February 10, 2020

etched in silver – a blackout poem

By Kat Myrman

etched in silver

i’m a woman
no longer young
changed by water
and wind, etched
in silver and want
hot flesh, a face
disappearing into
landscape

~kat

A blackout poem based on the poem below by Allison Funk:

Self-Portrait in the Nude

To understand what it would be like
          to remove my clothes
as painters do in portraits of themselves

          I imagine I’m the woman
who knows her body
no longer belongs to the young artist

who painted herself before she had children,
          before her topography was changed
by forces erosive as water and wind,

    and yet she goes on painting it,
the girdle of her earth that is now an etched terrain
crossed with silver rivulets.

And hills, I want to say to her.
          Valleys. Then hummocks,
hot springs, hoodoo. What is art about

          if not depression? Uplift? Depression
again? At which she straightens
          the flesh of her shoulders and neck

to face me before I disappear(ing)
into landscape,
my favorite state of undress.

Copyright © 2018 Allison Funk.

17 Comments   |  tags: , , , | posted in Blackout Poetry, Digital Art & Photos, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

February 8, 2020

don’t move in winter

By Kat Myrman

don’t move in winter

if you can avoid it, don’t move
in winter when days are short, no
birdsong to sweeten the dawn; no
cricket chatter, no creepers
chirping to quell the cold, black
silence of endless nights…take
it from me, i don’t advise it, for
change is never easy during
the season of letting go; when
death looms in the shadows seeking
souls to pluck. Winter is not for the
faint of heart…i know, and yet,
i am a tree, uprooted, barren limbs
trembling, bending, mantle scattered
to the wind, faded fronds snatched
from my fingertips as frost’s cool
kisses nip; numb to the core, i am
dormant, no consolation but the
promise of spring, of soft rain fall,
sun-warmed buds bursting, fields
of flowering weeds, nestling beaks
gaping, earthworms slithering,
rainbows, and greening…beautiful
greening…sigh…the tree that i am
rests for now in sleepy slumber
inside these unfamiliar walls…
perhaps they will feel like
home come spring…come spring

~kat

17 Comments   |  tags: , , , | posted in Digital Art & Photos, free verse, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

January 20, 2020

A Life Dismantled

By Kat Myrman

A Life Dismantled

sifting through the decades
of accumulated stuff
must haves in the moment
diamonds in the rough
for those timeless treasures,
only bubble wrap will do
shake the dust and cobwebs off
comfy well worn shoes
gently slip the photographs
from old broken frames
happy memories mingling
with faces with no names
shedding all the dross
that held me in the past
so to travel lighter
with only things that last
yet another chapter waits
its pages to be penned
each day, the simple gift of life
to live full to the end

~kat

I must admit this downsizing thing has truly disoriented me. I find myself clinging to routine, the easiest thing to assimilate to my new surroundings. But I have yet to find that sweet spot, where words flow like honey, where my eyes see things in ways that only an artist and writer can. I’m learning to live off the grid, with its big, starry black-mantled silence, and amber sunrises over distant mountains in the morning. For now they only manage to take my breath away. There are no words apart from the few sing-songy rhymes I manage to eke out. I know she’s in there…somewhere in the recesses of my mind…the muse who so relentlessly pursued me amidst the clutter and cacophony of city life. But here in the country? She must be cavorting with the faeries, giggling from behind downed tree hollows at my dizzy dry spell. I had every intention to start January 1st, full steam ahead. Part of the issue, I think, may be that I still need to unload the stuff we left behind and sell the dark, drafty, century old house I called home for over a decade. I need to be free of it. And so, I will drop a line now and again until I regain my footing. Peace and love to you. Until next glimpse…❤️

13 Comments   |  tags: , , , | posted in Essays, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

December 26, 2019

The New House

By Kat Myrman

The New House

No creaky floors, no walls

that groan with century old tales,

no glaring street lights dimming

the star-flecked, velvet veil.

No nosy neighbors peaking

through shuttered curtain slits,

the quiet here is deafening

but for a hawk’s shrill twit.

The timpani of woodpeckers,

a lone owl’s soft hoot hoo,

gray squirrels cluck from lofty boughs

and deer folk bound from view.

Here, just enough is everything

a body needs and more,

simplicity’s perfection gleams

from white-washed walls and doors.

It’s rather like a dream here still,

of drywall, sticks and stone.

She stood here empty on a hill

until I called her home.

~kat

(Settling in, finding my voice amidst new surroundings…and perhaps a tiny nudge from a sleepy muse!)

13 Comments   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Digital Art & Photos, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

December 26, 2019

Happy Holidays!

By Kat Myrman

Been so busy putting things away and settling in that I barely realized that the sun sets just over the ridge outside my front door. It’s an average sort of sunset, as sunsets go, but it is the most beautiful reminder to me to pay attention to my natural surroundings. The truth is, I get home from work most nights after this spectacular show. But while I’m off this week I’m going to make a date with the gloaming. This is why we moved here to our little house in the clearing on a hill. The pictures for the walls will be hung later. For now, there is a more pressing matter. The gentle dark descending, and the illusion, thanks to a perfect row of low hovering clouds, of a golden lake just beyond the trees suspended in the dusky sky. Peace on Earth…indeed.

15 Comments   |  tags: , , | posted in Random Thoughts and Musings