M Christine Delea's Blog, page 27

A Drink with Something In It by Ogden Nash

A Drink with Something In It

by Ogden Nash

There is something about a Martini,

A tingle remarkably pleasant;

A yellow, a mellow Martini;

I wish I had one at present.

There is something about a Martini,

Ere the dining and dancing begin,

And to tell you the truth,

It is not the vermouth--

I think that perhaps it's the gin.

Enough by Suzanne Buffam

Enough

by Suzanne Buffam

(from her 2010 book, The Irrationalist, published by Canarium Book)

I am wearing dark glasses inside the house

To match my dark mood.

I have left all the sugar out of the pie.

My rage is a kind of domestic rage.

I learned it from my mother

Who learned it from her mother before her

And so on.

Surely the Greeks had a word for this.

Now surely the Germans do.

The more words a person knows

To describe her private sufferings

The more distantly she can perceive t...

Obey the Aubade: Creative Prompt

I have been very interested in aubades lately--both reading and writing them. I think what is drawing me to them is all of the possibilities for me as a poet, and all of the interesting things I see others doing in their aubades.

Traditionally, an aubade is a love poem taking place at dawn; even more traditionally, those lovers are saying good-bye . The speaker may be happy at having had the night together, sad that morning has come and they must part, or both. The poems are generally spoken to...

Aubade with Ravens by Jessica Lynn Suchon

Aubade with Ravens

by Jessica Lynn Suchon

(published in Pinch, Fall 2019)

When you sleep, the moon plucks hurt from my palm

like a loose thread, unravels

skin and leaves a skeleton of iron in your bed. I dream silver-

veined marble basins filled

with cream. I dream the ravens that bathe there, the scream

...

Across Wyoming by Kari Despain

Across Wyoming

by Kari Despain

(published in Rockvale Review, November 2019)

driving for dawn, a wind storm shakingthe November landscape until it throbsfor color. Our bones achefor home. My children whisper from the back seathave you ever seen a person die? I don’t tell themabout their father who isright then, secretly drug-sick and huddledagainst the passenger door like a childhides from a giant. I tell themabout the Vegas airport when I was young—the oldestof them a fresh verve...

In the News: Prompt

For your inspiration this week, take a headline from the news--don't read the article (unless you really, really want to) and use the headline as your title.

Go from there, in any direction you like!

Here are some old headlines, if you would rather not use any from our current time.

Have fun! And feel free to add a Halloween-ish vibe to your piece!

Fish Have Feelings, Too

Space Pioneer Ready to Fly

His Weapon Sucks

Hospital’s Mystery Piano Man

Pistons Pound Pacers

Do Lobsters Feel Pain?

Gre...

Scars by Truing Tran

Scars

by Truing Tran

(published in North Dakota Quarterly, Summer 1993)

My father’s body is a map,

a record of his journey.

He carries a bullet

lodged in his left thigh.

There is a hollow where it entered,

a protruding bump where it sleeps.

The doctors say it will never awaken.

It is the one souvenir he insists on keeping

from a past still holding us prisoners.

Mother has her own opinions.

Bô cūa con ‘diên—Your father is crazy.

As a child,

I wanted a scar just like my father’s

bold and ap...

Tired Sex by Chana Bloch

Tired Sex

by Chana Bloch

(published inThe Atlantic, December 1997)

Trying to strike a match in a matchbook

that has lain all winter under the woodpile:

damp sulfur

on sodden cardboard.

I catch myself yawning. Through the window

I watch that sparrow the cat

keeps batting around.

Like turning the pages of a book the teacher assigned—

You ought to read it, she said.

It’s great literature.

Quietly Moving: Creative Prompt

Today's blog poem, A.E. Stringer's "Sunday Morning, Cumberland Gap" conjures up both movement (through space and through time) and stillness/quiet at the same time.

I have driven the Cumberland Gap many times, in all kinds of weather, and when things were silent (late on a week night) to very noisy (traffic on a summer Saturday stopped for road work). I have traveled over it before there was a nice road with a viewpoint/rest area--I like driving over it much more now!

Even though the poem do...

Sunday Morning, Cumberland Gap by A.E. Stringer

Sunday Morning, Cumberland Gap by A.E. Stringer published in Still, Summer 2015

Black cat appears under my roadside picnic table. The Frame Shop is closed, flags swaying. I walked here from the next town through an old railroad tunnel, two-step echo. Raw rock walls overlook the valley, as they have since before the westward road. Glaring quiet, no one leaves the church; perhaps no one went in. A forties-era pickup sits behind a white BMW. Passerby asks if anythin...