Probably just the wind
Have you ever seen the cat
Pawing at something under the door
Out of the corner of your eye
Death-blackened fingers withdraw
Back into the closed room
And you think to yourself,
…nah
Category Archives: Poetry
Bloomin’ Onion
AKA onion blossoms. They’re always at state fairs and greasy steakhouses. Do people outside the States eat these? It’s one of those things that’s just so bad for you, but worth it. Like everything at the state fair, all of which is deep-fried. Cowdog Creatives and I were joking about writing a poem about onion blossoms, now it’s reality.
greasy witch hands reach upward
pointed fingers of batter
inside are pale, limp worm bones
lost vegetable, battered and fried into crustacean
oil pooled in pockets
golden anemone
god of saturated fats
I think there’s an onion in here somewhere
pick a piece like a flower
light, empty crisp
loose guts slip out
How are we going to finish this and then
a sodden cold napkin and dark brown leavings
which even we couldn’t face
throw it away, wipe our fingers
and pretend it didn’t happen
but evidence remains
in our fingers, breath, stomach gurgles
Inside
Do you hear it?
Please say you do too
Scratching, scuttling, nervous sounds
Like a small animal
Whose heart flutters at 200 beats per minute
Whose teeth must ever
Chew
Chew
Chew
It skitters in the walls
Tiny nails abrading wood
But worse
The tiny teeth!
Nibbling the bones of the home
The rafters
The foundation
Scratching the insulation
Gnawing, nesting, breaking down, carrying on
Now you know how crazy people feel
Hearing rats in the walls
It’s a sound which can shatter your sanity
What if you could never escape?
Those constant little scritches
The sound, the feel of damage
That intense high strung entity
So busy inside
Your ceiling and walls
What if you could never escape?
I couldn’t write anything good last night because cats. So here are some silly 3/5/3 haikus I was playing around with.
Birthday cake
Candle porcupine
We love you.
Gorilla
Can’t fit into pants
Man or beast?
Dog flaps ears
Animals do talk
We are deaf
Hostess frowns
Looks askance at me
I farted.
Haibun – Winter Maneuver
Winter attempts an advance against fall. To one side of the road, a cold snowscape of white-laced grass, two-tone evergreens, ancient gnarled branches softly pillowed with marshmallow, a study in black and white. To the other, fresh grass scattered with the discards of the glowy orange maple, the radiant yellow fingers of the gumball tree, the startling neon red of the burning bushes. Winter is gaining ground against the bounteous color, blotting out the many-hued lawns with pure white primer, heaping icing on the trees’ heads. The trees, still warm and flexible, shake the wet snow from their glorious manes, spattering sidewalk and pedestrian alike with gobs of slush. Dripping sounds off from all sides, in full stereo. Splat. Splat-splat. It was not the sky, but the trees which rained.
Ever she dances
Nature’s unconscious graces
Embrace all conflict
Sarah D. Silvey 