that's mrs. mediocrity to you

and so began
the year of words
scattering themselves
like autumn leaves
on every page she
turned and all the
commas periods and
semi colons
were left holding tight
to white space and
ideology and she
couldn’t hear herself
think
for all the echoes
but those words they
crawled on her skin
like ants of fire
burning itching demanding
to be set free
til she screamed and ran
for cover finally jumping
into the pool despite
her inability to swim
and those words
well
they joined hands to form
a raft that pulled her
back to the surface
floated her home
laughed at her a little and
whispered secrets
behind flat palmed hands
passing her story around
and around until it
evolved into
an entirely different
poem

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I did it! A poem a day for 30 days.
In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

i am always alone always together
always held in the grip of this life
this amalgam of a long line of
choices i thought i never made
a tea brewed from fifty years
of love tears existence and
breathing in letting go holding
simple tools and learning how to
forge my way down this path
filled with weeds vines growth
finding my way sending out feelers
but i have always been blind and
those tiny bits of light that make
their way through guide me closer
to home deliver me from evil a
periphery of vision i have simply
discarded i can’t see i can’t
see i am lost always lost but
if you stand before me and ask
for directions i can tell you
the best way to get there

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A poem a day for 30 days.
In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

she lived in
a small house
in a small town
in a very small
postage stamp
version
of reality

at night
stars crept
under doors
and into cracks
to make certain
she was not
expanding

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A poem a day for 30 days.
In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

of course it all depends
on how you pronounce it
this word that means
both ill and null and void
this word that creeps up on you
even when you lie there
perfectly still hoping
against hope that
what you are is
something other than
not important
something other
than terminal or
debilitated or even
just plain sick
but this word
it just keeps
creeping and you can look
away if you want
pretend
it’s not there in the
room with you but
this is a word
you cannot
run from

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A poem a day for 30 days.
In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

bitter is a bell
that rings true
at midnight

sings loudest
in the heart
of the insomniac
who cannot
look away
look away
from the depths
of disillusion

reverberation
echoes hollow

molds melody
from habit

finds comfort
in decision

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A poem a day for 30 days.
In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

the sun moves in warm squeaky slithers of light
and i have acres of work still to cover today
yet i rest my head on this crumb-coated table
to watch an ant drag his dead friend home

i remind myself that he feels no grief and is,
in fact, simply gathering supper… i can’t help
but admire his tenacity and try not to inject
humanity into mother nature’s mandala

my heads feels as heavy as the body of resistance
that refuses to fit through a crack in the floor
and somewhere in my mind a song starts to play
about the sky and an ant and a rubber tree plant

and i think how easy it would be to stand up,
end the struggle unfolding before me, a squash
and a crunch and futility becomes forever but
i’m tired, oh so tired, and i kind of like the view

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A poem a day for 30 days. In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo, see more here.

almost far away
she found
an almost disaster
supported by almost
anything but hope
and she saw
with eyes almost open
an (almost)
ordinary life
filter down
through the years
sing song and
pretending
everything
is okay
almost good
almost bad
almost pretty
almost happy
almost broken
almost beaten
almost
turned inside out
almost drunk
almost delivered
angry
almost bitter
hurt
almost fragile
vulnerable
almost hopeful
invisible
almost old
deprived
and
hanging there
in between
every almost
that existed
growing round
like a vine
clinging hard
hanging on
was always
the white space
almost never
of escape

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I found this photo on flickr and was immediately, almost creepily, drawn to it.
The original is here. Poem title is a line from a favorite Cowboy Junkies song.

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A poem a day for 30 days. In honor of National Poetry Month, this post is
part of NaPoWriMo. see more here. And also dVerse poets Open Link Night, join us!

i could fill up a house

with all the things

i need

and you would laugh

at the emptiness

before you

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A poem a day for 30 days.
In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.

is the one that first comes too early
and then waits too long to deliver

green promises that blindly hover
in too tight bud inside too hot days

followed by darkness that freezes
and forms brittle patterns on glass

that holds you in more than it allows you
to see out and you watch as every bowl

in the house fills with words that are
all the wrong shape and the only one

that makes any sense at all is rage
and perhaps a little bit, disappointment

and it’s not like you didn’t know
this day would come, it’s just that

no one ever tells you that when spring
turns to summer it is time to set seed

or at least they never tell you how much
work that is, all that energy spent just

so tiny bits of something will carry on
after you die and besides it is simply

much more fun to be a flower

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A poem a day for 30 days.
In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.
Also joining in the fun at dVerse poets Poetics, join us!

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beckons

screams

flails

whispers

.

she knows

everything

except

how to die

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A poem a day for 30 days.
In honor of National Poetry Month,
this post is part of NaPoWriMo. see more here.