got dermatitis?
please don’t do anything rash
if you feel an itch
avoid embarrassment of
acting flaky when face turns red!
minor irritation
20 Feb 2025 3 Comments
in tanka Tags: dermatitis, face, itch, rash, red
amazon explorers
18 Feb 2025 27 Comments
dense tropical jungle hangs heavy
above our dugout canoe as we glide
stealthily on midnight blue waters
mottled with red glow of fluorescent
fish feeding along the muddy banks
our guide shines white flashlight
on canopy of trees that reflect neon
green and yellow back at wide eyes
straining to see into velvet black night
we hear coos, chirps, howls, screams
alongside and above us; both in far
distance beyond coffeed trunks, now
too close…beware a jaguar’s pounce!
______________
Melissa hosts at dVerse poets today. This poem was my first impression of Emil Nolde’s painting. After reading this article about the German expressionist artist also being a Nazi supporter, I wonder if he painted a river/path of blood? This was painted before his joining the “socialist” party but perhaps the violence is within us, waiting to come out…we cannot separate our art from who we truly are.
consider…
16 Feb 2025 2 Comments
one final question
did we love each other well?
dearly departed
give flowers to the living
forgive before forgotten
____________
zinger!
10 Feb 2025 19 Comments
Looks like
winter iz doing
its zing today…
blowing horizontally
snowing astronomically
squirrel rollz itself in snowball
and zings across the driveway
“to the tree, to the tree!”
(to quote Dr. Zing Suess)
stay inside and read, I say,
eat chocolate with greed today.
De Jackson serves quadrilles and zingers today at dVerse poets…
gold rush
09 Feb 2025 3 Comments
______________
trickle creek gold dust
fuels greed for mother lode
boom~bust mining town
see sea shells
06 Feb 2025 15 Comments
in sparrowlet Tags: abalone, beach, sailboat, sand, sea, shells, waves
______________
by curl of sea, walk curve of sand
wet feet make footprints on dry land
while combing beach for shells we see
to reach, pick up, turn palm of hand
and rinse sand off in waves as we
walk curve of sand, by curl of sea
find abalone, dig clams and snails
put cockleshells in handled pails
spot cowrie, conch or spiraled cone
look up to watch wind fill boat sails
search pools of inter-tidal zone
dig clams and snails, find abalone
________________
Check out dVerse poets where Laura reintroduces us to the “sparrowlet” form…
prognostications
03 Feb 2025 27 Comments
in haibun Tags: groundhog, hibernate, shadow, sleep, winter
Yes, the calendar says that February 2 is Groundhog’s Day. So what’s that to me? I may be a German groundhog but I am NOT getting up for any festivities, especially for Candlemas. I must finish hibernating and am feeling all tuckered out…now please, just let me sleep!
What in tarnation is all that commotion atop my burrow? Stop ringing that #punxsutawney% bell up there! I thought Gobbler’s Knob was a peaceful neighborhood but it’s gone to the prairie dogs, I say. There’s no shadow of a doubt, I’ve had my phil of winter in these parts already!
winter’s soft shadow
falls upon snowy landscape
seek comfort of hearth
Frank hosts haibuns at dVerse poets in observance of Groundhog’s Day…
oklahoma roam
03 Feb 2025 2 Comments
in tanka Tags: Chisholm Trail, Cimmaron River, longhorns, open range, walllow
where longhorns gather
hoof prints mark red mud wallow
thirst for open range
near cimmaron riverbed
relics of old chisholm trail
chill & ague
30 Jan 2025 14 Comments
in tanka Tags: chill, nose, sinuses, sneeze, sniff
Kim at dVerse prompts us to write poetry from an optician’s chart using a line of four words in order. The words I used in tanka form are: nose–one–cause–even
my nose is running
its race against sinuses
stiff sniff not enough
one sneeze will cause a series
using even more tissSHOOS!
siren song
28 Jan 2025 1 Comment
in haiku, Uncategorized Tags: beach, mist, seagulls
hear seagulls crying
salty mist caresses dunes
come walk shrouded beach
hold no regrets
27 Jan 2025 24 Comments
in quadrille Tags: camper, cold, home, snow birds, south, warm, wind
snow birds flee midwest
home for warmer climes
south but cool vortex dips
down to hitch a ride atop
their fifth-wheel camper;
wear winter coats to ward
off winds pushing against
leaf-stripped palms around
covered swimming pool…
Hint: no place like home ?!
Mish hosts quadrille prompt at dVerse: can you take a hint?
negative white space
25 Jan 2025 6 Comments
in negation Tags: beauty, love, margin, mind, soul, truth, words
margin is not
a blizzard of words
obfuscating page’s landscape
with directionally-challenged winds
margin is not
some narcissistic lover
manipulating poor gas-lit partner
into unconditional surrender
margin is not
an adrenaline addict
over-crowding calendar squares
with meaningless engagements
margin is not
an anxious mind
fretting over fearful rhetoric
contrary to obvious truth
margin is not
a malnourished soul
scrolling electronic junkfood
with no appetite for beauty
margin is spacious living and gracious loving .
a poem in my pocket 
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