Jingle Poetry asked for a love and romance poem. Here’s the best I have to give you – a take on love found, lost, found, lost… yet permanent. Amy
INTERTWINED
You recall that fall
the two of us, soul to soul
Wholly ourselves
if only for that moment
Now you’re safe
in your comfort zone
She thinks she is the only one
And that you yourself hung the moon
While I hang around here awaiting what where how when, pondering then
I whisper in your heart, stroking your memory
tenderly drawing you back to me
Our love happened
because nothing else could
Flesh upon flesh
the heart of the matter
smattering of promises we knew were loving lies
And now here’s your life: organized, precise, clockwork
Mine the jumble of a funny, frantic existence
Yet there remains the magnetic, eclectic tug
pulling you back to me
across miles of untouchable roadblocks
Our lives forever tangled, intertwined
Even apart, forever you’re mine
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
A Poetic Asides post. An ever-so-delicate look at how women’s bodies change over the years… Enjoy, and then click the link to check out poems by the rest of the gang! Amy
CHANGING
It comes to us all
Those gifted with double-X
The passage of time brings
the curse of our sex
First we get periods
Bloat like balloons
Bitchy and bothered
We cry to full moons
Then comes the part where
if you have some luck
you have a big baby
comes out like a truck
Your skinny jeans gone
to the clothing exchange
Your once-lithe young self
is at once rearranged
Your boobs not your own
‘Cause you share them with baby
and hubby gets jealous
But fools with them? (maybe)
Now gravity takes hold
and Cooper’s Droop socks you
More than a pencil
I can hold a whole box, too
Then finally menopause
There’s God’s big laugh
You sweat and you chill
and your mind’s cut in half
Part of it knowing
what you need upstairs
the other half, getting there,
asking, “What the hell am I doing here and why? There was something I needed up here but I don’t know WILL SOMEBODY TURN DOWN THE HEAT? I’M SWEATING MY ASS OFF!!!”
(c) 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
We were asked by Jingle at Jingle Poetry to create around the theme, Seven Deadly Sins. Here’s my take, and you can view other great poets by clicking on her link! Peace, Amy
SEVEN SINS I HAVE COMMITTED (in no particular order)
Wanting more
Staying too long at the party
Clinging to possessions I don’t need
Looking right past nature’s everyday beauty
Chocolate (need I elaborate?)
Giving too much to men who wanted more
Ignoring God (until the Spirit smacked me upside the head)
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Remember when TV had real news reporting, truthful coverage, and fewer ads?
TVoLUTION
In the beginning was creativity
Watch This – brought to you by
Buy This
This pattern morphed over time in sinister ways
as Buy This bought out the creators of
Watch This
Buy This now dictated the watching
Watch This was shuffled about according to Buy This trending
Our only anchor was the anchorman
the Network Evening News
Buy This pulled up that anchor and we were adrift
Then Buy This created
Watch This Happening Now
which became
Watch Only These Bits, then
Watch Only These Bits And Think This About Them
Buy This also went from choosy moms and see the USA in your Chevrolet
to eyes narcotically glued to the tube
Plasma spasm
Minds restless, but legs so lazy they got their own syndrome
and consequently their own drug
well-advertised, saturating the market like Crisco
and every bit as healthy
TVolution
In the beginning it was
“Watch This, then
Buy This.”
This pattern morphed in sinister ways
as the creators of Watch This
were bought out by Buy This.
Buy This dictated what we’d watch
Watch This was shuffled about
according to Buy This trends.
Our only anchor was the anchorman
(to our sorrow, no more Morrow)
Buy This took over the news department
Watch This Happening Now
became
Watch Only This Part We’re Showing You
then whittled down to
Watch Only This Part, and Think This About It
Buy This also went from choosy moms and peanut butter
to couch potatoes with legs so lazy
they got their own lazy syndrome
and consequently, their own drug.
To be fair, Buy This does mention the side effects:
Dry mouth, dry South,
desiring more sex but
unable to harden one’s resolve
and urges to gamble
and drive while asleep at the wheel
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For this Sunday’s prompt, we were asked to write about the harvest season. I gazed at a picture of Riley playing in fall leaves during her first Autumn, and the words fell like the proverbial fall leaves. Please check in at Sunday Scribblings to see other poets! Amy
HARVEST OF SIGHT AND SOUND
She was three
and had never seen falling leaves
never heard the crunch as crumpled tossaways
made munching sounds under her feet
“Mommy, where is the sand?”
Ah, Puerto Rico
The only land she had known thusfar
We had moved back to my hometown
“The beach is far from here, mi nena
Look above at the sunshine
streaming through the colors!”
She said it looked like a rainbow, una arca de iris
My daughter fell in love with Fall
and she a September baby, born on Labor Day!
We left behind the everyday glare of the tropics
for a land of constant change and atmospheric delights
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
We were given a jumble of words and asked to create a poem.
Purple, Kiss, Drooping, Gourd, Hook, Staircase, Extract, Glossy, Pluck, Muddy, Doll, Bitter
This is what happened for me. Get over to Big Tent Poetry and sample other poets, too! Amy
TEDDY BEAR
Every bedtime
One kiss for me, one for Ted
So much more than a doll
The biggest bear of all time
(or so it seemed)
His fur a muddy brown
Eyes a bittersweet chocolate hue
My girl would pluck Ted from the couch
and drag him drooping up the staircase (thunk, thunk)
Now Ted resides in my writing space
beside an 8×10 glossy of the daughter
who’s brilliant and sometimes out of her gourd and
hooked on art – like her mom
Sometimes, when I miss her much
(she having extracted herself to the West Coast)
Ted and I sit on the big purple blanket
talk it over
and have ourselves a good little cry
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore
THE ESSENTIALS
Should the shipwreck come
and I and my truck be washed ashore
Here’s what remain to call my own
sustaining me in my bamboo hut:
Tangerine candles and wooden matchsticks
A jar of honey
A box of African Red Bush Tea
My favorite honeybee mug
A volume of Neruda and one of Hardy
Paper and pencils
Pictures of my family and friends
A few sports bras and tramparound clothes
One little black dress, unusable in these circumstances
Hopefully, my bifocals would survive the swim
But most important of all:
My wit
My faith
My ingenuity, soon to be tested
My name
…even if I am the only one left alive to say it
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore
Written for the “Envision” prompt at Writer’s Island, my Saturday hangout. Peace, Amy
HEAVENVISION
Unthinkably vast
Earthly limitations banished
Swirling channels of gold
Soft, dry, enveloping
The comforting experience of a universe
you never recognized, yet never left
The essence of your spirit
breaks through an eggshell membrane
Penetrating a place that is not a place
but a pool, ocean, sea, sky
constellation of love and nothing more
Picture love’s embrace
in a place called Eternity
(c) 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
This was written awhile back for Writer’s Island, and we had a request for a re-post from Jingle Poetry! Dream on, kids… Amy
FREE FLIGHT
Wandering into the enchanted field
petting daisies, grazing the tips of
grasses grown wild and tall
She centers herself
gripping damp ground with her toes
Eyes close and her face turns skyward
Arms rise from her sides and she
wills her body to follow
Heels peel off the earth, then her toes
Opening her eyes, she is just off the ground
hovering, delighted, a featherweight being
Now comes the real work
She launches into a vertical breaststroke
slowly, loving the feel of her fingers moving through
humid air as though along a pond
The field is far below her now; her house is
a Lego-sized block. She levels off her ascent
and pushes farther into the atmosphere
Over hills, touching the tops of Douglas firs
Swooping down over the river, she waves to
kids swimming on the lakeshore
Look, they whisper, Why don’t our parents
believe us? She doesn’t wait for night
She takes flight when we can watch her
But the grownups are too busy, away from the
places in nature where she can be spied
so only children are inspired to try and fly
Someday, she muses, I will have a daughter
and we will take a night flight, hand in hand, close to
the harvest moon, as fireflies light the way
And when we’ve had enough of airborne travel
we’ll come to rest on our own roof
feet dangling over the eaves. Wondering, laughing
How many are blessed with the power of flight?
She doesn’t know, but thinks it must be very few
for she’s never seen another in all her travels
Her mother taught her the secret: Let go of the world
let the air fill you up past your lungs, so deeply
that you are the air. Let go and be free
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore, Sharp Little Pencil
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