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 Entries to The Daily Poem Contest. |
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| Nocturne in Perspective In the gloom of that Stygian hour before the dawn, when the eye longs for the relief of morning, trying to discern the world in forms familiar, failing, defeated by the unlit shades of daylight’s absence, then the mind yields in heartfelt acquiescence to the notion that we remain diurnal, creatures of the sun forever, bound by vision so dependent on the daily rebirth of the light that gives us sight. We may break off pieces of the day with candle, gaslight, electricity, to carry in our exploration of the world beyond illumination’s reign, yet this merely emphasizes our reliance on the light. Line count: 12 Free verse For The Daily Poem, 11.01.21 Prompt: IT IS NOT THE DARKNESS, BUT THE ABSENCE OF LIGHT 1. You may only use the word DARKNESS if you use the entire prompt sentence, and you may only use the sentence once. 2. You may NOT use the following words: night, dark or darkness (except as above), dusk, black, or void (or any derivatives) 3. Your poem must be at least 7 lines long. |
| Twenty Twenty Never thought there’d be a date with such a funny name bad enough not to belong in the family of nineteen but then to repeat the error seems like a speech impediment. Never thought there’d be a time when the world ate itself hiding away in a corner and munching on its fear as though disease and death were new and not as old as life. Never thought there’d be a year when I’d not dare consider the future a land to be desired watching fate weigh the balance between despair and hope dreading a finger on the scales. An interesting year, of course, but remember the Chinese curse “May you live in interesting times.” Time machine, anyone? Line Count: 22 Free Verse For The Daily Poem: WdC Birthday Edition, Sept. 07 2020 Prompt: Write a poem about seeing 2020 off. |
| Behold the Ripper This is how I murdered it, Ray Davies’ whiny voice objecting in my ear, the sounds of You Really Got Me fading into the background. They put a parking lot on a piece of land When the supermarket used to stand. Before that they put up a bowling alley On the site that used to be the local palais. That's where the big bands used to come and play. My sister went there on a Saturday. Come dancing, All her boyfriends used to come and call. Why not come dancing, it's only natural? Another Saturday, another date. She would be ready but she's always make him wait. In the hallway, in anticipation, He didn't know the night would end up in frustration. He'd end up blowing all his wages for the week All for a cuddle and a peck on the cheek. Come dancing, That's how they did it when I was just a kid, And when they said come dancing, My sister always did. My sister should have come in at midnight, And my mum would always sit up and wait. It always ended up in a big row When my sister used to get home late. Out of my window I can see them in the moonlight, Two silhouettes saying goodnight by the garden gate. The day they knocked down the palais My sister stood and cried. The day they knocked down the palais Part of my childhood died, just died. Now I'm grown up and playing in a band, And there's a car park where the palais used to stand. My sister's married and she lives on an estate. Her daughters go out, now it's her turn to wait. She knows they get away with things she never could, But if I asked her I wonder if she would, Come dancing, Come on sister, have yourself a ball. Don't be afraid to come dancing, It's only natural. Come dancing, Just like the palais on a Saturday. And all her friends will come dancing Where the big bands used to play. And now that the deed is done and to make it easy, here’s the result of all that slashing: On a piece of land They used to play My sister on a Saturday Would be ready In anticipation They did it My sister did In the moonlight By the garden gate The day cried My childhood died I'm grown up and My sister's married I asked her Don't be natural Saturday Her friends will play. Line Count: 17 Sorta free verse For The Daily Poem: WdC Birthday Edition, Sept. 06 2020 Prompt: Redaction Poetry. I used The Kinks’ Come Dancing lyrics. |
| Our Daily Rain Speak not of clouds but the sky, grey with its misty burden lowered upon the earth, its edges whispered into the air we breathe, damp, clinging, wet with the pinprick silvered drops magically coating the fibres of our clothes, caressing our souls with the essence of the sodden earth, our skin touched by the fingers of the soft rain, gently, brushing our hands and eyelids, turning at last to gentle showers, perhaps to downpour to fill the brooks, the streams, the rivers, and so define this place, this land of water, this grey and pleasant England. Give us this day our daily rain, and forgive us our umbrellas. Line Count: 20 Free Verse (of course) For The Daily Poem: WdC Birthday Edition, Sept. 05 2020 Prompt: Listen to today's instrumental song (Eluvium - Prelude for Time Feelers) and write a poem based off of wherever the music takes you. |
| Amilcar’s Apotheosis There being some discussion, rumour, gossip and hearsay on the subject of Amilcar the hermit, renowned sage and enlightened one, his age being variously stated between sixty and eighty years, we can assume that he was already old when, one fresh and clear-edged morning, he found a basket with baby inside on the threshold of his mountain cave. The police being summoned by the judicious use of a cellphone proffered by the first of his supplicants, investigations material and metaphysical produced no erring nor desperate parents, this process taking several weeks, Amilcar had come to know the baby and decided that he would raise the child, its fate now entwined with the hermit’s and, besides, he cared for it now, having tended its needs during the weeks when the parents were sought. A diamond, one of many brought by followers in gratitude for the wisdom bestowed, was sold to provide the funds to support the raising of the child and, for the next twenty years, Amilcar tended, nurtured, protected it, while the steady flow of followers, come for the advice of the sage, dwindled and eventually petered out as his advice became a matter of the raising of children in the correct manner, the proper attention to education of the young and the need to consider the pace of release of a child into adulthood. This dedication of the hermit to the upbringing of his growing charge, left him without thought of the road to enlightenment and his advice on child care was not needed by those that considered themselves adept in such matters. Time found the hermit and the boy (for so the child was), isolated in their mountain fastness yet happy in the company of each other. When the boy was grown and eager to venture forth into the world, knowing the shape of his future and impatient to reach for it, Amilcar hugged him and let him go, understanding that, as he had been the boy’s deliverance, so had been the boy for him, lifting him from the sole contemplation of his own existence to a greater revelation of his capacity to love, this twist being the true enlightenment he had sought for so long. Alone as never before, the hermit smiled with the knowledge that his life was now complete. Line Count: 63 Free Verse For The Daily Poem: WdC Birthday Edition Prompt: Write a poem about being alone. You must use the following words from the song: diamond, shape, twist, deliverance. |
| This, Too, Is Dance I remember old people, cardigan clad, slippered and held fast in a sedentary existence, yet ready ever to hum or sing a stately song of love and life in the long ago. Those still mobile might shuffle together a few halting steps on the floor, obedient yet to the gentle call of songs remembered when all else has gone. Even then I laughed, imagining my generation, decades in the future, bodies bent with pain, but still donning jeans and T-shirt every morning, finding it hard to face the fact of too many years being young, incapable now of the wild gyrations we called dance, but listening, still listening, to the music of our heyday. Ancient now and barely mobile for short bursts of careful travel, I know full well the irony of me, king of cool, brought low in a future I never expected, having decided in youthful vanity that I’d be dead by the age of forty, yet still here when close to double my expected span. The music in my ears (still working though not as well), pounding out the beat of the hallowed sixties, draws the same response from my aching bones, the legs, no longer trusted to dare a hurried step, but with toe tapping, shoulders swaying, head nodding, I do the geriatric dance, last defiance of the nursing home. Line Count: 48 Free Verse For The Daily Poem: WdC Birthday Edition, Sept. 03 2020 Prompt: Dancing in an unusual place. |
| Cento of Attention Hey there baby, I could use just a little help Wanna change my clothes, my hair, my face (This time, baby, this time, baby, this time, baby, this time) There's something happening somewhere I'll show you in spring, it's a treacherous thing You can't start a fire worrying about your little world falling apart Been there, done that, messed around There’s certain things that should be left unsaid We should have each other with cream We slip through the streets while everyone sleeps To walk away from something when it’s dead I shake this world off my shoulders Come on baby the laugh's on me Line Count: 13 Free Verse For The Daily Poem, Sept 01 2020 Prompt: Write a Cento - a Cento is a poetic form composed entirely of lines from poems by other poets. Sources: Lovecats, Bulletproof, Dancing in the Dark. |
| Repeat Until the End Like Yeats’ falcon in the widening gyre, we spiral in the dance, recycling arguments, sweat blurring our eyes, as our grip on the centre loosens and lets go, we swing wildly to the edge in our centrifugal course away, away from reason, destined only for the darkness that waits outside. Line Count: 12 Free Verse For The Daily Poem: WdC Birthday Edition Prompt: Pick any line from David Bowie's LET'S DANCE and use it as inspiration for your poem. Make sure you indicate which lyric(s) you chose at the end of your poem. I chose the line [Repeat until the end:]. I know it’s a cheat but it’s a line in the lyrics as stated and I really can’t stand that song. |
| Epilogue The problem with endings, they lead to new starts; beginnings can’t be trusted, they carry no guarantee. But endings are old friends, familiar and warm, they speak of the past, the work completed, the task achieved. There’s no confrontation, no sudden surprises, all finished and nostalgia can paint the memory with the best of the days and the titans defeated. The end is for enjoyment, for relaxation and rest, for final words like accomplishment and achievement and done. Savour the day and bask in the light, it doesn’t last long, for tomorrow stands waiting just one question to ask - What are you going to do now? Line Count: 26 Free Verse For The Daily poem, July 31 2020 Prompt: Write about an ending, closing or goodbye. |
| Daedalus Daedalus, great of wisdom and power, escaped Minos on wings of his construction, to Sicily where protection was offered. Yet freedom was sour in the old man’s mouth, his son, Icarus, having fallen from the sky when his wings melted in the heat of the sun. Daedalus mourned the day he devised their flight, his wisdom mocked by the youth’s demise, betrayed by fate to succeed in his dream, his hands filled with ashes of a funeral pyre. Now his dark days stretched empty before him, the questions haunting his every hour, was this the price of knowledge and art, can anything pay for the loss of a loved one, did his foolish pride cause the death of his son? Despising now his fame and renown, as a bitter old man he went to the grave. Line Count: 17 Free Verse For The Daily Poem, July 30 2020 Prompt: Write a poem inspired by a myth or fairytale. |
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