SOLC #8 - My Shadow Watches the Future

My Shadow Wears

A battered felt hat, with a wide brim
Trousers dusty from work 
Farmer boots. 
And he knows
The order of things.
His hair is like
Short spiky stalks from the stubble field.
My shadow is a worker 
Watching the future approach 
Finding unlikely solutions 
To common problems.



This picture can be found at the Library of  Congress http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/99614663/

The Child Sobbed

                                                         Sobbing Silently, the Child Cried

I asked the moon why it was blue
And it winked and laughed softly
I asked the water why it was blue
And the waves crashed
I asked the child why do you cry?
And it sobbed silently
I asked the shoes to dance
And it tap, tapped, shuffle, stepped
I asked the shoes to dance
And it did and the world echoed
I asked the rabbits why do you dance
And they sashayed and boxed
I asked myself where am I going
And the road twisted
The  shoes danced
                                                          The  child sobbed
                                                          And I kept quiet.
                                                          And everything was the same.    

          
*Photograph http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2003654924/ 

G is for Gallivanting

Gallivanting is one of my husband's favorite words.  It means to travel, roam, or move about for pleasure. For today's post I decided on a spine poem.

Gallivanting In Montana

F is For Fear

I am words whispering in the wind
I am chills that inhabit the dark, buried
I am the monster reflected in the looking glass
I am fiendish words twisted

I am eyes of darkness, stalking silently
I am a heart beating a staccato rhythm
I am secrets hidden in your memories

I am shadows of your dark side

I am screams splintering the silence 

I am the sound of a round being chambered.

I am a single night of violence, repeated

I am secrets hidden in your memories

I am green slime oozing up from fissures of distrust
I am rapacious thoughts chained with rusty links
I am vindictive words that cut to the bone
I am resentment that plots revenge

I am memories imprisoned breaking free.
I am disorientation, stirring shadows, panic
I am isolation, confusion
I am secrets hidden in your memories

I am a family photo and no recognition

I am estrangement that accepts no responsibility.

I am a memento wired with mental land-mines.

I am a demon, my name is FEAR.

Jigsaw Pieces - Finding Poems

Jigsaw Pieces


Memories

They've started to spill out
 
I remember bits and pieces.

Puzzle pieces
Spilling from the box.

Fear hiding in twilights' shadows

I see them in black and white.
Jig saw pieces.

I hear snippets.

The day is done
Gone the sun

Trying to fit the pieces together.

What do you do 

when fear is killing you?

More pieces spilling 

onto the table.

The day is done

Gone the sun

Twilight memories

I remember singing taps.

The day is done

Gone the sun..

Leaving through the door

Running towards the light.

Scattered pieces.

Jigsaw pieces 

in black and white.

http://www.facebook.com/everydaypoems?ref=ts

*I found the picture on Every Day Poems facebook page.  It is a picture prompt with the hope you will find a poem.

Remembering the Back Stories

I was browsing posts at The Poem Farm and found Spark Day- Nancy Claeys & Poems #332.  I was inspired by what she had done by matching a picture and a poem.  What great ideas for collaboration.  What a great idea as a writing prompt.

I started to think of some pictures that my uncle shared at my mother’s memorial service, pictures of her youth that I had never seen.  Melissa a friend took our pictures added music and did a wonderful slide show for the service.  I loved it – it was so poignant.

Friends who attended all commented on the slideshow.  I shared some of the stories that connected to the pictures.  The most common comment was, “Oh I wish there had been captions so we could have known your mother’s earlier life.”

That slide show and the comments have lingered in my thoughts, following me.  Lingering among the shadows, surprising me at unexpected times, helping me to remember and connect my thoughts.

I want to take some of those pictures and tell the back-stories.  Snippets of time, a pictorial slice of life. – A way to remember and connect, the hauntings’ of my mind that whispers to my soul.

Where I'm From

This poem was inspired by George Ella Lyon's "Where I'm From"

Where I’m From

I am from double boilers, from Hershey’s chocolate and homemade bread.

I am from cheap apartments that allowed kids, crowded, chaotic, and cramped.

I am from the prickly pear cactus, and Lodge Pole Pine

I am from Christmas Eve presents and hammer toes, from Elizabeth and Melvin and Grandma Boice).

I am from stubbornness and hot tempers.

From “money doesn’t grow on trees” and “when God closes a door he will always open a window”.

I am from rosaries and holy water, and grandma’s boarding school memories.

I'm from Idaho- Irish peasants and laying railroad track; bread pudding and red eyed gravy.

From Katie Mulligan Boice who was 18 when she bought her 1905 Indian Motorcycle right off the line, the woman my grandfather never let drive, my mother who graduated college in her forties and started teaching in one room schools.

I am from black and white pictures most long gone, berry pickers, and pump organs – music that plays now in my memories.