Heads or Tails
Symbiosis
Play or battle?
Neither realizing
both have scales
and cold blood
More things in common
than not
So it is with the game of war
played out across the globe
The US, the big fat crocodile
Everyone else worldwide
viewed by our military leaders as
slippery, needlekiller snakes
Croc’s jaws are mighty,
but venom has its own power
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Mama Zen’s Words Count prompt at Imaginary Garden With Real Toads gave us several gorgeous scientific images by Maria Sibylla Merian. I chose this because I could not ignore the balance of this drawing; and yet, there’s also an imbalance. So size “matters,” but the lithe serpent has fangs. This could go either way. The huge, well-fed croc (America) seems to have control over the snake (pick a country), but will that be the end? Or shall the snake morph into Medusa, exacting her own revenge… or quagmire? As a tiny scale on that croc, I wish I had some sway, some say, over who the hell is grinding our military jaws in MY name. Both let go, everybody wins. Aren’t we above animal games?
NOTES ON ILLUSTRATOR: Ms. Merian was a woman ahead of her time. She traveled (with her daughter and – GASP! – no male guardian) in 1699 to South America to illustrate wildlife. Click on the “Toads” link to see more of her artwork, which is all public domain. The name of her insect collection, published in 1705, is Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium; however, this is obviously from another collection.
Also posted at my snake-free swamp (in the very best M*A*S*H sense of the word), Poets United. Peace, Amy
Dark Voyage
Another dark alley
Why aren’t there ever any
light alleys? she quirks to herself
She waits for the next john to be sexed
Pawns her body for a fix
Used to be kicks
First the hash pipe
Upgraded to Opium 5.0
The real deal, the needle
Heroin
Looks like a smear of poop on foil but
once it’s lit, it’s hit and
she isn’t worth shit
Heroin, a nightmare cannibal picnic
sliding down the clever beanstalk
into the tar pits for a long slick sick soak
Heroin. She’s nodding, her mind
smolders with visions conjured from
the greasy plank decks of the U.S.S. Sheol
She forgets the mess under her dress and
presses her mind against a wall of sounds
When she wakes, her stomach will ache
She’ll john once more to score
to black it out
to empty the chasm
already scraped bare
The addict: A mind forever voyaging
through strange seas of thought, alone
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Image: Wikipedia Commons
Kerry at Imaginary Garden With Real Toads wanted us to write using a line from a William Wordsworth poem, since today would have been his 243rd birthday. The Wordsworth line I chose was, “A mind forever Voyaging through strange seas of Thought, alone.” This is how I see many addicts: isolated, caught in a foreign place (even if it’s his/her home town), and always wondering. The “aloneness” of the line grabbed me by the ear and said, “Listen!” And so I did. And then I picked up my pencil. This is also for the Poetry Pantry at Poets United… proud to be a member! Peace, Amy
For Peggy Goetz’s prompt at Imaginary Garden With Real Toads , a poem about going outside (mind, body, spirit, your choice!). I’ve been trying to hang with the Real Toads during NaPoWriMo, because it’s a small group of intensely focused poets who gracefully critique each other’s work). This will also appear on the sidebar at my first and always poetic home, Poets United (proud to be a member!).
Inside, Out
It stirs within him
The call to get out
To explore the
yet to be, yet to see
He stretches,
not wanting
to leave home yet,
but knowing it’s time
The way to the door
is dark, narrow,
but he’ll squeeze
through the gate into…
Bright lights
Much noise
Something pushes him on
Then a woman’s cry –
sharp as a thumbtack and
bright as an Easter bonnet –
sings across the hall:
“It’s a boy!”
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
An Existentialist Speaks
We’re all in it
apart
Alphabet pasta bits
swirling in chicken broth
A sand dune of human grains
awhirl, subject to
the wind’s whimsy
A night sky filled with wandering stars
Stasis in motion
We do what we must in our
earthly bodies without regard for
The Big Judgement fairy tale
Some argue that life without God
is meaningless
a void
They seem so sure and
squint hostilely at
my assertion that
all of that “redemption” crap
is pointless as a salt lick
on the I-90
Mom thinks I’m worse than
an atheist; she’s worried
I didn’t pay attention in
catechism class.
She’s right.
Here
Now
Lost in the stars
We’re all in it
apart
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
NaPoWriMo #3, for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, where Kerry asked for poems about Existentialism. Also, Three Word Wednesday gave us Argue, Lick, and Squint. Kim at Verse First for Poets United wanted poems with a “body” theme, whether a group or a single body. I hope I gave her both!
Existentialism is far from my own path, but I can see how people become isolated, believing there is no God, no consequence in the end, no hereafter, and no particular reason to have faith in anything. I can’t get my mind around it completely, but I gave it a try!
Come, Spring (a cinquain)
Sunlight
Pour through my pane
Melt ice around my heart
Transform my frozen mind gently
Frost free
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Image from Wikimedia Commons, by Mohylek: “I, the copyright holder of this work,
release this work into the public domain. This applies worldwide.”
NaPoWriMo #2, for Sunday Scribblings (seasoned, although mine is more seasonal). Also at “It’s Always Sunny at Poets United,” my wintering snowbird delight and haven!
Can you believe it? An unprompted cinquain. Spring must be coming… Peace, Amy
Participating in National Poetry Writing Month “A poem a day keeps the blues at bay.”
April Fool (The Poet)
She can do it
She’s done it before
April calls for
a poem a day
She locks out
distractions, lets
herself get lost
in memories and moments
It could be a
song – she has
staff paper on hand,
after all, plenty
It won’t be
floral themes
Funeral scented as
petals fall to the carpet
No “moon June spoon”
songs; something
bluesy with peaks
of soulful wails
She has written
about stoners and
wastrels, powders
up nostrils, bad sex
Politics and pencils
Incense and incest
LGBTQs and rednecks
Allies and enemies
Today, she will
simply vow to
make it worthy,
come what may
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For the Sunday Whirl (see Wordle HERE), and on the sidebar at Poets United, my oasis in the desert; AND for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads’ Open Link Monday. n celebration of the first day of NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Writing Month (or Naturally Panicky Writhing Motions, depending on my level of desperation).
The game is afoot, Watson. Watson, the foot is a game. A game, Watson, the foot is. Yeah, I’m ready! Peace, Amy
Lucky Girl Child
Our second sister,
birthed still as stone
Never to serve as
our father’s very own
little plaything – then relive,
after years of self-doubt,
what evils her Daddy
had carried about
I think it lucky
she heard God’s sweet call
Was she not graced
by good fate after all?
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
As always, I speak on behalf of myself, not for anyone in my family. This is my truth, and I tell it willingly to help others.
As frequent readers here at Sharp Li’l know, I was sexually molested by my father. Long before I was born, my mother suffered a stillbirth during her second pregnancy. Fortunately for Charlotte, subsequent pregnancies went well; however, there were consequences regarding my father – which she finally acknowledged knowing about, during the last year of her life.
Sexual molestation is more frequent in families that most would acknowledge. Fathers, uncles, teachers, and friends of the family, of whom over 90% identify as straight men, are the most frequent perpetrators of pedophilia. If you know a little girl or boy who is easily startled, wets the bed past the usual age, seems unusually shy (or gravitates toward adult figures with inappropriate affection), or even tries to tell you about “bad touches,” please take notice. It may be nothing… or it may be everything for that child to be noticed and taken seriously.
For more information on the signs of child sexual abuse, click HERE.
This was written in response to the weekly Trifecta prompt, Lucky, with 33-333 words, including the third definition below.
LUCKY (adjective)
1: having good luck
2: happening by chance : fortuitous
3: producing or resulting in good by chance: favorable>
May the children near you, and all children worldwide, be freed of this tragic circumstance. Until then, I bid you peace. Amy
SHADOWS OF GHOSTS*
The shadows of ghosts
are most feared
among the living
For the phantoms themselves
are but empty illusion
Yet their inkblot trails,
once perceived by mortals,
are evidence that
unfettered souls are still privy
to the whispers of men
Shadows of ghosts,
silent witnesses to
humankind’s
immoral deeds
on this earth
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For Open Link Monday at Imaginary Garden With Real Toads; also at my poetic haunt, Poets United. Image by Wikipedia Commons.
This poem flew out of my pencil while watching “Elizabeth: The Golden Age.” Many good things to say about this movie, except that it reprises Elizabeth’s putting on armor and rallying the peasantry once more. Having said that, Clive Owen, Geoffrey Rush, Abbie Cornish, and especially the luminescent Samantha Morton (as Mary Queen of Scots), and Elizabeth herself in the person of Cate Blanchet, all did very well.
* The phrase, “the shadow of ghosts,” has nothing to do with the poem (plus it’s singular in the movie), but I had to give credit to the screenwriters, William Nicholson and Michael Hirst, for penning it and inspiring this poem. Peace, Amy
Photo © Kim Nelson
The One That Got Away
Within
Gentle droplet
Humanity begins
Viewed at doctor’s, yet that same night
Taken
Woman
Mother-to-be
Seemingly, “Nevermore”
Her womb emptied by dark forces
Grief reigns
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
This poem, a cinquain (yes, I wrote a form that was not specifically requested!), for Poets United, is based on my first impression of the fabulous artwork of Kim Nelson (Poet, Artist, Blogger, and FRIEND – check out her work by clicking on her name).
Even though it’s in shades of red, my take was an ultrasound screen, with the fetal head at the top. I did have a miscarriage years ago, which probably explains the red connection, and it haunted me for so long, until I got pregnant with Riley and knew she was ‘in with Velcro.’ Peace, Amy (Proud Member, Poets United)
Five Years Old, First Circus
Loud, it was and smelled like
popcorn, cotton candy, candy, cigars, and
poop, but amazing all at the same time.
When you’re five, you like everything, almost.
Two men, the daredevil flying trapeze artists.
Two glittery women, dangling from ropes with their teeth.
Clowns, slipspilling silly – but scary:
Chalk faces; crayoned, exaggerated expressions.
I hid my face when they came near.
Boss in fancy suit and spotlight and mic.
Dogs jumping hoop after hoops like
they were hopping on and off a skillet.
Treats were trash, but I stashed an apple.
Kid next to me threw up on her mom, red, white, and blue.
Cherry soda, vanilla ice cream, and Lik-M-Aid.
After the show, Dad showed he had clout. Round back,
behind the tent, an amazing surprise:
A baby elephant, sporting a small seat.
Dad lifted me up and
I and only I was allowed to ride Burma,
the pride of the Lions Club Circus.
To feel her soft, upturned ears, lay my head down
upon her warm neck. I sang as she swayed beneath
my skinned-knee skinny legs.
That was the first time I ever connected
with someone who’d traveled so far,
halfway across the world, just for me.
© 2013 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
True story.
I’m sure other children got rides later, but I was so enthralled and focused that I didn’t notice. I thought Dad was king of the world that day.
OK, you all know I have a major phobia about clowns, with the notable exception being my friend Monica, whose character Imagin is simply pure and sweet. Maybe it’s because she is a woman – as much as I knew what “drag queens” were when I was quite small, men who paste it on for little kids scare the poop out of me. If anyone out there is a clown, let me know – you may well help me past my phobia!
Imaginary Garden with Real Toads’ “Kay in Alberta” presented us with a challenge that, thank the Lord, has NOTHING to do with St. Paddy’s Day… I also laid this on the shelf at the Poetry Pantry at Poets United. I’m probably more Irish than most of my neighbors, so I say, let the German-American and Polish-American and African-American and other Hyphenated-Americans drink green beer and barf in the street. Most of my Irish-American friends reserve that behavior for the other 364 dasy a year – and they are always prepared in the event of hangovers of nausea! Happy Kermit Day, Amy
Sharp Little Pencil 