NaPoWriMo 2024 #26

Taking a Walk in the Rain

Crashing sheets shush my son's seething -

teeth briefly cheesing cheeky as he schemes,

then hushed, mind brushed in breathing streams.

NaPoWriMo 2024 #25

 Question-and-Answer

What is your idea of  perfect happiness?

What do you most deplore?

What is overrated?

When do you lie?

What is your idea of perfect?

Who do you hate?

What quality do you want to see in a romantic partner?

Who are your friends in real life?

What is your idea?

What is your name?

How will you die?

What will you regret?

Didn't you see the heartache that would come from those eyes?

Will you die?

Who will remember it?

I'm embarrassed to say.

Can they answer for themselves?

Do you mind a people-pleaser?

Is anyone worse than yourself?

It's something of which I cannot conceive.

Do you ever tell the truth?

White lies.

See above.

I thought I knew once, but I can't seem to remember.

NaPoWriMo 2024 #24

 How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable

seems any intellectual pursuit

when those golden eyes droop in memory,

and even the imagined brush of speckled grey

topples flat the house of cards I've huddled in.

I'm tired. I can't taste. I can't stand. I can't.

I didn't think it would be so hard to say goodbye,

but thought has no place in the eye

of this tall storm.

NaPoWriMo 2024 #23

 To the Flash

Settle down, Barry.

You're allowed to feel your feelings,

even at a thousand miles an hour.

That's what makes it hard to sympathize,

because there's no stillness

in which anyone with you may sit,

because you're gone, saving the world.

NaPoWriMo 2024 #22

 The Fight

The pen is supposed to be mightier,

but the futon mattress rises to challenge.

Click goes the pen

while the mattress chuckles.

It stretches like a cat, unfazed,

and shivers against imagined cold.

The pen stands stiff, a sentinel

against this shrewdly biting air,

its nib is eager, black blood dripping,

but the spirit weakly slumbers,

desperate for imagination promised

by the dreams that may come

upon the greedy bed.

NaPoWriMo 2024 #21

 Orange

You'll expect me to say, "Nothing rhymes with orange,"

which is emphasized in the shadows

cast by orange lightbulbs on this page,

and it fills my tongue with an absence

wanting the juice of an orange - Wouldn't it

be delicious to squeeze an orange into

the orange-brown whiskey in a glass,

to chew the orange pretzels spiced

and salty? Isn't there something elegant

about the orange flame of a candle,

and aren't you glad?

NaPoWriMo 2024 #20

 16 Minutes

That massive man behind his desk

lifted the phone that never rang

now ringing from the wall

and we held our breath without knowing

why, pencils elevated holding

the air between them and the sheets of paper.

He told us to do our work

and we barely do for 16 minutes

when the phone that never rang

rings again and he says, "Both?"

What did we know before?
What do we think now?