Last Call for Poems

Okay, so I haven’t written anything here for a long time, but my mother Bonnie Mutchler passed away recently. That’s the subject for another blog, but anyway our friend and fellow poet DM Yates came up with the idea of doing a memorial poetry collection for her, and publishing it for free on Smashwords (who will then distribute it to Apple, B&N, etc.) I’m not going to pretend I have a name for this bad boy yet, so if you have any title ides let me know.

Also, I’m still looking for poems to include. They can be about anything: something fun and lighthearted, and epic story poem, a love story, whatever you want. The only limitations are that 1) you have to have the rights to it (aka if it is published somewhere else, you can’t have an exclusive contract with them) and 2) no politics or social issues, please, because I just don’t want to deal with the drama those topics can create.

Since there will be no fee for the book, there will be zero profits, so that means zero payment. This is just something fun we’re doing in Bonnie’s memory. If you’re interested you can hit me up on Facebook or email your submission to Joleene@JoleeneNaylor.com. I’ll also need a short bio from you – two or three sentences is good – and I’ll have a contract that basically just says I have the non-exclusive right to use the poem and that you know that no one is getting any money from the project.

I have several poems already, and am hoping to start putting it together in the next week or two, but I am willing to extend the deadline if anyone needs it. Bonnie wrote with a lot of poets back in the MySpace days, and it would be great to see some things from some of them, even if they don’t remember her because she did remember them.

Thanks, everyone, and have a poem kinda day!

Jo 🙂

Blogophilia Poem

It’s time for Blogophilia, the fun blog group where Marvin gives prompts to use in a weekly blog post. This week’s are:

Ecrits Blogophilia Week 3.10 Topic: Blue Skies
**BONUSES:
Hard (2 pts): Include a lyric from The Monkees
Easy (1 pt): Incorporate a game of Chess

Rather than lump this in with my thankfulness, I thought I’d whip something up:

Saturday’s Child,
I Wanna Be Free,
Like the wind that blows through the field.

Clouds moving in,
Obscuring blue skies,
Light to the darkness must yield.

A quick game of chess,
Between life and death,
Searching for souls that are healed

At last golden sun,
Overcomes the night,
Hiding me behind its shield

So it seems freedom,
I already have,
behind my own gloom was concealed

But now I can see,
In the morning rays,
At last my joy revealed.

.

I dunno. It’s worth points at least.
Now to work on turtles.
Jo 🙂

The Coffin Shaped Box

A coffin shaped box arrived at our door.
I brought it inside, set it on the floor.
The cat howled and circled, all in a tizzy,
Round, round she went, ’til her brain was quite dizzy.
What was in that box, she wanted to know.
Perhaps toys, or catnip, or imported snow.
Why was it so big, why such an odd shape?
Did it hold a costume, complete with a cape?
Was it a new bed, a place for her to sleep?
She meowed and she called, and begged for a peek.
So we cut loose the tape and lifted the lid,
Inside was a case – oh what treasures it hid!
And when it unzipped, inside a surprise,
A new violin that brought light to our eyes.
For though we can’t play, that doesn’t mean,
We can’t bother the neighbors with screeches and screams.
And maybe someday, a real song we’ll wail,
If for disturbing the peace, we haven’t been jailed.

Full disclosure: I am not the one hoping to learn to play. That would be my brother who has always wanted a violin. Unfortunately, in his youth, some kind soul told him that in order to master it he had to start as a child, and since he hadn’t there was no point. Being the person my brother is, he listened to them, and it’s taken me all these years to convince him to give it a go anyway. We got this set on eBay (it’s a learner’s violin set) and he is going to learn or I’m going to tie him to a chair and make him. Sadly I can’t read music (I’ve tried. And tried. There was a reason I went for percussion back in school) but I teased him that if he learned to play we could get our piano tuned and stick numbers on all the keys then he could write out the music for me using numbers for the notes (like little kid keyboards do) and we’d duet. Ha ha!
And now I head to bed. Have a good one!
Jo 🙂

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The Day After – A Poem

Though I haven’t done poetry challenges for a long time, I got invited to one on good old MySpace, so I gave it a whirl. The theme was the day(s) after Valentines Day.

 

I pass like a ghost among the gravestones
to collect the remnants of the flowers,
those I left for you just days before,
lying cold against the granite,
petals dried like the memories
that still linger, pale valentines I cannot forget
from a time when we never thought
that death could touch us with his icy fingers.
But he came and I remain
so every year I leave you roses
to remind myself that we once loved
and laughed and cried and sang
and that, though no one lives forever,
they are never truly gone
so long as we remember.

Song playing at the moment – Helplessness Blues – Fleet Foxes

Rambling Poetry: On the Side of the Road

(from Nov 2008)

Written while waiting in the parking lot of McDonalds 😉

On the Side of the Road

A world within a world
Panicked and yet so unobtrusive
Inside the steel cage
Joyfully greeting this solitude
As a universe passes by
Out of reach, on the other side
Safe behind the tempered glass
Meanwhile, moving down the highway
Are a thousand dreams
So close to one another
And yet isolated.
A hundred faceless, nameless souls
Who occupy this space
For only one moment
Before they speed past you
On their way to all the things
Which seem so important in their lives
But which mean nothing to you.
They flit past so quickly,
Not even worth a glance or notice,
And leave no impression or influence,
Like dead leaves at your feet.
A thousand cars,
A thousand thoughts,
But you are trapped alone
With only your own ideas for company,
A prisoner of our self imposed isolation.

Song playing at the moment – Summer Skin – Death Cab for Cutie

Rambling Poetry: So Ordinary

(from Nov 2008)

Written for BC Beneke’s open mic…

So Ordinary….

A slash across the cold gray sky,
A knife wound at the horizon
Bleeding red against the pale expanse
Cool morning brings redemption
Or just another day so like the last
Mix repeat, mix repeat
Directions for the ordinary life
The smooth gray box of mediocrity
Eggshell thin if only bravery
Would try to puncture through its skin
But better to have cried and lost
Than to have ever tried and failed
Better still to drown the dream to silence
Than to risk humiliation
At the cruel hands of the noisy rabble
It was just a case of mistaken identity
When the dream came drifting
from the heavens and landed
on the shoulders of an ordinary man
For things like that belong to those
Born under lucky stars
Or under lucky names
Not to those who go to work
And drink coffee from their ordinary mugs
While looking through their ordinary eyes
At their ordinary world
But perhaps the ordinary is only
In the eye of the beholder
And if you choose to see the dream
Then it is yours for the taking.
Each man decides himself,
Is it the dawning of redemption
Or of an ordinary day?

Song playing at the moment – Summer Skin – Death Cab for Cutie

Horror Poem: Werewolves

(Nov 2008)

I wrote this for the Demon Poetry  Contest, but lost :p

Claws tear and teeth rend both cloth and flesh
While seeking pale skin beneath
Chained in pool of crimson blood
Plaything for the werewolves in their den
Both beast and man wrapped together
Behind haughty eyes and sneering face
Each scream tickles their ears
As they take their turn with what used to be
A young maiden from the desecrated village
Both town and girl now ruined and destroyed
by hands matted with their blood
And they laugh as she pleads for death
A shattered victim of this bestial carnality
When her shell no longer serves its purpose
And they have exhausted their pleasure
Then their fun turns to feast
Raw flesh to tempt their pallet
And a burbling stream of crimson to end their thirst
Splattered on the walls and floors
Their den soaked with her life as she is pulled apart
A piece for each, a fight for the heart
With flashing teeth and snarling growls
And then the head impaled on a spike of stone
Above the door of the reeking den
A warning to those still living
Not to cross the werewolves path

Song of the Moment – Mother earth – Within Temptation

Horror Poetry: China Doll

(oct 2008)

This was written for a challenge.

CHINA DOLL

Creep across the floor and through my nightmares
wave your tortured limbs and scream about the agony
Haunt my memory and sicken me with guilt,
black and sticky like the tar we buried you in.
Cut me with razorblades of shame
the way we cut you.
Peel away my face and replace it with a china mask
while I scream and plead for mercy,
until my words are just gurgles of my own blood.

Watch my life soak your makeshift operating table,
the way yours did the one hidden in his basement.
Have your fun, take your revenge like we did.
Though my sin is so much greater than yours,
one who died for being too much,
the right name, the right face, the wrong attitude.
It was the punishment we inflicted on you,
you thought you were perfect and so
we made you into a living doll,
twisted and grotesque beneath our clumsy hands,
pale skin stitched with bloody threads.

Now you come to torment me in darkest night.
So take me to his basement
Tie my wrists and ankles with barbed wire and
shove a dirty rag in my mouth
to stifle the agony as you rearrange me
and when it’s done
and your macabre experiment has concluded
then bury me in the tar pit, a mutilated corpse who is
finally free of their mistakes.

***************

Fav song of the second – Think About It – Flight of the Conchords (this thing is hilarious!)

Rambling Poetry: Oh, Elizabeth

(from August 2008)

I was trying to sleep and for some reason suddenly found myself channeling Adam Duritz and Don Mclean at the same time, which is funny because I have been listening to Death Cab for Cutie the last two days – but who am I to complain?  Anyway, it’s actually a song – kind of – but I think that falls under poetry! So here is some….

Oh, Elizabeth, do you think that we could fly
Away from the ground into the blue studded sky
Where the only thing lost is the next golden age
And the sounds down below mix to a sweet serenade

Can you see past the dirt, past the coming decay
Where the lives lived are wasted and your sweat doesn’t pay
Past disease and misuse, past the lack of your tears
To a time long ago when we both used to feel

Oh, Elizabeth, do you think that we could fly
Away from the ground into the blue studded sky
To a place in our memory when the whole world felt free
Hazy and sweet wrapped in colors of green

I’m dreaming of angels, wearing star studded shoes
And they dance cross the sky while below we all loose
Wait in anticipation for dawn’s coming day
The sun rises like ashes that burn as we pray

Oh, Elizabeth, do you think that we could fly
Away from the ground into the blue studded sky
Past the hating and wanting, where we’re shedding our skin
Drink the wine of communion while we’re drowning in sin

Can you see me?
Can you catch me?
When I fall, will I fall alone?
Can you see me?
Can you hear me?
Are you there or am I really here all alone?

Oh Elizabeth, do you think that we could fly
Away from the ground into the blue studded sky
Oh Elizabeth, do you know what we’ve done
What we’ve corrupted and ruined and now overrun

Oh Elizabeth, do you think we could be free
From the chaos and destruction that is all that we see
Oh Elizabeth, can we get out of this place
Away from the death that is the whole human race?

Song playing at the moment – Summer Skin – Death Cab for Cutie

Rambling Poetry: Ring Around the Rosies

(originally from July 28, 2008)

No idea where this came from……

Ring Around the Rosies

So it’s ring around the rosies, pocket full of posies,

Three times, three times, now we hit the ground,

While memories slip through fingers, like petals of flowers

And the whimpering wind carries that sweet as honey sound.

 

A reminder in slow motion, of a world nearly forgotten

And a place that is forsaken, lost down paths I cannot find.

Amidst the summer keening, where the young heart’s always reeling

And the afternoon’s spent dreaming of warm places in the mind

 

There in velvet colored shadows I can find the smallest whisper

To remind me of the feelings that once a time were dear.

But to ponder and to worry on the emotion and occurrence,

Many years past now a blur, seems a game too childish here.

 

Because no person place or thing in the web of here and now

Can live up to imagination or those memories now dreams.

So to while away the hours, wasting all recourse and powers,

On contemplation and comparison is as useless as it seems.

 

Still, I recall them slowly, and though the memories seem perfect

Sublime nature’s an illusion a façade to hide the truth.

And perfection only seems so when you’re standing far away

From the source of your delusion, from reality aloof.

 

Two birds in the hand are worth five in the past.

If it’s gone it didn’t last, so it’s nothing that you need

Instead of hanging on and pining, inwardly sigh and dying

Take a look at what surrounds you and let the wistfulness recede.

Song playing at the moment – AFI – Beautiful Thieves