Illusions of Permanence

April Challenge 10: Location poem

This is the space we created together,
this house, this room that we filled
with our daily lives. I look around
and see it's full of colour.

Walls of books and pictures, reds and greens,
blues and oranges, the tiled coffee table,
the armchairs and cushions, the winged fairy
atop the TV, the two toy cats ...

The two living cats are curled in the chairs.
The two people are tapping at keyboards
and frowning. Their huge double desk
overflows with papers. They are sipping coffee.

The dining table came from my friend Beth
30-odd years ago. It's teak and I always loved it.
I stained the raw pine chairs to match.
If you look closely, you'll see I missed a few patches.

My Alice in Wonderland oracle I made myself
sits in a big black bowl on the coffee table.
I go and pull some cards, but tonight
all messages are inscrutable.

There's something cosy about a familiar mess.
You feel you could dive right in and get warm.
The lights are bright, and the big old fridge
makes a comforting background hum.

The phone interrupts with a squeal.
The voice on the other end begins to sound pissed off.
It's cold out there and dark, and he's hitching home.
There's a long way to go, and we're all knackered.

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008

11/4/08

All In the Interpretation?

April Challenge 9: Today's prompt is to choose a word (any word) and then write a poem either about that word or using that word in different ways.

'You're on crack cocaine!' he accuses,
or, 'What kind of crack are you taking?'
I am offended. He explains:
'Where I live it's a common expression.
It means, "You're in la-la land"
or, "What planet are you on?" '

This he said by way of exposing
the cracks in this edifice I call my life.
'Fair crack of the whip!' I thought,
'It's really not that bad,' but
when I opened my eyes
just a crack wider, I could see them too.

Now my questions are,
should I have a crack
at papering them over,
or let them fall apart with a mighty crack –
and which option
will see me crack up quicker?


© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008

11/4/08

The Little Deer, by Frida Kahlo

April Challenge 8. Prompt: Write a poem inspired by one of two paintings. The one I chose can be seen here.

This forest is full of dead trees.
There's been a fire, you can see
by the blackened trunks.
Even the ground is charred.

The victim stands at bay.
Nine arrows shot hard
have driven into the soft flesh.
The deep wounds run with blood.

There is no escape – facing the hunters,
hemmed in by all that dead wood,
at back a whirlpooling ocean,
storm clouds, forks of lightning.

All that, I notice later. First
what arrests and fills my gaze
is her face: Frida's face, startling,
staring from the animal's head.

Her wide eyes and closed mouth
appear only mildly surprised,
slightly disdainful. She is mute
and will remain so. The little dear!

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008
9/4/08

Rambling

April Challenge, Day 7. 'Today's prompt is to write a "ramble poem." That is, I want you to write a poem where you just start rambling without worrying about where you're headed. Very interesting things can happen in these poems. And don't worry about the interesting things, because they tend to just happen if you let yourself ramble.' – Robert Lee Brewer.

I want to mention how people can be flowers,
and I am led to this thought by the many times I see
the words 'Dalia Lama'. Note the spelling. My mind supplies
an 'h' and there he is, I see him, his bald Buddhist head
sticking out of a circle of bright yellow petals, his spectacles
reflecting their golden light, and of course he is smiling.
Who wouldn't be smiling, at the centre of one's flower self?
And I too am a flower. 'Rambling Rose,' the man sang
on the radio when I was growing up. My name was Rose.
Not really, but everyone called me that, shortening the full name
my mother gave me because it was so beautiful. 'I wish
they wouldn't call you Rose,' she said, but in those days they all did.
Rambling Rose was glamorous, forbidden. This I understood,
though not why. I was young. Tibet hadn't happened yet, nor my life.

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008

9/4/08


Linked to Poets United's Poetry Pantry #303 (22/5/16)

A Day in the Life

April Challenge, Day 6. Prompt: record the details of your day and generate a poem from that.

We curl close and warm,
talk a while, get up and have coffee
in front of our screens, breakfast
at the dining table, where we read.
He goes back to bed, sleeps,
doesn't wake when I leave the email,
go in and shower. Our grey cat
is curled up with him
at the foot of the bed.

At the other end of the house
my son Steve is silent until
at 11.40 I take him coffee, grab mine
(a new cup) and we talk till lunchtime –
late lunchtime, nearly 1.30.
He says it's exhausting
proving to me that I'm not a poet.
Not, that is, as some fundamental
core of my self, but rather
something programmed in,
a way of winning approval
even now, from my dead father.
This is unpalatable, and I'm hungry.
I go to make lunch and find
Andrew's now up and dressed.
I go in and make the bed.

Afternoon and evening,
between food and work, rain and shine –
between wind and thunder
and walking down to the shops twice
and putting out the rubbish and bringing in
the empty bin – my son forces me to see
unhappiness I live with and pretend
isn't there and refuse to fix. I end
by watching TV with tears leaking.
Then I phone my best friend Linda
to wish her Happy Birthday.
She tells me that her only son
has been in a terrible accident
and is now quadriplegic. He's 38.
I've known him since he was born.
Now my tears overflow.

My son, 39, gives me coffee.
I go on the computer to beg for prayers
and healing for my friend and her son.
My husband and I sit down
in front of the telly again.
We watch Andrew Denton explore
living with madness:
voices of angels and demons
all day, invading your head.

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008

7-8/4/08

It's a Bit of a Worry

April Poem-A-Day Challenge, prompt 5: a worry poem.

He's quite a lad,
one of a kind
I'm telling you.
Know what I mean?

You wouldn't read about it –
no, really –
he was all over her like a rash.
She wasn't impressed,
gave him the old heave-ho
quick-smart, that's for sure.

And he was that ropable,
fair dinkum he just went spare,
there was no holding him.
The demon drink,
it'll do that to you.

Well, we calmed him down
after a bit,
just in the nick of time
before he made a right mess
of all and sundry.

All's well that ends well,
that's what I say,
but when all's said and done
it was a near thing there.

He was like a wild thing,
all over the place,
a ship without a rudder
until we brought him to heel.

It was a very long day
as it turned out,
I'm sure you'll agree,
and all in all, you know,
at the end of the day
he's a bit of a worry.

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008

6/4/08

Thank You, Dear ...

April Poem-A-Day Challenge #4: Today's prompt is to write a thankful poem. Another option is to write a tribute poem. The thankful/tribute poem can be dedicated to a person, an inanimate object, an idea, a day of the week, etc.

Thank you, dear little insects
who, loving me so dearly,
come kissing up from the grass
or down out of evening air.

I am never alone
while, with ecstatic tongues,
you draw my blood
for your sustenance.

I am necessary to you. In reward
you leave decorative marks
on my skin, like imprints:
great red swollen blooms.

I am special. You prefer me
to any other. You crowd to my side
ignoring the rest. My skin
is thinner, my blood sweeter.

You make me notice you.
You are sharp and keep me awake.
I cannot brush you aside;
you're mine, all mine, and I'm yours.

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008

5/4/08

April Poem-A-Day # 3

This was well-timed for me! # 3 is to write a haiku - which it happens I do every Friday on MySpace at Haiku on Friday.
So this one appears all over the place today!

On the empty beach
a single line of footprints.
Now the sky darkens.

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008

Lois Lane

April Poem-A-Day Challenge #2: Put yourself in someone (or something) else's skin and write a poem about the experience. 


Both have good points,
my two boyfriends – as I call them
to myself, though neither's really that.

One who wants me, one
I want. A new slant on the eternal
triangle … as I go round and round in circles.

The 'mild-mannered reporter'
he calls himself. There's a by-line!
For most it would be contradiction-in-terms.

A sweet fellow, and no mistake.
At least he'd always understand my job,
being in the same line of work – my own calling.

As for the other one, he has
his own life of excitement. It leaves
too little room for me. Hell, he'd never be home.

I don't want a man who needs
me to be his mother, one who clings
so tightly that he bruises and breaks my wings.

I don't want a man whom I need
more than I want to; one who keeps me
in my place, applauding from the edge of his life.

They are like two halves of one whole –
shadow-twins. If only I could put them together,
combine their opposite extremes into my perfect man!


Also submitted, 4 Dec. 2011, to dVerse Poetics — going Comic challenge.

The First-Born: Arrival

(The prompt is "First")

He took a long time coming.
Twelve hours of me panting
trying to find breath,
nothing left to answer with
when the nurses murmured,
'Why isn't she using her breath to push?'
no lung power to say
I had no lung power, I'd caught a cold.

Later I found the power
to yell and swear as the pain hit.
'Oh!' said the nurses, gasping
almost enough to push him out for me,
'What would your husband say,
if he could hear you now?'
They looked all of 16, the pair of them.
I didn't bother to laugh.

Then it no longer mattered.
I thought the next push
would split me apart
from groin to crown
and that was irrelevant.
If I could, I might have shrugged.
All that mattered 
was getting that baby born.

Dimly I heard, 'It's a boy'.
They wrapped him round
and laid him on my chest.
I was too exhausted
even to raise my head.
Afraid my weak arms
wouldn't hold him,
'You take him,' I said. 'I'm scared.'

'How can you be scared,' said the midwife,
'Of such a little scrap?'
His skin was very fair,
his few fine hairs almost white.
I dropped little kisses on his forehead
when no-one was looking.
As each kiss alighted, a tiny smile
twitched his lips and his eyes opened.

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008

2/4/08

April Poem-A-Day Challenge

Robert Lee Brewer at Poetic Asides has issued a challenge to all and sundry for April – which is National Poetry Month in USA.

There will be a new prompt each day, and we may consider our responses first drafts, as the month of May will be for revision.

I intend a poem every day!

P.S. As noted in the comments, the link to Poetic Asides isn't working, and I can't make it work, although I see no reason why it shouldn't. Hopefully this is temporary. Otherwise, the full name of the site is "Poetic Asides with Robert Lee Brewer" and Google will still get it for you.