NaPM April 12, 2017
#1
Rules: Write a poem for national poetry month on the topic or form described. Each poem should appear as a separate reply to this thread. The goal is to, at the end of the month have written 30 poems for National Poetry Month. 


Topic 12: Write a poem inspired by a fairytale, fable, or parable.
Form : any
Line requirements: 8 lines or more

Questions?
The secret of poetry is cruelty.--Jon Anderson
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#2



                                        [Image: rosetattoo.jpg]



                                                                 < faery tale >


                                                you say visions are overrated
                                                you have them every night
                                                and at least once
                                                each day
                                                usually at school
                                                (when they serve the tuna noodle casserole)
                                               
                                                of course
                                                i have only you to trust
                                                not the wisest thing
                                                cause in your family
                                                you either lie
                                                or end up on the floor with bruises
                                                but you always call them
                                                rose tattoos
                                               
                                                                                        - - -
                                               

                                                                                                                a brightly colored fungus that grows in bark inclusions
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#3
Paul 4-12 V. 1-3
 
1. Consider the Grizzly:
 
He’s a Teddy in spring—
popping dandelions like candy,
carefree,
giddy.
 
2. You would’nt visit him in fall;
 
it’s close upon bedtime
and the salmon are served.
 
He’ll take the skin and eggs and brains.
 
3. You are a Black Bear
and will wait downriver
for the flesh that remains .
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#4
Beatrice


Beatrice was a bright girl but she had
a mouth on her like a longshoreman.
Not everyone likes being mocked, in fact
very few do. Her boyfriend didn’t.

Broken-hearted Beatrice! She asked
her fairy godmother for help. Her FGM
snipped off the end of Beatrice’s tongue.

After much ado it stopped bleeding.
She can’t speak clearly, so now she won’t
say a word. Her boyfriend came back.

They got married.
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#5
    Maybe a Dog

Maybe a dog in the distance
between the trees
squatting under a crescent moon
shitting out his entrails
before trotting away.
By the time I tell this again
it will be a wolf and a full moon–
a howling, growling timber wolf
with paws the size of buckler shields
carried by the foot soldiers of King Harold.  
The savaging of Granny before the beast-lunge
toward the girl, and the flash of my sword.
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#6
^ Killer. I'm really liking your work. Thumbsup
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#7
Disgusting lesions cover
every inch of skin.  Lepers
are the worst.  Jesus reveals
himself, to embrace the peel-
ing derelict in the street.
Contagion's risky, scary,
but Francis kisses his cheek.
'Preach everywhere; use words if necessary.'
Peanut butter honey banana sandwiches
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#8
Rough Day in Jericho (The Morning After)


At Jericho a stranger left the inn
at which he’d placed a wounded man within
to heal, whom he had found upon the road;
behind, he drew his donkey with its load.
Upon a corner stood a priest who cried,
“Last night I saw a wounded man beside
the road to Zion!  Danger lurks nearby!”
“I saw him, too!” a Levite shouted, “Why
do we allow vile Kuthim to exist
and rob us, like that one?” He shook his fist
toward the stranger who indeed was dressed
unlike men where he’d stayed a silent guest.
All shrieked, “Samaritan!”  They beat him down
then ran him and his poor ass out of town.

Kuthim was a (more) insulting term for "Samaritan."

Luke 10:25-37
feedback award Non-practicing atheist
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#9
Peter Pan Breaks up with Tinker Bell

You wanna hear a fairy tail?

Sparkle dust poofs out jingling like bells every time it twitches.
It's enough to drive any boy crazy.

I chased that tail for years
and never got older.

But that doesn't mean I never wished for the gift of a finished life.
My shadow never would do me in, always too afraid when I asked.

I will never, never return to that land.
She can keep the tree house.
Thanks to this Forum
feedback award
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#10
A good pub
has a name
like a fable.
Paired animals
and mad royals
learning lessons.
I'll find a moral
for every empty
glass on this table.
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#11
(04-13-2017, 04:26 AM)CRNDLSM Wrote:  Disgusting lesions cover
every inch of skin.  Lepers
are the worst.  Jesus reveals
himself, to embrace the peel-
ing derelict in the street.
Contagion's risky, scary,
but Francis kisses his cheek.
'Preach everywhere; use words if necessary.'

Greatest beauty in worst ugliness.  And not at all preachy, the words.
feedback award Non-practicing atheist
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#12
@ Tiger the Lion: Thumbsup
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#13
The Proposal

Of many bells, this bell tinkled most bright.
When faced with it, your face, you saw, was mad.
The fiend, so voted they, you’d bell that night.
Of many bells, this bell tinkled most bright.
Her whiskers, tickled, twitched. Your heart, in fright,
quick pattered, jiggled that in hand you had:
of many bells, this bell tinkled most bright,
and faced with it, your face, you saw, was mad.
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#14
Erithacus rubecula

A baby born to carry cries,
wrapped in hay.
A mother too weak,
asks all beasts to feed
the fire, keep him warm.

Her feeble words crackle
over the failing flames
and the stable grows dimmer
as the beasts sleep on.

The simple brown plumage
of a brave tiny bird,
flutters in onto an oak beam
singing to the mother.

All night the bird fanned
heat on to the baby
ferocious in its task
exhausted it fell.

Hot embers burnt its breast
a vest of bright red  
blessed in the morning light
the saviour of our child.

If your undies fer you've been smoking through em, don't peg em out
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#15
Paul Comes out of the Closet


Out here in Greece
words do not matter
to the gods -- there is no blasphemy
to those who treat names
as names, not meanings.

This imperial heart --
to think, when I was a child,
I hoped that being the son
of a Roman father would free me
from being a Jew.

I remember, on the road to Damascus,
the final solution
came to me in a vision -- after death
comes resurrection, and out here
across the sea, we're all mere subjects.

Though I've been doing the prompts sequentially, I think I take them too roughly for my later pieces to actually fit -- at least with the prompts of the day. April 11 would probably better fit today, today better fit April 5, and April 5 April 11. Oh well.
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#16
Lilliputian

Tease,
call me
scavenger.

So I had to
steal, beg, and bribe:

Steeple keepers,
captains, fishermen,
merchants, ferrymen,
nagsmen, magicians,

those noose men

whose squareknots, overhands,
bowlines & sheetbends
are now loosed,
stretched into
straight lengths;

Tangled nets
forever unwoven,
pulled & driven,

prayers,
asking integrity's strength.
there's always a better reason to love
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#17
Only the Living Tell

Witches have big noses
and bigger appetites.
One of them opened
her mouth
like a dark cave
at the end of a trail
of cookies 
waiting for a child to wander in.
She was going to spit him
into an oven, at least
that’s what his sister told me,
through her cake-stuffed mouth.
Witches are dangerous.
I heard one of them
made a deal with a soldier,
paid him gold to bring
her a tinder box.
They like their fire
but they don’t like burning
at least that’s what the stories say.
The secret of poetry is cruelty.--Jon Anderson
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#18
Jinni

The Jinni asks: how do you want to die?
It's the gift of choice, of knowledge,
release from the building suspense.

Do you want to die quick like a flash
of dynamite, an asteroid impact?
Do you want your body to remain
intact, maybe heart attack or gas?

Do you want the fame you didn't have
in life, a breathtaking death,
one for the record books
and a million re-tweets?

Do you want your death to dress
your story in white,
bookends of goodness, covering
your life like a sheet?
Maybe you'd like to save
a Hybrid full of disabled babies
from a Humvee full of pedophiles
with twisted, pointed mustaches
and center-parted, bowl-cut hair
slicked with trans-fatty fry grease.

The Jinni is an ifrit –
it can make things happen.

Some people choose to simply
fall asleep;
they take a breath,
then exhale.


Most fall into silence, hoping
that the Jinni is the one who decides
whether dying must always result in death.
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#19
@Lizzie
Lovely
billy wrote:welcome to the site. make it your own, wear it like a well loved slipper and wear it out. ella pleads:please click forum titles for posting guidelines, important threads. New poet? Try Poetic DevicesandWard's Tips

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#20
@ Lizzie- Love this and the whole piece

Do you want your death to dress
your story in white,
bookends of goodness, covering
your life like a sheet?

If your undies fer you've been smoking through em, don't peg em out
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