Our next installment of edited poems from last week’s poetry jam on Twitter is below. As I edited the contributions, it was fascinating to see the twists and turns, and how a word or a phrase could shift the whole flow. The shift, however, is gradual, mostly because of the time delays associated with the various applications we’re using to post.

I’m also learning that, even in a poetry jam, there is a narrative.

Poems from the House of Memory – 4

By @KathleenOverby, @doallas, @llbarkat, @mmerubies, @mdgoodyear, @TchrEric, @PoemsPrayers, @monicasharman, @mxings, and @togetherforgood; edited by @gyoung9751.

Window Shopping for Breakfast

Window shopping. Listening, leaning
toward cream and sugar, white
cream, catching light for the children in
the morning. They will have oatmeal and
milk and talk about toys and books
while I drink my coffee with cream.
I like lots of cinnamon on my
oatmeal and I like my milk whole and
ice cold from the fridge. I
hold a peach, kiss its cheek. Bring
the tin for peaches and smooth cream.
Peaches, cones find me alone,
soft, rough to the touch. My sons will
wake early and greet the day, ready
for whatever adventure awaits, and
I will be tired. Always, so tired.

Spectator

I am willing
to toil and escape being
just a spectator, in spite of
or because of
the lovely bits carried by a spectator.
They are buried so far down, that
you are having to dig, but digging is
sure to turn up treasure.
So often I am the spectator, even
from the middle of the action
I just watch brains churn words,
sun-struck, dazed with delight.
I only needed a longer
churning to make me smooth.
What makes a spectator
Grouchy when the sun asks
him to be otherwise?

Hollow Like a Tin Can

In the morning, hollow like
a tin can, I will close the day
before it begins, but get up as
moonlight sneaks one last
moment through the window,
shattering pain through panes.
How can this heart, restless and
Leaning, be ready to fly?

Now the tin is too hot, too long
in the sun, but still hollow, empty.
Hang me like a tin can from
low branches; knock me as you pass.
Hear what sound echoes from tin,
a tin heart for a tin man,
beggar of scarlet passing the
bucket for love.

Maybe His echoing laughter, waiting for
us when there shall be no
more tears,
beats to a sound we hear not.
I am scarecrow and tinman and
cowardly lion, but mostly I
am Dorothy searching for
my home.

News of a Baby

I hear the news
a baby is due. A baby makes smooth
edges to prickly pine cone.
She will give birth to all
womanhood, to the giggles
of a little girl that never will be mine.
I will need to remember
how to change a diaper.
I will worship at her tiny feet,
her baby belly laughs,
and let the life-stone ripples
sail through my body
and take away the regret.
Tonight, I slid into hot bath
water and thought about
babies and wombs and births that
will never be.
I took that chance from me.

This section of contributions from last Tuesday’s poetry jam on Twitter has been, by far, the most difficult to edit. It appears that there were three or four poems going on simultaneously, and some of the participants were using Twub, which had an unanticipated delay in the posts, so that contributions and response contributions were happening at different points. That problem (our first ever with the technology) really hit hard, beginning in this section. The next section to come looks like it has a similar problem.

This is why they pay the editor the big bucks.

Poems from the House of Memory – 3

By @KathleenOverby, @doallas, @llbarkat, @mmerubies, @mdgoodyear, @TchrEric, @PoemsPrayers, @monicasharman, @mxings, and @togetherforgood; edited by @gyoung9751.

Tin Cans We Took

Grandma saved the cans for us.
We carried them in bags to be remade,
bought candy with their nickels.
Tin cans we took, full
to the river, where nothing spilled, for
I protected every word.
Tin cans we tipped,
to let run our lives.
Now the tin cans
hold only memories
Your car became a tin can, that
somehow still protected you; as
you were pulled from it, you
were still alive.

I Like My Pie, With Cream Whipped

The farmer’s wife made pie,
sticks of saltless butter
folded in and baked.
I like my pie, with cream whipped,
whipped full of tender memories.
Real cream whipped,
a lovely thing unless you’re under
the whisk instead of holding it,
trembling, as fingers hesitant
to dip in cream.
I remember cream, real, whipped
for a restless heart.
I would be content with
coffee and pie, you and me and
a fluttering breeze.

Among Stones, Rebuilding

Among stones, we rebuild each time.
It is time to rebuild. You will rebuild
new, and you will rebuild better, than
you ever could before.
There will be dialogue in your room, where
before it was absent. You will speak again.
I know the words are coming from deep,
carried on a song, not stagnant but in
the disturbance made into another that is richer.
Measure its worth by your work.
Shop for meaning; sing words of disturbance.
Do my poems make you work? Fine, I like the
sweat beading on your upper lip.

Andi and Sherry: Family Relations

I could, perhaps, fall into this. It is the
letting go that doesn’t quite let go.
Did Grandma fight with Grandpa? Did
she cry on the times she let him
down? Did he even tell her why?
Oh, Andi-Girl, you are so beautiful
Already, and your wings are not
even strong enough to fly.
There you are, Andi, there you are,
right where you’ve always been, inside
your body, waiting for us, to catch up.
What a treat to sit back and watch the
show that God has sketched for us, the
blossoming of rose and thorns
in Sherry’s soul.

This is the second “installment” of poems from our poetry jam on Twitter last Tuesday. I decided to post this one by itself; it is definitely a standalone.

Poems from the House of Memory

By @KathleenOverby, @doallas, @llbarkat, @mmerubies, @mdgoodyear, @TchrEric, @PoemsPrayers, @monicasharman, @mxings, and @togetherforgood; edited by @gyoung9751.

A Walk to the Small Dairy

Once, we walked with tin cans
to the small dairy for milk.

Whisper lulls cream to
butter before it remembers,
cream sweeter than butter,
each morning’s delight.
Cream and butter,
fly with me.

The idea of using a
finger to skim cream from
fresh milk always seems
romantic. One thumb of
white stuff tells
me otherwise.

But from thumb it
falls on tongue
softly.
Someone else’s hard work
can taste bitter in
my mouth.

I have spoken too much,
taken too little time to churn;
find the sweet cream and leave
the rest behind.

Add cream to coffee and pour
me a mug. I promise to
stay awhile.
Churn me, turn
me to the light;
cast me like dice.

He wants to butter my bread and I want to eat
it warm fresh from the oven, but both of us fail to
rise, in the end.
Make of my words what you will; unchurned,
they have no meaning, sit tight in
the throat, melt like ice, cold words.

I will sit beside you;
we will churn words together,
drink coffee with sweet cream.
I drink my coffee
Black. Sit with me awhile.

Speak aloud your words
that I might know
how to place them in my life.
How to hold their meaning
in my heart? How to use them
to sing me back to you?

Seeing shore, and trees leaning inward.
You call me back. Churning?
My brain has been churning
all week long, trying to explain
where there is no explanation,
only my own fault, my own weak fault

To wander, or to turn? And sit with you.
My words, tonight, feel pushed forward,
unsure of themselves, unsteady on
their club feet. My words seem
small and futile beside yours, whey
drained off of your sweet butter.

Cast me before Jesus
and leave me there.
I want to stay with Him now,
curled into His embrace
yours forgotten,
leaning into his back unsure.

This past Tuesday, we had our regular (mostly regular) TweetSpeak poetry jam on Twitter. Ten poets participated, and for whatever reason, this one seemed to have flown quickly for the hour it existed. The prompts for the jam from @tspoetry were all taken from Love Poems from God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West, by Daniel Landinsky and others.

These are the first four of the edited poems; there are more to come.

Poems from the House of Memory

By @KathleenOverby, @doallas, @llbarkat, @mmerubies, @mdgoodyear, @TchrEric, @PoemsPrayers, @monicasharman, @mxings, and @togetherforgood; edited by @gyoung9751.

The House of Memory

The house of love calls.
I hear its sweet voice
calling me
from shadows into light
so fine
it stuns.

Your house
clings to the hill
of my memory,
calls me to beds
of iris, phlox
gardenia.
Gardenia flowers
leave behind a strong scent.
I stoop to smell where they once were
and find your fingers there.

Roses snag,
pulling me back,
not letting go.
Darkness creeps
as wisteria hides my face
from my Lover.
He lives in a place
I do not dwell.
I seek
His Word
to understand.

Butterflies

I want to write about butterflies
tonight,
the kind of butterflies
that struggle to break free
and will somehow make you see
that you are beautiful,
always will be
beautiful.

Weeping willow,
you are hiding the butterfly’s wings
but I know they are there,
and they are brightly colored
and strong.
And it won’t be long
now;
she’ll be spreading those filmy shades of sunshine,
and untangled from your branches,
she will fly,
wings unclipped;
she soars
above His house.

She will fly
higher than she ever soared before,
because now she knows what it is like
to hang cocooned in pain,
to shiver and have
no way of understanding the cold.
She will whisper and then shout
until He turns her ashes into beauty
as He promised that He would.
And she soars, spiraling over composite
shingle and wisp of chimney smoke
though the day is not winter enough for flame,
flame to melt ice glass.

Winter Rye Across Your Lawn

Winter rye grows tall enough to bend
in tiny arcs across your lawn.
Rye bends like a fish
leaping.
Bowing at your entrance,
I’ve been expecting you.
This small pebble in the water
makes ripples,
ripples. Curve within curve, flowing
away. To shore.

I want to save you. I
want to take your hand and
watch you dance,
bring the life to your face,
understand the vastness
and the rhythms of soaring
waves
shivered into pieces,
falling like rubies , each His tear.
I want to save you.
And I know I can’t.

Just jump in she says,
but my mind wanders, following…
She’s going to quit the violin. I
had hoped to hear her play
sad music
one day.

I Am Quiet, I Am Small

I am quiet,
I am small,
as ice cold water
flows over me.
Turn me to your
face, whisper
me red like
rubies;
moon light shine to hurt,
casting light where darkness lulls,
moon light
my heart seeks
yet my window be closed,
aches quiet and closed. And
aches ruby red and falling
like hard cut drops of blood
from a sky I do not recognize.
I dodge the bullets;
smoke rises from chimney into blue; ice
shivers into pieces
above; below
all changes.

I, crying blue sapphires and
laughing yellow lemons
while you shake your head,
concerned and lost
and never able
to understand.
At your house, the tv knows when
it has spoken too much.

I get it, though you think I don’t.
I do. I get it. And
getting it doesn’t help
me. Getting it only makes
it all hurt… worse.

We’ve now reached the finale of the poems created during last Tuesday’s poetry jam on Twitter. The jam produced some 24 poems in all, including the five below.

I’ve called this group “Poets at Home” for the first poem in the group, but actually they’re all about poetry. The fourth one, “Conversation in a Desert Caravan,” was inspired when our friend Bradley Moore, aka the Shrinking Camel, suddenly tweeted in the middle of the jam. We thought we he was joining us; actually, his tweet was one of those “auto-timed” things connected to a blog post. He sent a note later, proclaiming his innocence, but it was too late – the jam shifted and pursued the camel for a while. And we knew better: there’s a poet seeking to break free from the heart of the Shrinking Camel.

The five poems are “Poets at Home,” “Plumpness,” “What Poets’ Words Become,” “Conversation in the Desert Caravan,” and “Midwest Man.” I have no idea who the Midwest Man is, but the poets got carried away and he became the subject of the “end song.”

Poets at Home

By @lorrie58, @memoriaarts, @togetherforgood, @mmerubies, @llbarkat, @poemsandprayers, @doallas, @KathleenOverby, @TchrEric, and @lauraboggess, with a slight contribution from @gyoung9751. And dedicated to The Shrinking Camel.

Poets At Home

Saw the house,
thought of my family
in the house.
Felt like it could be
a home.

I am here
in my rented living room
with my orange-shirted husband
and the TV playing
in the background.

And I in black,
untying my sweater
to check the tag:
no wonder I am so
warm. It is cashmere!

Crime shows on TV,
where I learn about people who
almost got away with things
I cannot imagine
Horror.

Dog dances
Excitement;
thinks my husband’s
meal is made for
him. He spoils
all my meals
by eating while i read,
unable to separate
the filling of my belly
from the filling of my mind.

Until I think perhaps
even the basement cannot
protect me
from a word-tornado.
Tree knocked over,
sticks and branches
bloom again,
creating new hope.

Plumpness

What kind
of irony is that
to be shriveled
yet plump?
Plump again from
life giving water.

Starving invisible children
are shriveled with
swollen/bellies.
Plumped up lips
with words,
full-mouthed words,
or the brown
trace of cinnamon
on my lip,
shriveled raisins
plump.

Dark, smooth and rich,
too strong;
left me gasping,
lips shriveled in disgust,
plump with want of
something good.

What Poets’ Words Become

Poets’ words anchor
us in moments, become
memories, anchor us
yet cast us free
to drift among stardust,
Imagine God in cashmere.

I want to stop in the street
and write you poetry;
read my words while you
swerve your car
and hear me, who blows the
whistle to stop the occasion.

Words like cells
multiply, stepping on
scent, attracting the desert
creature with velvet green hands,
tendrils of spin,
creating birdhouses.

Poems recall
the place
the time
the occasion,
what we count for
meaning.

Please, take my words
Make me beautiful
by reading them.
Time be words
could stop us cold.

Conversation in the Desert Caravan

A camel lurks.
I climbed upon the
camel’s back, danced
upon the elephant, touched
noses with giraffe.

I went
into the night,
borrowed a camel
from my neighbor’s
dreams, sewed them into
lumpy words, from high
atop the camel’s back
where I might reach
for stars.

I would rush to your arms
but my camel was borrowed
and sewed into lumpy words.
Sorry. I will borrow
your words
light as lips,
brushing moonlight,
because you borrowed
my camel.

Refresh
like camel
with lumpy back.
Carries words,
this burden.
We’ll teach that camel
to lurk and dream
in crook
of moon
smiling down
toothy camel grin.

God laughed when He
made a giraffe.
Imagine how He
chuckled when He
made the platypus.

Mars, Venus,
giraffe, platypus, camel,
weeds, trees,
dresses, caresses,
all the stuff of poetry.
Circle of words
dance past
giraffe, tickle the calf
of hippo, camel
quiver.

Camel hair is rough
so clothe me instead
in rabbit fur
and sheep’s wool
and cashmere sweaters
you paid too much
money for.

Ruby woman, how did
you know I bought
cashmere, wore
it on a bitter Friday
night in New York City
but I paid/a fair price?

Can’t pay too much for
this circle of dancing words
of laughter and stardust and
afterglow.
The camel’s humps quiver in
a circle to
dance with words.

Midwest Man

Where went
the Midwest man,
spinning sentences? (He
is searching for poems who
lost their hashtags.)
Midwest man spinning
sentences of wheat
waits for new words
to rise to tongue.
Poets do sometimes make
hash of tags
when words get lost
in cyberspace.

Midwest Man is
copying and pasting like
a crazy person.
Midwest man
is purpled with
paste, crazy haste
bluing an innocent
Tuesday night.
Midwest man
becomes a whirling
dervish of words.
Cut, paste, copy;
poem passion flushes scarlet.

Midwest man
might open window,
let words out
onto his plains.
So many poems
in the making
must Midwest man devise
once words land
in his buckets.

Anticipation fills
the air as the words
spread and eaten
on toast
with poetry jam,
thick, red, sticky,
melting, sometimes
confusing jam.
No raspberries for this toast!

But always delicious
and good for
you! Another
hallelujah for
dumping the bucket,
dumping buckets
on the floor,
splashing in word puddles.

I fear that we have
this night
drowned him
with words red,
purple green
blue, deep
purple haze,
yes.

A poem becomes a
viral video.
Poetry goes viral;
it is catching,
contagious;
once bitten we bite. It
turn us
insideout
right side up
back to the beginning
before the end.

I think I’ve said last Tuesday’s poetry jam on Twitter was prolific. I was sandbagging. It was hugely prolific. Below are what I’ve collectively called the “Color Poems,” part 4 of the what is taking on the look of a small poetry volume. The poems include: “Colors,” “Color Has Clarity,” “Blue Flannel,” “A Mouth Empty,” “I Drop These Stones,” and “Planting Seeds.”

Five poems remain, and I will post them tomorrow.

Color Poems

By @lorrie58, @memoriaarts, @togetherforgood, @mmerubies, @llbarkat, @poemsandprayers, @doallas, @KathleenOverby, @TchrEric, and @lauraboggess, with a slight contribution from @gyoung9751.

Colors

I felt yellow
discomfort like a
wet bed in
the middle of
the night when
she said those things
to me.

Free words
from mind,
from heart;
collect them not in
schemes
of other poets
nor rhymes not your own.

Now I feel slightly
green anticipation,
fresh events,
when he, who grows
green with envy, purple
with rage, walks through
that door.

Broken phones,
communication
unsteady,
trashed pieces
of conversation.
She is caught, red
with poem passion.

Scarlet love knots not for
she; to be caught must feel
broken and lost. White with
loss of red from face turned
ashen by words unexpected;
cords of twisted pride
paint the landscape of her heart.

I never knew black and
white existed, not
till words flashed
green blue red,
mixed with
brown and gray, cells
pulled taut over bones.

Red face chiles burn holes
in heart and esophagus.
green chiles, green peppers,
green tomatoes, green onions,
green green salsa green,
pistachio green salutes boring
races ahead as art.

I think the angels are pink on
the inside of their robes.
Who has world enough and
time to give each word
a color? Paint the
whole lot petunia pink
and be done with it.

Color Has Clarity

Vermillion regret
because my frappucino
does not exist,
venti or otherwise.

Served real espresso to
snotty teen girls who
were used to gas station
cappuccinos. Laughed.

Color has a clarity
words may not.
Clarity is lost inside
dreams of the dayspring.

Blue Flannel

Petunia pink
does not suit
blue-flannelled man across
from me
who mocks my crimson
poetry lover.
Show me the way
to your heart. Is it
chilies? Is it words?

What does blue flannel
know of passion? It knows of
comfort and day-to-day/life.
Blue flannel
knows passion
when dimmed by candlelight.
My blue flannel is stripped away
revealing pink silk.
Be gentle/in the night.

Painting the roses red,
painting the roses red.
Turn the brush
upon myself;
I may just lose
my head.
Burn and be
done with;
it is a favorite verse.

A Mouth Empty

A mouth empty,
a mouth filled
with words
spilling into a well.
Years of words
add up
to stories
poems
novels
fiction
truth
questions
answers
more questions.
Shall I give you
the details of
a chili sliced
in two, bruised lightly
at one end,
seeded?

I Drop These Stones

I drop these
stones into your
hands.
I discard the stones,
then chase after them,
scattered by my thoughtless hands,
your heart there, broken.
I will take the stones,
put them in
a blue flannel pocket.
Count the days
and yet still lost,
whisper thin,
here and there,
questioning
staring at one white stone,
hoping.

Planting Seeds

Planting seeds makes tree-sized
futures promising, the
seeds from blossoms,
the seeds from sweet
sweet peas. I sow to please.
A garden sweet
she makes
of vegetables
bruised often to sprout,
of scents,
of all that’s new,

Or eggplant,
its purple coming on
with a touch of oil;
rose petals, dandelion green
violets crushed sweet.
Sweet garden,
edged in white stones,
plumped with beauty, spilling out light,
salvation. You don’t
bring me flowers
anymore.

We’re still posting poems from Tuesday’s poetry jam on Twitter. We have four more today: “Does God Wear Cashmere,” Rhythms as of Spring,” “Language Lesson” and “Coffee at Starbucks.”

When you’re in the throes of a poetry jam on Twitter, it’s hard to see how the entire flow of lines and phrases actually make sense. Some contributions are made in immediate response to others, and some are considered and chewed upon, and then the contributor poet hits “enter” or “update.”

But when you take all of the tweet contributions as a whole, and lay them out, you can see it. The flow isn’t like a slow meandering river, but more like river rapids, changing as some new thing happens or is uttered, rising, falling, eddying and crashing.

I’m posting these in small bites. You can savor small bites. There are still more to come, at least two and more likely three similar-sized posts.

Does God Wear Cashmere? 4 Poems

By @lorrie58, @memoriaarts, @togetherforgood, @mmerubies, @llbarkat, @poemsandprayers, @doallas, @KathleenOverby, @TchrEric, and @lauraboggess, with a slight contribution from @gyoung9751.

Does God Wear Cashmere?

I only own
cashmere socks
shrunk in the wash;
no sweater for me.
Does God
wear cashmere,
I wonder?
So soft against the neck,
pushing away the cold,
clinging
as words, too, cling,
too long.

Dancing Word turns upon
laughter and smiles in
a New York City
space,
soft fall thoughts like
cashmere. I knew about
the cashmere because
I brushed your
arm in the subway,
stopped and wished
you’d stop, to
embrace a lonely nothing.

He makes cashmere
to leave you wondering
how something so rich
can yet divide.
He needs no cashmere.
What could clothe
Him but glory?
My skin is cashmere
when he touches it,
never too cold, never
too hot, cashmere just right
like baby bear’s porridge.

Baby bear
will dance with the
stardust words
and the camel’s humps
in a just-right cashmere sweater.
Porridge and broken
rocking chairs
litter my childhood,
a strange mix of too big,
too small,
just right,
just me.

Life spins
and so do I,
wearing cashmere,
dancing with baby bear,
my Spanish too rusty.
Pay for stardust?
A collision with words.

Embers, waiting for
breath, warm me.

Rhythms as of Spring

Rhythms as of spring,
rites played out
under moon’s light
at dreams begun,
at words finding place in hearts
warmed.

Why is it a witch’s circle?
Why can’t I dance in
the moonlight?
Worship my God?
Bow to the feminine
He made inside of me?

Venus feeds on moondust,
Mars on word-spears
made to stay the heart.
The dizzy dance of
poetry is rising a
rhythm in my
heart.

We meet in rough collision
Still
eight years past when they
think we should have broken.
Instead we grasp hard
at one another.

And thrill to touch, and
set adrift on starlight
flowering words,
the most shimmering feast,
feeding with the bloomin
the warmth of day.

I do not shrink, any
longer, when you
touch me.
I came alive
some time ago. I dance closer to
you now.

Wordpool spins and twists
in wind from
whispered words,
sucking me down into
its poetry. I
purr to the stroke of affection.

Fingers edge,
lift my chin
and I shall see.

Language Lesson

Moi? Soft and yielding?
moi? No, you do not
know… me.
C’est le vie,
que sera,
come what may,
that’s life.

Oui,
si,
no,
non.
Will your words
be more than
yes and no?

Foreign places inside,
big like a venti,
a mix of French
Italian
Spanish
words of love
languages.

El gato
es muy gordo
on words he cannot
digest.

Digestion suffers
when speed eating,
speed reading
not taking time
for myself.
Help me learn to
digest more than the gray.

Coffee at Starbuck’s

I rolled my eyes at
Starbucks customers
trying to order nonexistent
drinks from my espresso bar
in Mississippi.
Porridge and coffee,
the kitchen sings.

Gracias,
mi amore,
and all that goes between
dwell thou between the
gray or shall you have
it black and white,
piping hot?

You cannot freeze
cappuccino,
so there is no
frappuccino,
just ice and coffee and milk,
like a shake
you gave a fancy name.

Starbucks:
the very word is poetry.
Perhaps we should just
end now.

Despacio, el gato:
these words
purr like steam
sneaking, rising
from a camel’s
morning Starbucks
Venti.

Grande
is a camel’s cup,
more or less.

From poems about poems (“Meta-Poems”), last Tuesday’s poetry jam on Twitter took a turn toward love poems. Boy did it take a turn! Below are three, which I’ve entitled “Borrow My Life,” “Life Frail,” and “The Words in the Heavens.”

And there are more to come. It was one prolific poetry jam.

Love Poems 3

By @lorrie58, @memoriaarts, @togetherforgood, @mmerubies, @llbarkat, @poemsandprayers, @doallas, @KathleenOverby, @TchrEric, and @lauraboggess, with a slight contribution from @gyoung9751.

Borrow My Life

Borrow my life;
crush it between
your rough fingers;
secret weight of crushing hand
pushes it into words.
Last night, I dreamed of
secret weights
held back just barely from
crushing,
kept just slightly from rushing
to your arms.

Thighs carry secrets,
support their weight
below the heart and stomach,
holding up desire
above their flesh.
Ecstasy and sorrow float
alone.

Desire to couple can
sometimes make one single,
make one solitary,
even in that moment
when two come together,
Revealing words collected in net,
singing love song,
smelling blossoms
pressed in pages,
seeing the shimmer in the wind,
feeling the ecstasy.

Sifted word-sand,
Shifting word-sand,
drifting on soft breeze whisper.
Whisper when you tell me
no, Lord. Please
whisper when you tell me
no.

Life, Frail

Life, frail,
twist turns leaf upon love
twixt black and white.
Life, frail,
tosses words out,
as from a mouth in anger.
Regret later
finds its home.

Free they flow,
when you
are near,
words harrumphed and
rocky make for
pitching dreams.
Lumpy regret twists
mouth into fragile leaf.

Words won’t heal him. They
don’t help him. I am powerless
beside him. She keeps right on
hurting him. Words hurt him, so
why, if words can hurt so
hard so bad so true,
why can’t they
save him too?

Give me your words.
Mine are finished.
I laid them all out
there for her to see and
she still left me. Her
stone-words
lie in my heart
as a weight unbearable.

The Words in the Heavens

Borrow a couple of
words, a single word, even
I will take it, frail
light as lips brushing
moonlight. Find words in
the face of the moon, on
tips of stars,
within the heavens deep.

Along the Milky Way,
words light up the sky,
bend toward Venus,
looking for Mars.
I do not feel
the burden of the words,
only the lightness
of their afterglow.

Whisper moonlight on
hard words,
lift lightly to
heal.
Venus, love,
Mars, war.
What words do they
share, so different?

Polished ruby red and cut
prettier than white diamond,
bloodier than who
you think I am.
Mars be the challenge;
Venus has words to spare
for love.
I feed them moondust.

Dip your words in
the well of Venus.
Lift them silver in the
dripping afterglow.
Thighs ache,
love rests.
The room is dark and
peace descends.

Perelandra sings as
Venus dips low,
collision of it all made flesh
Perelandra,
where God could start again
with a new Eve,
a day with no
mistakes.

Last Tuesday evening, 11 of us gathered for an hour on Twitter and created what is turning out to be the coolest poetry jam yet. The prompts from @tspoetry were all taken from Poem Crazy by Susan Wooldridge.

We had fewer interlopers and accidental contributors this time, except for a certain camel, whose autotimed blog post popped into the middle of everything and actually moved the poetry jam in a different direction. Such things happen. He’ll show up in a later poem.

Meta-Poems

By @lorrie58, @memoriaarts, @togetherforgood, @mmerubies, @llbarkat, @poemsandprayers, @doallas, @KathleenOverby, @TchrEric, and @lauraboggess, with a slight contribution from @gyoung9751.

1.
There’s a poem
in my dishwasher, somewhere
between soggy spaghetti,
olive oil, the spoils of day.
There’s a poem swishing
its way.

Under the couch
a poem is crouching,
trying to stick
its tongue to my heels
and lick its way to
my heart.
In weeds and dirty dishwater;
is this where my poetry begins?
Magnetic breath,
metallic grate,
words on plate
serve it up fresh.

The venerable dogwood
stood alone,
branches held out.
Weeds, noisy,
fought for ground beneath
the dogwood’s shade,
hauntingly dark,
outstretched limbs.

Noisy weeds,
they would steal away
the words that press my heart,
hiding under couches,
in tiniest places.

2.
Where do poems hide?
Dogwood sweet,
shaded near my feet,
reaching dark-limbed
to serve up day.
They also hide until
people die,
kicking at the dirt,
biting bottom lips

Words rise and grow
wheat from the tares
to fulfill prophecy
much needed.
A sea of weeds,
ready to be turned
by the wheels
or the heavy white van.
The doors open;
inside a hefty load
of small crabapple
and sassafras trees.
Alone in the shade,
tares hide,
hang out.

A poem held in hands
offers thanks
unspoken.
Poems hide
til people die:
does that mean
a poem’s life hangs
on death?
Where life is
in all places secret and revealed,
under branching tree or
above or within,
this is where the poetry begins

3.
At day’s break,
words surface,
fall as light rises,
caress sound,
each plant a poem,
Each poem a plant,
music pulsing with every
push upward
into the light.
Each poem a seed,
words
etched on stone
telling stories of loss
where souls dwell.
Writing opens seeds.

Turn and see
the seeds,
the weeds, the tree,
the dishwater,
the van full of boxes,
the stone with words etched
deep.

Poems, too, rise
with new life,
a mother’s song,
a father’s heart.
Secret freedom begins
Inside.
A poem’s life hangs
on death
of self to awareness of
other;
turn and see ghost words
drifting through vapor
at day’s break
and night’s gentle fall.
The words are here,
there,
never bound by two dark covers.

4.
There’s a poem in my closet
somewhere between the
jeans I wear most often
and the skirts I plan to wear
when I buy them and imagine
the swish swish swish
against my legs.
Swish, swish,
a poem wishes itself
past legs, up thighs,
rising to ecstasy.
There are poems in my house,
under blankets,
behind chairs
on the plates I use for dinner
and the clothes my husband wears

What does a poem
need to come to birth—
a bit of earth, a fallen seed,
ghosts of lilies,
vapored night,
extinguishing a dying
light;
vapor stories
disappearing with
a breath.
Dark opens into words,
filling space,
holding refrains
held long,
seeking release,
shade tree
respite from
words of sorrow.

5.
The blossom pressed
between pages
of white;
vapor stories
now and again caught on
white paper.
Magnolia sweetly held
as memory,
finding its way
into song.
She plucked flowers from
my heart. I did not
know that they
were there.

Open dark covers:
aroma of poetry pours forth
song and scent and vapor;
words of sorrow split loss from
remembrance
as rosemary
scents
some mornings.
I am mist. I hang.
You may float and
fly and dream. But, I
hang, hover, wander.
I stay alone, a
song as blossom.

6.
Dream catcher,
what dost your net
reveal?
That a love song
be reaching forward
into the past.
The words rise
and shimmer in
the wind.

Our poetry jams on Twitter are supposed to last for an hour, and they do, but all of us tend to linger for a while, talking, chatting, congratulating each other, make the odd comment here or poking fun there. That lingering lasted for some 20 minutes last Tuesday night, and it struck me that we had another kind of poetry jam going on.

So I collected all of the comments from afterwards, along with a few others that happened earlier from some of those innocent bystanders who wandered in and left dazed. The results are the five poems below. And yes, I had fun with these.

5 Poems in Conversation

By @doallas, @llbarkat, @MonicaSharman, @memoriaarts, @TchrEric, @katdish, @redclaydiaries, @poemsandprayers, @lauraboggess, @kathleenoverby, @mdgoodyear, @gyoung9751, @BridgetChumbley, @sarammsalter, @mxings, @nitewrit, @mmerubies, @jamesrls, @togetherforgood, @lorrie58 and @moondustwriter, and a little #smooch of editing by @gyoung9751.

A Conversation Poem (1)

This is wild stuff here,
folks. Anyone else feel
breathless just
reading it?
I’m hungry too!!
Coming back for the
smooches! Good night to
all.

Whoa, that moved fast.
Lots of fun too!
Is there an easier way of
tracking who is talking on #tsp?
Tweet newbie here.
I’m using tweetgrid. Only
way to keep up, and
I use the term loosely.
For what it’s
worth, I use
Tweetdeck and
create a column for
#tsp . Click on the
hashtag; all will
be revealed (even
the corset talk).

Editor does gather up the
threads and sew
them all together (and
quite fashionably).
Good night you all…well done!

Once again it’s Tuesday
evening, I’m working &
catch a glimpse of your
game. Longing to join
but only able to sigh
& watch. Peace.
One of these days
you might get a word in;
glad you were here.

Oh sure, I’m still
thinking over that
last one… so
slow, so slow;
good thing it’s
not a dance. Standing
ovation here; amazed at
the quick brains. Clap.
Clap. Clap.

Seriously? Drop the link over
at Seedlings and we’ll add
it to the next RAP.
A slow goodnight, and thanks to all.
Big bunches of #smooches to
all of you. What a
#smoochfest! Ciao!
 

A Conversation Poem (2)

Yeah, I think I’ll go
back to Tweetdeck. Web
confused me mightly! My
#tsp tag/search doesn’t show
everybody- like couldn’t see @katdish.
But could tell there
were more people
talking than I
could “see.”
We will have to figure that out.

If you all go to
@tspoetry, you can
see who we follow. Follow
everyone and it will
make the party
easier to “see.”
Thanks for a
nice evening. Have a
restful night of
poetic dreams.

Glad I’m not the
only one! Fish out of
water, indeed. But
total blast. I will
be forever fascinated with
turn of phrase and
word. I need to
check and see who I
need to be following.
I did an add column on
Tweetdeck then
entered #tsp. Pretty
much real time.
Did M. Goodyear stick
around? It’s half his
“fault” I’m here.
Yeah, where did that
boy go?
Liked take-off on
Goodnight, Moon.

That was a wild ride.
My cheeks are stretch-marked
from laughing.
Thanks so much for
moderating another
great event.
I second that.

Oh boy. Big
work for Midwestern
Man, whoa!
That is one hunk of words.

A Conversation Poem (3)

I think if I
kept a tab open to
@tspoetry on Twitter,
and the #tsp tag
open on HootSuite, that
would work for me.

Got a long phone
call in the middle of
everything. Better luck
next time!
Good night all.
Tme to go rest up so
I can deal with
the cherubs in
the a.m.
Good nite, teach.

Making Bad Choices

Watch American Idol or
do poetry jam? I think #idol
wins. #tsp folks, I’ll
be in the audience.

Pppbbbtttt!
And again I say pbbbtttt!
Sounds like a Sunday
School song.
Had to go back and
re-read what I wrote;
again I say rejoice!
And get thee in here!

The Tangled Nonsense Part

Can I use that
line sometime? The
tangled nonsense part? That’s
AWESOME!
I was about to tell
you how proud I was of
you for attempting this. Then
I saw that tweet & all
went out the window!

A rose by any
other name, is still
a rose. Besides, I can’t
help myself. TWSS.
We do get dramatic, no?

Husband
glared at silver fish,
wishing them back
to places she refused
to send them.

“Red clay”? When did
you arrive in GA?

I’ve now got you
and @sarahmsalter in
the poem.
What did I say?!
If by “no” you
mean “yes,” then “no.”

Silver fish do send up a
@katdish.
Gaaaa!
(Gaaaa! is a registered
trademark by
@katdish.)

Okay, well the
tangled part wasn’t
mine, just the
nonsense. Go figure.
Well, it’s not like
anyone is ‘watching’
or anything… #pressure.
I was amazed when
they actually
incorporated my
nonsense into the poem.
(Got that line, too.)
THAT is the joy of
words and language!
Our nonsense is
someone else’s poetry;
there you have it!
(Well, that didn’t hurt,
too much!)

We may call this
#tsp “Red Clay and
Breadcrumbs in a Katdish.”
For red clay?
Oops,
maybe I should go pick
up my daughter from
dance practice.
#Twitterdistractedme (Smirk).

I’ve got tears streaming
down and
my family thinks I’ve
gone straight over
the edge with all y’all.
That was a great line!

That, my sweet @doallas
is a secret
but you knew
didn’t you, even
as you asked.
Those words come
not from me;
poems and prayers
eve would prefer.

Well, I think I’ve
done enough damage
here. Gotta go
write a guest post intro.
Bid a fair evening
Thanks for your words.
Tis the end. Sigh.

Moondustwriter: you guys
did #tsp without a
little moon dust. I’m
broken hearted.