Silence
I crave it
A stilling of the voices in my head (“never,” “can’t,” “imposter”)
A silent night
A holy night
All is calm? Never.
Bright? That’s the synapses firing, ratatat, plinking in a tinny pitch
The closest thing to silence I have yet to experience
is in dreams
Even now, tinnitus, like angel songs on high, has descended
down ’round my ears
to provide my anxiety with a soundtrack
© 2025 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For What’s Going On? The prompt was silence. Too many years in NYC and other big cities. Even here in rural Wisconsin, the muffler-free POS trucks of the Friday Night Bros haul ass down the streets. The mere concept of silence is foreign to me, so I went all in on the “how.”
Hook, Line, and Sinker
I was shocked when you all fell for it
A swell guy (for a billionaire)
He swept you off your feet
Captured your hearts (and played your heartstrings like a fiddle)
Now, we Manhattanites knew all about him (pre-escalator, pre-Apprentice)
We were there when he cheated and lied to small contractors (oh, and his wife)
We knew he was a steaming pile of (insert vulgarity here)
And while he dangled the Shiny New Thing (dizzyingly bright), you swayed to YMCA
You chained yourself to his fictitious yacht (um, which the Saudis paid for)
that has become a sinking ship
I have neither schadenfreude nor smugness
There is no victory here
Only one last sweeping view of the shore
because as he sinks, as you sink,
we all sink together
We are sunk, kids
© 2025 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For The Sunday Whirl. Check out the link to find the words for this one! My internet is spotty and I need to post this fast, hee hee. A
I haven’t been this unsure of the world and my place in it since the 80s in Manhattan, as I watched my dear ones getting sick and dying in the first pandemic. That sense of hopelessness and fear can cripple us. The best thing I can do for this prompt is post a song I wrote years ago for World AIDS Day, in memory of my dear Jeff French. It’s called “The Day I Saw an Angel Fly,” and I hope the link to the recording opens all right. If not, let me know and I will find another way to get it to you. Guard your hearts, my friends.
In the 80s, on a big iron bed
My friend Jeffery, and a sign that read, “Body Fluid Precautions”
A nurse came in and whispered to me,
“Put on a mask and gloves – it’s for protection, you see”
And in defiance of the rules, I lay the gloves aside and wiped his fever cool
When it was time to leave, Jeffery tugged at my sleeve, and spoke of
Angels flying free
He said, “Angels, they’re waiting for me…
They’ll take away my fever and fear
They’ll give me wings and release me from here
We’re all of us, angels-to-be
I hope you see them when they come for me
When I go, and your missing me soon, turn your face to the sky
And say you saw on angel fly”
So many years, so many goodbyes
Too many breaks in our family ties (sisters, brothers, friends, and lovers)
A little news of research each day, and in the meantime, we pray
We keep on working for the best
But when the battle’s lost and someone’s laid to rest
Jeffery’s words come back to me – I close my eyes and I see
Angels all around
Angels, on holy ground
They see my fears and soothe all my pain
They give me reason to face life again
We’re all of us, angels-to-be
I know I feel them when they comfort me
I’m not sure of too much in this world, but I know I learned to cry
The day I saw on angel fly
I can’t remember when I learned to laugh, but I know I learned to cry
The day I saw an angel fly
(c) 1992 Amy Barlow/Sharp Little Pencil
For What’s Going On, the prompt is “In these uncertain times.”
Years ago, humans picked cherries from the trees in Door County, Wisconsin
Until the owner bought a machine
that shook the bejeezus out of the entire tree
The workers no longer harvest the cherries (10,000 every harvest. Humans, not cherries. Ten. Thousand. Workers.)
The humans used to fill an office with the clickclack of typewriters
They typed flawlessly (because there was no white-out yet)
They used carbon paper and typed triplicate copies
They took dictation and cleared up the boss’s abysmal syntax
There were 36 women in my mom’s office, they fed their families, they cared for their parents, all on that salary
Until computers
Now, that roomful of women have become maybe 2 apps on your smartphone
The human stands at an easel
regards the subject (whose face is so beautiful…)
and renders the model’s very essence onto canvas
then, because art is a business, they upload it onto their Instagram
Until A.I. gets hold of it, spits out an image
something like the original, except there are no edges, only eerie smoothness
The artist spent years honing their craft; they spent massive amounts in art supply stores,
hired the model, rented the space, but most importantly
The artist puts their soul into the craft
And now Artificial Intelligence has stolen their work without recompense
And now Artificial Intelligence can steal my work, your work, everyone’s work
AI can steal your face, your voice, and it won’t ask permission
And for the CEOs, it will be justified as “streamlining the organization”
AI doesn’t need days off or vacations
AI doesn’t need health care
AI doesn’t need paid time off for the birth of a baby
AI doesn’t vote, so politicians don’t have to worry about consequences, like they did with those pesky unions and such
AI doesn’t need a cafeteria, office space, none of that
AI only needs access to an environmentally hazardous amount of electricity, plus obscene amounts of water to cool the jets
A.I. NEVER SLEEPS
AI has no conscience, no face, no creativity
Humans create. Humans relate to one another. Humans breathe.
AI is just a xerox machine that vomits
© 2025 Sharp Little Pencil/Amy Barlow Liberatore
For the blog What’s Going On, the prompt was Being Human.
“Peace through strength”?
Bullshit.
How about
peace through compassion
peace through commitment
peace through diplomacy, through communication
peace through a meeting of minds, however small they are
peace through common goals
peace through disarmament
peace through understanding
No one person can solve this, because
No one person caused it
It just feels that way
No, that man is propped up by millions of smaller weasels
with smaller minds, smaller thoughts, smaller world views
There is only one way we can have peace right now in our country
and it ain’t just through politicians (although the geezers could step aside, which would help)
It’s through determination and clear-headedness
through organization and strong mutual support
through harnessing and sharing radical love
but also, when needed, an abundance of WTF energy
Because what the actual fuck in going on here?
© 2025 Sharp Little Pencil/Amy Barlow Liberatore
For What’s Going On? The prompt is peace. That subject is so fraught at this moment. It’s easy to grab a beer (or a joint) and reach for the remote. Watch those bizarre shows where grown people put themselves through hell in hopes of winning fame. Or the ubiquitous talking heads on the news – whatever the issue, whichever side… maddening and biased. And how late-night comics keep trying to make this funny is beyond me. I can’t laugh. This shit is as serious as a heart attack and about as funny as a crutch, as my mom used to say.
Politicians may be useless, but pick up the phone anyway. Then, get in touch with your senior neighbors, your single-parent neighbors, your Queer friends, your Latino neighbors. They need your full-throated support.
Because doing something is way better than what most people are doing right about now. And keep praying, but match it with action. Amy
Grandma Laughlin, gone forever, listens always
I talk to her out loud, loudly and often
Guardian angel of the trolley lines, spirit of the Chicago Public Library, goddess of suffrage and suffering
“Blanche, I’ll bet you thought we saw the last
of that ass Hitler, but Deutchland Uber Alles is on an endless loop
A rancid record spinning crackling – thunk-kathunk-kathunk
Who’d’a thunk it, Grandma, it’s’ happening again.”
And even though she was too classy to swear
Even though she wouldn’t have said SHIT if she had a mouthful of it
I cuss freely when I speak to her
What’s she gonna do about it, anyway?
“Blanche, that miserable fuckwit will get us all blown to kingdom come
Bastard takes everything FDR stood for and
folds it into paper airplanes
sets it on fire
burns it with a spyglass and
feeds it to the pigeons
(strike that – I don’t believe he would ever feed a creature other than himself)
There is a haze on all our hearts, a deep groan of disgust…”
Blanche’s face is in my mind
In her heyday, an irrepressible Socialist, FDR fangirl, chatterbox, survivor
By the time I knew her, she was weary
Made it through the Great Depression but
bound by the other kind, dull and grey and nothing to say
But she blinks slowly and seems to convey,
“I know, Amer. I wish I could say I lived to see the other side of the nightmare,
but this one is so much worse.”
There is no moral to this poem, no twist, no clever upshot
Just remembering her face, the calm after the storm, ready for the next one
© 2025 Sharp Little Pencil/Amy Barlow Liberatore
For What’s Happening Now, the prompt was Grandma. I had a grandpa, too, but Blanche, my mom’s mother, took the cake. One of my favorite human beings ever. Love you, Grandma Laughlin.
In this time of darkness, this Tale of Two Countries
Let there be light
In this time of oppression, suppression, deep depression
Let there be light
As Sprocket Boy takes his silver chainsaw to the very heart of our government
And 47 makes our country a global laughstock
Let there be light
Yet there is light
within the collective conscience of those who love
who love unafraid, unbidden, extravagantly, simply because they can
who love our nation despite its flaws, who love others through the madness
Let there be light
Let there be light
© 2025 Sharp Little Pencil/Amy Barlow Liberatore
For What’s Going On?, the prompt was Light. Seems it’s the one thing that’s in short supply. Along with hope.
The very idea that Elon Musk has access to our information and to Fort Knox is unacceptable and frankly unbelievable. It has been about a month. A MONTH. Let’s get going. Calls to make. Congressional regional meetings to attend. And light to be generated within each one of us, before it’s too late.
Gunmetal grey shrouds our town
Down Main Street, out to the Miracle Mile, the air is laden with
a sudden scent: Snow’s a-comin’
Grown-up winter chills us senseless
There is not, nor will there ever be
enough Vitamin D
Today, it’s a snowglobe slide to a local café
comfort in a coffee mug
Soon, all will be forgiven and Mother Earth will grant us sun and shade
But outside, at this very moment
it’s colder than my Aunt Caroline
and I thank God for all my friends at the cafe
We can bitch about the snow and
sneak a little brandy into our cocoa
while the barista checks his news feed
© 2025 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For What’s Going On, the prompt was Landscape. And yeah, once in a while I write something other than politics.
On the eve of the destruction of all we hold dear in our democracy
At the edge of the cliff
In the belly of The Beast (yes, the one in the Bible)
it’s normal to consider giving up
letting go
After all, I am not the one in peril
Straight, white, cisgender old lady – what, me worry?
And when Reagan, begging for re-election, asked, “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?” my answer was “Is that WE singular or plural?” cuz my friends were dying of AIDS and he did nothing
So it’s a Reagan moment writ large, and the WE is definitely plural
WE are immigrants scared to send our kids to school, to go to work
WE are trans women being shouted at in the gendered restrooms
WE are trans and nonbinary kids whose parents want to help us avoid puberty until we figure that shit out
WE are pregnant and don’t want to have a baby
WE are Black and brown Americans, trying to stay alive
WE are unhoused without health care, living in a car with our kids
WE are vulnerable and scared and just plain tired of the fear
So the call is real, the pull is strong, to step into the breach
To stand in the way of bullies, to fight book banners, to help people get their abortions safely, to open churches to immigrants AND stand at the door when ICE shows up and say
YOU WILL HAVE TO GO THROUGH ME
When the Thought Police try to harass our youth
YOU WILL HAVE TO GO THROUGH ME
When insecure men in red hats (brown shirts) pull their crap
YOU WILL HAVE TO GO THROUGH ME
And I refuse to stand still; I refuse to stay silent; I refuse to bend my knee
I refuse to be a Good German
© 2025 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For What’s Going On, with thanks to all the rabblerousers there.
NOTE: Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and JD Vance can kiss my Irish ass. But you already knew that. Amy
Up the stairs, count the steps
1, 2, 3, 4
1, 2, 3, 4
1, 2, 3…
Crap, it didn’t come out even, it’s eleven
But 1-2-3-4-1/ 2 /3-4-1-2-3 will have to do; the middle is two
Plus 11 is prime, so that’s something
At book club, as with any circled gathering, the circle goes clockwise from my left:
1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – me
becomes
4-5-6 (me) 1-2-3
Once I’ve calculated the delicate balance, once the gathering is complete, my mind can focus fully on the book we just read – wait, the meeting is over already? What was the book about again?
I knew our last house was perfect, because it was exactly 16 steps up from the basement. (I have been known to climb two steps at a time to make the sequence work out into even groups.) But my therapist’s office was 20, at least an even number.
This new place has 20, too. 5 x 4 will have to do.
© 2024 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For What’s Going On, Mary asked us to write a poem based on numbers. This hit home for me because the main part of my OCD is counting, specifically grouping to the point of anxiety. I know most people don’t number pavement or floor tiles as an extreme sport. Example: If there are alternating colors in striped tiles down the hallway, I not only count them; I make sure the number of steps per group are the same all the way down the hall. Three wide stripes can equal five steps, and a break in that pattern will annoy me, even if only for a moment. Anxiety is at its heart.
This used to cause me all sorts of trouble in school. How could I be expected to pay attention to the teacher when she just put up a new cardboard cutout balloon display and I had to find the center balloon, then group and number balloons by color (to determine which color won), etc. etc. I barely passed high school.
It’s exhausting, time consuming, non-productive. One of the many ways my mind deals with anxiety. Let’s hope I can find enough peace in 2024 that I don’t start, you know, counting the hairs on my arms. Or the beats of my heart. Cuz if that happens, I’ll never make it off the couch.
Amy
Sharp Little Pencil 