W3 Prompt #202; Sensory Shadorma

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 19 Comments
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Wea’ve Written Weekly

The torch has been passed. The POW at W3 Wea’ve Written Weekly is Nancy Richy. She challenges us to write a Shadorma, a compact Spanish syllabic form built from a six-line stanza with a strict syllable pattern: 3 / 5 / 3 / 3 / 7 / 5 . She also would have us focus on sensory details. Spring isn’t always pretty, this is what came to me. Go to The Skeptic’s Kaddish to read other responses and to find out more about this unique weekly poetry prompt.

 Abuzz by D. Avery

windows buzz 
desperate tip-tap
on warm days 
cluster flies
as desirous as any
to feel spring breezes

d’Verse Quadrille #243 Birds

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 35 Comments
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De Jackson, aka whimsygizmo  is hosting at d’Verse, the pub for poets. It’s Quadrille Monday and De says bird is the word for that poem whose only rule beyond including a form of the prompt word is a 44 word limit. Go to the Pub to learn more.

Empty Handed by D. Avery

my neighbor has chickadees
eating from her hand
that’s how I wanted
this poem to land
but it must have seen 
a tail twitch in my eyes
up and away it flies
those delicate wiry feet
alight on a branch
aloft
out of reach

W3 Prompt #201; Firsts Echo Poems

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 17 Comments
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Wea’ve Written Weekly

O’Nika McGill is providing the challenge at W3 Wea’ve Written Weekly. We are to write an echo poem, either repeating the ending syllable(s) at the end of the same line, or repeating the ending syllable(s) on a short line directly beneath it, like an echo. Further, the poem is to be about a significant first. My first poem for this doesn’t really fit O’Nika’s guidelines, though every day we wake to more “unprecedented” atrocities. Ever wanting to take part in the W3 I made a second attempt for this prompt. Go to The Skeptic’s Kaddish to read other responses and to find out more about this unique weekly poetry prompt.

So It Begins by D. Avery

And so it begins— the end.
The end

begins with sabers rattling. 
Rattling

rattle and hum, incessant buzz.
Buzz

whine whistle fiery bang!
Bang!

You’re dead! You, us, or maybe it’s them...
It’s them

or us. We. We are all to blame.
To blame

for giving in, for giving up, all for not.
For not

forgiving and seeing we are one and the same
The same

people, just people who want to live.
To live.
Beyond Its Echoes by D. Avery

One can also fall out— a drift— adrift
Though not alone, I am I am
away from you I grew I grew
A heart still holds love lost love lost
a heart that echoes with want with want
a heart that thirsts for more for more
And knows first love might not last not last
beyond its own echoes echoes 
in half remembered distance 
Distance.

d’Verse Quadrille #242

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 42 Comments
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Lisa (Li at Tao Talk) is our host for Quadrille Monday at the pub for poets, dVerse. Our allotted 44 words this week must include some form of the word hunger. Go to the Pub to leave your 44 words or to just hang out and read the fine poetry you’ll find there.

Measurements by D. Avery

In summer sun 
we took the measure of winter
stuffed the woodshed’s maw 
In fall felt a degree of wealth
counted in cords

Still feeding the fire
we hunger now for spring 
fathomless under the snow
Wind whistles cold
through the woodshed’s thin ribs

#SixSentenceStories; Ground

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 22 Comments
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Last week’s Six Sentence Story prompt got away from me. But as I went about doing whatever it is I do, I got distracted by shadows. They are especially compelling in February. By the time this poem got started, the link up time for last week’s prompt, “mark” was gone by. But the venerable host of the Six Sentence Story blog hop, Denise, aka, GirlieOntheEdge has provided a new prompt word, and that word is “ground”. That was already in the started poem so I finished the poem, making sure there are six stanzas because that’s the one rule, it only counts if there’s a six count. So- late for last week, right on time for this week. Click the link up to link up.

What Tracks Are These by D. Avery

What tracks are these
shadowed pockmarks in the snow?
Snow swept from wind swayed trees
crater the ground below.

What laid these tracks 
etched sharp against the white? 
Leaning shades of black
stretched long in February light.

Here are tracks of one embarked, 
scrapings on snow white page
A poet’s trail, slashing marks
a way out of a cage. 

Whose tracks are these?
Eyes dotted, heart crossed
seeking what no one sees
exploring the edge of lost.

With spring thaw, what is left to see?
Crow picked bones of scattered words
ribbed shadows beneath the trees
Whispering wind is all that’s heard.

Was the poet the hunter or the hunted?
With the melt, no tracks left to show
what tracks were laid or followed
in the shadowed snow.

d’Verse Quadrille #241

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 46 Comments
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De Jackson (aka WhimsyGizmo) is hosting Quadrille Monday at the pub for poets, dVerse. She would have us write 44 words on the topic of flowers. This is what I got. Go to the Pub to leave 44 words or to just hang out and read the fine poetry you’ll find there.

February Blooms by D. Avery

fluff flutters by
not a dandelion
not a butterfly

bare branches brace golden moon
sparkling cold  
rosy cheeks in full bloom

white petals fill the lane
blow against
frost ferned window panes

bitter cold but I’m not dour
surrounded by such beauty—  
swirling snow flowers!

#SixSentenceStories; Brand

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 19 Comments
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Today is the day that the link is open for to enter a story (or poem or stream of consciousness, basically any form of writing) as long as that writing is in exactly six sentences (or stanzas, lines, etc.) Guess it’s a branding thing, this six count. All I know is, Denise, aka, GirlieOntheEdge is the venerable and most reliable host of the Six Sentence Story blog hop and I am happy to join in today after an unexpected visit from Vinny. A long, long time ago an MC that appeared here in a Six Sentence Story, became recurring character Ernest Biggs. Before long Ernest met Marge Small and all her friends, including Ilene Higginbottom. Through Ilene, Ernest and Marge ended up being involved with a boy named Vinny who showed up today out of the blue.

No Problem To Biggs or To Small  by D. Avery     

“Seems like the real problem was you telling the principal it was BS to not allow you to wear that shirt, but, especially as you do not use that product or even have a surfboard, I don’t see why you can’t just wear another shirt.”

“One, I don’t have very many shirts, two, I don’t have money to buy shirts, and three, it’s a cool brand, and four, my reasoning isn’t necessarily in order of importance, in fact, Marge, all things being unequal, being cool is very important at school.”

Though she intuited the answer, Marge asked Vinny anyway whether or not Dickie work shirts like the one she was wearing were cool, and he confirmed that they were not.

“What about a t-shirt that was made to look like a Dickie work shirt, complete with a faux patch that says B/S Service?”

“So uncool it’s cool just might be cool…”

With Marge financing, Vinny designed the shirt, even drew a dipstick for the slash and after he got the coolest kids to wear their free merch, all the other kids paid to make Biggs/Small Service Station a brand name, right up until the principal announced that Bigg and Small Dickies were no longer considered appropriate for school, which made Vinny so cool he couldn’t be uncool if he tried.

d’Verse Haibun Monday; Groundhog Day Redux

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 15 Comments
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It’s the day after Haibun Monday at the d’Verse Poets’ Pub, which fell the day after the full Snow Moon. Host Frank J. Tassone challenges us to write a haibun about Groundhog Day, a past time rooted in Imbolc and Michaelmas. The following is where this prompt led. Head over to dVerse to find more and to link up your own haibun. Grab a warm drink while you’re there.

Springtime In Time by D. Avery

Groundhogs, gophers, whistlepigs… around here we call them woodchucks. Are ourselves called Woodchucks.  But around here people don’t go underground through the cold dark of winter. We layer up, lay wood on the fire, light into the work that still has to get done. We play in the snow and on the ice when time and weather allow. All the while the four-legged woodchucks remain deep in their burrows. What Punxsutawney Phil gets up to on the second of February is faraway and irrelevant. Seasons have no clear markers. There’s calendar spring and then there’s the day one wakes to and dresses for, days that still bear cold and snow. But because they begin earlier and end later, these days also harbor the faith that our own woodchucks will stir and resurrect spring with their emergence from their hibernal dreaming. Eventually.

white breath lights night air
among shadow trees I climb
back to the Snow Moon

d’Verse Poetics; 1,2,3…Go!

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 34 Comments
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For Tuesday Poetics at the Pub for Poets today, Mish says write about numbers; numbers in general, a favorite number, a number that has meaning for you… the possibilities are numerous. I hope my poems count because, full disclosure, they are not fresh. These poems were written way back when I was a poetry writing math teacher. The first was for the kids. The second I wrote about this time in 2016. Go over to d’Verse Pub for Poets to find out more about Mish’s prompt. While there read the other poets’ responses and link your own poem. 

 Zero!  by D. Avery

Zip, zero, zilch, nada
If you don’t value zero, well you oughta

As a stand-alone number, some say zero doesn’t count
but zero has a place of high standing, no doubt
Invaluable zero, symbol of nothing 
we need you zero you really are something

Zero’s the gate keeper, resolute
between negative and positive, absolute
Zero’s a portal, a fulcrum, the start of infinity
a number with highly important properties

Zero the Hero, every digit’s most well rounded friend
a valuable number without whom there’d be no powers of ten
Without zero, we’d stop counting at nine
without a zero, taking a place in the line

Add or subtract it, there is no cost
multiply it by anything and all will be lost
Zip, zero, zilch, nada
If you don’t value zero, well you oughta.
Discounting Electorate Math by D. Avery

I am
one three millionth
As a number
very small.
I am one
of three million.
You are too?
That’s two.
And also she?
That’s three.
Actually
there’s three million
Ones
like us
Three million who
were discounted.
Three million three millionths.
That’s one
big number
whose common denomination
is that we
did not count 
in this our own
great nation. 
Three million three millionths
rise as one
Indivisible
for any number 
divided by one 
is that number.
It would not be improper
for all us ones
to rise, 
to converge, raise 
our voices surge
in our own 
enumeration.
And it would not be improbable
to estimate
the discounted
to be innumerable 
within this our own great nation. 
Rise as one
make whole
the fractures 
Heal the divisions.
Cancel out hate
in this our own
one world.

d’Verse Quadrille #236 & #TankaTuesday No. 39; Coax (in a Prose Shadorma)

/ D. Avery @shiftnshake / 35 Comments
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Sometimes it takes three prompts to get my pen flowing. I am answering Lisa’s quadrille call with Willow’s suggested Prose Shadorma. At D’Verse, Lisa would have us use the word coax in exactly 44 words. At Colleen’s Tanka Tuesday Poetry Challenge, Willow wants a haibun like response but the syllabic form is poets’ choice. The third prompt? A fleeting bit of beauty spied on my commute, a bit of sun at the end of a gray wrung day. For that glimpse I am grateful and also to our two prompters and their hosts; I appreciate your constrained prompts!

November Light by D. Avery

I love November! So many shades of gray. Light is where you find it. The best times to look are usually dawn or dusk.


pearled whispers
’twixt sky and mountain
sunset coaxed
from gray clouds
golden lit sliver of blue-
writ with raven’s wing