Please note that blogger is being difficult lately, and comments may take longer than usual to publish--if you can't get yours to come through the interweb hoses, email me at the link on my profile, which you can access from the sidebar, and I will see that it gets included.
My own 55 follows here...
Some Random Fancies
Memory's mirror steals tomorrow.
Thought gates in
comfort or torture, hauled
in the wheeled heart's freight.
Hope's a midnight dancer with
masks removed at dawn. Fate
flies like a drunken raven;
jealousy poisons the lawn.
.
Lust has scars and flowers
for those who call it love;
death's an infinite kidnap
where no ransom is enough.
~January 2018
Image: Girl with Death Mask (She Plays Alone) 1938, © Frida Kahlo Fair Use
If lady Experience had a grandchild, she would go around quoting every single one of these lines as pieces of wisdom spoken by her grandmother. I love the structure, the snap-shot feel of the tone, the fantastic title. My reader's greed is wishing for expanded poems birthed out of each stanza, and an entire novel based on the second to the last (I wish I had written that). Love the chosen artwork, too.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Magaly--I only wish I could expand on anything these days--every word is a great struggle. But comments like yours make it worth it.
DeleteHere is my bit for this week. Whatever you do, please remember to "Never Touch the Baby Carriage":
ReplyDeletehttp://magalyguerrero.com/never-touch-the-baby-carriage/
Only your mind could come up with this one, I think--and I am so thankful for it. ;_) The popping sound had me cackling, and the atmosphere, shivering. A 55 that Galen would have loved.
DeleteI hope he's in that place where all awesome souls go, reading and grinning... :-)
DeletePlease bear with me, all, as I will be absent this morning for the usual doctor-hospital-treatment routines that have been dominating things of late, but I will be around as soon as possible to see what everyone has come up with.
ReplyDeleteI see that Brendan has written a 55--here is the link
ReplyDeletehttps://blueoran.wordpress.com/2018/01/26/sympathy-for-the-draugr/
Sorry B--I seem unable to comment on your blog--I will try again, later.
Thanks H, got the poem posted but had to leave for work before finishing the link here --
DeleteThese fancies are like bars that jail the life, the being, the spirit, in a cage of baroque angst. Each of them is a dimension of the entire house of mirrors shattered by the last. Tight and tidy as a noose --yikes and amen. The hospital vigils have not been infertile. Sorry about the linkage problems, dunno what terrors the falling net of neutrality is wreaking on us all.
Yes, there is so much wisdom in this. I feel I should copy it and hang it on my wall. I love the whole piece, but this line really stands out for me, "Hope's a midnight dancer with masks removed at dawn."
ReplyDeleteHere is my 55 https://blackinkhowl.blogspot.com/2018/01/black-dirt-doesnt-ask-questions.html
What a wonderful rhythm and the words so true, lovely
ReplyDeleteThank you Shadow--good to see you.
DeleteThe poem is excellent, obviously. It doesn't show the labor you put into it--meaning that it reads so smoothly it's as if it emerged already in full voice.
ReplyDeleteThank you Shay.
DeleteMud Green has written a 55 and has asked me to post the link, so here we go:
ReplyDeletehttps://mudgreen.wordpress.com/2018/01/25/as-they-do/
I can only echo the thoughts of others here. The poem is succinct but packs a wise punch and offers much food for the poet's digestion. Bravo.
ReplyDeleteMy offering. I'd written this yesterday as a 67 word poem and went took a re look. It's now a 55.
https://paulscribbles.wordpress.com/2018/01/27/frost-roads/
Thanks, Paul--I'm not writing very fluidly at the moment, but you have to take what comes, I guess. I'm glad you took the scissors to this one, as it makes an excellent 55. Thanks for playing.
DeleteLove the poem, and the painting by Frida Kahlo.. the last couplet really hammers in the message. Makes me think of how we are born with fear of dying which ties so well back to the painting.
ReplyDeleteHere is my entry
Thanks, Bjorn. I hope you have a wonderful birthday next week.
DeleteExtraordinary picture and incredible poem. The last two lines are all too true. Orpheus should have thought of that before he went to bring back Euridyce. Here is my link for the day: https://kanzensakura.wordpress.com/2018/01/27/walking-crow/
ReplyDeleteimma starting to sound like someone else... Maya Angelou (posthumously) and Queen Latifah kidnapped me:)
ReplyDeletehttps://posthumousness.wordpress.com/2018/01/27/imma-start-to-see/
Beautiful and evocative images in this, with so much heft for a 55. Thanks for playing, angie.
DeleteWise words of our innermost self H, where we battle our own loves and betrayals. Death is indeed an infinite kidnap...
ReplyDeleteMy entry is here: https://hypercryptical.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/consent.html
Anna :o]
Thanks--so well said, just like your 55. Glad you made it by, Anna.
DeleteJoy, these read like the very best of William Blake's proverbs. I especially like the way you have phrased them to forced the run-on line - it really made me think about the words.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Kerry--I am greatly flattered by the comparison to Blake, though I doubt I have reached that high with these--still, I'm glad at this point to have anything to say, and even more so to find a way to say it. Hope all is well with you, friend.
DeleteOur 55 extravaganza is concluded for this week, but hope to see you next time. Thanks to all who came by and made an attempt to kick ass this weekend.
ReplyDelete