacher, are you there?” Isabel whispered, tapping the rough tree trunk.
An eye blinked open and swiveled down at her. “Is it summer already?”
Isabel grinned and nodded. “It makes you thirsty. You really want a drink.”
The knothole of wood that was her teacher’s mouth shifted up at the corners. “My roots are deep enough for that. You just want me to make it rain.”
**Both short, though unrelated.**
{1} Untitled (and possibly unfinished?)
the girl up on the balcony—
it's so dark, she's a shadow, she's unseen
high up in the rafters
she can hear the coughing, she can hear the laughter
she can see the magic and she can see the actors.
she's like a stormcloud up there, waiting
look out, it just might start raining.
{2} "Nightmares"
They call it 'otherworldly'--
the nectar-colored sky
behind the blackened front
of the approaching summer storm...
the sunlight and the rain that come at once,
dripping gold...
the sighing of the wind among
the youngest of the trees...
the stirring of the lake
beneath the water lilies...
'Otherworldly'.
I laugh at them--
at the narrow minds
that speak of other worlds but cannot grasp
the wonders of their own,
who cannot fathom sun and rain at once...
or a nectar-colored sky.
Let me just say first that I have a fascination with form poetry. Not just metered, rhymed poetry, but the very rigid, strict forms. In writing fiction, I sometimes get overwhelmed with all the freedom I have regarding word choice, rhythm, sentence length, and structure. I've found that in those circumstances, it can be helpful to confine myself to a particular form, force myself to think inside the box for a change. So here are two of my experiments with form poetry. First, Mockingbird, a haiku, and Queen Anne's Lace, a cinquain.
riding a cloud, unconventional,
flying out loud, interdimensional,
run, jump, fly, come along for the ride.
I'm gonna see you on the flipside.
(chorus)
dancing in the fourth dimension,
step sideways between the particals,
there's no rain in zero gravity,
lost in thought, lost on the flipside.
alien ship, extraterrestrial,
major head trip, super fantastical,
laugh, cry, sing and spread your wings,
how off earth do you steer this thing.
(chorus)
dancing in the fourth dimension,