Monthly Archives: July 2016

July 8, 2016

Blue Lady Blue

By Kat Myrman

487px-Heinrich_Vogeler_Sehnsucht_(Träumerei)_c1900

Painting by Heinrich Vogeler Sehnsucht (Traumerei) c1900

Dreary morning veiled in white
from darkest night
at break of day
she comes to pray

for hope, for healing grace, for peace
for hate to cease
for love’s pure balm
to bring us calm

from endless nights of terror’s rage
to turn this page
of history
to set us free.

What are you thinking Lady Blue
as you peruse
horizon’s wake
this bleak daybreak?

is your fair lover ‘cross the sea
oh could it be
that your heart yearns
for their return?

or is it wanderlust’s appeal
seeking to steal
your soul away
this break of day?

kat ~ 8 July 2016

A couple of Minute Poems for Jane Daugherty’s writing prompt, “Daybreak” and the painting you see above.

The Minute Poem is rhyming verse form consisting of 12 lines of 60 syllables written in strict iambic meter. The poem is formatted into 3 stanzas of 8,4,4,4; 8,4,4,4; 8,4,4,4 syllables. The rhyme scheme is as follows: aabb, ccdd, eeff.

29 Comments | tags: Challenge, lady blue, Minute Poem Form, Poetry, prayer | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Minute Poem, Poetry

July 8, 2016

Friday’s Word of the Day Haiku

By Kat Myrman

selenotropism

Today’s Dictionary.com Word of the Day is Selenotropism. It’s a whopper of a word comprised of six syllables. This presents quite a challenge when tasked with writing a Haiku! I decided to use the adjective form giving me another syllable to work with and I also opted to take further creativity liberty in the application of the word. Selenotropism is a Biology term that refers to plant growth and movement in response to moonlight. The word entered English in the 1880’s and comes from the Greek “se”ēnē” for “moon” and trópos which means “turn”.

A bit about the biological term…

Most of us know that plants will lean toward light. If you place a plant in a window, you will find that you need to turn it every so often to keep it from leaning to one side. This phenomenon is called “heliotropism” (helio referring to the sun). A biologist by the name of M. Musset, intrigued by the heliotropic movement of plants decided to conduct experiments on the influence of the reflected light of the moon. He chose three nights in February of 1883 to test his theory, exposing young plants to direct moonlight from 9 pm to 3 am. Almost immediately the buds of the plants bent the stalks in the direction of the moonlight and remained in a leaning position until the moon disappeared from view. He coined the term selenotropism, a nocturnal counterpart to the established heliotropism to name his discovery.

Source: Journal of the Royal Microscopical Society, Ser. II–Vol. III, 1883)

So now that you have a new bit of random information to log away in your brain, I am going to take this word on another twist. I propose that our dreams are inspired by the cool light of the moon. At least when I saw the Greek influence of the word, that is where my mind went…a “turning toward the Moon” and the way that moon glow influences our subconscious thoughts as we sleep. I suppose I’m taking full advantage of artistic liberty and freedom here, but then I am also prone to coloring outside of the lines too. Blame it on the moon!

To Dream Selentropic

Adrift in sleepy
selenotropic currents
dreams flood the gray void.

kat ~ 8 July 2016

9 Comments | tags: Challenge, dreams, Haiku, selenotropism, word of the day, word of the day haiku challenge | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Essays, Haiku, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings, Word of the Day Haiku

July 6, 2016

Waves of You

By Kat Myrman

autumnleaves

A soft wind’s caress
tender waves, exquisite bliss
memories of you…

kat ~ 6 July 2016

For Haiku Horizon’s weekly challenge, prompt word: Wave.

10 Comments | tags: Challenge, haiku horizons, memories, Poetry, Wave | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Digital Art & Photos, Haiku, Poetry

July 5, 2016

If we were having…

By Kat Myrman

There is this writing prompt here on WordPress that I see every now and again. It starts with the phrase, “If we were having coffee…”

Um, okay, I’m gonna stop you right there. I’ve been limiting my coffee intake, so I hope you don’t mind if I take a bit of artistic liberty here.

Let’s start this again…I like herbal tea by the way…with honey…unless it’s Earl Gray…then I like my tea with cream and a bit of sugar. Where were we? Ah-hem…

“If we were having tea…um…I forgot to ask. Do you like your tea black? I think that’s the right term for it…or I could ask if you are a tea purist…Or…oops…you might actually be okay with having coffee. Cream and sugar? With your coffee? I hope you don’t use those artificial sweeteners…they are sooo bad for you!

Hot Chocolate, you say? With marshmallows? That works too!

Back to the beginning then. This is the great thing about being an artist…the possibilities! Here we go…

“If you were having coffee…oops sorry, I have coffee on the brain right now. Do you think it’s possible to go through coffee withdrawal? Forgive me…Let’s start over. I got this. Okay.

“If you were having hot chocolate with marshmallows and I was having jasmine tea with honey…” If I’m being honest here, and I think that is the point of this exercise, tea really doesn’t cut it for me. It’s basically watered down leaves with no kick, but I do feel healthier when I drink it…I do like it I suppose. I love teapots. I collect them. Hmmm

One more time. I’m sticking with the program this time. (Deep breath)

” If you were having hot chocolate with marshmallows and I was having jasmine tea with honey…”

I think the goal of this writing exercise is to write a conversational dialog. Maybe we could talk about current events.

What is that? You make it point not to talk politics. You don’t watch the news? Well okay, I get that.

Maybe we can talk about…oh…thanks for letting me know. You don’t talk about religion either…and you don’t believe in airing your family’s dirty laundry? Uh, I’m okay with that. We can pass on those topics.

So…what do you think about all this rain we’ve been having? Yep crazy. You got that right!

Is your coff…uh hot chocolate cool? I can nuke it in the microwave for you if you’d…ah, you have an appointment?

Well, thanks for stopping by. Good talk! Have a great day. We’ll have to do this again…soon. Or maybe not. Busy busy. I get it.

(Sigh) I think I’ll drop the “if” or “we” this time. I am going to have myself a coffee with a dram of Irish cream. Ahhh!

I think there is a reason I’ve been avoiding this writing prompt! 🙂

~ kat ~ 5 July 2016

14 Comments | tags: #weekendcoffeeshare, coffee, conversations, hot chocolate with marshmallows, tea, writing challenge | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Digital Art & Photos, Essays, Humor, Random Thoughts and Musings