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Posted: |
Jan 1, 2018 - 6:32 AM
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By: |
mgh
(Member)
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TO MY SON’S WEDDING Newly single and alone, I drove to my son’s wedding and hit a fat black dachshund, red chum spattered in a circle, a ruby ring around my front tire. The owner carefully offered, “Not your fault. Female across the road. Never could teach him the dangers of these mean streets.” His young son opened their screen door, an older sister instantly retrieving him. My sudden remorse for the boy’s strings circling his flattened heart elicited no permanent pity. Next year a new puppy will enchant his eyes, ensconce his heart. Maybe sooner. Driving slower now around normal curves and smooth straight highways, I ponder what to say, my son asking for last minute advice. Hand him the ring. Proffer platitudes. Let him discover soon enough a dog pound’s renewable love purchased for only forty dollars and a can of food. DEATH OF DOXIE For the first time in years, my dog didn’t dash out to dance his greeting around my car. Unable to hurdle the barricade of pain, only the drumming of his incessant tail lead me to the corner where he’d dragged paralyzed hind legs. Called the vet, told the nurse, “It’s time and I need to stay with him.” She snapped “No appointments left, drop him off. We’ll finish it later.” She didn’t understand this singular dog who was only mine, who feared a broom casually leaning on a wall, who cowered from large tumbleweeds summersaulting across my lawn. So I sat in the office, holding his vibrating body, waiting for the attention that should be paid to one so timid and loving. He would not have understood my absence. The doctor muzzled his Doxie nose in blue Velcro, unnecessary for a dog ignorant of cruel jaws. As the syringe shot relief into his paw, I held his face close, mumbling litanies, “Just look at me, no more pain.” His faithful eyes fastened to mine, and then his kind heart stopped, no glassy fading look, just brown open eyes still trusting. Only the silence of the stethoscope and the protruding tip of his wafer tongue signaled my invisibility. At the desk, I paid with a check and my heart, and left, trailing the loneliest objects in the world, a disconnected leash and a collar circling air. At my home, I tossed in the garbage a warm, odorous dog bed and stained food dish. At times I managed a smile when thinking of his eyes that reflected no betrayal because unlike Candy, I didn’t, “let no stranger shoot my dog.” Joanie, You are not only a poet, but a damn fine story teller. If you ever need help writing fiction, please let me know.
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Geez joanie, poignant prose, but i could barely get thru the doxie one, made me too sad. How about some bloody happy subjects, girl, before we all top ourselves with depression!!!.
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Joanie, you keep going - i was just funnin wiv ya. Theyre well-chosen subjects. Hell, the best poems are usually on poignant themes x
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Of flying, afraid, do not be. Tis crashing of which you should be scared shitless. @billcarsoncrappoems.com
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Ennio Morricone Some say He is And forever will be The "Maestro". And yet perhaps It is merely the fact That Morricone Cannot speak English And hence the Italian "Maestro" Is the term Which the Maestro Understands.
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"Checking" translations Is for pedants. Viva la vida Maestro Schmaestro
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Posted: |
Jan 1, 2018 - 11:30 PM
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By: |
joan hue
(Member)
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For the past few decades students in all grades including college have been asked to share their written work with their peers. It is called Peer Editing. It is tough for a writer to see his/her own flaws. (Even professional writers have edit groups.) It is also hard to share one’s written words; words are a part of one’s self. ON EDITING How can I show you never be satisfied with once? Spare yourself red ink pen umpires and remember how few are picked in First Round Drafts. Should I describe my lilac bush that didn’t bloom because I never pruned last year’s dead parts? No. Students won’t relate. Instead, remember your first kiss, a maze of noses, boulder lips, clacking teeth, meandering, tentative tongues, and faces chagrined. Be glad that kissing is a plural act. There’s power yet, a softness in meltings of mutual mouths because you adjusted angles, played with pressure, and readjusted. Then let others, telescoped vision and smelling liked new, well-tuned cars, read your writing. They’ll find fresh freeways for your pen. You became slowly, nine months. Take time with your creation proudly birthing writing that finally has Ten fingers, ten toes.
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I USED to write some poetry... I have a friend who was an English teacher, and one of the poems I wrote(About 18 years ago), he said was BRILLIANT. HOWEVER, if I were to post it here, I would be banned for LIFE!
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Posted: |
Jan 2, 2018 - 5:25 AM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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Joan, I'm hugely impressed! I only write "proper" poetry on very rare and unlooked-for occasions when the muse strikes from nowhere. Our friends' cat, Boots, died a year or two ago. Sadly, our cat, Amelie, wasn't far behind, but rhymes kept popping into my head when Boots went, so I wrote them down just to see how it looked... For explanatory purposes, Boots was black with white feet (surprise) and Ameile was a tabby, and the two of them lived at numbers 4 and 6 respectively. We sometimes liked to think that Boots and Amelie were in cahoots. That cats from numbers 6 and 4 collaborated on a tour of duty to preserve the peace (except of course for birds and meece) The pair would always leave a track – the stripey and the black We liked it when you went away because you’d often ring and say “Could you feed Boots, morn and eve?” That was easy, he’d receive the visits. It was fun to do and made him seem like our cat too. Of love and care there was no lack for cat of mainly black. Boots was master of the hunt, in his mind it was elephant and wildebeest instead of mouse he’d distribute around the house. (Amelie is much less bold – a pussy, if the truth were told, who likes her rodent take-out cold.) If body parts are in a stack, blame the stripey and the black. But feline lives are short and sweet and black of body, white of feet Will now no longer come to greet you, sitting on the stair. The local wildlife have a chance, the birds might sing, the mice might dance, But passing Boots’s house they’ll glance and see a shadow there For while their spirit lingers on, no cat’s ever truly gone.
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