Magpie Tales # 45

Celebration

Evening dark enfolds the waiting city.
Children dream, perhaps of Santa Claus,
while juke-box music churns its tuneless ditties
into the streets where nobody gives pause
to think of Christmas.

The midnight hour solemnly approaches;
a small group congregates in vacant pews,
their measured footsteps rhythmically encroaching
upon a silence echoing with the news
of that first Christmas.

Around the crib the candlelight is flickering,
but muted organ notes cannot compete
with raucous sound of angry voices bickering
from drunken revellers outside in the street.
Can this be Christmas?

Expectant landscape waits for welcome silence,
as moon and stars continue on their way
around a world beset with wars and violence
which needs the gift of Peace as much today
as that first Christmas.

Wilow's prompt for Magpie Tales this week reminded me of these verses I wrote way back. I have posted them before on Napple Notes, but they remain as pertinent as at their first appearance, and it will do no harm to give them another airing, as visiting commenters vary each year...

Heavens!

The Poetry Bus , being driven  by Titus, is now on the road. I've thumbed a lift after watching the very clever video which made me think I'd never be able to buy a legitimate ticket if I used the first set of words that filled my mind - they were too surreal! Instead, I've written the following ones on the thumb with which I hope to flag down the bus!

Cosmic

Your fingers caress the black and white keys;
rhythms of life cradled between your hands
fill the universe with stars. They light candles
in my mind as Earth and Sky and Sea
all merge within the music of your love.


Blue waters of awareness circle round
and oceans create life from out its depths.
The heavens spin with stars and melody
which nourishes the universal song,
until its spark ignites a wonder in us all.

Microfiction Moday # 61

A washboard, a tub and a girl (called Dolly?) washing doll's clothes?
What ever happened to Women's Lib and washing machines?



Thanks once more go to Stony River for prompting a typical Jinksy reply to this week's Microfiction Monday challenge of writing a little something in less than 150 characters. Feel free to count them if you must, but I assure you they're well within the guidelines!

One More For Big Kids

Ernest Aris 1947

Hopping Mad?

Six rabbits in search of a burrow
hopped all the way up to Harrow
but when they got there,
they cried out in despair -
the only one left was too narrow!

Thanks to BKM for this week's prompt over at Monday's Child. Okay, so it's Wednesday, but who's counting?

Seeing Is Believing?

In such a white out,
above snow covered country
the pilot was lost.

Another Ticket For The Poetry Bus

This week it is driven by Kat, who is expecting Pub related offerings, and here is my little tail ...er...tale of a tail, I mean...

The Red Lion

Some lion cubs frolicked 

and chased their own tails

but suddenly one of them 

loosed a great wail.

"Ouch!" I've been bitten! 

My tail has turned red!

And he ran in a circle, 

"Look how it has bled!"

The lion pride laughed 

and one smart arse cub

said "Cor! Now you're 

just like the name of the Pub!"

Microfiction Monday # 60

The latest fad for having matching 'His n' Hers' sets can be un peu de trop, when taken to extremes.



Thanks to Susan at Stony River for this gruesome but fun MFM!

"Weird"

How could I miss a chance like that? Write something weird is the request of Poets United Thursday Think Tank # 25. Hope this will do...

Spellcheck Nightmare

Writing flopsibitses
is what I do the best.
Ordnidapso poems
don't put you to the test,
but wofflynumblit dodits
of scrudabompy zest
will fill your squoozy moments
much better than the rest.
My keyboard lollyfrangles
and my brains get foglymessed
and my fingers danglycobble,
they really are a pest.
But underneath the splayjin
I'm absolutely sure
my no-pollipty nonsense
is no dafter than before.

Another Snowy Scene

That is Willow's Magpie Tales topical choice for this week of less than tropical weather we are experiencing in the UK - and elswhere, I guess!

The steps to your door,
even when covered with snow,
spread warmth in my heart.

Microfiction Monday # 59

Thanks to Stony River for today's picture prompt.

Don't give me that load of bull, son! 

Leopards don't change their spots - you two timed my daughter!

Bug's Poetry Bus

There are multiple destinations on offer this time, but I couldn't resist the one which gave me a chance to wax lyrical, so my ticket will be for her third choice of route, for a Bug's Eye View of the scenery!

Unadorned
A pallid sky provides a perfect backdrop
for silhouettes of leafless branches. Black
and finely etched, trees' spirits dance
in the shadows of imagination.
Their summer ballgowns have long disappeared
and naked now, their beauty stands unclothed
but no less vivid. They reveal their souls
in ghostly shapes whose underlying promise
of latent rebirth will have until the spring
to gather forces before burgeoning.

Monday's Child # 22

By Marjorie Torrey 1945

Thanks for this week's photo prompt go to 
B K M  at Monday's Child.

Oyez! Oyez! Oyez!

The palace issued a Royal Decree
to Draco the dragon. "Come to tea!
Make sure you're here by half past three.

The Queen would like to shake your hand."
"Now, you behave, you understand?
came the advice from his old Gran.

"Show her that you have good manners,
no 'Um's" or "Er's" or mumbled stammers -
and don't set fire to her banners!"

Princess Pearl was not a-frighted,
said that Draco should be knighted
and Queen replied "I'd be delighted.

Arise Sir Draco Goldengreen -
by Royal Appointment to the Queen!"

Microfiction Monday # 58

Thanks to Susan at Stony River for this fun photo prompt!

"To wear or not to wear school uniform?
The decision can put one on the horns of a dilemma."

And I've just thought of another MM...

"This is not how I expected my stag night to end."

Magpie Tales # 41

Countdown

The clock ticks.
We have to pick
our moments well
for who can tell
which may be our last?

When grains have passed
through their hour glass until
the very last is about to spill
onto the waiting heap,
then no last-ditch leap
will save us. Time will follow
its course until the last hollow
tock of the clock
will bring life to a stop.

Magpie Tales gave us this ticking time picture of a 'past its sell by date' clock face for this week, which inevitably lead to thoughts of the eleventh hour we will all have to face at some point! Let's hope next week's prompt will be a less decrepit picture, therefore slightly more upbeat in its automatic associations! Nil desperandum, folks!

Microfiction Monday# 57

Pablo was prepared for all weathers; Heat = sunhat: Cold = poncho: Rain = waders.
Could that be why he also sported a Boy Scout's kerchief?

Do go and visit Stony River to see other's who joined this jamboree.

Monday's Child #20

With bag and tail draped over wrist
and boa made of feathers,
Lady Rat would sally forth
in every kind of weather.

She always wore a fancy hat,
the times she came to call
on humble Mrs Churchmouse,
who was quiet, shy and small.

Together they would chat and laugh,
tell tales of hanky-panky,
but Lady Rat laughed till she cried
and needed a big hanky!

It's taken me for ever to get round to writing this Monday's Child  post! Better late than never?!

Poetry Bus for 15th November

A Tramp's Tale

When I chose to leave my home
and start out on life's road alone,
I knew I'd need some eating tools -
I was not a child of fools!
I had a knife, a dented spoon,
but I could tell that very soon
I'd seriously need a fork
to stab the lamb or beef or pork
bangers in my frying pan -
or juicy peaches from a can.
With worldly goods upon my back
I sauntered on by lonely track,
up rolling hills and grassy down,
until I reached a country town
full of shops and rushing people.
In a church with crumbling steeple
I stopped and said a little prayer.
and took a rest while I was there.
'Dear Lord, a fork is all I need...
I wonder if You're paying heed?'
Then came a voice inside my head;
these were the very words it said:-

'When you come to  a fork in the road, take it!'


Thanks go  to this week's Bus Driver, Karen at Keeping Secrets

Magpie Tales # 40

 In Absentia

The spaces in my day
leave holes in the sky
where tears fall through.
Your thoughts are absent,
and build a fence too high
for me to see beyond.
I grieve for a lost time,
for I do not understand
where it has gone,
nor yet why, but its pearls
remain strung about me.

Thanks to Willow for this Magpie Tales picture prompt.

Microfiction Monday # 56

Young feet walk the path;
life and lane stretch out ahead.
To where will they lead?

The final destinations
remain in the arms of Time.






My Tanka today is in response to this delightful photo prompt at Stony River.

Magpie Tales # 39

Headless chickens we may be,
but never without laughter.
Like the chicken and the egg
one has to follows after...

A chicken rushing round and round 
in circulatory motion,
is just like us in certain states
when, minus head or notion,
we chase our tails to no effect.
For we are doomed to meet ourselves
back where we had started-
once the circle is complete...

But, do not be downhearted!
Shrug your shoulders, give a laugh,
(He who laughs last, laughs longest!)
and  remember this old saw -
The devil take the hindmost!
Now, kindly close the door...

N.B. A 'saw' in this context is a saying! 


For more fowl feathers see Willow's  Magpie Tales this week.