dVerse – This Jolly Beggar

No, but Yes, November

A response to “No!” by Thomas Hood (1844)

November threatens forgetfulness
of summer’s desire, the yearn, the yawn, the yes!
of existence, with no! of “no shine,
no butterflies, no bees”

with creak of knees, lines of face
silver hair and brittle nails
and yes! wintry death of all desire
but for the joy in plenitude

carpe diem of eternity summering in You.

“Thus the snow loses its imprint in the sun.” (Dante, Paradiso)

For Cee's FOTD (Flower of the Day), a dahlia;
"No! Vember," d'verse's Poetics prompt, pays tribute to "No!" by Thomas Hood and asks that we take "a line from this poem and use it as springboard for a new poem." I chose "No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees."

Your pipe tobacco
Sears like your red beard
Against my skin
Enflaming
Swirling taut nostrils
Your smoky grey eyes
Promising new intrusions
Of incense-breathing flame
As we talk and the day softly fades
Into an Orient-soaked night
Where the moonflower opens and glows.

It’s good to be back at dVerse’s Poetics with guest host Jo who asks us to find inspiration in “a world of common scents”!

Dragons Blue

In caverns of the skies
broken nuts scattered their prize
dawn-bright baby dragons blue
between the fleece-clouds flew
to grab their sun-crowned delight
which storks and eagles’ flight
brought upwards where they grew
and sometimes they even knew
to breathe a warm “thank you”!

De Jackson asks us to write a quadrille (44 words) 
using some form of the word "crown"
Click on Mr. Linky to join in!

Witches, Warlocks, and Political Consultants (A Duodora)

Photo by **Gantas Vaičiulėnas** from **Pexels**

He’s got no heart
that’s plain for us to see
yet adamantine
chains of our own greed
mocking bind our flesh
permission securing to multiply
lies that his desires ours would circumscribe

She’s got no heart
that we all clearly know
obscure it we must
the voters to con
paid consultants we
diabolical masters creating
sly illusions to blind our client’s tribe

Lisa at dVerse: Poetics -- "Halloweeny Humans" asks us to 
write about a dislikable human trait. 
She also introduces us to a new poetic form, the Duodora, 
which we can choose to use. 
Duodora Form
a quatorzain made up of 2 septets.
syllabic,  4/6/5/5/5/10/10 syllables per line.
rhymed Axxxxxb Axxxxxb L1 is repeated as a refrain that begins the 2nd stanza. x is unrhymed.
Enjoy more at Mr. Linky.

Wind Elf (A Compound Word Verse)

Along the rolling hills I hear
your mournful singing haunting clear
yet windblown.

Under the moon’s vapid eye
how can I, elf, to you deny
your windsongs?

I’ll keep you under lock and key
lest you flee and escape from me
as windstorm.

The elvish king shall have you back
when he returns the one I lack
now windbound.

On Hallow’s Eve we’ll make a swap
my child returned, you with your harp,
— home windward.

Grace at dVerse challenges us today to write a Compound Word Verse, an unfamiliar form to most ous I daresay. She writes: "The Compound Word Verse is a poetry form invented by Margaret R. Smith that consists of five 3-line stanzas, for a total of 15 lines. The last line of each stanza ends in a compound word and these compound words share a common stem word which is taken from the title. (In the first example below the stem word is “moon” from the title “Moonlighting”; the compound words related to the title are moondust, moonbeams, moonsongs, etc.)

The Compound Word Verse (3 lines) has a set rhyme scheme and meter as follows:

Rhyme Scheme: a,a,b
Syllable/Meter: 8, 8, 3

Click on Mr. Linky to read more and join in!

By Way Of Broken Twigs in a Dreaming Forest (A Found Poem)

Photo by **Mikhail Nilov** from **Pexels**

I might parrot-fashion a torn heart
question short-term memory lost
far off find the Sultan’s three wives
above the flame trees
satiated, muffled by autumns
roots wounded in the woods
snaking whisper: find
a cracked bell
voice of the rain
under my tongue
wandering scent

Go nowhere: red fox, intrepid
a straight man with name
that fails to show, lost and found
on the Kansas Prairie

I stalk: ragweed, Calvin Coolidge
missing persons, prize peacock,
around the breakfast table, hot
air in the mirror-testing
home, little fool

‘And the lost were found,’ select:
response, resolution, finding,
return to re-write or even reorder
visiting gatherings of fourteen
poker hands, under the unturned stone,
hidden deep, secret, wakening,
to the rain crying.

What is a found poem? Click here.
Laura at dVerse Poetics: Lost Poems and Found Poetry asks that we 
pick one of two options, of which I picked "finding a poem within a 
poem or prose." Instead of selecting only one of the  ‘lost poems’ 
(or one of your own finding where something or someone is lost ) 
and re-writing it is as a ‘Found poem’. I stretched the rule to
include all of Laura's prompt, prose and poetry, to compose my 
found poem.So I encourage you to go to the dVerse poetics prompt to 
see the text used, containing Susan Rich, Pablo Neruda, Peter 
Schneider, Maxine Chernoff, and Laura Bloomsbury's prose. 
Read more at Mr. Linky and join in!

Lady Lavender

She came sailing in —
foxgloved murder digitalis
among shape-shifters in ash-colored silk
an Austen novel in her head
drysalter’s pharmacopœia of prurience
in everyone else’s closet Gothic
pawned in a room of Macbeths
unshriven, exhumed desire
— sailing in, lighting torches
blanketed fire,
lavender swan.

At d’Verse Sarah asked us to write a Quadrille of 44 words using the word "Ash." 
This is a reworking of an earlier poem.
Click on Mr. Linky to read more.

No (Wo)man’s Land

Warning: Sensitive topic broached.
Björn at dVerse: MTB asks us to write a cadralor, which poetic form consists of "5, unrelated, numbered stanzaic images, each of which can stand alone as a poem, is fewer than 10 lines, and ideally constrains all stanzas to the same number of lines. Imagery is crucial to cadralore: each stanza should be a whole, imagist poem, almost like a scene from a film, or a photograph. The fifth stanza acts as the crucible, alchemically pulling the unrelated stanzas together into a love poem. By “love poem,” we mean that your fifth stanza illuminates a gleaming thread that runs obliquely through the unrelated stanzas and answers the compelling question: 'For what do you yearn?'" Click on Mr. Linky to join us.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com

A bird cries over the tele-
phone wire, is it you? is it done?
over black shrouded head

Shiny pruning shears in her gloved
hands, methodically apply to de-
locate dead heads, snip, snip

There once was a small torso in a
womb severally dislodged by forceps
into medical waste

If death comes in slippered feet,
will they curl at the ends
or just your lips? Mother?

All the ghosts have left, barren
in winter, the autumn leaves twist
the sea breezes rustle in her mind.

In Praise of Dostoevsky

You see through me,

Dostoevsky, you leave no light

between truth and reality

and a woman’s heart (like a man’s)

lays bared before your demands

that life be lived not in the shadows

but where madness, danger, evil threaten:

and faced, leaves no doubt of allegiance

to the God whose truth is love.

Sanaa at dVerse's Poetics asks that we "dip our toes"
into a panegyric: "Plainly speaking, the term “Panegyric,” 
refers to a poem of effusive praise. 
The genre being Greek in origin is closely related to 
both eulogy and ode. Click on Mr. Linky and join in!

That Funky 70’s Hit

For dVerse Poetics --I couldn't get Lillian's birthday website link to work either, so I simply chose a memorable hit from my childhood.  Grand Funk Railroad's "The Loco-Motion" is the first No. 1 song I remember from my childhood in the 70's. It seemed to be everywhere on the radio all the time. But the song had been recorded first by Little Eva and been No. 1 in the 60's; later in the 80's Kylie Minogue took it to No. 3 on the Billboard. Not bad for a song about a train dance, chug-a-chuga! Click on Mr. Linky to join in!

The 70’s made a lot of commotion
The worst in hair, the worst in fashion
I ran around in patchy jeans and braids
You were cool in long hair and good grades
Then one day the neighborhood was jammin’
People snappin’ fingers and gyratin’
Kids in diapers and granddads in knickers
All fancyin’ the music, ignoring the snickers
“Come on, come on,” “chug-a-chuga,” swinging hips
“Groovy!” “the loco-motion” on everyone’s lips!