Sunday Poetry Corner Jan 22

Hi, and welcome to the first Sunday Poetry Corner. I thought it would be fun to share a bit of what I write when I'm not working on stories. Poetry was my first real introduction to writing. It taught me how much joy could be found in playing with words. There are so many times when the voices of my characters bleed over into the poems that I write and more than once, a poem has inspired a story because the voice refused to fade away.

Please feel free to leave comments, and if you feel like it, you're more than welcome to share a poem of your own. For my fellow poetry lovers out there, I would love to know who your favorite poet is, and maybe a little bit of why you like them. I'm always looking for a new poet to read.

My favorites are a toss up too close for me to decide if I actually like one over the other. The first, Robert Frost, connected with my love of nature and wild places, while the second, Jim Morrison, spoke to all the twisted rambles and dark corridors in my mind. They sit side by side on the bookcase shelf beside Dylan Thomas, Emily Dickinson, and Lord Byron.

I hope you enjoy this first installment of the Sunday Poetry Corner. Without further ado, please let me present this weeks poem:

Of Dreams and Ruined fireflies

Chain smoking dreams on the hood of my car

We paint dragons in smoke against an azure sky

Waiting for the stars to chase the sun from too bright heavens

Everything sparkles a little different after dark

Tattered edges of glittery wings hide the fray in swirling neon

We feign amusement in face of scorn

Crawl home and puke our sins in porcelain bowls

The dregs of last night’s misery oozing from our pours

There’s no escaping the long shadows that creep across our lives

Shadowing the fall of all we once held dear

Is there no end to the pantomime of life we endure?

This silent, black and white movie

making us laugh at the broken clown

ashes fall like ruined fireflies

a rain of white against tanned skin

What careful disassembly of life the fire brings

Reducing form to a barely recognizable mold, like our dreams

The whispers of them still echo on nights like there

When we lay beneath ancient moons

remembering all we’d hoped to be