#496: The Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers and all…

Now that, in the tall tale tradition, I have elevated Beyoncé in poem #495 to goddess and creator status, I thought I would try to do something a bit more serious with the subject. It’s fascinating to me, but not surprising I suppose, that an image, the same image, seen in two different contexts, canContinue reading “#496: The Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers and all…”

#495: Beyoncé created the universe…

Beyoncé created the universe and it was good, I tell you, it was good.On the seventh day, She rested, of course,but sensing that something was still amiss,She invented The Beatles, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was the eighth day, and there was musicof every kind and there were no lanesand no bullshit about who could doContinue reading “#495: Beyoncé created the universe…”

#492: I learn I’ve earned a top fan badge for God…

I learn I’ve earned a top fan badge for God, the news reaches my notificationsand it makes me laugh on a couple fronts, the first of which is the genius here: to be the first person to have the gutsto make a Facebook profile page for Godwho’s antithetical to “churchiness,” antagonistic toward all dogma,calling outContinue reading “#492: I learn I’ve earned a top fan badge for God…”

#491: Some days you just don’t want to write . . .

I Some days you just don’t want to write. You get up and you try to meditate,but something is wrong with your dog and sheis harassing you non-stop while you sitand you find yourself angry, cursing inbetween deep breaths in and out. And the promptfor today is uninspiring, the list of brainstorms you made for sonnets runsContinue reading “#491: Some days you just don’t want to write . . .”

#490: Sonnet with a Stolen Last Line from Shakespeare that is not a Sonnet about Shakespeare, FYI

When reading sonnets by another poet, I think to myself, mine aren’t very good. And I try to dial in the source of that doubtby pointing at the things I like in his, the things that make his poems better. He’s not rhyming, his lines, most all five beats;I’m not doing or doing these sameContinue reading “#490: Sonnet with a Stolen Last Line from Shakespeare that is not a Sonnet about Shakespeare, FYI”

#488: My son at eighteen years becomes a fan . . .

I’m having a really hard time with the idea that the 8th of April might be the first day on which I don’t complete the composition of two poems, one of which must be a sonnet. I could let myself off the hook, I suppose, because yesterday I posted a 28 line sonnet, or, rather,Continue reading “#488: My son at eighteen years becomes a fan . . .”

#486: I wouldn’t call myself insomniac . . .

Here’s the seventh sonnet on the seventh day, a full week of two poems a day for a month. Right about now, the 20 days ahead is looking to me like a long haul. Today’s sonnet includes some extra-credit, bonus material. Sometimes 14 lines is not enough. So how about a twenty-eight line sonnet? Or,Continue reading “#486: I wouldn’t call myself insomniac . . .”

#484: Kevin was obsessive, compulsively so . . .

Kevin was obsessive, compulsively soand would sometimes anger when things didn’t gothe way he liked, would bite with sarcasm, poke at his wife, but this was his worst. Even though he’d say that when he metmy sister, he was a drugged-up mess, from the beginning none of us saw this. What we saw was aContinue reading “#484: Kevin was obsessive, compulsively so . . .”

#482: Shakespeare tried to immortalize his love . . .

Shakespeare tried to immortalize his lovein sonnets, in perfect iambic linesand in masterful metaphor, enjambed rhymes.What lives on is the poem, not the person. But it’s better than nothing, I suppose,and everyone who dies should have a poemcomposed in their memory, 14 lines,a poem that preserves something of a soul, that argues that the worldContinue reading “#482: Shakespeare tried to immortalize his love . . .”

#480: My brother-in-law died from his cancer . . .

My brother-in-law died from his cancerat home on February twenty-fifth.I hadn’t seen him since October lastwhen he still had some hair and could carryon with conversation as if he was not really sick. Even then, though, he hadconfined himself to the sofa; he could physically do little else and welikely knew that it would neverContinue reading “#480: My brother-in-law died from his cancer . . .”