The Migraine Speaks (much to my dismay)
Yes, that ball bearing behind your right eye
It is I
Thief of thoughts
Barbed-wire butchery
Trailing tacks and nails and
prickly pins
I’ll stick in your head
‘til you wish you were dead
I strike with little warning
and lots of retching and tears
and pulling of the blinds
I am your migraine
You are my prisoner
(until the meds kick in)
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
I have not shared much in the way of my artwork, but lately I’ve taken up drawing as therapy. The picture above was drawn during a migraine, so it was quite a feat for me.
For Imaginary Garden With Real Toads’ Open Link Monday, plus dverse Open Mic, and ABC Wednesday later this week… “M” is for migraine.
ORAL FIXATION
Following years of extractions,
protracted dental procedures
that chanced to finance
dentists’ kids’ tuition,
here’s the fruition:
End of line for teeth like mine
Complete comeuppance
(come-out-ance?) of my
upper floor of teeth (the basement
to remain untouched beneath)
Oh, doctor, pray thee
go gentle into that good right
side; succumb that gum with enough
anesthetic to render a rhino redundant
Gas me gutless
The final result, partly insult
My smile replaced;
our savings laid waste
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
You know I will write about anything when you read this one, right? Yes, I will join the “upper denture” group this week, after years of secondhand nightclub smoke plus poor access to dental care rendered my upper rack wretched and wrecked.
For Imaginary Garden With Real Toads’ Open Link Monday and dverse’s Open Mic Tuesday. And if I’m absent over the weekend, it will be because my face looks like a cauliflower and feels like the aftermath of a prizefight! Peace, Amy
Hellish Mind Music
Exquisite pain
Migraine music
Satan’s symphony
starts slowly
Building, blinding
to crescendo
Muted applause
at its end
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons, all permissions given by Searobin, creator
At Poets United, Kim introduced us to William Carlos Williams’ “The Red Wheelbarrow,” a simply gorgeous poem of only eight lines and no punctuation. Read it HERE. She asked us to build in the same form a poem in which every word matters. I woke up with said migraine, so it became my subject! Ah yes, art is pain… pain is art…
This also appears near the hedges bordering the Imaginary Garden With Real Toads. Peace, Amy
Dentists and Origami
Dentists cling to
ass-slinging phrases:
“Only $3,000,” and
“We prefer implants,” or
“It’s easy, and it’s only $2,700!”
You are entering a world of pain,
paralyzed in their sterile chair,
these hair-raising inestimable estimates
tossed off like freshly folded
origami vampire bats
circling the cubicle,
jugular-bound to bleed you dry
Count the scales on
his alligator shoes
Take notes, the personal pix
of Peruvian vacation with
family, a long row of
perfect pearlies
The iron-clad irony:
We pay,
they play
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Isadora at Imaginary Garden With Real Toads asked us to use one of our favorite movie lines in a poem… Just saw “The Big Lebowski” for the first time in years, and although it’s irredeemably filled with swearing – haven’t heard that many F words since labor – John Goodman’s line, “You’re entering a world of pain,” seems so appropriate here!
My empty tooth canal is stuffed with clove oil-soaked gauze and it’s still 85 degrees at midnight and I cannot go outside because the humidity is too much for my lungs, like breathing warm pudding. “Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you find the play?” Amy
Labor Room Blues (in the key of AARGH!)
Would that my trap door’d been
strung with elastic
My labor would have been
oh, so easy – less drastic
If I am blessed with one
more babe, I’m sure I’ll
scream, “Cancel the Gatorade!
Let’s try epidural!”
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For Three Word Wednesday: Labor, Cancel, Elastic
Also at Poets United, prompt: Strings
And Riley, no hard feelings! But if you think you’re getting a baby sister or brother at my age, think again, ha ha.
Three Word Wednesday gave us Gag, Maintain, and Omit. Also at Poets United, my poetic community of friends. Peace, Amy
Who’s Crying Now?
The only way he could shut her up
was to gag her with a bandana.
The only way he could maintain control
was to try tying her to a chair
The only mistake he made was to omit
searching her pockets for pepper spray.
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
This is for my friend M., with whom I had a conversation today. Some days are like this; others, much better… Peace, Amy
Quiet House Riot
Alone, left at home.
Isolation is
cold consolation.
Then the storm moves in.
Soon floodgates open;
silent shrieks fill cracks
in fractured places.
Sea salt shores it up.
Building castles of crystalline tears.
The Dark Ones hand me a shovel.
They say, “Dig it.”
They aren’t hip – they’re talking about my grave.
Maroon lagoon
of sodden gloom.
So low,
solo.
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Also at my poetic home, Poets United.
The prompt at NaPoWriMo was to write a poem using words you hate. This covers a wide spectrum from one part of my life. I miss you, Jeff. Love, Amer
Panel from the Memory Project
Pneumocystis Pneumonia (PCP)
Prone on the steel-back chair.
Probed straight down the gullet.
Cysts and rancid breath emerge
as he lay stupefied.
He will awaken and count the hours.
Tick, tock, curse the clock.
Swabs grabbed cultures.
Petrie dishes cook up the fetid truth:
He has it.
He has full-blown AIDS.
It is 1985.
He is 32.
Tick. tock, curse the clock.
Skeletal soon enough, too soon.
Patches of scabs peel off his scalp.
Bactrin on every sink so that
if he barfs, bleeds, or brays
we can wash it off.
Tick, tock, curse the clock.
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Also posted at Writer’s Island (Day 28) and Poets United.
Sharp Little Pencil 