I met a prattling woman
From her mouth, the words kept a-comin’
Critical talk-talk-talk-talk
Like a hen: bawk-bawk-BAWK
’til I finally exploded and said,
“You realize, don’t you, that you aren’t the only person in this room,
or this organization,
this town,
this country,
or this world,
right?
You need to stop talking.
Stop talking.
Listen.
Take a breath.
Other people have thoughts and feelings.
They may be different than yours but they are just as valid.
The biggest problem right now in this country isn’t
transgender troops or
government waste or
Venezuelan gangs.
It’s that people don’t listen.
They don’t.
They talk over people.
They mock.
They belittle.
They shut down conversations.
They think everything is about them.
Please stop.”

Actually I didn’t say that. But I woke up in the middle of the night wishing I had.

This is my response to this week’s W3 prompt: write an Almost Poem, a poem that’s almost something, but not quite.

Actually, I’m not sure how almost this is. It’s based on my day yesterday. Or a snippet of it.

Congrats to Jaideep, this week’s Poet of the Week. I HIGHLY recommend reading his poem You, Me and the Catastrophe of Love. It’s amazing!

He presses
Himself to the wall. Guesses
She won’t see him out of view —
Boo!

So surpised!
You! she yells, giggling disguised
As annoyance, but she’s not
Hot

She’s laughing!
The fun is telegraphing
A bond they share. It’s such prime
Time.

’cause sometimes
I think being scared (oft-times)
Is half the fun… More than half!
Laugh!

This is my response to this week’s W3 prompt. POW, Violet, gave us three quotes to choose from to incorporate into our poem — all having to do with “The Human Condition.” I chose a quote from Krystal Sutherland, House of Hollow: “Sometimes I think being scared is half the fun.”

I used a Celtic form called Deibide Baise Fri Toin. Syllable counts per line are 3-7-7-1. Lines 1 and 2 rhymes on 2 syllables. Lines 3 and 4 rhyme on one.

This is my submission to the W3 challenge this week. The challenge was to write a Ghazal on the theme of Love. Here are the instructions for a Ghazal:

• Made up of a chain of couplets, where each couplet is an independent poem;
  • It should be natural to put a comma at the end of the first line of each couplet;
• The Ghazal has a refrain of one to three words that repeat, and an inline rhyme that precedes the refrain;
  • Lines 1 and 2, then every second line, have this refrain and inline rhyme;
• The last couplet should refer to the author’s name;
• The rhyming scheme is AA bA cA dA eA etc.

I read and read and read the instructions and, in the end, did only half of them. I wrote couplets, I had a refrain (though not at the end of the line), and the last couplet refers to my name. But the internal rhyme and the rhyme scheme? – Meh.

So shattered
Everything that mattered
Broken, unfixable, trashed
Dashed

One person
Opts to better, not worsen
Fashion, build, construct, un-break
Make

When you might think all is lost
That all pieces should be tossed
Giving up has higher cost

This is my response to this week’s W3 Challenge. Here are the guidelines given by the Poet of the Week:

• THEME: Write a poem to encourage someone not to give up—urging them to persevere, try again, or push forward for just one more time or day;
• STRUCTURE: Use no more than 11 lines;
  • Choose any form or rhyme scheme you prefer;
• Optional Inspiration: Consider drawing inspiration from the image and/or statement by artist Glen Martin Taylor above;
  • If you do include Glen Martin Taylor’s statement or repost the image, please give proper credit to the artist.

There’s an unpronounceable Celtic form called Deibide Baise Fri Toin. Syllable counts per line are 3-7-7-1. Lines 1 and 2 rhymes on 2 syllables. Lines 3 and 4 rhyme on one. So I wrote two of those plus three more 7-syllable lines that all rhyme with each other. Total lines = 11.

From the window seat on the plane, plain
Stretches out. And sometimes I see sea.
Sometimes it is a sandy beach. Beech
Trees with maple, birch, hemlock wood would
Populate my view. Back row aisle, I’ll
Say that my view is, of course, coarse
Economy class — deaf to my pleas: Please,
I need the window but I know no
One cares! [sigh] Be there in a few. Phew!

This is my submission to the W3 Challenge. This week we are challenged to write an “Echo Verse” which means the last syllable is repeated at the end of each line. It was a fun challenge.

When I fly, which isn’t often, I truly am a window seat person all the way.