Loving You Through the Years

A trail of drugstore glasses
...in the kitchen
...in the den
...in the bedroom
like our clothes last night.



Prompt inspiration:
Imaginary Garden Fireblossom Friday #10- Lights, Cameras, Love

Back to Love

Call it 50 shades of weakness, a lapse of judgement from my inner goddess, even a mid-life burp... whatever it was, it's over and I must vitiate my previous opinion of the sorry excuse for literature, 50 Shades of Grey.

I am appalled that this porn trilogy has now outsold Harry Potter. I've read that some hotels place it on their nightstands instead of the Bible... oh my gawd! This E.L James is making a million dollars a week... for filth? If I were her, I'd be embarrassed and ashamed!

What has this world come to? Has it become a world where relationships are devalued and obliterated? A world reverting back to male dominance and female submissiveness? Come on all you female activists... how can we support this abuse?

Violence becomes more prevalent every day. People wear guns like wallets. Any spark of "you did me wrong, so I'll get you and everyone else in my way" becomes a deadly reality. Emotions are time bombs.

Why? We have become a society of instant gratification. Everything is right at our fingertips, just a click away. We are spoiled because we get what we want when we want it. What happened to waiting?

In my opinion, we don't need trashy novels to feed fuel to the fire. I permanently deleted shades of grey (it doesn't even deserve capital letters) from my Kindle. It's null and void. Was never there.

What we need instead is peace, hope and love. A reminder that there really is good in the world left and that fairy-tale love can exist. Yes, we may have to wait... but it's so worth it.

Grounded

Under Windsor Bridge, 1912, by Adolphe Valette
Courtesy of The Mag

grounded, the man

bides time

caramel fog the layer

of descent

hope, a bridge

to heaven

Drawn Before You

Phosphorus greenish glow
breaking crests on dark ink,
a tip of neon highlighters;
lines ~~ the waves across the page.

Vivid drifts of words
conch shell
whispers;
secrets
waiting to be told.

Split down the horizon,
left and right;
paper cuts
a nick of broken glass.

You find yourself torn
between the insidious and tinted
dying to change the evening tide,
rough, then gentle in your limbs.

Preludes of debate
leave a tinny aftertaste,
lies the reason
drawn before your eyes
as clear as elementary art.

**
Prompt inspiration: The Sunday Whirl 70- tip, fix, tinted, preludes, vivid, tinny, drifts, nick, waves, gentle, limbs, insidious, split

College Apartments

Clanky
hanky-panky
flashing opinions
like cymbals clashing. I
hear the echoes, smell
the beer, hide from the fear
with college textbooks
as reading pleasure while I
lie alone on the lawn
bikini clad and covered up
drinking in the atmosphere
away from the rumpus
ruckus at the pool
away from the dissent
having spent
my childhood years
in disaccord, discord,
feeling discarded.

Prompt inspiration: Imaginary Gardens- Mary’s Mixed Bag: Neighborhood

Eye Contact

A battered bike leans
against the wall. Inside
Nobody clanks coins
on the drugstore counter,
a cold unopened beer in hand.

I clamor for blue
Gatorade with not much
time before my son’s
Taekwondo class ends.

Nobody
can't talk straight,
and the teenage boy
rings her up,
rank with fear.
I see it in his eyes-
an uncertainty his lack of contact
with the customer reveals.

Just today I reminded my son
to look adults in the eyes
when speaking, out of respect.
We wouldn't want them to mis-
construe the truth, think him miscreant.

When I leave the store, Nobody’s
bike waits beside my van. She
scrounges through Something
for What?
I freeze, wonder
what’s in that bag she has.

Is this the end?

I avoid her eyes, walk with
purpose, hop inside
faster than a blink.

It kills me
we must live
this way, but I
survive. This time.

*

Prompt inspiration: Imaginary Gardens- A Word with Laurie (miscreant)

Waltzing with a Wolf

With a whiff of whimsy
and wild whispers,
the gray wolf swept
one warped woman
into his warm embrace,
whooshed away webs
of shadowed woe
as they waltzed
through life.

©laurie kolp

Prompt inspiration: Imaginary Gardens - Imagined by Marian Sinead O'Connor's The Wolf is Getting Married"

When Testosterone Starts Kicking In

He said he couldn’t wait ‘til high school
when he could date, and then he paused
said it didn’t matter if
she was smart or not as
long as she was hot.
I rolled my eyes
said a prayer.
Here it
comes.

@laurie kolp


*Prompt Inspiration: Nonet Poems: Poetic Form at Poetic Asides


**I was so happy to discover that I won second place in the challenge! Here's a complete list of the Top 10.

A Boy and His Dog

image by Zelko Nedic

One might think it strange:
a wayward, rampant boy
whose rough conditions early on...

...one might think would cause
a frenzy of foster parents
falling left and right,
a stack of cards misdealt;
but a good old faithful friend
learned to attack
his checkered moods
with wholehearted love
and sublime attitudes...

...one might think a calming channel
that coaxes robust energy
to settle down, enjoy life
as it is now, not how it was...

...yes, one might think
the ball is finally in his court
and, thanks to his dog, they’re correct.

©laurie kolp

Prompt inspirations:

The Sunday Whirl #67- wayward, falling, frenzy, attack, sublime, strange, settle, rough, channel, ball, robust, life

The Mag 128 (picture prompt)

PilLOWed

Cut the crap,
the hazard trap-
endanger not your
words with shallow
verbs and adjectives
too fluffy. My voice
is a pillow- when
I open up people
listen then fall
asleep.

@laurie

Prompt inspirations:
Imaginary Gardens- Words Count with Mama Zen
 3WW- cut, endanger, hazard

I WILL work out again...

Ever since my frozen shoulder pushed me into physical therapy, I've had a yearning to get back to the gym. I realize how much I miss the clang of metal weights drowning out top forty music and the malodorous bodies stepping off the cardio machines dabbing sweat with white hand towels.

Now this urge has steadily grown over the summer and I find myself romanticizing the time in my life when I had gym memberships and ran five miles a day; especially since my shoulder stiffens up when I don't do my mundane stretches. I just know a gym would help!

Pete once surprised me with a fully paid year-long gym membership. It was in-between birthing three babies in four years. I was falling asleep in the shower when I was lucky enough to have one. Needless to say, I can count on both hands the total amount of times I went to work out. I think I might have a wee bit of a problem trying to coax him into another one.

Years later, when the itch reappeared, I decided I'd just have to build up my own repertoire. I escaped to Target when the kids were in school and bought all the stretchy pully, arm shaking, thigh squeezy things I could find. Two weeks tops, and they were carefully tucked away in a drawer. Next, I tried the Wii Fit Plus, but it only lasted through the month of January; I'd much rather write in that spare time. Finally, I've always done push ups... until the frozen shoulder ordeal. Sigh.

Yesterday, Katie did some Wii yoga and reminded me that I was once the champ with the highest score. Hmm...

Then an hour later, I had an encounter that proved to me that the man upstairs really wants me to get back to the gym. I was at the drugstore buying a get-well card for someone. I had on sweats because where I was going is freezing cold. A lady who looked a little familiar, but I just couldn't put my finger on it, came up to me while I was checking out.

"You going to the gym today?" She said.

"What? Uh, no."

"I'm headed for Cathy's class, then some weights. Isn't she great?"

"Oh, yeah... sure, she is." I do know a Cathy who is pretty special. I smiled, paid for my cards and then waved goodbye.

I just know that was a sign from God. The problem is... will Pete be convinced?

I have it all planned out- when I drop Katie off at dance, which is four times a week, I'll go work out in the gym down the street. Pete can taxi Andrew and Nicholas to and fro on the nights he's not in school. When he is in class, I'll send the boys to Taekwondo classes that sync with my exercise schedule. Sounds great, but something tells me it's a pipe dream.

 Keep your fingers crossed, and I'll keep you posted.

Blanched

Figure Eight, 1952, by Franz Kline

On a pale cover
in my mind 8 years
of disappointment spray

melancholy memories

with erotic delusions

~~a sprinkle of powders~~

~~psychedelic powers~~

  ~~illusionary grasses~~

blanche rosy intellect.

Sometimes,

8 stray fibers

wrapped in
blingy gold

swing from the corner,

fling flaxen affiance-

hope that soon dissolves

like the 8 antacid pills

I stuff down my throat

on a daily basis

since you’ve gone.

©laurie kolp

Prompt inspiration: Sunday Whirl #66: erotic, melancholy, rosy, gold, swing, powders, pale, cover, spray, grasses, fling, stray

Picture prompt- The Mag 127