213

SO CRUEL
Who stones the path of love, with soleless shoes
In paradise, awaits nectar, no one sings the blues

Run to the fountain, where love, flows ever free
Trumpet your choruses, busying flutter, as a bee

Where, under shady trees, congas rock after school
Why, string the puppet now, you gotta be so cruel
SO CRUEL © gillena cox 2016

Written for Isadora's prompt
Out of Standard - What's My Line

The Challenge: to write a poem incorporating the lyrics as you misunderstood them to be. Never misheard a song lyric, or just not getting inspirado from yours?
We all have one....that one song lyric we have misheard and believed to be accurate only to find out some time later (and probably after some great debate) that the real lyrics are something else entirely.

I chose "So Rude" by the group Magic, when i first heard the song, i thought they were singing [Why you gotta be so cruel]

212

[image: a facebook share]


ETCHED
i remember hearing her song
liking it because Tina sang it
i remember humming her song
i think Tina's reeks of diva

songs come a million a meter
like the tide
memory remains

to reign in our responses
footprints on a sandy beach
etching our hearts
ETCHED © gillena cox 2016




Written for Marian's prompt
Bittersweet Melodies

211

CHARM
a charm of humming birds,
jeweled in sunlight,
their wings beat of understandings,
to curtail all sobbing crowds;

brooch this veil to his chest,
he who ignites sorrow in the light of day
come, lament your woes in divine halls
cloistered in stained glass windows

a shadow of its backward dance
these humming birds unique in their
flights of nourishing awe
here lamb are fed on daily bread
CHARM © gillena cox 2016
[with thoughts and prayers for those suffering from terrorist attacks in Brussels today]

Written for De's prompt at
Poetics : Poetry is for the Birds

Challenge :to draw our poetic inspiration from the whimsical, musical, magical names given to groups of birds.

Linking also to
The Tuesday Platform

Monday WRites #53

A Happy Holy Week to all
[a google dot com image]

REDEEMING GRACE
Joyful joyful sang the angels
To chords of night called so holy
Strains of shepherds piped chorals
Could not contest them worthy

Thence the cries of hosannas
As the ass his burden bore
Then that place of sorrowful coronas
In shrouded garments to endure

Hear that sound of cracking sky
When his head bowed of nails abusive
To feet and palms oh hear his cry
With gentle heart he did forgive
REDEEMING GRACE © gillena cox 2016



You've heard about the Monday Blues ❧✿❧ well this is Monday WRites (musing on the definition here of rite, as any customary observance or practice eg the rite of afternoon tea).
Welcome to Monday WRites #53, ❧✿❧ Todays write is linked to The Imaginary garden with real toads❧✿❧ Whats your mood like today ❧✿❧ I invite you to link in with one of your WRites




GRAB MY BUTTON
<br /> <a href="http://myblog-verses.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0C9WPzL5kFEY1gEitLn4bC5inZjfq2beowWitvrD3zLruIRMxxj1RyrHw6Xcd6SlmEASrTd6rLFn4mfF8D8XC5Mz4ASE8iblAAmc3uaKNuHtYgvzIWajyH64D6kzlwugaU8wP610yKLRq/s320/button2Monday+WRites.jpg" alt="verses" /></a><br />

Written for Outlawyer's prompt
Under an Influence; Anxiety Lost In Translation; Blocking Writer's Block- Weekend Mini!

THE CHALLENGE: Take a poem written by someone else. It doesn't have to be a favorite poem, but one that interests you. It can be a poem written in English, or another language, if you prefer (but that's up to you.) Read the poem a few times over, ingest it. Then sit down and write your own poem.
❧✿❧
inspiration for my poem is from John Milton's The Passion
Erewhile of musick, and ethereal mirth,
Wherewith the stage of air and earth did ring,
And joyous news of heavenly Infant's birth,
My Muse with Angels did divide to sing;
But headlong joy is ever on the wing,
In wintry solstice like the shorten'd light,
Soon swallow'd up in dark and long out-living night.

For now to sorrow must I tune my song,
And set my harp to notes of saddest woe,
Which on our dearest Lord did seize ere long...[click the link to read his whole poem]

209

[a google dot com image]

TIMELY MUSIC
these are morsels tasty, fed from your finger tips holy
mother - harmony of sky and earth; a crescendo of praise
rising, on notes of elation, the echo of sound melodious

these are aromas sweet, delicate as a lullaby hushing
to sleep, baby eyes in buntings warmed with the kisses
of humming quavers, in skies darkening for shadowy moons

these are the silvery linings rimming dawn's trimmings
as yet another tomorrow sneak peeps a day ahead to yesterday
singing all the songs; of lament, of cheers, and of hosannas
TIMELY MUSIC © gillena cox 2016

written for
PROMPT NIGHTS On Popular Demand – Such passion music can raise and quell [3]

208

[a google dot com image]

ST PATRICK'S DAY SUNSET
On rainbows slide playfully,
Syllables at the speed of lightning
Dripping wet like fresh ink
Into a poem so green,
The leaves of clover squint,
For the sparkle of fantasy;
Where treasured gold composed,
Stare as leprechauns, hurrying, empty
The evening sky into night blankets
For verses and stanzas need never sleep.
ST PATRICK'S DAY SUNSET © gillena cox 2016


An Irish Blessing
Wishing you a rainbow
For sunlight after showers—
Miles and miles of Irish smiles
For golden happy hours—
Shamrocks at your doorway
For luck and laughter too,
And a host of friends that never ends
Each day your whole life through!
[a google dot com image]



Written for Isadora's prompt at
Out of Standard - From the blender to the page

THE CHALLENGE: World-blending... the practice of combining elements from contrasting places, times, cultures, or beliefs into a piece of art or literature. World blending can result in the creation of an entirely new genre or movement.
We are asked you to write a poem that incorporates elements from different worlds.

Monday WRites 52

[a google dot com image]


MORNING SONG
Where one bird who sang so sweet
Hopped to wall a-tweet tweet tweet
Felled fresh dew
As daylight drew
Silvery of clouds in night's retreat
MORNING SONG © gillena cox 2016



You've heard about the Monday Blues ❧✿❧ well this is Monday WRites (musing on the definition here of rite, as any customary observance or practice eg the rite of afternoon tea).
Welcome to Monday WRites #52, ❧✿❧ Whats your mood like today ❧✿❧ I invite you to link in with one of your WRites




GRAB MY BUTTON
<br /> <a href="http://myblog-verses.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0C9WPzL5kFEY1gEitLn4bC5inZjfq2beowWitvrD3zLruIRMxxj1RyrHw6Xcd6SlmEASrTd6rLFn4mfF8D8XC5Mz4ASE8iblAAmc3uaKNuHtYgvzIWajyH64D6kzlwugaU8wP610yKLRq/s320/button2Monday+WRites.jpg" alt="verses" /></a><br />

206

[a google dot com image]


PARAMOUR
Gentle breezes, touching cheeks; fingers of sun rays, putting to shame every master painter, stroking in warm colour, on faces, lifted, like praise worthy palms; a sensuous wind drafts by, lifting skirts in magical sweeps, of windy-gesturing-Eros.

sunlit daybed strewn -
lo! bougainvillea shrouded
in veined scarlet bracts,

PARAMOUR © gillena cox 2016


Written for Brendan MacOdrum's prompt at
Sunday Mini-Challenge: The Paramour


Brendan says "The first written poetry of our Western tradition began in Greece between the seventh and sixth centuries BC. Standing at the border of the preliterate, poets like Archilochos and Anakreon found an alphabet in which to ferry verbal expression into the symbolic language of the mind. The act transformed culture and history and who we are. (The literate is now disappearing behind visual culture, borne by wordless ferry-workers.)

Where were the first literate poets going when they wrote their song down? It wasn’t to philosophy or myth; instead, they dazzled to the arrow-thwocks of erotic love. Sappho, another of the first poets of the literate age, wrote:

Eros, once again limb-loosener whirls me
sweetbitter, impossible to fight off, stealing up...

For this challenge, lets go back to the edge of that forest and name the paramours who led us to write. Let’s celebrate the badness of that defining encounter which has inspired our best work. Celebrate them individually or serially, angelically or down and dirty—swamp-prime"

205

[a google dot com image]


WINGED ODYSSEY
I do not envy
Them, who defy gravity
Yet, were i able
I would relable,
My feet to fly
My hands to try
Greeting moon maiden and martian
Where in persimmons grow a garden
When thunder clap, serious in storm
Challenges me, there to carry on.
WINGED ODYSSEY © gillena cox 2016

Written for grapeling's prompt at
Get Listed, Equinox Edition, featuring Leonard Cohen

Challenged to select 3 or more words (or reasonable variants) from a given list and post a new poem
I chose gravity. able. storm

Monday WRites 51

[a google dot com image]

..and those who were suffering from diseases and painful complaints of one kind or another, the possessed, epileptics, the paralysed, were all brought to him, and he cured them all Mt 4:24

HE DID THIS
Those sick, he healed
To the blind he gave sight.
The lame, he made, to walk.

Blessing the poor,
He secured for them a place
In God’s Kingdom.

The gift of healing,
He gave to us;
To continue his work

Conquering the demons
Of disease and poverty;
To create a world

Of human dignity
Jesus
He did this.
HE DID THIS © gillena cox [first posted at Wordchimes dot com April 2003]



You've heard about the Monday Blues ❧✿❧ well this is Monday WRites (musing on the definition here of rite, as any customary observance or practice eg the rite of afternoon tea).
Welcome to Monday WRites #51, ❧✿❧ Whats your mood like today ❧✿❧ I invite you to link in with one of your WRites




GRAB MY BUTTON
<br /> <a href="http://myblog-verses.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0C9WPzL5kFEY1gEitLn4bC5inZjfq2beowWitvrD3zLruIRMxxj1RyrHw6Xcd6SlmEASrTd6rLFn4mfF8D8XC5Mz4ASE8iblAAmc3uaKNuHtYgvzIWajyH64D6kzlwugaU8wP610yKLRq/s320/button2Monday+WRites.jpg" alt="verses" /></a><br />

Linking also to
Prompt Nights – Guérison par la foi – Faith, healing [9]

203

[image from google dot com]

GREEN HUES
The mountains hid behind the mist
While worms wiggled, wet the earth,
Moist the delight of leaves and stems

Pitter patter, the memories flowed
Through streams of childhood stares,
Bare of shirts, the backs of boys frolic

Jumping, running, screaming their fun;
Which girls, never could have back then;
How horrid boys can be, in their world

So carefree, loud, and most times muddy
But the mountains hid, not because of
Their games; the mountains hid to spruce

The green of vegetative hues, to dazzle
When the sunlight returned, thereabout
GREEN HUES © gillena cox 2016

Written For
Prompt Nights – When besotted with Green [8]

202

SWAY
held between posts of rigidity,
grey areas of frieze meet fear
unlike the dancer's stance, swaying to,and fro;
stretched to a frizzled tension
neither a leaf fell nor a flower bloomed
in the dreaded zone of extreme indecision

jumped into the cold emerald of the ocean
a splash of pearled water awakened the soul
SWAY © gillena cox 2016


Written for Kerry's prompt at
Flash 55

Challenged to write a piece of poetry or prose on a subject of your choice in precisely 55 WORDS
For the optional extra part of this challenge, include the word EXTREME/ EXTREMES in your title or the body of your work.

201

DAWN AND QUIET
Loud, the voices of men, in the quiet street,
And early morning noises from garbage trucks;
Workers risen so diligently, on their feet,
Clear the way for another day;
That ritual commotion in the quiet street,
Announce the return, from the realm of sleep;
Yet, still not heard, a birdie’s tweet;
Day in, day out, there will be rubbish;
The tropical air, cool, will greet,
Those coming in from the night,
Conscious, to early risers in the quiet street.
DAWN AND QUIET © gillena cox 2016

Written for Kerry's prompt at
Kerry Says ~ Let's Count on Our Fingers & Toes

Challenged to post a poem on the theme of 'Numbers and/or Numerology'
I choose to dwell on the number Eleven.
DAWN AND QUIET is a poem of 11 lines written in the form called The FOLD which i created in an experimental online exercise in 2007.

200

A TO Z ROSEBUD
A flower was offered to me
Bud stage, i held in my hand
Chrysalis of love's unfolding

Deepening, colour to my cheek
Every petal i counted when furled
Forever is a long span to envisage

Grown to weather, rainy or sunny
Happy was the grasp around that stem
Inviting passion with shy smiles

Just a tiny gesture this giving
Kept in a vase blossom sweet
Love inspires a poets soul

Many syllables describe a rose
Nought for beauty to compare
Only to sheer delight in its sphere

Pruned from a bush of thorns
Qua mystery in here splendid form
Respite of yearning plucked

Stay o reason to the mind
Tether the strength of clouds
Under setting sun's spell

Visioning golden fleeces around
Waning sun to nighttime hues
X targets the space of conquest

Yonder shines the moon so bright
Zany lovers to accept this night
A TO Z ROSEBUD © gillena cox 2016

Written for Sumana's prompt
A flower was offered to me

CHALLENGE: to begin a new poem with the words " A flower was offered to me"