I’ve decided to set myself a little challenge for the year. Each month I will create a poem relating to that month, different styles, differing contexts. Nothing too too taxing, probably dull and doubtful of proficiency but *blows-raspberry and sticks up two fingers, one finger if you’ve really pissed me off*
January – acrostic
January drags
All bare and dark
Never ending nights
Uninviting and stark
Adverse weather
Reducing our spark
Yearning for Spring
A number of years ago I put together a poem about the stress of the Christmas period Festive Stress. I’ve had some amazing Yule Tides at home through my childhood, teenage, and young adult life and had an awesome adventurous one away sailing but as I age and deteriorate I find the pressure to meet the joyous expectations more and more anxious riddled and not being physically capable of getting stuck in very difficult to accept. Anyway I’ve had another ramble through the rhyming world…..
I’m not a Christmas grinch, I just don’t feel the draw
I’m not a Christmas humbug, I just can’t do it anymore
The expectation to get excited, be festive and merry
The stress the season employs, I’m not prepared to carry
Shopping trips round crowded stores, people all jostling
Worrying over gifts ideas, the getting and the wrapping
Writing letters with a positive spin, that cramp my hands strained
Wondering if there’s been a death of which I haven’t learned
Watching all the Christmas specials a sensation begins to rise
It chokes me in my throat and brings many tears to my eyes
Thoughts of gatherings in the past, of staying up until day break
Maybe it’s grief of family died and my loss of ability to partake
I’m quite content in my own space, I’m happy in my own company
Knowing others are celebrating, playing games, chatting bubbily
I don’t feel excluded as I enjoy my Pringles and Brazil nuts
Hoping my kin are feasting heartily on roasts and cold cuts
Excuse me as I politely decline all sincere requests
It gets too overwhelming, makes me an anxious guest
I send you all heaps of Christmas greetings that pass into New Year
From my comfy sofa where I’m warm and in good cheer
Ne’er cast ya clout til May is out. Ha! With the great British weather as it is, I’m na’ casting out my clout regardless of the month. Soo in April there was a frost somewhere every dang night, chilly you say, well it would seem so. Friday morning as carer arrived, in the time it took her to get from car to my door there was rain-heavy rain- hail, chunks of stinging balls of ice! Mother Nature is off her meds again, or her grandkids flipped her calendar back to February.
So … how are things? Been anywhere? Looking forward to being out and about with the great unwashed? I know what you mean, it’s too peopley out there *shudder*
I scrolled back to my list, can you believe it was as far back as 20th March! Time has done it’s thing, still feeling a bit groundhog but the days are lighter for longer. Anyway, as they say, previously
So my to do list is lacking the mastermind effort (I’ve started so I’ll finish). In my defence April got taken over with writing a poem everyday and reading all the other excellent, poignant, hilarious, rude, epic verses.
May, I have decided will be crochet month, each day I will do some, hopefully getting a blanket to grow across a week, maybe a toy or two across the weekend. Ohh, I wrote a poem about that…..
I'm a little hooker
Not short nor stout
Sometimes I swear
Often I pout
You mucky minded readers
Keep your trap shut
It's not what you're thinking
None of your smut
Yarn over, pull through
Yarn over, pull through two,
Front post, half double,
Twiddle deftly is what I do
Blankets for the pussy cats
Toys of fish and mice
A gift to Cats Protection
Because I'm really nice
I must admit there were times went I felt myself going mildly cuckoo as I wrangled to make things rhyme or when rhyming couplets spewed forth like a native second language. Still, I have completed the challenge, a poem per day.
Last time I bored you with a few of my attempts. Well buckle in dear reader, here we go…again!
Our lovely group leader posted a picture of a fun fare, think charactered postcard, as a prompt to rhyme.
Yesterday at the funfair, There was so much to do
Throwing for coconuts, Hooking a duck or two
Crash banging on the dodgems, Screaming at the ghost
Stopped atop the Ferris wheel, Sure scared me the most
Eating hot dogs and candy floss, Galloping around the carousel
Sliding down the helter skelter, I started to feel unwell
With all that motion and excitement, The injested sugar and grease
My inside started to heave, It had to be released
Sorry Mr Tristrum I tried my very best
Apologies for spewing all down your bright striped vest.
Another bright thought in the wee hours, triggered by a podcast I was falling asleep to
I love an oxymoron they often make me laugh
Like being 'slightly pregnant', or choosing the 'larger half'
Being 'weirdly normal', when you're 'clearly misunderstood'
My 'unbiased opinion' tell me these are 'terribly good'
I feel your 'deafening silence', hear your 'dull roar'
From 'growing small' with 'intense apathy', wait I have more
How 'awfully good' was that 'crash landing'
What about a 'civil war' or being 'found missing'
It really is the 'living end' how 'seriously funny' these get
'Good grief', it is 'properly ridiculous' and yet
They're 'openly deceptive' and leave 'only choice'
Our language is ridiculous But it's our only voice
I found the challenge of haiku and fib syllable patterns quite enjoyable.
One
Nine
Thirty
Twenty six
Forty four, sixteen
Bugger, no Jackpot win, again
As for the last day, well…….
When April returns in 2022
Wanting another each day
You can if you want to
I'll be running the other way!
I’ve kept all my creations in a document, after a month or four I’ll re-read them and groan, maybe blush a little that I put them in public view.
April is National Poetry Month, across the cyber world people attempt to grapple and wrangle with their language to conjure something of power, of poignancy, or amusement. Poetry is one of those forms that has many variations, from the syllable structure of hiaku, tanka and fib, the free form structure (isn’t that a contradiction terms, an oxymoron), limerick, sonnet, the list goes on.
Many moons ago in the blogging days of the defunct bcuk.com a group of us would game play with words, write short stories, poems, enjoy the weekly Friday fives, Wednesday wordle and alike. A few of us are in a private Facebook group and have been enticed (read cajoled) into taking part in the write a poem everyday.
Now I am no bard, I struggle enough just writing a blog. My levels of imagination swing between non-existent to fleeting sparks. Yet somehow I seem to have ended up joining in and I might admit begrudgingly that one or two of my attempts ain’t too too bad. I shall now proceed to bore you all with a few, please feel free to vacate now if you wish.
Let’s start with a light limerick
There once was a man from Nantucket
Who was troubled by the hole in his bucket
Eliza suggested
Henry then tested
Until they conceded to chuck it
A haiku follows a syllable pattern of 5-7-5.
Procrastination
Is my new occupation
Until tomorrow
A fib poem follows the syllable pattern 1-1-2-3-5-8, and I was attempting one when the death of HRH The Prince Phillip, Duke of Edinburgh was announced
Gone
Dead
Grieving
Such a brain
Such a character
None like him will be seen again
The acrostic style is where the first letter of each line spells something out
Nonchalant
Openly inquisitive
Through my window creeps
Mannered and quiet
Yet expecting
Chair, blanket or lap
And caresses on head and chin
This cat of not mine
There there is the more traditional comfortable style
Fight The Rhyme, is the new rallying call
We'll storm the libraries, we'll march to Whitehall.
April has been high jacked, It's becoming quite the strain
More addictive than hippie crack, the effort quite the drain.
It's sneaky and enticing, You're teased with a simple ploy
Just a few to start with, to release those endorphins of joy.
A little harmless game, it's fun, a poem a day
Before you know it you're caught, and with headaches you pay.
I am here to make a stand, to stop this engulfing all of us
If you need help, reach out, to Poets Anonymous.
Websites like thesaurus.com, rhymezone.com and syllablecounter.net have seen their hit rate sky rocket into the stratosphere.
Right then, off to wrestle with tomorrow’s attempt.
The world beyond my window
Is in a bit of a state
With pandemics, plastics and pollution,
Deforestation and nuclear waste.
The world beyond my window
Is in a state of fear
With anger, riots and violence,
Police suited in riot gear.
The world beyond my window
Is sometimes blue and green,
With life and light and untold
Beauty to be seen.
The world beyond my window
Was somewhere to explore,
Rolling on the high seas,
Rocking around a dance floor.
The world beyond my window
Is removed from me,
Years and decades have flown by
While my mind thinks it 1993.
The world beyond my window
Is somewhere I don't pursue,
It's not because of Covid
More nothing I can do.
The world beyond my window
Continues without me,
My ability has passed
To work, drive and spree.
The world beyond my window
Has become out of reach.
My access is now virtual
And that's a dreadful pastiche
Poets are looking to rhyme corvid19
That has put us all in quarantine.
First some people act as an unruly teen
Behaving the worst I’ve ever seen.
But what can we glean
From this growing scene.
Of their stockpiled pasta and Andrex clean,
Of groups congregating, turning mean.
A few with the kind hearted gene
Volunteering to help and shop for cuisine
Deliver food and much needed caffeine
A smile and a wave through windows clean.
Perhaps there is much we can glean,
Society may not be pristine
But during times of the unforeseen
Acts of consideration are not few and far between.
©️AnneMarie2020
Dark December days
Leeching life’s lustre
Morphing melancholic moods
Damp drizzle descends
Languid leaves loam
Freezing frosts form
Dreck drizzle drops
Sleet slams skin
Mental motivation missing
Damp decay deforms
Winds whip wildly
Endless echoes emanate
December drags deeper
Christmas is coming, The goose is getting fatThe TV Ads are blaring, giving it all that.
Mum is busy stressing, what gifts there are to buy
No socks, pants or smells, harder she must try.
The stick tape’s gone missing, the bows won’t even stick
She watched all the videos to find the wrapping trick.
The decorations are dusty from storage in the attic,
The waving snowman should move but he standing there all static
The cats gone up the tree again, the baubles won’t survive,
The dogs been at the mince pies, the hamsters at the chive.
The kids are all excited at the gifts beneath the tree
Trying to shake and feel and find which one’s for me.
Dad’s no help, he’s snoring, he’s sampled the christmas punch
Mum needs a bigger oven to cook the christmas lunch.
Turkey roast and turkey stew, and turkey curry too
Anyone for more sprouts, the gravy turned to goo.
Come Boxing Day it’s all over, well it is for some,
One is still working, you know her, she’s called Mum.
As you raise a glass to toast and welcome the New Year,
Just 359 days until Christmas again is here.
I am sure I wrote something similar one christmas ago, might have been on a community group over on the departed and deleted BCUK. Anyway here is something rattling around my head [anything to avoid the wrapping].
Christmas is coming, The goose is getting fat
The TV Ads are blaring, giving it all that.
Mum is busy stressing, what gifts there are to buy
No socks, pants or smells, harder she must try.
The stick tape’s gone missing, the bows won’t even stick
She watched all the videos to find the wrapping trick.
The decorations are dusty from storage in the attic,
The waving snowman should move but he standing there all static
The cats gone up the tree again, the baubles won’t survive,
The dogs been at the mince pies, the hamsters at the chive.
The kids are all excited at the gifts beneath the tree
Trying to shake and feel and find which one’s for me.
Dad’s no help, he’s snoring, he’s sampled the christmas punch
Mum needs a bigger oven to cook the christmas lunch.
Turkey roast and turkey stew, and turkey curry too
Anyone for more sprouts, the gravy turned to goo.
Come Boxing Day it’s all over, well it is for some,
One is still working, you know her, she’s called Mum.
As you raise a glass to toast and welcome the New Year,
Just 359 days until Christmas again is here.
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Just Me, Nobody Special 