NaPM April 17, 2018

[Todd]

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 17: Write a poem inspired by things we discard.
Form: any
Line requirements: 8 lines or more


Questions?

[Richard]

Garbage

I wish you could discard me,
ball up our past, throw it in a can-
the metal might ring from impact,
but once silence takes over,
alone with thoughts the size of our brains,
we'll realize the truth:
"till death do us part," belongs with half read anniversary cards
that rest at the bottom of dumpsters,
surrounded by maggots, who'll one day
sprout wings and fly away like angels to heaven.

[Knot]

Disposable


Deep well, cold water,
life drunk by the bucketful.
A dead girl, raped, four.

Green forests climbing
mountains, snow carpeted sky.
A dead girl, raped, eight.

Old school, classrooms wait,
the hunger for hungry minds.
A dead girl, raped, eight.

Brick built promises,
walls to raise generations.
Dead girl, raped, seven.

.

[RiverNotch]

The Beginning of History


I promise you we'll make America great again.
Who's we? and why do I even care about America,
oceans and oceans away. I got my own problems.

Yeah, you got your own problems,
lil bitch, like them drugs
or how you handle them. You shoot them up
all gangsta, if gangsta had an academy,
a badge, and a hatred of all things
non-bougie. But you're non-bougie
too. You're a piece of Americana
and whatever that means to everyone else,
with your turn-of-the-century, dog-eat-dog
mentality. If you really had your own problems,
you wouldn't have tuned in to Trump,
to us, who see you only as a dumpster
for our niggers' unloved pups.

[Wjames]

Memories

Mama’s ash tray is still collecting dust
with the books on her nightstand
in a two dollar storage locker
that smells like my childhood.

I don’t remember what happened
to Papa's belts after his funeral,
but for the one he wore
to his grave.

[dukealien]

Teaching Things


Song, video, and story celebrate
forgotten toys, small tragedies of fluff
and clockwork, tearless doll-eyes’ closet fate
to stare unmoved when kids have loved enough.

But what of those purveyed as education,
that taught to type, manipulate and phone?
Toy barns inspired a bygone farming nation;
doll houses built desire and set its tone.

And plastic models, scaled, from first inept
attempt, glue-fingered, matching tab with slot—
their fate is seldom to be fondly kept:
boys throw their worst away, then some are shot.

Toys teach possession first, then to accept
its loss — retaining memories and skill
at loving, managing, which may be kept...
and neat doll homes to furnish and to fill.

[Keith]

Waste water

The duty phone vibrated
off my bedside table,
rubbing one eye, I sat on the edge of the bed.
"Hello"
"Hi is that Keith? There's been a large oil spill and we think it's got into the river"
"Shit, close the main discharge valve, I'll be there in an hour"
"Where's the main discharge valve"
"I'll be there in half an hour"

I squinted at the coloured lights on the phone, 3:00am.
The unwanted night air had a silence that amplified my movements
and the car clocks seemed brighter as I turned over the ignition.
I imagined driving into an apocalypse on empty roads.

Work was quiet only a small crew were there at night,
no wonder they call it the graveyard shift.
I took the shift manager to the middle of a huge concrete loading bay
and pointed at the inspection hatch.
" They don't pay me enough to go down there at night",
he said, passing me the torch.

We used two Tee bar keys to lift the manhole
and I began my decent into the abyss.
As I gripped the rusty steel ladder the torchlight
swung around, all I could hear was rushing water.

I reached the bottom, standing in water I moved the light around the chamber.
One of our largest boreholes had burst, washing away all the ground under the slab
A vast pool of spring water was running through the main valve down to the river.
I closed the valve, staying in the chamber to see how quickly the level would rise.

It was then I noticed a flash of silver in the water, then another and another,
thousands of tiny fish had swam towards the light. I couldn't believe it,
I took out my phone to take a picture and shouted back up to the top,
" you'll never guess what's down here?"
As I spoke something very large and very dark scattered the minows.

I can honestly say I don't remember climbing the ladder.

[Richard]

Memories

Mama’s ash tray is still collecting dust
with the books on her nightstand
in a two dollar storage locker
that smells like my childhood.

I don’t remember what happened
to Papa's belts after his funeral,
but for the one he wore
to his grave.

I quite like this Wjames. It says a lot in just eight lines. Nice work

[Tiger the Lion]

Nocturnal

thanks for thinking us cute
when God painted our faces
like bandits

thanks for hacking the trees
and paving the earth
and giving us city hands 
to do soft city things

thanks for always breaking
your back to serve up supper
for all and sundry

thanks for the cookie factory
a block north of the river
and how it spits steam 
enough to warm two acres 
of bush beyond it's fence
where we can gorge
on discarded dough

thanks for the chicken mills
and concentrated camps of cattle
that can't help but spill
meat

thanks for little Jill
who's never going to finish
her brussel sprouts 
before the truck comes
Wednesday morning

thanks for letting Billy drop out
and discard his futon
and the shear bliss of it's goose down

thanks for never being quite awake
at this hour

[just mercedes]

Early birds


Ornithologists
charting the health of sparrows
in urban parks
noted differences to rural data
in hatchling survival rates,
attributed to fewer
lice infestations.

The city birds wove
cigarette butts with their
nicotine burden
a noted pesticide
into the walls of their nests.

[dukealien]

Early birds


Ornithologists
charting the health of sparrows
in urban parks
noted differences to rural data
in hatchling survival rates,
attributed to fewer
lice infestations.

The city birds wove
cigarette butts with their
nicotine burden
a noted pesticide
into the walls of their nests.

Beautiful (and apt)!  One is moved to wonder if the starling explosion from Central Park in the late 19th century had aught to do with the prevalence of cigar butts in that time and place.  Though it's said they might have had to compete with (human) foragers seeking raw material for the lesser brands of stogie.

[just mercedes]

Thanks D.A - indeed, our discards can have unforeseen consequences on other life. This is written in an attept to banish the image of a sea turtle killed by the plastic packaging from beer cans.

[Todd]

Extinct
 
rush of the current
bell inflates beneath water
tone struck in silence

Once thought to be safe, the Grocery Bag Jellyfish found it's way to the endangered species list. Ironically, replacing its greatest enemy, the leatherback sea turtle, who had consumed the jellyfish in great quantity, and had recently been deemed extinct. Scientists expressed alarm at the risk to an animal with no current predators.

[Leanne]

Labels

Sometimes -- when I think of it -- I check
labels to make sure of biodegradability. I 
don't want to burden the earth more
than I must, but I don't always remember. 
I confess, it is this carelessness
that led to investing in a product 
entirely unsuitable for consumption.

I believed in redemption, but the 
package I once had wasn't worth 
recycling.  I left it behind and, like the hermit,
borrowed another that I soon outgrew. 

They would not decompose, and so, 
in deference to the demands
of the earth, I decay instead.

[Tiger the Lion]

Coffee Girl

handsome 
more than a girl
ought to be handsome

your face
part snarl
part smirk
part yawn

you want out
and look at my car

you should come by
for tequila and poetry
if daddy says it's okay

what a thing to say

I think you could live 
with about thirty-six
so I say thirty-five
and fix my face