we wait

sky is dark and damp

clouds hang pregnantly, shadows

hiding underfoot

cold feet on sidewalks

of water, leftover rain

in puddles seeping

summer poppies dead

our long-gone days are wasted

winter is heavy

water, water, but

still with the promise of snow

we wait for winter

articles with voice

I actually wrote this way back in September and just forgot about it after that. Now that I think about it, is was a lot of fun to write this one.

     Last night I had a horrible dream. It must have been because of the terrible stories the younger daughter told when she came back from school yesterday. I have decided that the older one, who owns me and often plays on me, is mature enough to be trusted. Since dreaming that terrifying dream though, I know I will be wary of the little one.
     In my dream it was the early afternoon. I knew that right way, although I'm not sure how, as I was completely wrapped in a dusty fabric case - hot, suffocating fake velvet. I could see nothing. I only felt the hard plastic weight of my neighbours pressing against me through each of their thin fabric coverings. We helplessly jostled each other as someone far stronger and larger entered the room and moved towards us with great shuddering steps. We swayed and were pushed against gravity as we were lifted up and up, and I could hear the faint muffled chinking of my poor comrades as they collided with each other, with the cardboard prison walls, with me.
     We were breathless, voiceless, helpless.
     The human bumped us up a set of stairs and into another room. We all slid sideways as she shifted her weight to shoulder open a door. Immediately we were assaulted by the noise - what unbearable infernal noise! Shouting and screaming and high-pitched wailing. But it was nothing to what was still to come.
      The human set us down now and addressed her audience. "Boys and girls, welcome to your first music class of the year!" she shrilled in the slightly freakish, over-enunciated voice that all elementary teachers develop.
     The children screamed happily.
     "Now, when I call your name please come up to the front. Jessica... Timmy... Natalie..."
     I waited as the bodies above me were removed one by one, and the sunlight streamed in more clearly and harshly through my thin fabric case. With each moment, as the light grew brighter, the noise outside grew shriller and more diabolical. I trembled and tried to bury myself deeper in the cardboard box which now seemed my last sanctuary, but I could not move. I could only feel the shapes of those beneath me still. The light grew brighter still, and as my fellows above me were removed they screamed like the devil... the light was blinding...

bearing spring

This was a hard one to write. The idea is that each line (except the last one) is 3 words long, and each word can be used either as a verb or a noun. I like the end result though. 

snow drifts covering
leaf, plant, sun
icing branch, root

wind whistles... cries

love dreams float
     like water ripples
     like wave kisses

lick rain drops --
drink rain tears.
drip drop       -------whisper

rain, scattering troubles,

will voice wishes
will voice spring
bear spring

lark sings in ephemeral may of meadow rose

 This is a project called the "Humement" that we did. It's basically taking a page out of a book and altering it, leaving some words behind that make a coherent phrase or story. Mine says "lark sings in ephemeral May of meadow rose". I wanted to do something really dark to contrast with the pretty flowery images. First I chose the words and letters that I wanted, then I coloured over the the path of the phrase with a white crayon. I coloured the rest of the page with different coloured crayons - mostly blues, yellows, pinks in the top half, blending into earthier reds and greens. Then I went over everything with ink and a sponge, and sort of scratched out a few bits to make some patterns.

 Here on the bottom right I did a scratched-out rose. Obviously I'm not an art major but I tried.

 The wavy lines are meant to evoke the wind. 

 Here's a closer-up photo of the path of my phrase.

~~~~~~~~

And here, because it relates to ripped-up books as well, I have a lovely illustration and definition of an oboe from the same old dictionary that my humement came from.I mounted it on some cardstock, put a clothespin on it and taped it on the door to my room.

The definition says: "a wooden musical instrument in which a thin, poignant tone is produced by a double reed."

a november poem

leaves plastered heavy
above bus shelter sunroof
soaked in rain puddles

passerby on bus,
warm, well-rested: november
is wet and lovely

autumn viewfinder

 The grim sun hides and the shadows are black as dirt, yet in the soil something is growing still. A prickly green arm stretches out, half-smothered by fiery leaves, the burning effigies of a dead spring. It is a weed, a plant most hated by humans who delude themselves into taming nature, but fragile and feeble as it is I cannot help wishing it well. With an effort of small struggling perseverance it reaches out its awkward spiny leaves to embrace the sky; it reaches past the corpses of past seasons, past the clouds, to beg the sky for life… 

A leaf lies naked, still on the ground like a street child, its arms streaked with mud. Veins glow white upon the blood-coloured skin. Without a home, it shelters in the dirt day and night, huddled in the company of others that are blown its way. Though it has little strength left the stem, which still holds itself stubbornly straight. Washed halfway under the shelter of a small, more alive plant, it lies motionless, waiting for another gust of wind or water to carry it away again. 

 

I watch the drowned leaf, though it is motionless now. The veins fan out from the central stem, which juts up towards the clouds. Rain gathers in small bubbles on the plasticky skin, clear water intruded upon by specks of soil which muddy its purity. Some dirt has been washed into the crevices of the pale veins, wedged into place like beach sand that dries onto sun-warmed toes. Though leaves and light are muddied and fading, the scent of wet autumn is still warm and clings in the air, rich as chocolate drunk outside in the cold.