Most mornings Donald stops by my high school classroom before school starts. He sits on the opposite side of my desk and we talk house music, longboards, even Steve Jobs.
As far as I know, Donald hasn’t written down any poems of his own yet, but I’ve already heard the voice of poet stir during our conversations.
Recently I surprised him with an Every Day Poems subscription. Now when he drops by, we have something new to share. We drop lines from our inbox-delivered poems, checking to see if the other recognizes them. We continue to play with the images and weave them into conversations.
It’s fun. Because we share.
Tweetspeak’s May Play
Last week, we invited our readers to play with found poems, using words or phrases from Pamela Miller’s “Marilyn Monroe at the Gates of Heaven.” A found poem happens when you choose words or phrases from a text and then stretch them out into a new poem.
Some of you posted your found poems in the comment section of last week’s post.
Linda McCrae Tame wrote,
Cuddle me up and hide me
In the secret place,
Our trysting place.
In the midst of noise
And chaos all around,
You quiet me;
My heart is open.
Louise Koutavas stopped by to play, too.
If you want sprinkles
on your head, there is always
room for one more, here.
And some of you tweeted your poems using the #mayplay hashtag. Here’s a sampling …
@vnesdoly: Lord, here I come/tired and wet/Cuddle me long/ballgown me white
@llbarkat: Cuddle me in white mink/I’ll pop out of a barrel for you,/smooth fur smiling
@HaikuHughes: I fill the bathtub./ “No tap-dancing up the stairs!”/ Sugar, she’s just four.
Creative word play is good for the soul. This month, whenever you have a spare moment, grab a word (or more) from our Monday poem and stretch it out into your own poem.
Here’s how it works …
If you haven’t already, please consider subscribing to Every Day Poems.
1. On Mondays, the Every Day Poem in your inbox becomes Play-Doh. Pinch off a word. Or more. Mix in your words and colors. Until yours.
2. Tweet your poems to us. Add a #mayplay hashtag so we can find it and maybe share it with the world.
3. Or leave your found poem here in the comment box for each week’s May Play post.
We’ll read your tweets and share some of your weekly play each week. At the end of the month, we’ll choose a winning poem and ask the playful poet to record his or her poem to be featured in one of our upcoming Top 10 Poetic Picks.
Here’s today’s Every Day Poem.
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BONUS: Winner Takes the Chocolate
If you have a short story about why you love Every Day Poems, leave it in the comment box here or post it to your blog and leave us the link.
We’ll enter your name in a drawing for some gourmet chocolate.
Now go play.
Photo by .craig. Creative Commons, via Flickr. Post by Matthew Kreider.
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Well, if someone else’s delight is a motivator, my own delight for chocolate is a strong, strong motivator.
!! !! 
!
I notice in the #2 of the #mayplay instructions, it says “poems” (not “poem”). Which I interpret to mean… no upper limits. (I already tweeted two.)
No upper limits. Of course! Tweet away, Monica.
And I’m wishing *I* could win the chocolate. Maybe I’ll write incognito. Maybe Lyla can give me a Skitch disguise and no one will notice.
OK, you got me. It’s up on Twitter.
Just say “chocolate,” and she’ll move faster than a speeding bullet.
Here’s my link:
http://monicasharman.wordpress.com/2012/05/07/every-day-poems-like-a-poem-ography/
Oh, boy, here goes:
Poured
The chardonnay didn’t work;
the Chablis and the seyval dripped
and pooled too thin
so I touched the reds, the merlots
and cabernets which I almost
didn’t buy but did anyway
pouring at my neck, staining
the fur, the silken lining
of my silken coat, my silken skin.
Soaking the white thread
from my cuff in the last droplets,
I pulled the thread
through my front teeth, flossing
in vino cavitas.
I like the taste of cabernet.
Before Sunday
The needle ran
between silken hands,
the skin, so scarlet
near the neck.
I felt the thread
hug the secret place
between almost
and didn’t.
Monica: I love your enthusiasm — as well as your superhuman agility!
Glynn and Maueen — Oh, I feel your threads turn and burn red. Thanks so much for twisting these words and playing with us!
the magnolia is antique
or is it ancient
like crossing your fingers
it doesn’t matter
in this place
this farm
where the needle
is lost in the haystack
and the secrets
are buried beneath the skin
leaving hands hungry
to touch the truth
in the growing storm
Sunday alone…
holding you,
resting my cheek upon your velvet skin…
drawing your aroma in
mesmerized
I close my eyes
and escape…
to the hidden place,
and wonder who
will nurture you?
as crimson dusk turns dark then into dawn,
I waken to
the morning dew…
still holding you!
Indomitable
by: Toby McCrae
short sharp shock
the needle drops
sound spins
shiny black vinyl
play on
stretch it
tar covers hairline cracks
don’t stop don’t stop
Oh, God
Play on
Fingers go where eyes have gone
Touching, nudging threads.
Stretching threads convey the cover
Rued within our heads.
Tea Time
Some say it’s a genetic thing.
When those patriots
dumped that tea
in Boston Harbor,
they rearranged
the nucleotides
in our tea-making
chromosomes.
The American Revolution
was only a minor consequence.
The loss of ability to make a good cup of tea
was forever imprinted.
We were doomed
to the frenetic pace
of our pounding blood.
Tables grey in the mind
yellow Formica on chrome legs,
milk splashed from soggy
Cheerios in a green Fiesta bowl
curling laminate, faux mahogany
six matching chairs.
giblet gravy staining
red Victorian seats
dry cracked oak, rehabbed
from creamed enamel
workroom to kitchen
residual paint embedded
in crevassed legs
Meals and memories, whispery specters
dine in an out of my cerebral folds
as I sit alone toying with the corners
of my burned cheese toast
Rosanne, I love that tea poem!
To Be
Duck the egg, leave the shell
to its nested niche,
break out of the birthright
that defines expectations.
Leap beyond the liminal space
dare the boundaries
of heritage,
the stagnation of thought.
Walk the slender moon’s curve
test the deep space of infinity
and know
what is beyond.
Deferred
Aphids crawl through mounds
of aubergines, searching
for the succulent stems
the purple globes have abandoned.
Alien workers, they are disenfranchised
from the crops they have tended,
the world they have known,
the dignity of purposeful life.
Their insect brains barely
process their loss, cannot see
an alternative existence.
Slowly, they abandon their dreams.
Testing the Cream
Baskets of butterflies filter my thoughts–
Papilionoidea and Hesperioidea.
I search family history
father
mother
Where is the pattern
that forms my wings
the scales covering my eyes?
Butter stolen centuries ago
split, spread
Lepidoptera leaving their larvae behind.
Recherché
The speckled notebook
covered with dust
rested on his abandoned desk.
Its dappled shield
protected the soft tissue
of doubt within the bones
of despair.
His fingers closed
over the aggie, the flecked
projectile that named
him champion of boys,
their heads bent
over a circle in the sand,
marbles the spoils
of the victor’s control.
The mottled fountain pen
his father had used to write
prescriptions with the certainty
of the consummate healer mocked
his brindle indecision.
The notebook had served
his purpose. the aggie its time,
but now stippled life
defied the easy answer
the sharp crack
of marble on marble.
Opacity required a certain
black dominance,