A Poem a Day

cake

This is a sonnet about cake. I’m not kidding. Oh my god this is so bad. I think I might just give up. I don’t like poetry after all.

I don’t know what it is about cake
that makes me feel so calm.
Bad days are an excuse to bake
kneading dough with my palms.

Pouring it from bowl to pan,
taking time to lick the spoon.
Vanilla bundt turns golden tan,
watch it rising like the moon.

Out it comes, breathing heat
touch it lightly and it springs.
Mouth watering for this sweet,
thick frosting is just the thing!

Cut a slice, make it thick.
Eat it slowly, that’s the trick.

in which i get tired of napowrimo

21 days, 21 ways to write a shitty poem.
Is it time to go home yet? Pack up my words,
put away the rhymes that spend too much time
trying to be clever. Short stories, you see,
are so much better than these poems. Leave
this form for those who know how to handle
meter and verse, who don’t curse the fact
that they can’t remember how many lines
a sonnet has, and who can’t, upon remembering,
come up with 14 good ones. I am trying but I am tired
and April won’t end a moment too soon.

seeds

seeds are planted, seeds are plucked
by the lackluster, the blustering cold,
the less than thrilled, the chilled,
but not killed. simply laid aside

for another season, no reason needed,
not really. there’s no good-enough
for some people, no use in trying
or in crying. moving on, it’s what we do,

how we’ve been raised, what we know.
and it works. wounds heal, grief fades
and these gardens will lay, waiting
for whatever we decide to finally plant.

bffs

Today’s Read Write Poem prompt is non-sappy friendship. So here is an only slightly sappy poem. For my friends!

we are two coffee cups, deep with wide mouths
that never stop running. chipped in the same way,
appreciating the quirkly slogans printed
on our round bellies. cheers to us.

we are piles of clothes, traded back and forth
worn out and worn again, everything old is new
when we share. we compliment, shake our heads
guide one another to the look that looks best.

we are kitchen tables and craft night, cookies warm
from the oven, packages that arrive unannounced,
yoga class, funny stories, too much wine.
we are friends, we are forever, and i am grateful.

miles and miles to go

Three miles in the rain, not so long
but enough pain in my shins and calves
and my chest and my heart. My lungs
are angry with me, my knees do not look
kindly on my mind

which tells me to keep on going, even as my
body begs me to stop. But there is a finish line
not so far away, with water and oranges

and other runners, all of us wearing numbers
pinned to our backs. I can run three miles just fine
but when people are around me, when there is
a pack, I run faster than I should, pump my arms
harder than they would
if I were running alone, six slow miles on a wooded path
through the center of town, trees tall and shielding me from
the roads and cars that care not for anyone lacking four wheels;

past the creek that rises and falls with the rains. Six slow miles
is sane, you see, easy and carefree. Three miles in the rain
demands a faster, more focused pace. A beginning, an end

and me inbetween, breathing and sweating and yes
yes
I’m there.

beginning

I used the Read, Write, Poem prompt for today. These daily poems are getting harder and harder to write. I hope I make it to the end of the month.

Where to begin? At the end, naturally,
where everything I want, is mine.
Where everyone I love, is here.
Where the words are abundant, flawless, filling
the holes in my heart, the pages of
magazines. Where a modest collection of books
line the shelves of my personal library, my name
on every spine.

How to get to the end? Plunging forward, of course
feigning delicacy on a graceless path,
stumbling, crashing through branches and bushes
that draw blood and leave long and ugly scratches
up and down my arms. Fine. I’ll do it, walk where
I need to walk. Begin with modest attempts, trudge
in every dark place placed before me. The end is not so
far off, as long as we’re always beginning.

4-16-09

Two years to the day and a flyer
appears on campus. It speaks of violence,

bullets, death, decay. But not in any
metaphorical sense. Not in anything close
to sense at all. A cry for help, probably
but who can be sure? And the police

come to campus in cars, on bikes, patrolling the grounds
and laying lingering looks on various students, searching
for a clue, a strange glint, some foaming at the mouth, perhaps,

not willing to rule anyone out. But nothing happens.
At the end of the day, we turn our locks and
open our doors, step out blinking into the light

slightly disappointed by this turn of events, this
non-event, forgetting what happened two years ago
to the day. We eat dinner and figure someone else will

take down the flyers.

shameless

At the poetry reading tonight
I plan to beg, borrow and steal
as many metaphors, line breaks and stanzas
as I am able to fit in my purse.

I am bringing my big purse.

And I am not ashamed to share this with you, you
who many end up here, on this page
a version of yourself you do not recognize
or particularly like. The truth, it hurts.

But I promise - there is no harm in this.

What are we, but orbs circling one another
planets in the same system, breathing the same air
sharing DNA, germs, the confines of one small earth
bumping elbows. Holding on. Begging, borrowing,

and stealing. It all comes from the same place.

ship and harbor

Despite my best efforts, I missed ANOTHER day of this challenge. Shucks. Here’s today’s desperate attempt at metaphor - I’ve been digging the ship and harbor thing as of late. Lastly, be on the lookout for those two missing poems, which shall appear sometime before May.

Harbor said to ship,
“Don’t slip into my safety
without asking me first. You see, I thirst
for the open sea too. But I know I’ll sink
if I dare move through salty air,
heave my heavy boards and ropes
tie my waterlogged posts to hope
for hope is a buoy, doomed.”

Ship said to harbor,
“Don’t ask me favors, this flavor
for venturing is an aquired taste. I don’t
rock as much as you think, I too fear of sinking
into the sea that betrays me
every time a storm comes to port. The sort
of life I seek is a rope and a shore
nothing more, just a place to rest my maiden’s head.”

Harbor listend to what ship said,
moved groaning boards to make some room.
Ship slipped in, covered in sea’s grime
and each got a piece at the same time.

working

taut muscles and slender stomachs
hips and thighs that don’t surprise
the onlooking with their sway.

we are taught to work, push and pull
burn and earn the right to walk
in public places. no room for imperfection

here; use it or lose it
or have it taken from you. give it away,
if you have to. and never forget

that one can only count on calories.
you must desire nothing, for example: 
the absence of womanly curves. less is better

(unless we’re talking breasts.) sway
only in the wind, and don’t you dare
take up too much room.