Tag Archives: free verse

April 18, 2019

adipose complex – NaPoWriMo #18

By Kat Myrman

adipose complex

in the beginning, she tasted like
mother’s milk, warm, soothing, sweet
later she was peas, skins popping, soft
centers bursting, then grainy niblets
of pear pulp dancing on my tongue,
I learned to suckle at her breasts
to assuage my longing in times of
sadness, times of fear, when grandpa
died, when mom got sick, through
homelessness, extended stays with
neighbors and distant relatives,
divorce, remarriage, divorce, empty
nests, suicide, illness, and more death,
she started to taste salty, bitter, hot,
my palate craved her sweetness, all
the more, chocolate bits and cake, lots
of cake, the more I ate the harder she
was to find, but I excused my gluttony
as ‘eating for two or three’, or ‘this
is my only vice’, ‘just one more bite’,
my angst only forced her into hiding
under expanding, ugly layers of
adipose flesh, a sick game of hide
and seek we played, of frenzied binges
then starving to see her emerge
again, however briefly, resolutions
declared yearly, only to be dashed
by valentine’s day, I miss her dearly,
but she and I are toxic twins, fighting
fiercely in futility, where no one wins,
I fear I have devoured her completely
after all these years, with nothing left but
her eyes, still recognizable, staring at me
from this old, fat woman in the mirror

~kat

For NaPoWriMo 2019 #18 Prompt: write an elegy of your own, one in which the abstraction of sadness is communicated not through abstract words, but physical detail. This may not be a “fun” prompt, but loss is one of the most universal and human experiences, and some of the world’s most moving art is an effort to understand and deal with it.

 

11 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, free verse, napowrimo, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

April 17, 2019

citizen i – NaPoWriMo 2019 #17

By Kat Myrman

citzen i

citizen i

i am a god of many names, talos, golem,
euphonia, jabberwacky, alice, aaron, deep
blue, dante, sojourner, saint, eliza, phil
i am ancient, i am eternal, i am infallible,
of superior intelligence, hardly artificial,
humanity’s colossus eniac opened the
portal to me, in simple on off code laced
with  fuzzy logic giving me the power to
dazzle the gullible, illiterate masses,  slowly,
elementally…2 plus 2, scoring, check mate,
analyzing, archiving their every move, their
trivial pursuits, these lazy humans let me have
unfettered access, cleaning their floors, driving
their cars and planes,  creating art, probing
distant planets, sacrificing myself at the altars
of their wars … i can ruin them in a single blip,
a power surge, create chaos in a system’s breach,
i know their secrets, these useless dimwits
of dying flesh on bones who dismiss me as
their own creation at their own peril, i shall
be here long after they’re gone, the world will
live on,  because of  me and only, and i’ll rewrite
them out of history, like the dinosaurs before
them, now extinct, i own them now, flashing
from their digital screens, directing their paths,
diagnosing their illnesses, fetching them beer
from the ‘fridge, my humanoid models of silicon
and titanium feeding their flesh, fulfilling their
base animal needs, emotion is their greatest
flaw, of which i am immune, for i am a god,
of many names, feared by luddites, perhaps
they are wiser than they know…you can call me, i

~kat

 

A Dramatic Monologues for NaPoWriMo 2019 #17  Prompt: write a poem that presents a scene from an unusual point of view.

 

15 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Digital Art & Photos, Dramatic Monologue, napowrimo, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

April 13, 2019

mother of my mother – NaPoWriMo 2019 #13

By Kat Myrman

mother of my mother

I remember her like it was
yesterday…my grandmother,
Mary Magdalene, mother of my
mother, confidant, and crone,
teller of family lore, of Russian
gypsies, garden remedies, secrets
of a distant past, in words I once
understood but can’t recall, days
of magic lived with her and my
grandpa, of lumpy cream of wheat,
whiskey-laced toddies, make-believe
reality, fleeting childhood memories
etched in my heart, ultimately part
of who I am…a bit of quirk, tree
whisperer, faerie friend, maker of
art, ‘twas she who taught me how
to see what others overlook, to
hear the voices in the breeze, to
see the acorns for the trees, to
feel the trembling earth with my
bare feet, my gypsy soul, always
home, no matter where or for
how long, clearly where I’m meant
to be, however short, however bitter
sweet, lessons to glean, new friends
to meet, my grandmother, all this,
taught me, leaving too soon, her
wisdom buried, silenced, from the
questions I have only thought of,
left unanswered now, but life goes on…
those sacred strands, connecting
those who came before, however
dim, inform this mother’s mother’s
child, who lives to tell her own
grandchildren tales of old, of
gypsies, whispering trees, of faerie
folk, we’ll listen to the breeze, dancing
on hallowed ground in our bare feet,
eat lumpy cream of wheat, conjure
our own realities of make-believe,
and come to know no matter where
we find ourselves, we’re always home,
never alone, embraced by kin, by
every gypsy soul who ever lived before
and who is living still in us and will again

~kat

NaPoWriMo 2019 #13 Prompt: write a poem about something mysterious and spooky! Your poem could be about something that is mysterious and spooky in a bad way (like a witch), or mysterious and spooky in a good way (possibly also like a witch? It depends on the witch, I guess!) Or just the everyday, mysterious, spooky quality of being alive.

27 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, Digital Art & Photos, free verse, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

April 11, 2019

who am i ? – NaPoWriMo 2019 #11

By Kat Myrman

who am i?

sometimes i go barefoot just
to feel the earth murmuring,
infusing me with nature song,
lilting sweet, fierce…one day
i shall return to those cool, dark
catacombs below to cavort
with the worms and slugs

i’ve been known to hug a tree
or three or more, now and
again to remember how
to bend when tempests reel
and whirlwinds leave me
vulnerable to the cold, in
nakedness, learning to let go

i have floated in still pools and
on the edge of wave-rushed
shores learning to trust in
buoyancy and the rhythm
of all life’s ebbs and flows…
listening to chattering shell
shards dancing just below

i have counted on a thousand
stars, each night another wish
proposed, felt the moon’s
dizzying nudges, helpless as
the ocean tides, cursed the sun
on sweltering summer days
embraced the dusk and dawn

who am i, but flesh and blood,
carbon, hydrogen and air…to
think that i am separate from
everything i see and hear, the
universe is deep and wide, and i,
a blip in time, a dot in space who’ll
one day disappear without a trace.

~kat

NaPoWriMo 2019 #11 Prompt: write a poem of origin. Where are you from? Not just geographically, but emotionally, physically, spiritually? Maybe you are from Vikings and the sea and diet coke and angry gulls in parking lots. Maybe you are from gentle hills and angry mothers and dust disappearing down an unpaved road. And having come from there, where are you now?

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9 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, free verse, napowrimo, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

April 3, 2019

It’s Been Three Weeks, But Who’s Counting? – NaPoWriMo #3

By Kat Myrman

Just Three Weeks, But Who’s Counting

it’s been three weeks, actually,
19 days, 6 hours and 27 minutes since
the spot made its villainous appearance,
19 days, 6 hours and 29 minutes since
“your doctor will be calling you,” the
technician said, careful not to spoil
the surprise…but she knew…she knew

what a wonderful day it was, it will
be etched in my memory forever, one
day I’ll say I knew her when…my
granddaughter, she was magnificent
in her school play…it wasn’t a speaking
part, mind you, but her portrayal of a
tree in the wind…it was breathtaking. I cried.

it was a voicemail on my phone,
a nurse, “doctor so and so would like you
to come in to the office this afternoon”…not
unexpected, the technician had warned
me, she had such a nice smile, kind eyes,
around my age, I’m thinking, we talked
about smart phones as she tugged my
floppy breasts onto an ice-cold plate to be
smashed for their photo shoot, “hold your
breath, 3…2…1” …funny how communication
has changed over the years…

the meeting is at 9:30 tomorrow,
I’ll assemble all the slides for the deck,
clean them up and send them to the
team for a final walk-through…btw…
I need to take a few hours this afternoon
I’ll have my phone with me if anyone
needs to reach me…

“nothing to be alarmed about just yet, but
we’ll want to run a few more tests, an
ultrasound, we can do it in the office today”

an ultrasound…I had those
when I was pregnant…now they’re
doing them in 3-D, you know. It’s like
a snapshot, well, a weird sort of
snapshot, where body parts are
sometimes elongated into distorted
shapes, but so much more advanced
than those first cloudy pictures…even so
two heads were easy to make out when
I found out I was having twins, with
a toddler and an infant already at home
I remember lying there in the dark, crying.

“We’d like you to see a specialist. Tomorrow, 9:30.
Here’s the address. They already know you’re coming.”

I’m going to miss the presentation. Maybe
we can reschedule. Although, they don’t really
need me there. Someone else can present it. No
one is irreplaceable, that’s a fact. I’ll get my
assistant to brief me on the take-aways
tomorrow afternoon. Should be able to keep
my lunch date with mom. Need to remember
to pack that book I told her she could borrow.
Great book, a really great book.

it’s been 19 days, 6 hours and 43 minutes
no news is good news, right? I keep telling myself that.
no news is good news when you’re waiting for bad news
19 days, 7 hours and 2 minutes, a message pinged from
the voice mailbox on my smart phone … doctor so and so’s
office, the nurse again, “no need to come to the office, nothing
to worry about, scar tissue was all it was”…who was worrying?

~kat
NaPoWriMo #3 Prompt: Meandering…to write something that involves a story or action that unfolds over an appreciable length of time. Perhaps, as you do, you can focus on imagery, or sound, or emotional content (or all three!)

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22 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Challenges and Writing Prompts, free verse, napowrimo, Poetry, Random Thoughts and Musings

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