Angela's Third Time's a Charm Thread

[Angela]

Thank you, Donner and Dunc! Love that you stopped by!

Singing my ABC's now. (I know I haven't the voice for it.)

7) Freak

Anchor break. Calculate.
Decide effect. Flog.
Genuflect. Hunger intensified.
Joyous. Knot lover. Mastur-
bation negation. Oath. Please!
Quantify. Relish sensation. Taste.
Unleash vulnerability. Want.
X= Yield: Zenith.

[Angela]

8) Butter Mold

Cherry wood, etched
with a lilac sprig, sanctified
by pure spring water-
seasoned with decades
of sweet cream, timothy grass
and simpler ways.

[GreaterMandalaofUselessness]

Hey Angela,

Hoarder with Crewel Intentions Great pun in the title. I read this as written by a stoner embroiderer, talking up her next project, which may or may not happen. Nicely done.

Steampunk feast - love the knife catching the taste buds and triggering hunger and the geared tongue missing a cog enjoyed the overall mechanical trope: pistons, gears, steel fingers. Steampunk indeed.

Solvency I read this as a mother no longer able to comfort her adult son as she could when he was a child. Even though he still engages in child-like pursuits (video games, and fantasy cards) he's supporting himself, more or less.

After we fight Love the way you work the metaphor in the last stanza.

as I pluck and crumble
filigreed wings
from stinging things
thought long dead.

Freak took a couple of reads, but then it worked for me. Zenith brings the poem to a much needed climax.


Keep em coming.

Matt

[Dunc]

Angela

Freak - Great way to do an Alphabet, and your bag of Things is full of curiosities. Particularly admire the way you handled x. y, z.

Butter Mold - By golly, I haven't seen a butter mold in decades. Poem beautifully decorated to celebrate one.

Good readin'!

Regards / Dunc

[Angela]

Thank you for your thoughts and comments, Matt and Dunc! I will get to fluffing you guys. You are on my list. Work has kept me busy and so drained at the end of my days. I spent this whole day off trying to catch up. Needless to say, I am drained from writing! You all know how it is.

9) Butter Mold 2

Cherry wood, etched
with the likeness
of an ivy sprig
caught meandering
over a rock ledge
in a stone walled garden.
Baptized by spring water—

seasoned with sweet cream,
timothy grass
and slanted rays.

[Angela]

Damn cat poem:

10) Maui Wowie

When I was seventeen, I landed this cherry
babysitting gig— two kids old enough
to fend for themselves. They had snacks
and a pool and cable tv! They also had a cat
named Maui that sat and flicked his tail
to the tick-tock of a creepy cuckoo clock—
I should have paid heed— someone should have
said something to me— but the lady of the house and I
shook on the spot. My very first day

dawned hot and steamy, my thoughts
on water and a new bikini that would drive the guys
crazy all season. The girls were oblivious
in front of the tube, so I headed to the kitchen
to scrounge for food— I didn't know that Maui
was a tiny hunter in a calico coat! He sprung
with a hiss and a rumble deep in his throat
and sunk twenty claws and two fangs
into my sun-kissed thigh! The kids just blinked
and munched their Crunch when I went screaming by.
I found out later he was a poly dactyl demon— no help
knowing he was a genetic mutant. I couldn't shake him.

So please don't ask me to love your shady beast—

I still can't shake Maui, now.

[Angela]

11) Ten Minutes Spent on The Voodoo Sanitarium Tour

That guy there? Oh, he is old school
and has the best room— he thinks
he has chicken feet. His splayed toes
tap a funky beat on the wide plank
floor. Just look at that
doll with the twined-up hair— she don't care

for poultry meat. She has gnarly nails—
painted red like cut flesh— she knows
strips teased back leave stripes— she grins
when you grimace, so pay no mind
when she gnashes at her orange
julius-smeared straw. She's funny— sometimes

she cradles a dead baby, except her baby
is in another wing— her baby
shrieks on the hour, he's like a goddamn
cuckoo clock. I mean
you could set your watch by it. We won't
make it over there—

you gotta have access to a special set of keys
to get through that particular door.

[Angela]

Grilled sourdough with blackberry jam is one of my favorite things! Have I eaten today?! Hmmm. Better get on that.

12) Grilled Sourdough

The knife, when it came,
was a reprieve from glowing coals—
cool jam spread with deliberation.

[Dunc]

Angela

Butter Mold 2 - Hm, reminds me of something I read about Butter Molds recently ... still, a lovely evocation, not least S2.

Maui Wowie - A winning title for a pestiferous feline, indeed. Somewhere between a coming-of-age story and Ambush at Dry Gulch.

Ten Minutes - Another fine title. And correspondingly weird.

Grilled Sourdough - You've convinced me! Your poem's delicious.

Regards / Dunc

[avalanche]

Loved that first one about the odd finds in the charity store. And Solvency, very nicely drawn.
Maui was a special minion, I think maybe a familiar ? Heeehee...

Av

[Stagyrite]

Hullo, angela,

some nice shorter poems here, the 2 butter mold poems speak to the way objects from the past can draw us in and even slow us down. The word "deliberation", in 'Sourdough', was just right in so many ways. Voodoo sanitarium tour was colourful but also disturbing, with a strong tension between the breezy N and the things she describes.

keep pushing on!

[PClem]

Hoarder cracked me up and nicely balanced two competing refrains.
Trainwreck - nice allegory for a relationship
Buttermold - is a lovely poem. I prefer the first, the simplicity and spare but effective images fit the subject.
Ten Minutes - astute observations for what is an overwhelming and disorienting experience.

[Donner]

Hi, Angela,

"Maui Wowie" reminds me of those stories you read of people calling 911 because their cat is holding them hostage. Usually it's the kids that cause the trauma. The poor girl isn't warned by the mother about the cat and the clue that the kids are old enough to care for themselves says she's more than glad she has work to escape to. (Reminds me of one of my few babysitting ventures. We watched a horror film of the kids selection - and with the parents' approval! - and then after I'd sent them to bed, I sat there, alone, late at night, waiting for the parents to come back.)

I've visited a mental hospital before. That will help clarify any doubts you might have about being "normal". I've also accidentally locked myself in the "memory care" unit of a nursing home while delivering flowers, so the last two lines resonated with me. The title says it all.

Donner

[Angela]

Thank you, Dunc, Avalanche, Stagyrite, PClem and Donner. You guys are awesome for reading and commenting. I will be around to read your work. This has been a rough napo. No time for writing let alone fluffing. Gaaa!

13) On Why Cleaning Before Bed is a Joke

Someone said take 20 minutes to clean
out my head before bed, so I think:

I like the way stir-fried kale
gives between my teeth,
it has the perfect bite that satisfies
and keeps me from grinding my molars
at night. Which reminds me to search out

the neighbor's porch light shining
through that minute slice between the slats
that always makes me squinch
my eyes shut tight and count the breaths
of the man lying solid and sure beside me.


My belly twinges as the too-familiar red warmth spreads
between my thighs— I clench my teeth to hush a moan
against impending changes. My nipples don't care,
they still want to be suckled- I pinch them
and imagine my hands filling

with lead pellets. I want to scream
bloody murder. Civil war has been on my mind
since the election. I wonder about the people in my life
leaning left. I wonder if I keep leaning right—

Will we miss each other?

Will we miss each other?

Will
we
miss
each
other?

Blink.

[Angela]

14) Butchering the Blues

I cup my hands around air,
there's no weight there. I remember

my dad butchering the blues—
Pabst at his side, Camel burning—
I would watch the smoke curl
and not worry over signals
as he mangled lyrics and laughed.
See, there were intervals

between mad rushes. Did I tell you
they called him Crazy Mike? His hands
were rough and I don't really remember
him working— but, he'd dance with me—

He's dead now and that's not the point—
it's some silly snippet of a song
that keeps bothering me. Something
crooning, something wondering—

What ya gonna do now
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxya sweet little thing?