Wednesday, November 30, 2005

this just came in my e-mail. i'm passing it on. i'm also doing everything possible to keep from working on my freaking poem!


" Grief can take care of itself, but to get the full value of joy you must have some body to divide it with."

MARK TWAIN


i may have posted this before, who knows,(brain burps) but it is worth repeating. s

Tuesday, November 29, 2005

you know fate is funny. in my life i have always been open to whatever the fates felt like sending. i have met good and bad but always learned from whatever or whoever came into my life at any given time. i've met some interesting people through my writings, my poems and now my blog. recently i got a post and some e-mail from a man in west virginia named charles tuitt/ charlie tee. he is in a group named, THE CARPENTER ANTS. i checked out his blog, STANDING IN THE SHADOWS OF MUSIC http://diffrentstrokes.blogspot.com and his website for the group www.carpenterants.net

you can listen to their songs and buy their music. charlie tee sings and plays sax.he is in west virginia via the bronx.
i liked their music and charlie seems a cool guy. you might want to check them out. they are kinda blusey and soul and really are good! s
been pouring outside all night, all morning. made me think about looking for a CD that i knew i had somewhere.

it's really good. i finally found it. THE EXCELLO STORY volume 3 1957-1961

one of my favorites on there is RAIN'N IN MY HEART by slim harpo!

if i have to see this grey, cold and truly depressing day from my window (and yes, i have to go out into it shortly!) i might as well listen to some good music! s

Monday, November 28, 2005

received an e-mail today from jim(dr. jim bennett) the head of my workgroup. a project/ challenge some of us took part in was on line along with some earlier efforts, some of which i was privileged to be included in. i'm a little upset tho, i can not (and i KNOW it has to be me, the computer challenged little lady, not the people that work on the various pages for the poetry kit)open the manet file where i think i should be one of the poets participating. god!
anyway, i am in some of the other things along with some wonderful poets that i really believe you will enjoy. i am in CONCORDANCE a game of words. 2002 NATIONAL POETRY DAY and NATIONAL POETRY DAY 2004. please check out all of the poems offered on this page, especially ONE DAY, colin addiss/ new york. colin was terribly injured in the world trade center and died 2 years later. he was a gifted and courageous man. thanks, s.
http://starwood.port5.com/

it is a slow site, but it is worth it if only to read colin's poem.
some days bring sweet surprises. this one did. nothing else i can say. s

Sunday, November 27, 2005

a BIG get well soon, to gary b. you can read a few of his poems in my blog. hope you are better and back with us pk'ers soon! s
a discussion about genetic testing that i took part in on another blog reminded me of this poem, so i took it out and did some rewriting on it. it still gives me goosebumps everytime i fiddle with it. i am done with it after this. i hope.


a child's bad dreams
no boogey man under my bed
just a tumor


pieces
bits
quick flashes strobed

the sound of a saw
biting into bone
my dreams smelled of blood
and disinfectant
with
grownup words that
i didn't understand

make them
GOAWAYGOAWAYGOAWAY!


Saturday, November 26, 2005

there was no chicken joke for this past friday. i figured everyone was tired of any type of poultry no matter if it clucked or gobbled, tho ducks are alright by me. don't think anyone gets to eat duck on thanksgiving. s

Friday, November 25, 2005

this just came in my daily thought alert.

" Nothing happens unless first a dream."

Carl Sandburg




do you know?
hope everyone made it through turkey day.
i had some minor mishaps. i would have been surprised if i didn't.
now, i'm supposed to be working on a poem, but i'm still putting things away and doing tons of laundry.
on top of all this, one of my e-mails is not working, 2nd time in a week it just won't let me mail out and i have NO idea if it's letting mail in!
but, i'm lucky to have what i have and that i have anything at all, so i shouldn't complain, but i do. must go, have a happy... s

Thursday, November 24, 2005

happy thanksgiving to those i know and those i will meet and those i never will. s

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

A small note, Thursday is thanksgiving. In my life, there is a lot I'm thankful for, but there were 5 pages of sheriff sales in the local paper here this week. It isn't possible that all of these families are some how slackers as some would have us believe, or that the economy is just peachy. Please, give a thought to them this Thursday. Thanks much. s.
two quotes for this morning with all the yammering in Washington, the smearing of a good man because he has his opinions.

" he who joyfully marches in rank and file has already earned my contempt.
he has been given a large brain by mistake since for him the spinal cord would do."

Albert Einstein


"you don't get harmony when everybody sings the same note."

Doug Floyd

Monday, November 21, 2005

this poem is a sort of stew, a few dashes of a list poem, a pinch of prose, sort of and a smidgen of rant.




nope, i won't



think about you at all
i
will
not,instead
i'll ponder my
love of blue m & m's
my car's good gas mileage
how i hate it when
caramel popcorn
sticks to my teeth,
that the world is
going to hell in a
big fucking handbasket. yep

i've got thoughts on snowflakes
cornflakes
dandruff flakes and winter itch
nope, i have no time
no time at all
to think about you
but i do
dammit
i do think about
you.




Saturday, November 19, 2005

i hunted through my files for a poem than tied in with food because of the recipe i posted. well, this isn't about food but yeah, it is about nourishment of a kind.



ask

i would feed upon you,
live on your glances, satisfied by

your scent , your intentions
i would feed on these

between breaths
tastes caught on the tongue
singing you

with my skin
damp alive

pulse
ragged music

dance you
wild

rock you slow
hungry again.
oh, about the recipe below, geezzz make sure the chicken is cooked all the way(doesn't take long)
just wanna be safe here about poultry! cluck, cluck!
i was reading tunesmith and anthony's blog this morning about what passes for italian cuisine. it is a good post. anyway it got me to thinking about posting a recipe since i had mentioned before that this blog is pretty much me and that i can cook having learned from my grandparents when i was about 9 or 10. this recipe is mine tho. it's fast and easy (no jokes!)
and it's good. i don't have a name for the dish but here it is

2 whole boneless chicken breasts cut into 2 inch pieces
flour them pretty good (hey, i never said i write cook books, ok? )

melt about 1/2 a stick of butter (and about 2 tbls. of good olive oil)
in a big skillet.

brown the chicken til golden, sprinkle it with salt, cracked black pepper(i use kosher salt and fresh cracked pepper, it really does make a big difference)

use two cans evaporated milk plus some skim or 2% you'll know how much milk to add after the canned by the thickness of the sauce,
stir and keep stirring as it comes up to a gentle boil, that will thicken the sauce

add about a tbls. of dried basil and a few gratings of nutmeg, to taste(go ahead, you're the cook, it's allowed, taste and add more if you want. i always end up with a bit more pepper and basil, that's just me, i'm allowed as well! )

hopefully while this has been going on, there's been a big pot of water boiling on another burner.

i use linguine, barilla! cook about a lb. hey, maybe two and serve the chicken and basil sauce over it.
notice i'm taking for granted that anyone that tries this can cook already? i'm giving you the benefit of the doubt. IF you can't boil water (and hey, that's fine by me, i can't do algebra so who am i to say one word???) then just go to one of the eateries mentioned at t&a tunesmith and anthony's blog. mangia!
something from the I CHING: "chaos, as a new plant breaks the ground with great difficulty... so must we push against difficulty in bringing forth our dreams."
i just checked out the new foamy the squirrel cartoon. "bra bashing" oh god, i can relate to that one! the link is in the blog here somewhere.

and yes, i know there has to be something wrong with me that i enjoy that lunatic cartoon. s

Friday, November 18, 2005

got an e-mail from my friend philip ( some of his work is posted here, very good it is!)
anyway, he got to see bob dylan over in england. said it was amazing! he very kindly told me all about it and i thank him. must have been great. dylan's lyrics are poetry as are tom waits and simon and garfunkel's . there are many songs that written out touch me more that way as poems than as songs. just me i guess, strange little woman! s
a hello to alex ! fate and the computer age bring about strange but nice things. hi alex, be well. s
another friday, geezzzz


why did the chicken cross the road???

to come up and see me (sometime)

mae west



it couldn't, it was a rubber chicken!

chico marx


HONK HONK

harpo marx

Thursday, November 17, 2005

just an itty bitty-teeny thing, i've been checking for the schedule for, IT'S ALIVE. the wonderfully bizarre horror show on sat. nights and god, still not up for november. i guess i will tape it and be surprised again. really, not a big rant as i have my trusty old VHS, but i'd love to know what to look forward to, besides, i taped the 3 movie night they had and missed the end of the last movie cause the show ran long(or i screwed up the setting, i AM tech/mechanically challenged!) s.

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

this one reminds me a little of Poe. it's a rewrite that i may fiddle a bit with. i wrote the original when i was in the same mindset as today. might as well put it to use. s.
the sound between beats

so still my heart
the muffled thud
solace of the grave between beats
i seek the quieting
of blood too hot
the craving of your flesh
damnation of a soul
reaching for heaven's hardness
the heated length
finding the abyss instead
and still i go on blind.
so quit my pulse
still my need
the sound between the beats.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

" it is never too late to be what you might have been."

George Eliot

Monday, November 14, 2005

well done charles

you've earned your rest
a place in the heaven that you believed in
a man, a man you were
more than just a priest
you were.
now more than just a saint
you are.
well done charles
well done.

Msgr. Charles Owen Rice
' LABOR PRIEST ' dies at 96
i'm not really happy with the sunlight poem below. it's an old one and i dug it out of what i laughingly call my files(two black file drawers that look like the files of a seriously disturbed person, hey on second thought...)
anyway, since it is sunny today AND november, here it is.
november's catdance sun

comes through the window on
soft paws nuzzling at me.
laying on my back i join in
stretch arch meow
soft yellow warmth purrs over me.
contented.

Sunday, November 13, 2005

another note about my blog here. it is poetry, but it is more. it's whatever i choose to post. it is pretty much me.
most of the blogs that i read(except for the lit. ones) have a political flavor to them. i leave comments on the ones i like the best. i care, i've been a political junkie since my teens, not surprising since i graduated in 1969 at 17. i care about our country. i care about the world and i care about people. do i know statistics backwards and forwards? nope, besides as someone once wrote, there are lies, damn lies and then there are statistics! i am not a fool tho and i have my opinions and they are mine and valid, important to me. i vote.
i cross party lines and tho i enjoy a good debate, i intensely dislike the sort of sound bite, clever quip, t.v. wrestling flavor to our political system of late.
i've been around a long time, pgh is really sort of a small town type of a city and i use my real name, unlike others that blog. i have to, as my blog contains my works. i do resent tho, being told that some of the examples i've cited about wars and veterans and family and friends experiences in wars and hospitals are made up or embellished , horror stories. that pissed me off big time. i use my name, as i wrote and i've spent my life back and forth to v.a. hospitals because of my father. no one needs embellish the hell of war, some tho, see a desperate need to play those horrors down it seems. just my rant. i resent being labeled a liar only because my views , my life experiences make some that favor war uncomfortable. s and yes, i support our troops!!!
cold, so fucking cold.

Saturday, November 12, 2005

BROKEN MIRROR



there are slivers of glass in my blood. they carve poems of you inside my heart. s

sssshhhh, a finger to my lips


i have a photograph of you
it smiles at me. just

as i snapped it your eyes met mine


and no one knows the whys
of that smile but me
and you.
it is a beautiful, sunny day. i'm sitting here in a room empty of furniture save my computer and 2 old trunks that i repainted. i sold my daughter's old bunk beds and desk . she's married and doesn't need them.
funny thing, i have barry white's voice on my computer and now, when i log on i hear him say (in THAT voice) "now where you been baby, you got mail." but it echoes because the room is empty.
a good friend asked if i felt sentimental when i saw the furniture go, but in truth, i am proud that i raised a wonderful daughter that grew to be a kind, able and independent woman.
i'm sentimental about other things tho. s

Friday, November 11, 2005

" you can not do a kindness too soon, for you never know when it will be too late."

ralph waldo emerson
after dinner conversations

dark words between us
like blood pooled under the skin
bruise colored and numb
too swollen for pain to set in
just now

last week's anger has faded into
a sickly yellowish green
like a week old bone break
still crippling.
another friday, another chicken joke!


why did that chicken cross the road?

give me 10 minutes with that chicken and i'll find out!

thomas de torquemada

Wednesday, November 09, 2005

oh, you just must check out the stolen car saga at mutually assured destruction
www.dynamic88.blogspot.com

he was taught a brand new skill during the course of this saga .(no, not how to write haiku)
i wonder if he'll teach me, might come in handy. s
by the way, read on aol today that the price of oreos is going up due to gas prices! so not only will i be cold this winter, keeping my thermostat turned down BUT i will have less oreos to help me cope! i'm po'd! s
happy day after the elections!

i vote in every election, only missed twice since i was eligible to vote
and yes, this has nothing to do with poetry unless you stretch it to say peace of mind makes for easier writing or perhaps freedom to write what one chooses depends on whether there are sanctimonious guardians of purity in charge, no dirty words or subject matter allowed in your poetry lady! (unless you are a republican big shot and write about bears and deer and men on dogs...)

anyway, i voted.

as i mentioned a few times about this blog, it's poetry and guests and my rather eclectic(some may say scattered) thoughts, but there is method to my madness if you hang around long enough to get to know me better. most of the blogs that i read, other than the lit. ones, are political so every now and then i rant on theirs(blessings on them for listening)

so , i just wanted to say, i voted, so i can bitch, if you didn't vote, guess you can't. tho if it's a really good bitch, go right ahead! s

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

november

comes in torrents
cold rain strips
the colors
washing them away
leaving lifeless scraps
littering the lawn.

Monday, November 07, 2005

just cause i am in this mood...


to get the full value of joy you must have someone to divide it with.

Mark Twain
In great moments life seems neither right nor wrong,
but something greater, it seems inevitable.

Margaret Sherwood


and you know it




There is only one happiness in life, to love and be loved.


George Sand


tho it frightens you.
holy crap, my blog's worth is up to $ 3,951.78 ! should i sell??? ho, ho! that silly site is just addictive! s
this poem is a rework of 2 older ones, then joined into one. s
mid nights

damp twisted sheets, knotted muscles
fingers and thumbs
grasp at naked thighs
leave bruises

opened eyes
opened blinds
OPEN LEGS

moonlight casts shadowed bars


sliced across cracked white plaster
they stripe my shame.
stronger than iron
they hold me prisoner.

Sunday, November 06, 2005

sunday. supposed to rain, looks like it outside, pittsburgh grey.
i think the fundraiser i wrote of went well. everyone seemed to have a good time.
tired today, and no words for a poem. some days, there are no words. s

Saturday, November 05, 2005

saturday. have a fundraiser to work tonight for a scholarship committee i'm part of. i'm a nervous wreck hoping all goes well. so, i thought i'd just post it and perhaps leave a little of my anxiety here. s
brady
3 day waiting period

black x's on monday
tuesday
wednesday
today staring down the barrel
waiting.

Friday, November 04, 2005

i got a new book the other day. SEEDS FROM A BIRCH TREE writing haiku and the spiritual journey by clark strand

as i've mentioned, i love haiku, can't write them well and it almost seems a crime to deliberately write bad ones. so, i read about them. they soothe my spirit. it needs help of late, but that's a whole story in itself and bittersweet. i do recommend this book tho, i recommend haiku to anyone that needs to breathe. s
TAH DAH

friday again! time for a chicken joke (penndot, take notice)


why did the chicken...ah, you know the question!


BECAUSE

'tis better to suffer in the mind the slings and arrows of outrageous
road maintenance than to take arms against a sea of on coming vehicles...

HAMLET

Thursday, November 03, 2005

in solitude we give passionate attention to our lives, to our memories, to the details around us.

virginia woolf


and sometimes it pisses us off. s
this is an ongoing challenge in my workgroup. the topic- heaven.
this is mine, with some editing from gary b.

heaven is

a carrot on a stick
a promise or
slick advertising
leggy pouting models
wearing wings and lace panties

what is heaven
chocolate ice cream?
a scent spritzed
by over eager sales ladies
in department stores
could heaven be an orgasm?
ooohhhh! might be

what is heaven, really?
only one way
to find out.



by the way, an odd coincidence, a few months back i was at a picnic and for some strange reason(could have been the company and the alcohol) a friend started to sing the song PLASTIC JESUS. i just joined right in! i hadn't thought of that song in years and years. no one else there had ever heard of it and if the 2 of us hadn't sang it together they would have said we made the title up. anyway, what was on a blog i read but a link to the song. be advised, it could be thought blasphemous (or in bad taste, but hey, this is me here...) so if you want to
www.turoks.net/Cabana/PlasticJesus.htm ( i think He has a sense of humor, we are still all here aren't we?)

my parents had a plastic madonna on the dashboard of our rambler!
like i wrote, this poem is a challenge piece. it could be changed over the course of a week or so. s

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

hope

neatly folded
bagged,
taped shut
boxed
wrapped
in a plain brown wrapper
and shoved
under the bed




nov. 1st. already!

hi all. thanks to everyone who has commented. thanks to those that have written me longer letters at my mail address. just a reminder. i set up this blog for my poetry and that of others, but also, i decided to use the blogging form instead of a traditional site because it is more immediate, more interactive. i feel that if i use the blog to show myself as i am and to put in my thoughts and feelings, that the readers can see that poetry is personal and topical and a living thing.
me, i need to hear from everyone, not just writers. i want to find out what subjects touch or tease or anger. i love to see how people read my poems and other's and come away with a whole different take on the piece by reading it and bringing their experiences to it. seeing the poem through the filters of their lives.
so please, pick a poem, read it, let me know your take on it, perhaps how you might do it. don't be shy. you can use the address if you don't want to post where others might read it. but i really want people to see that if you want to write, you can. they are your words, your feelings, use them, share them, embrace them.
just my rant. thanks, s.


afterthebridge@hotmail.com