STUDIO QUANDARY
Not what I thought I’d paint this day
Not at all, the dizzying colors and
figures from last night’s dream
I tossed the covers
Stirred the maid from her rest
Even woke my wife in the next room
A dragon gave chase and I
was naked screaming running
Bare and barely missing his fiery, explosive tongue
Now the dream is slowing settling on wood
The creature and my whirling flaccid flesh
And a phrase I still don’t understand: Barney & Friends
© 2015 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Imaginary Garden of Real Toads gave us this Rembrandt, “Artist in His Studio.” I put myself in his cobbled boots and decided to give him a little scare… and myself a chuckle! Amy
First, an apology for not being up to date answering your comments – I promise to catch up by the end of the week!
Three Word Wednesday asked for poems containing these words: Might, Passive, and Flag. Took some liberties with those words… let me know what you think, especially after you decode the definition below (if you’re not a Wisconsinite, that is!) Amy
Dragon’s Breath
A Dragon’s breath is rancid
Stifling, smells like hemlock that’s
been brewing too long
Dragons hate Badgers, tough little guys
who burrow so fast their escape routes
to dodge the Dragon’s flames
Badgers have claws so long and hard,
rodent talons that can scrape Dragon’s tongue
into ribbons of blood and leathery flesh
One particular Dragon, draggin’ in riches
from Wizard Brothers, shows off his
shiny scales and mighty bearing
Badgers are not passive. They have seen
Dragon burn through other Badgers’ lives
like fodder, trying to scare the rest
back into holes, to render them unnoticed,
inconsequential. But Badgers’ tenacity
will stand to fight as one:
They will chase the Dragon from
their own flagged castle, as the Golden Lady
points the way to a better future
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
NOTE: For non-Wisconsinites, our state is engaged in an effort to recall the current governor, Scott Walker. The Dragon is obvious; the hemlock, well, you can draw your own references, although the Wizards are the Brothers Koch, who funded the Tea Party, then helped them look like a grassroots effort, when in fact it’s more like a perfectly manicured lawn. The Badgers are the namesake of many sports teams, including our UW College team, and also refer to everyday, six-pack Wisconsinites. The Golden Lady is “Miss Forward,” a statue atop our “castle,” the Capitol Dome here in Madison. She bravely points the way forward… wearing a helmet that has a BADGER on it! How cool is that?
Sharp Little Pencil 