Wisconsin Mud
Autumn task
Baskets of weeds
Seeds fall to soil
Toil with the tiller
Clay ground first
Curse of my garden
Hardens like rock
Mocks my feeble shovel
Red, this level
Beveled by tilling machine
Green detritus mixes
Fixes a greyer hue
Potting soil on top
Prop myself with a rake
Stakes then reposted
Toasted from our labors
Add soil meant for pot
Plot now proper brown
Garden set for sleep
Steep some tea and rest
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For Sunday Scribblings, the prompt was simply “mud.” I’m also putting this on a shelf in the Poetry Pantry at Poets United and spilling on the bar at dverse Open Mic Night!
Of course, the damnable ironweed of earlier in the season (CLICK HERE) refused to disclose the center of its evil web of roots, and the pye wede followed suit. Monica planted some spring bulbs in front; a failed daisy plant finally sprang into life in late autumn, surprise! More daisies will be planted, as well as tiger lilies, the bulbs go in now. Next spring, we hope to have a plethora of pots: Herbs, petunias, Sweet William, lobelia, and Johnny Jump-ups (my favorite).
C’mon. Don’t tell me you didn’t see a rant coming this week! Politically yours, Amy
Naked at the Tea Party
Morning mist lifts over Madison
yet a cloud remains
following the foolish victor who
occupies a solid gold throne
furnished by a Faustian family
from a land far, far away
As he breaths through his mouth
he complains his crown
is bulky, unwieldly (gotcha! He doesn’t know that word)
adored as it is with spangles, sparkles
the spoils of ill-gotten gains
and still – ill repute remains
He resigns himself to another day
of allowing teachers to go home (forever)
Freeing children from pesky doctor visits
Yet his doom looms: HE IS JOHN DOE
Jump one hurdle, slam into a wall
The drumbeat grows: Indict “Koch Lite”
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For Three Word Wednesday: Bulky, Mist, Reign.
Also at my poetic soapbox, the ever-trusty Poets United (not a PAC, incidentally!).
Image courtesy of the magazine named for my patron saint: Mother Jones.
First, a plug for my friend Dani’s site, My Heart’s Love Songs. I am honored to be the featured poet at her blog this week, and she speaks about the global community we are creating by interlinking our blogs. Thanks, Dani!
Always and Forever, Ironweed (dammit)
Our first spring here, a bit of garden space.
Colors came to every garden, save ours.
Only one flower – no crocuses, nor lilies,
nor tulips – but a massive bush of columbine.
Its flowers, sweet pink and yellow
Surveying the remainder: Weeds.
Carefully planted, cultivated weeds,
but who the hell cultivates weeds anyway?
Milkweed and the invasive monster
known as Ironweed, plus some grasses.
Friends took snippets, but what remained
was grief, plus my secret desire to torch it all.
I’m not hip to gardening, nor drawn to
communing with worms… so, with pretty new
red spade in hand (hey, at least I’m
fashionable), I delved into the muck.
Dug around, dug into, but never got under
the pernicious Ironweed. The stillness of
the evening shattered by my clatter, the
prying, the watering of clay dirt to loosen soil,
fingers fumbling, a botched surgery in an
intestinal mess that was the bowel of the weed,
until, YES! One last backbreaking tug – the
plant uprooted and I was on my ass, triumphant.
Attached to the weed’s butt, yam-like, marrowed
spurs of root, tangled as Kardashians in a mosh pit,
evil as Triffids – or those pods in the horror
movie that hatch your zombie replacement.
(Perhaps this is how the Tea Party started?)
Next day, peering out our kitchen window. Monica’s
birthday snapdragons, potted and hanging from
a shepherd’s hook; the lovely, swaying columbine;
fresh-planted herbs; two new begonias and…
an offshoot sprig of Ironweed, fully two feet
from the devil’s own plant I’d just dug up.
I s’pose my pod replicant can deal with this,
once it’s done growing the New Me in our basement.
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For Sunday Scribblings, “Always,”and for The Sunday Whirl: Secret, Colors, Window, Grief, Massive, Hips, Clatter, Marrow, Perhaps, Hand, Flower, Stillness, Crocuses.
Also at my poetic garden (which has no Ironweed), Poets United and at dverse Open Mic Night!
Wild in the Streets
Those crazy Wisconsinites
From Madison to Green Bay
They’re getting ready
The signs are up; protests continue
Bikers now pump their tires full
Those who walk are re-Scholling their shoes
Unions are getting out the vote
Churches are getting out the vote
Raging Grannies are getting out the vote
College students are getting out the vote
The handicapped are all accessible:
Teachers, farmers, union rank and file
Families on public assistance
People whose jobs were cut to give fat cats tax breaks
Women in general
(Hell, he doesn’t discriminate, he hates ALL of us)
Governor Doofus. Dumber than a sack of rocks.
We’re jumping in the pool
We’re jamming the polling places
We’re ready to make our stand
We’re gonna tell the Koch Brothers that
WISCONSIN IS NOT FOR SALE.
And when we’re done, we’ll meet
on State Street for some local brew
Scott Walker, start packing now
Save us the embarrassment of evicting you
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For Sunday Scribblings (‘wild’) and for Poetic Bloomings, asking for poems based on a movie title.
“Wild in the Streets” is a cult classic about a pop star who eventually gets into politics. Once he’s president, he mandates things like putting people in nursing homes on LSD. It’s a true stinker, but the title was perfect for how some Tea Party members from other state view us, as we strive to get the incompetent man pictured above out of our everyday lives. Teabaggers still don’t get that they have been co-opted by the Brothers Koch, who pull all the strings and want to privatize schools and end reproductive freedoms. Silver-spoon trust fund babies; never really had to work because Daddy left them everything!
Irony In The Air
Summer’s here, or so it seems.
Shining sun – the stuff of dreams.
Odd Wisconsin irony,
not a trace of snow to see.
Last year, we were steeped in snow,
flannel-clad from head to toe.
Now I wear a sad array
of summer stuff not packed away…
Ensemble matching? No, I fear,
but T-shirt’s message does ring clear:
As war grows on despite our rants,
Lennon’s pic: “Give peace a chance!”
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For ABC Wednesday, brought to you by the letter “I.”
Processing Me
I am at the Wisconsin DMV
I am sitting on a plastic chair
I am scolded by a supervisor for
sitting instead of
proceeding directly to Photos
I am told to sit down in another plastic chair and
wait for my number to be called
I am DY72
I am in the process of being processed
Now I know how cheese must feel
© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For dverse and Poets United!
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?
OK, I had to come up with a poem to meet my own prompt at We Write Poems!
The form is “3 + (x) = poem,” and today, as I rode the bus and hung out with a homeless Vietnam vet my age who’s been given six months to live, there was no place else to go but the steam grates and the fact that the two major refuges for homeless folks will be shut down this winter by our lame-ass governor, Scott Walker (brought to you by The Koch Brothers; paid for by same).
I’ll be away for the weekend, so pardon my not answering comments promptly. Have a peaceful Labor Day – if these guys get their way, that holiday will mean nothing in a few years. RIP, Triangle Shirtwaist Factory women – you are not forgotten. Amy
Homeless in Madison, Winter 2001
Homeless folks dread winter
This coming winter especially
We with homes worry for them, too
(Governor closed two safe havens)
Wisconsin is “penniless”
No money for “extras”
We with homes give to NGOs
(But the Guv has bucks to redo the Capitol Cafeteria – all winter long)
Ironic. That cafeteria provided
daily shelter for many residents
from punishing, sub-zero winds
(Merry Fucking Christmas)
Our governor “doesn’t hate anyone,
least of all, the poor”
We protest to remind him of his lies
(As he settles into his plush office for a toasty-warm Madison winter)
Politicians and the Constitution
don’t always agree… we need many
voices to speak on behalf of those in need
(and to recall this sorry excuse for a governor)
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Poetic Bloomings (a newer prompt site – check it out!) asked for poems using the most irresistible prompt: “There’s a moon out tonight.” Aaaaaah. Amy
La Bella Luna
Grab a jacket and take my hand, darlin’.
Tonight, Monona’s lakeside is calling out to us.
La bella luna want to bathe all lovers
in beams of reflected light.
Here by the shore, slight chill of the autumn to come,
we’ll stroll, serenaded by so many crickets
and the soft paddle of ducks, looking for a late-night snack.
Though full-faced Old Man looms above, silverfoiled and shining,
the lightning bugs are not overwhelmed.
Blinking gold, ruby, emerald… just out of reach,
yet so near, teasing us, same as they did
when we were kids lying in field of wild grasses.
City lights are low, revealing buckets of stars
spilled in horoscope formations.
We needn’t prove our love beneath this panorama.
We are no longer teenagers, needing it now, now.
The silver moon lingers in streaks of our hair
as we walk and whisper, my hand in your jacket,
you arm slung around my shoulder as we make our way home.
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
DISCLAIMER: Actually, we live near the shore of Lake Mendota; Monona is to the north of our skinny stretch of the East Side of Madison, WI. I felt the name “Monona” was a bit more poetic. Apologies to all Tenney Park neighbors!
Strolling
Today, I’ll stroll to Mary’s place.
The patio screen scritchscratches with my departure.
Why lock it? Next Door Nan will be at home.
Sneakers on grass, bristling the sunburnt ground cover
The brush of palm fronts bending to grant me passage
And all along the way, crickets chirping
Now my sneaks scrape along the sidewalk,
past Pete the shoe repair guy, who waves.
“Time for that again?” he jokes.
“Yupper,” I shout, as my finger makes
little circles around my ear. “I’ll bring my
sandals over tomorrow, hope you can save ‘em!”
A profusion of orange flowers, “ditch lilies” they call them here,
but I dead-head the wizened, faded flowers,
pitch them into the fray, mulch for another day.
(Someday, I will be wizened and faded, too –
but if they want to toss me into the mulch pile,
they’ll have to catch me first!)
Finally the clip-clop upstairs, into the waiting room
with the fountain that always makes me need to pee.
Then, the soft inhale of a door opening:
“Amy?” smiles Mary, my therapist.
“Let’s do this sucker,” I laugh, and whoosh!
The door shuts. Tears to be shed, secrets to keep.
© 2011 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
For We Write Poems‘ prompt, Walk. Also on display at Poets United! Peace, Amy
Sharp Little Pencil 