Where in the World is Linda?

Heading out for a few days to a funeral in Massachusetts. I'm determined to still write my NoPoWriMo poems and am taking my computer with me but probably won't be able to get online. I'll catch up with everyone on Sunday.

NaPoWriMo-Day 2 and 3WW

Parallel Bounce Mysterious
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Skinny Dipping

We turn off of route 16
and follow parallel tracks
down a dirt
road to Emerald Pool.

We sit on a big
rock overlooking
the water. The sun
covers us like
an electric blanket.
The heat from the stone
is charcoal briquettes.

Soon only our clothes
are left on the ledge
as we play in the cool
water. I feel my breasts
bounce around
like bubbles.

I dive deep
into gray-green
twilight as mysterious
as outer space
as mysterious
as us,
as mysterious
as the poems
I don’t even know
I will write yet.

NaPoWriMo-Day 1

The challenge is to write a poem a day for the thirty days of National Poetry Month.
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Well, here we go.
My computer is glowing
like a grinning puppy
waiting for a treat

and my fingers are itching
to create metaphors
that jump off the page
and stain the brains

of everyone who reads them.
So, where are all the cool
ideas hiding? Why won’t
they come out to play?

I tried three times earlier
this morning to write poems
but the words just lay there
like dead worms.

I even dreamed
about NoPoWriMo
and how much fun
it would be. But, now,

I just sit here looking
out the window
for inspiration. The trees
are still bare. Snow

covers the ground. Oh,
the sun just poked through
and is grinning like
a puppy…Hmmmm…..

I found this flower thing on another blog and was tickled when it said I was a snapdragon! A few years ago, when we owned a motel, I bought a bunch of snapdragons called sonnets. They grew to 14 inches high. How perfect is that for a poet?

I am a Snapdragon What Flower Are You?

Overheard

for ReadWritePoem March 31, 2008
We had to eavesdrop then write a prose poem.
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Standing out in the hallway between classes I heard one guy say to another:

“Hey, man, your hair looks especially fro-ish today.”
And that reminded me of my own hair when I was their age.
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When I was sixteen, I’d do anything for straight hair. Before dances Anita would get the ironing board out, lay a dish towel on top of my curls, put a hot iron on it, and I would pull my straight hair out. I’d shake my head back and forth to make my hair fly like a comet tail.

In those Beatles-crazy days, I used U.N.C.U.R.L. and Curl Free to look like everyone else. It never worked.

I’d wrap my freshly-Prelled hair around my head using it as a huge roller then sit under a space-suit-looking hair dryer for a couple hours and pray that it wouldn’t rain or get humid. It always did.

In college, once, on a rainy morning, I taped the middle third of my bangs to my nose, and used clips to hold the other thirds straight against the sides of my head until I made it to class. I huddled under an umbrella to hide this straightening device. Wouldn’t you know, a guy approached me from behind, put his arm around me, and asked if he could share my umbrella. I tried to hide my face but when he saw the alien walking with him, he took off.

Now that I’m older, I let my shoulder-length hair have its own way. Remember those banana curls your mother would spend hours creating by wrapping your hair around her fingers? Mine does that automatically.

Last week, I had to go to the garage my husband visits after work each afternoon, to get something from him. After I left, one of the other guys in there asked him if I had dreadlocks!

And tonight, when my logger husband got home, he buried his face in my hair and said, “Mmmm, you smell good.” I said, “After a day at school?” He said simply, “You smell better than a skidder.”

Just a small victory for a curly-headed misfit.

Out of this World

for Sunday Scribblings March 30, 2008
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Start with French vanilla
ice cream. Scoop out
a good-sized moon
of it and let it mound

above the sides
of the bowl. Then
sprinkle stars
of walnuts all over.

After that drizzle
pure, light amber
maple syrup
like sun rays

over the whole thing.
Finally, let your spoon
orbit looking for a perfect
spot to land for an
out-of-this-world treat.

Gamble for Writers' Island

Lucky

When we went to Foxwoods
a few years ago,
my mom had such a successful
time playing the Lucky
Seven machine

I remember the grin
on her face when I
found her in the non-
smoking casino
standing like the Statue
of Liberty with her hand
up flagging me down.
And there were
the three red sevens
lined up like soldiers.

After she was paid her 1,199
coins,
we meandered around
other casino rooms
and eventually settled
at a different bank
of machines: she in
front of a Lucky Seven
and me a 5X Diamond
a few seats away from her.

I can still remember
her calling out to me
every time she won:
the three green sevens,
the three purple sevens,
and twice more
the three red sevens.

Everyone around her
was cheering her on.

The only ones she
didn’t get were the pink
sevens that paid 500 coins.

Just before leaving
we walked through
one more time
and she put a $20 bill
into yet another
Lucky Seven machine
and, of course, this
time she got the pinks.

I should have known
then that this winning
day was going to be
our last good time
together at a casino.

But there was no message
in the clanging bells
announcing her success
that less than a year
later she’d be in the hospital
too weak to even
put her own cannula
into her trach
never mind a quarter
into a Lucky Seven
slot machine.