Ask Us About Our Ninja Disguise

[Donner]

Laurie and Claire - Thanks! Are you sure, Laurie? Are you sure that Melanie wouldn't write a Sevenling? Hmmmm?? Mhahahahahaha!

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April 9 Prompt - Everyone loves my purse

* * * * *

Purse Snatchers

Everyone loves my purse. Even men
have told me they would carry that one.
They like the distressed leather
that looks like a pair of favorite old boots
you never toss, the zippered flap that covers
the two outside pockets that store keys
and cell phones with cargo pant practicality.
Nothing prissy about it, yet women will come up
and coo over it, ask to touch it
like they would a pregnant woman's
belly, and I've been pressed to recite
its litany of features to strangers
in stores. Everyone asks

where I bought it, even the post-op nurse
that tended to my husband when she spied it
on my lap. I've taken to slinging it
across my body, holding it close
like you do when you travel or walk
an unfamiliar street, like you hold your child's hand
tight in a crowd. I've started taking it
to bed with me to use as my pillow,
wrapping the strap around my wrist several times
so it won't disappear
in the middle of the night.

* * * * *

All Stitched Up

I am a maker of things;
curtains, clothes, all things sewn.
It’s a living. It’s an art.
He was a destroyer of things;
plants, animals, all that lives.

After he went away I took a bubble bath,
splashed water on the floor
and left it to evaporate.

My skin is soft from sands
and oils, I exfoliated
his skin from my body.
I am stark clean.

Towels tower in a corner,
there’s hair in the sink.
I’ll have fast food for supper.
I am a rebel. I am fixed.

I see old friends at the market
they mention how different I look
with makeup and colorful clothes.
Everyone loves my purse and gloves,
hand stitched and dyed. Smooth as skin.

* * * * *

The infamous purse:

Who wouldn't love this purse?

[kristalynn]

These are the best prompts ever! I love seeing what you both did with this last one. Taking the purse to bed with you is just silly. Silly in a good way though, fluff!

[RobynD]

Hey, Donner, Melanie,

I've been reading these, intrigued like everyone else. I suspect next year you may have a few copy-caters. I'm enjoying the surprise in these. I read the first, and the second is a complete surprise.

I think my favorite pairs are Last Kiss and Everyone Loves my Purse- these latest two are quite amusing.

I've got some definite ideas on which are Donner's, but will keep my thoughts to myself.

Unstalked is one of my favorites thus far, although I'm still puzzling if the end is a resolution for the one being stalked?

I will be interested in seeing what comes next from this thread!

[prooftheory]

The purse poem's really show the two sides of the coin when it comes to material possessions where in Purse Snatchers there is this sense of over-attachment, in All Stitched Up the possessions become an affirmation of independence.

Both poems exhibit a lot of skill in breaking stanzas. I like the break in the first one "Everyone asks" where you get the first hint that maybe S isn't so secure about her purse. I liked that the purse could be a stand-in for S's identity.

In the second one the structure of the stanzas are almost cinematic in the way they present the transformation, moving from scene to scene.

Well done, both of you.

[Midge]

Cool idea to do napo as a collaboration, and it seems to be paying off. Interesting to see the similarities in the most recent two -- the curious sexual/natal backdrop to the purse. I love the touch like that given to a pregnant woman's belly, and in the second that fast food / I am a rebel trope. Very nice!

[Hare]

I do like 'Glory Days' and especially appreciate the line break on 'cloister'.
And 'Unstalked' I like that.
And this

The boy has a knife that can slice
Through a body into a mattress spring.
He has a rope that can choke
the voice from a screaming child.

Actually, I like them all and need to return and read at leisure.

[W.G.McLeod]

Unstalked – ‘How fortunate she remembered those words by Heart’ - Snort, heehee.

Way Out There – ‘Mensa is a joke without you’ is beautifully sarcastic. Stanza four has got great enjambment, too.

You’re the one – Great ending image of the limp balloon.

April 7th - I wanted one of you to do something about a little kid not wanting hand-me-down shoes so bad. Still - Prayer of an Older Woman – ‘I'll follow my grandchildren up the tower and down the highest slide at the water park with glee and they'll praise You for a granting them a grandmother with moxie’ – Is sweet. And - Real Housewife of Common County – Stanza #2 and concept is great!

Let Me Count the Ways – ‘If I did I’d be a flat busted insomniac eating Cheerios every day’ - Nice! ‘each with a petal left to pull’ - What a gesture.

She’s never counted – Telling ending.

Purse Snatcher – ‘ask to touch it like they would a pregnant woman's belly’ – Snort, chuckle.

All Stitcked Up – I love morbid humor!

I'm having such fun reading these!

[vmh]

April 3 Prompt - What I was saying with that last kiss

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What I was saying with that last kiss

I watched Match Point this afternoon,
figured this had to end better for me
than it did for Scarlett Johansson.

I wanted to surprise you and have sex
on a Wednesday for a change.

I thought of you over the dishes this morning
and suddenly missed you
like a girlfriend, not a wife.

I've arrived at that peak in a woman's life
you men are told is out there, lurking.
It's true.

I trusted that you could take a hint;
the now-flat beer left on the counter testifies, Amen.

Take it as a warning: it won't be the last one like that.

Please, kiss me back the same way.
Please, don't let it be the last one.

* * * * *

After His Retirement

Before, my days were a soft rain of sound,
a sesame seed muffin, water and tea.

Now my days are fried potatoes,
a belch of beer, and a loud tv.

I softened my lips to his forehead
and said, I love you, still.

Then, I pushed my mouth to his
cheek and said, you’re the only man
I’ll ever know.

And what I was saying with that last kiss,
twist, clamp, and grip was,
get your ass up and off my couch.

It was hard to pick but this was my favourite set. I like the themes that are emerging from both of you. I don't bother guessing for these types of things, as I'm usually wildly wrong, or wrongly right. I'm just enjoying the playing back and forth between the poems, and both of you.

All sets of these poems are awesome character studies. Especially April 9 Prompt - Everyone loves my purse.

Really well done, and I'm with Robyn, that there will be a bunch of copy cats next year. Tremendous idea that you are both executing very nicely.

Vicky

[Claire]

What I was saying with that last kiss
...is a poem I wish I had written. You reach right into the kitchen where I wash my own dishes, that's great.

Both everyone loves my purse poems are vivid and expressive. The idea of purse as a comfort-blanket is astute.

[Donner]

Andrea, Robyn, proof, Midge, Hare, Wendy, and Vicky - You are all most kind and generous. Thanks so much, much appreciated. (I'd love to reply more specifically, but that would give away too much. So I won't. ) Robyn - we're both interested in seeing where this thread will go next, too - we're at the mercy of the other, every other day. HA! Vicky - This has been the most fun NaPo for me ever, so anyone who wants to copy-cat the idea has my blessing. Unless I patent it. Which is highly unlikely.

Thanks, again,
Donner

[Donner]

April 10 Prompt - Her wishes are the same as her prayers

* * * * *

One More

She runs every day and prays in time
to her cadence. She wonders some days if God hears her
plea over the padpadpad of sole
on the pavement. She's had a cadre of wishes

run through her life - that the world not end
before she was kissed,
before she fell in love,
before she got married,
before she bore children,
before she found out who she was.

On her last birthday, she blew out the candles
with a new wish, to cast off the hair shirt
she wears along with her running shorts
and shoes. Wishes are the same
as prayers, but birthdays only come once
a year, so she runs and runs and runs.

* * * * *

Terminal

It all goes to the sky. There’s hope
in things that rise. Stars are for wishes,
the heavens are for prayers. We keep promises
inside the moon.

That’s as full as the moon gets, I say,
and I’ve stored promises there for you.

I slept in the hall her first day of school,
dotted calamine on chicken pox. I was there
to tell her all boys don’t pull hair, to pick
out a prom dress, to adjust her cap and gown.

Days before her wedding day she prays
for more wishes, wishes for more time.
But her wishes are wasted
the same as her prayers. She raises her head
to the sky and sees no heavens, no stars, nothing
but a broken moon.

[Andrea345]

doh - you guys are hot

there's some good work in here

[Sorella]

Here I was thinking easy-peasy, I know Donna's style so well, and have an idea about Melanie -- but I am impressed with you both, and totally confused about who is who!
Unusual idea for a thread, this parallel universe collaboration. It has triggered new styles and subjects, dealt with in a flabbergasting ninja-way. Love the first and last, and middle one, will be back to read more, but the dentist calls.

Sorella

[Donner]

Thanks, Andrea and Sorella. It's been a very interesting (and relaxing) (and fun) NaPo for me.

* * * * *

April 11 Prompt - She was already wearing enough makeup

* * * * *

Comfort Zone

I'm trying not to stare,
but the bright blue shadow
covering lid to brow,
cheekbones startled pink
rather than merely blushed
and stop-sign red lips
are hard to ignore.
She's already wearing
enough makeup for 10 women,
but she's bent over,
studying her options
from the overfilled shelves.
We all know the type, the ones
who found that thing
that worked for them in high school,
so they wear their glory
days as letterman's jackets
into their 40's, 50's,
60's. In her case,
it's the security of Maybelline,
the familiarity of Cover Girl.
It must be confusing,
trying to find that just right shade
from the array of a new century.
I wonder if she never had
an older sister to pass on
her tricks or a husband
who told her how lovely she was
as nature painted her.

* * * * *

Life After Leaving Lake Wobegon

She wore sunglasses with a floppy hat
and was already wearing enough makeup
to not be recognized by paparazzi, or her
own kids – if she had any.

She stops at the bakery for loaves of wheat and rye,
shuns her face from bagel buyers;
she can’t be bothered with autographs now.
She stops at a fruit stand, then the deli next door,
threatens the owner with loss of her business
for not knowing what “the usual” is.

She returns home and waves
a royal hello to neighbors mowing,
walking dogs, cooking out.
Some wave back, some say hello.
But no one knows her name.

[romac1]

Hi Donna and Melanie! Good to read your poems again, as it's been a while. Especially enjoyed the petals from daisies and the wishes/prayers from the batch I read.