how far down does the water go?

how far down does the water go? further than your pockets, past your toes. further than the holly tree you uprooted last year. further than the wren, crow, even past the web-footed duck. further than the pitcher that slipped and fell and spilled. past strangers tears. past long dead relatives. past the shovel forgotten and [...]

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ferryboat crossing

ferryboat crossing gull on top of sand sand on top of preening shore shore on top of feathered feeding feathers on top of cormorant curving neck cormorant on top of placid waveless sound salted ocean limb on top of serpent coiled mist mist on top of farside shore far grey procession on top of snowed [...]

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Prodigal child (napowrimo #21)

read write poem   napowrimo #21 prompt by Kristen McHenry   perfectly flawed Today’s prompt is from Read Write Poem member Kristen McHenry: “In ancient times, Persian rug makers were deeply religious and believed that only God could make something perfect. They would deliberately drop in a small faulty stitch, a flaw, into each Persian rug. In doing so, [...]

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Dowsing

Dowsing Find water. It’s in your breath, every day you dowse, you rain. It’s the glue that keeps things apart. (Else you’d be a lump.) You gotta flow, just the right amount. You gotta separate words from none. Skip a stone across the lake. (Here, take three.) Ka-plunk is the noise you make coming into [...]

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I am here

read write prompt #106, repeat after me by community member Rethabile Masilo Write a poem using repetition for poetic effect is the prompt for this week. (Read the prompt for full details and examples.) (Read other participants responses to this prompt.) I am here I am here. Ferry boat moves, water slides away. Ocean current [...]

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Faucet

Not like a stone, I change when I wanna.  Italics perhaps makes more clear. Faucet   And then someone says no you won’t listen it’s your day your hour your time no it isn’t. You resist, a matter of principle no it’s not any excuse for a port, brave new waves. Barely through the door [...]

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Flood water

Flood water   A flood can come on small feral feet. A flood wants to lick your hidden toes.   It wants your shoes.  Its got none, you see. It wants to look in your pockets.  Spare keys? Or tumble in your drawers, riffle your socks, find an old pocket knife.  A flood has nothing, [...]

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Storm

Storm       An ocean shore shouldered storm, brunt thunder waves, far pacific eye.   Sundered amber tress, kelp conceals temptations of earth and rock, luring froth into fertile nests.   Bare elbow to thigh upright, white, crested processional.  Stellar furrows awaiting seedling roots.   Afterward, a tussled bed. More sea, more stone.   [...]

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Watersongs

Watersongs     Says water, Everyone lives on a mountaintop.   Familiar stones, rounded thoughts. Measure them in the curve of your hand. No boundaries, only another waterfall.   Trenches are where water likes to go, however sometimes it changes its mind.   River seems blue because water loves sky.   Oceans are memories of [...]

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San Carlos Creek

San Carlos Creek.     Every bough bends before wind’s waiting touch, saying – here,      come this way,     bend your breath into me. Each tree beside the creek has its’ own ritual dance, each beckon sky, swaying thirsty green tresses, inviting breezes within their whispered tapestry, this mating courted here.     Wind [...]

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Waterfall

Waterfall     There is just one ear that I should trust, listening as you do, and in silence, well. And only in my own voice will I hear your easy care.   Words like ink rendered from one life. At best shadows within the current of your steady gaze, and still you smile, your [...]

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September’s first poem

  September’s first poem.   I am learning to walk, slowly.   As it is less intense, it is become, more deliberate. Like the trickle of water downslope is deliberate. Not imposed, but surrendering; within the whole it gains by being less.   It is – irresistibly becoming, at peace.     1996 © Neil [...]

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