Monday, October 31, 2005

by the way, POETS WHO SUPPORT SURVIVORS is up to $3575.00 in donations by poets . i posted about the site earlier.

check it out if you write, it might be something that appeals to you. s
i've been reading the lyrics of tom waits. i found the official site and went to the lyrics page. amazing. the poetry grasps you and goes through your skin, i swear it. thanks to anthony for letting me in on him. i had heard him, but never really listened. s
happy halloween!

eat some candy!


boo!

Saturday, October 29, 2005

hi all, went to the halloween party i mentioned. dressed as an old fashioned little girl, white cotton dress and black leather maryjanes, blonde curly pigtails with little beige bows and my teddy bear hubert(humphrey). i was surprised that people really liked the blonde wig on me! i felt silly. i have really pale skin, but always had really dark hair and when i looked in the mirror at myself, i looked so very strange to myself, it creeped me out. tho, i will say, i took the compliments with a smile(and a grain of salt)s.

Friday, October 28, 2005

hey, i've had over 1000 visits here, thanks so much, really does my spirit and my heart good!

going to a halloween party, dressing up, oh god, i always feel a little silly doing that. boo! s
a public service announcement


the wonderful duo at TUNESMITH AND ANTHONY have declared today national toupee forgiveness day.


this is an important and much needed day. details can be accessed at their blogsite,T & A Tunesmith and Anthony's Blog

http://www.tunesmith-anthony.com
time for another chicken joke.

why did the chicken cross the road?

" the chicken did not cross the road. i repeat, the chicken did NOT cross the road!"

richard nixon

Thursday, October 27, 2005

got an e-mail from Jim Bennett today. the new issue of CAUGHT IN THE NET will be on line soon.computer gremlins are preventing it from being accessed today, but the older issues are there, including some that i am in. this new issue is featuring Michael Waters and the guest editor is Dan Masters. CITN has over three thousand subscribers now. it has some really good poems. you might want to check it and the rest of the sites accompanying the PK out. http://www.poetrykit.org/pkl/CITN/caughtin.htm
the main site is one of the most respected and comprehensive sites on poetry that there is. s
a small little thing, because the stones were just here. s



jab me with that needle

vintage stones
album spins round
round and round
mick wails
my years unwrap
skin goes smooth
blood flows hot, breasts
grow high round
round and round again
sable hair flows long
naturally dark, again.
i spin round
the magic wraps round
round
reset the needle
get off of my cloud.

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

this just came in my e-mail daily thought alert. it goes so well with what i posted earlier about some of the people i know.

"If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it."
Margaret Fuller
just a few thoughts. i am very lucky to have found a place with such talented and sharing poets and artists, singers and songwriters and photographers as those in the PK list, past and present. my thanks to them all. i hope to have more works by them to share with you. i hope to have a few more from local poets as well. pittsburgh, it's my home. s
hooray, i'm so pleased to post another guest. his name is dam robinson. he is a performance poet from England. he has hosted," originality at the citadel & jaw structure", in st. helens. he was the winner at the" Lancaster litfest spotlight poetry slam" in 03. he was featured on the BBC radio Merseyside and guest compered at "DGPS Liverpool UK." he compered & performed at The Fusion Cafe at Leeds and has been published in over 40 magazines and respected internet sites in the UK and the USA.

his website is, http://uk.geocities.com/damrobinson1@btinternet.com

i hope you enjoy him. they are, poetry school and fuck buddy.

he has opened my eyes to a whole new way of living poetry. s
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Tuesday, October 25, 2005

a question

asked in a cool, beige room
in that low tone automatic and
reserved for things like this,
asked i suppose because
i was dry eyed and i'm sure there
was the slightest of smiles
unsettling, inappropriate,
truthful.
"don't you care?" with a nod
toward the dear departed and the line of
mourners, viewers, visitors and gawkers.
"don't you care?"


just a thought, tho an eclectic believer. i like to imagine st. peter standing to give rosa parks his seat. s

Monday, October 24, 2005

i got one of those e-mails the other day, the kind that you are supposed to answer something or other and pass on.
most of the time they are the same sort of thing and no one i know likes it if i pass them on, but this was, i thought, interesting and a little scary waiting to read the replies.
i was supposed to send it to my friends and ask them to reply back describing me in just ONE word. i decided to try and hoped that i didn't get any back that made me make an appointment for a mental health check up or charm school. so far i was described as
bouncy
funny
butterfly
crazy(but not in too much need of a shrink)
cute
(drop dead gorgeous would have been better, but i'll take cute!)

anyway, i did think it was interesting. s
just wanted to say hi to sadie, in case she checks out my blog. s

Sunday, October 23, 2005

we had another challenge in my workgroup. we were challenged to write a poem about a person that meant something really more than amazing to us. someone that really left a mark. this was an easy one for me as i already had the poem here on my blog. it's called, revelations of a kind.
everyone to a person cited the same lines as excellent, great, strong etc.

those lines are," he, the master of self deception, always closing himself to avoid opening the wound or perhaps turning away the fearsome possibility of joy."

i'm proud that it was well received, but in all honesty, it is the only words that fit him, and in a way, myself as well. s

Saturday, October 22, 2005

going out dancing tonight. i can fast dance and i can slow dance if the guy doesn't mind getting a foot stepped on now and then. i wish i could dance organized dances, you know, dances with steps, cha cha, polka, tango etc. that damn pesky brain tumor i had when i was a toddler, well, hey i shouldn't bitch but still...

anyway, got a new pair of black boots with soft soles, just made for dancing and black jeans. maybe something might trigger some words, flesh them into a poem, hope so, my words seem to have hidden themselves deep inside somewhere. s
hi, foamy the squirrel has his halloween rant out! www.illwillpress.com/hoopla.html

it's adult and foul mouthed, but i wouldn't expect less from foamy! s

Friday, October 21, 2005

this is a favorite. it is for those who truly KNOW. s


" Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now,
thus much let me avow
You are not wrong who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream."

Edgar Allen Poe
a friday chicken joke just because...

what do you call a ghost chicken?

a poultry-geist!!!!

Thursday, October 20, 2005

just an update on the "fb" competition/ challenge that my workgroup held. there were some clever, some ,wistful poems and some fierce, but nothing that i would post here because people think i'm odd enough as is, but it was very enlightening in terms of my own spirit. completing the task made me really think about some things. s
oh my god!

check out the onion, www.theonion.com nov. 19th

pittsburgh is totally unprepared for a zombie attack! damn you mayor murphy!

Wednesday, October 19, 2005

bordom and anger
in the rain


he's bored
and that makes him angry
the rain outside gives a reason
the steady beat
reminds him of a dance
long over.

fists beat time
with the rain
adrenaline rush, bored no longer
dances around the room
tears up a steady beat
in time with the rain.

Tuesday, October 18, 2005

there are days like today when living is like biting down on tinfoil. s

Monday, October 17, 2005

monday night, just a little note. no poem. i have been busy working on one for a poetry challenge from my workgroup, the PKlist. the topic was f--- buddies. geez.
BUT, hey, a challenge is a challenge and so far, it's been turning into some good poetry.

me, i wasn't sure at first just WHAT a fb was/is. i mean i know now what it means, but never having watched sex in the city, i was woefully ignorant of the term.

every now and then my group gets frisky(oh hell, sometimes we get insanely fun!)
and like i mentioned, so far some great little poems have come about from this challenge. usually we have more traditional challenges. topics like valentine's day, or national poetry day or challenges using a specific word or two. THIS tho, came about from a random comment and snowballed (yes i see the 2 words i just typed, tsk, tsk!)

anyway, if i get good c&c on my little poem or rework it til i like it better, i'll post it. remember, it's a poem, not an autobiography. s

Sunday, October 16, 2005

oh phooey, just in case anyone read my last post and was all a twitter wondering if i was one of the 3 in pa. that got a hundred grand on the powerball,( no big winner) nope, still here, no log cabin in the middle of 25 acres of woods, no furniture deliveries from ethan allen, no brown chickens either! s
home tonight, robot monster just started on," it's alive." i have it on vhs AND dvd, yes, i know, but i did say i that i am ODD(frankly, for a poet, i'm NOT that odd. tho i do know some very normal ones, just that, by and large we are an odd bunch. now, if i hit the powerball tonight and become ridiculously wealthy, i will not be thought odd. i will be "delightfully eccentric" and everyone will want to hang out with me, ha!)

Saturday, October 15, 2005

beautiful morning today. this is the type of fall day that makes me want to go out and jump into a big pile of raked leaves. trouble is, i'm the adult that has to rake em up first!

been checking out some of my favorite pgh. blogs this morning. i gave some advice to dynamic88 over at mutually assured destruction, hope he can find that william shatner album, hope the neighbors from hell don't actually ENJOY shatner's rendition of lucy in the sky with diamonds!

it was nice to see a comment on my blog from anthony. i answered, let him know if he was scary or not, wish he would have left a comment or two on a few poems. i bet he has an interesting take on poetry.

guess i'm going to get my dogs and go outside and enjoy the morning. s

Friday, October 14, 2005

one last one for friday nite, another bar poem, working on that infamous book.


lucy

lu lu, lucy comes in around 9
head down, it looks
as if she's not looking but
she is

doesn't miss a trick
she may have even turned a few
back in the day, waaayyy
back in her day.

juicy lu lu
lucy all two hundred and thirty pounds of
used to be,
finds her regular stool at the bar

cocks her head up toward the bartender
and waits for the first of many.
a dollar a bottle, cheap and easy
to get a buzz on

lots harder for her
to get a cock now, even if
she's easy and buying her a few beers cheap
but every now and then

lu lu, lucy gets up and shuffles out
the side door, into the dark asphalt lot
takes out her false teeth and
shows 'em just how she became

ju ju, juicy miss
lu lu, lucy.
geezzz, big freaking news flash on my aol screen just now...


potato chips and cookies and candy bars are BAD snacks, fruit and bottled water are GOOD snacks, god, water is not a snack anymore than KETCHUP is a vegetable. i don't care that the late prez ronnie r. proclaimed it so for school lunches!!! and WHO didn't know that candy etc is a BAD, BAD, SHAME ON YOU SNACK??? get a grip! s


me, i say life is uncertain, eat dessert FIRST!!!!
a bar poem.


thirsty?

you stagger as the race is run
an athlete winded before the gun sounds
stumbling over amber bottles
and shot glasses
left dry you choke on other's dust
good excuse for another drink.

cheers!
it's the weekend again, time for another chicken joke!

why does a chicken coup have 2 door?

because if it had four it would be a sedan.



what's the difference between kinky and perverted?

kinky people use a feather, perverts use a whole chicken!

( that one has been making people at the bar laugh for 2 or 3 years now. i think i need some new jokes!)
cool, i was just listed in pittsburgh webloggers

it's a really interesting site. i've been checking out all the different blogs from around my hometown. some are really good, some are really odd, some are a little scary and a few have become must reads for me. give it a read if you have some time. s

Thursday, October 13, 2005

"you're being silly"

oh yeah

"DON'T BE"

but

your eyes flickered.
weaker sex

these marks are earned
the crow's feet, time's
battle scars. the grooves that
bracket lips, quotation marks
for the statements of my heart
stretched and sagging belly
a mother's reminder.
and yet,the weaker sex

because you make more money, are taller
can lift more, shout louder...?

i just had a sweet little surprise. the UPS lady showed up and handed me a package. i wasn't expecting anything and was beginning to panic a bit, thinking i had ordered something and forgotten all about it, automatically trying to figure out if i had set aside money for WHATEVER it was OR perhaps i had forgotten to mail back a book club order form marked, "nothing this time"

turns out it was a big bag of halloween candy from m&m's saying i was "booed" by red and yellow! a very clever advertising gimmick. there is a small halloween bag along with the rest and instructions to take some of the candy and "boo" a neighbor and friend and to include a greeting from m&m in the bag.

neat idea, nice to have a little fun and if that fun includes chocolate, well so much the better. how'd they know i get warm and fuzzy and "excited" when plied with chocolate? my reputation must be growing, ho, ho!!!! s

Wednesday, October 12, 2005

almost 4, nothing more.

leavings
lonely must smell like this



i am sure that it does, a dry
cobwebbed dusty scent like

an attic long after the family
has moved on to other things
abandoning special moments to
cardboard boxes and plastic garbage bags

or the musty aroma of a fall apple
shrunken into itself overlooked in
a dark pantry left a dull and wasted thing
juiceless and unwelcomed in the light.

leavings.
" Love takes off masks that we fear we can not live without and know we can not live within."

James Baldwin



just a simple truth for some people to mull over. s

Tuesday, October 11, 2005

cold out, put in the storm windows. that always makes me feel as if summer is truly gone.i am also storing my cement forms and tools away that i use to craft my message bricks. if need be, i can make a few in the garage, but too cold for me to do them outside, my hands get blue from the cold and the water. time goes so damn fast anymore, except when i am waiting for something or someone important, then, each moment can be a lifetime.

i am surprised that i have had almost 600 views on my little blog here. i hope people have enjoyed their time with me. i am always happy when i see comments or get e-mail about my works. s

Monday, October 10, 2005

this is from the book i've been working on for years now. it may change again. s


shooters

there are three of us
at the end of the bar
my nose is itchy
from the scratchy smell of
the cheap whisky you two are pounding down
but then, who am i to pass judgment?
me, with painted nails and a glossy paint smile that
i can actually see grinning
in two pairs of glassy eyes,
wide with fake honesty red with booze and smoke as
you both tell tales of vietnam

vietnaaaahhhhhmmm, in slurred pittsburgese
"back in nahhhhhhmmmm, yadda, yadda...!"

there are three of us
one with an invisible icepick between her eyebrows
and a long dead lover, forever nineteen, me
sipping at my watered down kahalua and cream that's
curdling in my belly
but not sick enough or pissed off enough yet,
no, not not quite yet to tell
these drunken middleaged bullshit artists that
i've got their number that i've just about had it, that
i KNOW they were never outside of the freaking southside, EVER
that their often mentioned purple hearts are about as real as
my fake nails, just there to impress

there are three of us
at the end of the bar at the end of the night
two have drunken hardons and one of us
me, well i've finally lost my painted smile
and i swear, i have dirt under my manicured nails
from staying here listening to this crap as
two of the three of us do shooters of cheap booze and
are shitfaced enough to think i'm still smiling.

Saturday, October 08, 2005

this is more of a prose poem, based on a real moment in time. s


street man


there was a street man downtown
when i was seventeen and still fresh
and opening to new things. a streetman
so tall and so thin that i'd look
to see if he was breathing and not some
60's group hallucination.

once a week he'd come into the lunch counter
that was across the street from the college.
a street man, dressed in a dusty outdated tux
a pair of hot pink, clean ladies panties pinned
to the back of the tux jacket, i didn't know why
i should have asked, but

he was a street man and it was the 60's
and he could've been a narc or a headcase
we were afraid of narcs, most of us
hell, we were headcases. most streetmen were too,
most, not all.

my streetman, i'd watch to catch him breathe
wondered about the panties, looked to see if
he acted like a narc and since i was only seventeen
and open to new things, after some time

asked him why he wore a tux, while trying
to pretend those damn panties weren't there
or so pink. he looked at me, looked at me deep
looking i think for that openness

touched the side of my cheek with the tip of his finger
leaned in as if for a first kiss. me, well i didn't move
i didn't breathe. i might have let him kiss me
i think i just might have.

the streetman smiled and said so very softly
" i know why, robert kennedy was really killed."
then turned away and walked out.
i support our troops, i know more than a few, and i am old enough to understand that there are evil people in this world that should be dealt with, but i think we as citizens and lovers of our country must always watch over it as a parent watches and loves their child. the government is us, we, the people. we must remember that fact. death and everything that comes with it, well, don't we all know what that does, to us, our families and friends. war is thousands of deaths, thousands of families and thousands of friends and neighbors grieving.

and a few people, celebrating, profiting and looking for more. just a small rant. s
after listening again to the names of the newly fallen yesterday, i found this today.


"War is at best barbarism... It's glory all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot, nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, more vengeance, more desolation."

General William T. Sherman
hi, the poem, sugar lake, goes with the poem about uncle buck. it's the end of the tale, for now. s
sugar lake

there's a bar across sugar lake
little buck would row his dad
two doubles and two beers
and buck would row him back.

fifty years or more
the bar still sits
and buck's ashes drifted down
sweet as sugar
at sugar lake.

Friday, October 07, 2005

and just because i can...

2 chicken jokes for the weekend,


why did the chicken cross the road???

The fact that you thought the chicken crossed the road reveals your underlying sexual insecurity. Freud



To purchase chicken 2.01a, which will cross both roads and calculate the energy it used. There are bugs, yes, but if you uninstall traffic 2.0 and farmer 1.2 it will run. If it freezes at white line 2.0, we have a patch... Bill Gates
been raining all day. i like the sound of rain at night, but daylight shows rain grey and heavy, so i shut all the windows and let down the blinds. the silence isn't as heavy as cold, grey rain sounds. s
whole

you move beneath
my skin
with the flutter
of wings
fall in allegheny county


early dusk,the woods buzz the cicada's song
cricket's chirp summer's death rattle while
flocks of turkeys gobble fall's newborn cries
bright color rims the dying leaf
and fog shrouded fields greet cold morning sun

Thursday, October 06, 2005

i am so pleased to post this from a truly gifted poet named berko wills. yes, he does have another name.

he is from new south wales, australia. a fine poet and songwriter. he also writes wonderfully insightful commentaries on his blog, http://touchedbytheson.blogspot.com it's really worth checking out.

this is a song of his. i wish i could hear him sing it, wish i could share it with all of you.

Putty it Over

There's a crack in my resolve
The work is too involved
Putty it over

The hole through which i fell
Led me to this hard cell
Putty it over

It's a telltale sign
Though only hairline
Putty it over

Let nothing go to waste
Mix it into a paste
And putty it over.


thank you grant, for letting me use your talent for my blog. sherry
going to get my haircut this morning, hooray! i look like moe from the 3 stooges! s

Wednesday, October 05, 2005

i'm posting this to remind myself.


" Most people would rather be certain they're miserable, than risk being happy." Robert Anthony


isn't it the sad truth? misery can be addicting in it's familiarity, comforting in it's routine. happiness is the unknown quality in some lives. the unknown can be frightening. s
nevermore

that damn bird
he won't sit above my door anymore
i hit him with the hard end of
my broom, knocked him silly
and baked him in a pie.
hey, if you can
make one using four and twenty blackbirds
i can surely do it using
one smart mouthed, over grown crow.

Monday, October 03, 2005

cock (a doddle do)

you strut around your barnyard
of pool table and jukebox
like a bantam rooster

cock of the walk
because you have one

feathers ruffled
pecking at your hen



with strident squawk
and sharpened spur

is it because
you know she carries the egg
holds the secret of life between her legs

and you , loud as you crow
are only a cock?
august wilson passed on yesterday. there isn't anything i can say. if you don't know who he was, look up his name. you will be so much richer in spirit if you do. s

Saturday, October 01, 2005

it's oct. already. i am amazed that i've had this blog going since july! i have hopes that people will find it and enjoy it, perhaps leave a comment or two, tell me what they like or dislike about my work and the blog in general.

i'm hoping for more guest poets. i enjoy the different styles and ideas. i hope that you do as well. s
i wanted to post this because it is a favorite of mine, as neruda is a favorite poet of mine . i love it. it means a lot to me, i hope you will enjoy it too. s

Body of a Woman

Body of a woman, white hills, white thighs,
you look like a world, lying in surrender.
My rough peasant's body digs into you
and makes the son leap from the depth of the earth.

I was alone like a tunnel. The birds fled from me,
and night swamped me with it's crushing invasion.
To survive myself i forged you like a weapon,
like an arrow in my bow, a stone in my sling.

But the hour of vengeance falls, and i love you.
Body of skin, of moss, of eager and firm milk.
Oh the goblets of the breast! Oh the eyes of absence!
Oh the roses of the pubis! Oh your voice, slow and sad!

Body of my woman, I will persist in your grace.
My thirst, my boundless desire, my shifting road!
Dark river-beds where the eternal thirst flows
and weariness follows, and the infinite ache. pablo neruda






i think i could live through almost anything if i KNEW without a doubt that there was a man somewhere that felt this for me. this is such a sensual poem and filled with such longing and yes, love! s