Things You Might Do With a Single Match
Ignite it, for sure,
with scratching friction
that scorches wood
and bone and earth
or turn it into
an imaginary friend,
with a phosphorous head
and single-footed body,
dancing on the table top
or hold it up at deepest night,
a firefly levitating in darkness
off outstretched finger,
painting ink-light on air
or place it back, gentle,
into the book from which it came,
where fellow stories wait at rest
for the chapter to close
for #openwrite and #mastoprompt
(inspired by https://www.ethicalela.com/things-you-can-do-with-an-orange/)
If only he'd let me
keep looking
for peepers and frogs
instead of home,
I'd stay, peeking
beneath forgotten logs
but no, it's time,
he tells me,
it's time for us
to go
I wave goodbye
to the woods
and stories
I'll never know
— for #openwrite about shifting to a different perspective
https://www.ethicalela.com/perspective-poem/
Sometimes I am judge,
and sometimes I am jury,
and sometimes, I stand accused,
madly dashing down notes
for my defense of a scribbled-out
poem or song or story,
written in a rush and posted
before I took the time to consider
each line as evidence
to be used later in trials
of a writer's revisionist history.
—inspired by #openwrite and the prompt of a One Sentence Poem
https://www.ethicalela.com/one-sentence-poem/
If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn — Charlie Parker (attributed)
What exactly am I living
when I am playing music
out of my horn, just the way
Bird told it, according to
some, while according to
others, maybe the words
of Bird I carry around with me
were never his to begin with,
and ain't that just like a bebopper
like Charlie Parker
to lift something from someone else
and riff it into your own as a bit
of theft, and all I'm left with here
to play with is the possibility
that we need to live our days
like stories like song
like improvisational poetry
— for #openwrite
Come grab your chair
I'm over here
These days we write
won't disappear
We sit to watch the stories grow
I've traveled your stories
You rest in my poems
We share the shade
of leaning, home
We sit to watch the stories grow
When you're the leaves
and I'm the stem,
we root together
and wait for Spring
We sit to watch the stories grow
And next year's harvest
starts with this year's seeds
We gather our words
on this fragile belief
We sit to watch the stories grow
I wonder
if the world
dreams of
me
and if it
dreams of
me,
what might
the dreaming
world see of
me?
Am I
a thorn
or a source
of pride?
A knitter's
hook or a
singer's
smile?
or maybe
the world
doesn't dream
at all of
me
maybe the
world can't fall
asleep;
a restless spirit,
all because of
the likes of
me
for #openwrite
https://www.ethicalela.com/i-dream-a-world/
Short Thoughts About Writing
Ink
gone dry;
poems still flow
Write
of spaces
between the stones
Stories
don't exist
until we speak
Leaving
off letters
makes new words
Sometimes writing rules
break, become
bent
Memory
becomes filter
for remembering nothing
Pages
closed, the
book remains unwritten
for #openwrite using Hay(na)ku Poetry Style https://www.ethicalela.com/haynaku/
Alternative Names for the Daily Newspaper
- smudged inked fingers, with coffee and scones
- echoed shouts of rolling machines in motion
- camera lens clickclickclickclickclicking
- question/answer question/answer question/
- crumpled thin paper fire starter
- Relic, yet reliable
- Tipping on the balance beam, daily
- The space where death goes to be noticed and remembered
- Paneled fun space art show gallery
- Help Wanted: A daily document to connect the community
for #openwrite
https://www.ethicalela.com/alternate-names-a-list/
inspired by https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/56843/alternate-names-for-black-boys
Hiding Myself in Annotation (An Experimental Poem)
One: See #2
Two: Where a part of me
might linger
in a poet's notes,
the other ghosts to
Three: See #5
Four: You notice I'd crouching
not revealing much, in order
to hide to
Five: In public spheres, where
one so easily disappears,
I am barely these words
as you think you know me
here
Six: See #3 then step to #8
Seven: I am Kevin.
That much is truth.
Eight: I am writer power
poet teacher preacher songwriting
go it alone leaping forward
like skipping stone to #10
Nine: See what I did there? Gave just
enough verse to completely
disappear from here, and then hit
the poem upon reverse
Ten: Back to #7
for #openwrite
https://www.ethicalela.com/steps-to-being-insert-name/
Whose woods these are
I may no longer know
as my shoes dip heavy
through new-fallen snow
The dog's beyond me,
on the trail of a scent
as I follow her tracks,
in silence, seemingly sent
from somewhere above;
trees grabbing midwinter sky
as I hike through the gap
between the ground, and I
for #openwrite with hat nod to Robert Frost (of course)
http://www.ethicalela.com/out-back-a-form/