My Anchor

An American Sentence for Posted Positive Poetry. the American Sentence was created by Allen Ginsberg because he couldn’t follow the rules for proper classic haiku. It must be a complete sentence and exactly 17 syllables.

My Anchor
“When someone you love becomes a memory…that memory becomes a treasure.” — Unknown

Even after death, you are still my anchor in sad stormy weather.

Haibun: Shaken, not stirred

For De’s Prompt on dVerse Poets Pub. I haven’t followed any rules this go around.

Haibun: Shaken, not stirred
“A martini. Shaken, not stirred.” Bond, James Bond

My husband was a James Bond aficionado. He knew everything about him. When he was in hospital dying, his only regret: he would miss the new movie.

He will be watching from heaven when I go – I will be stirred without him by my side.

 

Tears in Frames

For Carrie’s Sunday Muse BlogSpot.  Artwork is: “Eyes Without a Face” by Digital Collage Artist Robin Isely A short one today. I have been immersing myself in Japanese classic haiku and am starting back on my quest to be succinct.

Tears in Frames
“One by one, drops fell from her eyes like they were on an assembly line – gather, fall, slide…gather, fall, slide…each one commemorating something she had lost.” ― Lisi Harrison, Monster High

Tears came before I could stop them,
what was the point in wiping them off?
I have imprisoned myself in my grief –
observers wander the halls
in the museum of my grief –
as lost as I

Peeling Fruit

For dVerse Poets Pub.  Today is Quadrille Monday.

 

Peeling Fruit

“What can we expect from an empty shell Where many hearts of pearl once beat to dwell, Waves fail to break hard layer’s bond of love, Wailing shore sends memoir to the sky above” ― Munia Khan

The knife plunges into the blood orange
and the chef pulls back the peel
and rips it from the orange.
the blood orange seeps red liquid.
I feel just like that orange.
the orange bleeds juice –
the human bleeds tears.
the knife keeps ripping.

Cold Stars

For Amaya’s prompt at dVerse which has some strange rules. I hope I fulfilled them all. If not, oh well.

Cold Stars
“You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it.” ― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

I look at the impersonal stars in
the cold night sky
and I wonder –
do they know you died and left my sky?
do they care?
they shine all the time you know.
you just can only see them at night.
How can I care about the end of civilization
when my life changed so drastically?
Is that why you stars shine on in the cold darkness?
Not caring?
You stars suffered an unfathomable loss
eons ago?
And still burn with the pain of it?

The Songs of Birds

A quadrille for Dverse Poets Pub. It is quadrille Monday and De is hosting. She has gifted us the word “fill” or a variant of the word.

The Songs of Birds
“You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it.” ― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

It is cold and rainy but the trees
are speaking with the voices of birds.
Their songs fill the air –
they must have known I was lonely and
needed a friendly chirp or two.
I wander around this empty house
like a ghost – weeping.

Sorrow is Shit

For Carrie’s Sunday Muse BlogSpot.

Sorrow is Shit
“People once believed that when someone dies, a crow carries their soul to the land of the dead. But sometimes, something so bad happens that a terrible sadness is carried with it and the soul can’t rest. Then sometimes, just sometimes, the crow can bring that soul back to put the wrong things right.” ― James O’Barr, The Crow

the crows were once my friends.
then a great sorrow overtook me
and I exploded in anger and then finally,
deep harsh tears.
the crows left me.
I am alone lying here,
the crow drops a key into the empty
cavity that is now my chest –
sans husband, sans heart, sans friends, sans love.
I wish the crow would replace my friends.
sorrow is shit without friends.

Love

I chose option 1  for Mish’s prompt – a book that is physically close to me and that means a lot to me – Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
A short not-quite poem.

Love
“ ‘You’ll stay with me?’
Until the very end,’ said James.”
― J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

I will stay with you,
Until the very end.
I held him until he took his last breath –
my beloved husband whom I love until the end of time.

Days Pass

For Carrie’s Sunday Muse BlogSpot.

Days Pass

The red of sunrise, the blue of the sky all remind me that you are gone.

The End

A haibun for DVerse Poets Pub. It is about new beginnings. I am ending the haibun with an American Sentence instead of a classic haiku.

The End
“Grief is like living two lives – One is like pretending everything is alright, and the other where your heart silently screams in pain.” Anonymous

December 22 my husband died unexpectedly. He had been in the hospital for a few days but then, he died. I sat and held him untl he drew his last breath. Christmas did not exist this year. The New Year’s did not exist. Nothing exists except the deep pain. I walk around the empty house and look out of the windows. The beginning of the year dawns grey and rainy. I curl up in Brad’s recliner wrapped in the blanket. I don’t think I will ever get warm again. Half of my heart has died.
I look up from the depths of a mine, a caged canary beating my wings against cold death.

The Mine

The words. I did not use all of them. solitude, cage, moonless, identical, circle, gravity, canary, root, platitude, apparition

For Skylover’s Word List.

The Mine
“Grief is like living two lives – One is like pretending everything is alright, and the other where your heart silently screams in pain.” Anonymous

January 3.
the smell of petrichor rises
from the roots and
moist air circles me
in the moonless night.
solitude cages me.
an owl drifts across the sky
like an apparition.
I look up from the depths of a mine,
a caged canary beating my wings
against death.

Cafe Royal 06/08/2018

This is a poem I wrote while I was working on my PhD in Fine Arts. I am re-posting it here today with revisions. Why? Because I have been deeply depressed and this poem suits my mood. This poem is part of my Dorian Gray series, written along with a thesis about Oscar Wilde and his times.

Cafe Royal 06/08/2018
“…your body is not a temple, it’s an amusement park. Enjoy the ride.” ― Anthony Bourdain
“The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”  – Oscar Wilde

The third cafe mocha of the morning,
the young man with the antique face
put down his cup and stared at the handsome waiters.
The Café Royal always had the most…delicious waiters.
His eye was arrested by one of the waiters
taking an absinthe to someone –
It was 11:00 am in the morning.
Surely too early for absinthe.
He spotted her.
At the table alone, grief in every inch of her body
She put down the newspaper –
Lowering it down slowly as if,
as if it were a baby or a mortally ill cat.
The waiter flamed the absinthe for her.
He said something to her.
She raised her eyes to him and then lowered them.
Picking up the absinthe,
Picking up the newspaper.
The young man with the antique face
continued to stare at her until
she looked up and saw him.
For once he was ashamed of his actions.
He stood and walked to her table.
She looked at him from head to toe
and said
Nothing.
She lowered her face again and
one of the gorgeous waiters came
with another absinthe.
Don’t, he spoke. Please don’t.
He put his hand lightly on her wrist.
I know grief he said. I know pain of loss
and heartbreak. I’ve watched my friends dying
One.
By.
One.
She put her head down and began to read the paper again.
Upside down he read:
“Anthony Bourdain, 61, found dead by suicide”
For once he was almost human.
For once he almost paid for her drinks and walked away.
Dorian Gray sighed. What the hell,
One only lives forever.
He sat down at the table and looked into her eyes.

Reeve Darney as Dorian Grey in Penny Dreadful