Feeling Like a Bit of Satire

Don't ask. Just have a good laugh at yourself today. 

At the Aquarium

by Max Eastman

Serene the silver fishes glide,

Stern-lipped, and pale, and wonder-eyed!

As through the aged deeps of ocean,

They glide with wan and wavy motion!

They have no pathway where they go,

They flow like water to and fro.

They watch with never-winking eyes

They watch with staring, cold surprise,

The level people in the air,

The people peering, peering there;

Who also wander to and fro,

And know not why or where they go,

Yet have a wonder in their eyes,

Sometimes a pale and cold surprise. 

Enjoy the Poetry Friday Roundup with Renee at No Water River.

It's Friday!

Oh, dear. I completely forgot it was Friday. Yep. It's been that kind of week.

So I'm scraping up a few lines from a poem I've been working on this week. I'm still tweaking, but I could be tweaking from now to the next time I sail to Antarctica.

Right.

Stop by Life on the Deckle Edge where Robyn is hosting the Roundup.

Sinking Ship

Decks heave

timbers scream

bolts break

steel buckles 

hold fills 

planks splinter 

She quivers in pain, 

retches, jerks, 

gasps like a dying beast. 

Those who love her 

curse the ice,

stand nearby and grieve.

© Doraine Bennett, 2015

2015 Progressive Poem

Welcome to my favorite National Poetry Month activity, dreamed up and monitored by the lovely Irene Latham! 

I love the progressive poem, the way each day a new poet wrestles a line from his or her interior journey, fixes a string of words onto the last, and waits to see how thoughts so simple, so individual, transform the whole, while at the same time are transformed themselves by this living, breathing poem.

This little mermaid slipping through bayou is just too safe and tranquil for me, so let's infuse a little intrigue! Maybe she'll wish for a net. I'm handing this off to Renée at No Water River to see what happens next. 

She lives without a net, walking along the alluvium of the delta.
Shoes swing over her shoulder, on her bare feet stick jeweled flecks of dark mica.

Hands faster than fish swing at the ends of bare brown arms. Her hair flows,
snows in wild wind as she digs in the indigo varnished handbag,

pulls out her grandmother’s oval cuffed bracelet,
strokes the turquoise stones, and steps through the curved doorway.

Tripping on her tail she slips hair first down the slide… splash!
She glides past glossy water hyacinth to shimmer with a school of shad,

listens to the ibises roosting in the trees of the cypress swamp–
an echo of Grandmother’s words, still fresh in her windswept memory.

Born from the oyster, expect the pearl.
Reach for the rainbow reflection on the smallest dewdrop.

The surface glistens, a shadow slips above her head, a paddle dips

Follow the progress below:


1 Jone at Check it Out

2 Joy at Poetry for Kids Joy

3 Heidi at My Juicy Little Universe

4 Laura at Writing the World for Kids

5 Charles at Poetry Time Blog

6 Ramona at Pleasures from the Page

7 Catherine at Catherine Johnson

8 Irene at Live Your Poem

9 Mary Lee at Poetrepository

10 Michelle at Today’s Little Ditty

11 Kim at Flukeprints

12 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche

13 Doraine at DoriReads

14 Renee at No Water River

15 Robyn at Life on the Deckle Edge

16 Ruth at There is No Such Thing as a Godforsaken Town

17 Buffy at Buffy’s Blog

18 Sheila at Sheila Renfro

19 Linda at Teacher Dance

20 Penny at A Penny and her Jots

21 Tara at A Teaching Life

22 Pat at Writer on a Horse

23 Tamera at The Writer’s Whimsy

24 Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect

25 Tabatha at The Opposite of indifference

26 Brian at Walk the Walk

27 Jan at Bookseedstudio

28 Amy at The Poem Farm

29 Donna at Mainely Write

30 Matt at Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme

Birthday Acrostic

Yes, it's Poetry Friday. (Visit Laura Purdie Salas for the Roundup.)

Yes, National Poetry Month.

But more importantly it's my grandson Joseph's birthday. 

You can see my read-aloud choices. Both such fun books to read. I'm always wishing my grands weren't half a country away, but my voice travels far.

My acrostic for Joseph at six.

Jiggle and wiggle, be jolly and jump

Over the fence and the ditch and the stump

Seeking a serious somewhere to sit

Even though everyone else does not fit.

Please take the path that will bring you back home.

Help me to see where your feet like to roam.

National Poetry Month

Whew!

I am playing catch up once again after a wonderful spring break mini vacation, time with my son and his wife, and a lovely Easter.

Here is the link to Jama Rattigan's extraordinary list of all the cool, exciting, poetic opportunities going on this month in the Kidlitosphere.

I will be working on poetry all month, but it will be quietly in my own little corner of the world. The stupendous Renee LaTuillipe set up a partner system among some of her Lyrical Language Lab graduates simply for accountability. As usual I was late to the party, but somehow lucked out and got Renee as my partner. So yeah, you can bet that's going to keep me writing.

I will also be contributing to Irene Latham's progressive poem. It's such fun to watch this poem develop as each poet adds a new line each day. You can follow along below.

And I'll check in occasionally, just because it's April!

1 Jone at Check it Out

2 Joy at Poetry for Kids Joy

3 Heidi at My Juicy Little Universe

4 Laura at Writing the World for Kids

5 Charles at Poetry Time Blog

6 Ramona at Pleasures from the Page

7 Catherine at Catherine Johnson

8 Irene at Live Your Poem

9 Mary Lee at Poetrepository

10 Michelle at Today’s Little Ditty

11 Kim at Flukeprints

12 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche

13 Doraine at DoriReads

14 Renee at No Water River

15 Robyn at Life on the Deckle Edge

16 Ruth at There is No Such Thing as a Godforsaken Town

17 Buffy at Buffy’s Blog

18 Sheila at Sheila Renfro

19 Linda at Teacher Dance

20 Penny at A Penny and her Jots

21 Tara at A Teaching Life

22 Pat at Writer on a Horse

23 Tamera at The Writer’s Whimsy

24 Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect

25 Tabatha at The Opposite of indifference

26 Brian at Walk the Walk

27 Jan at Bookseedstudio

28 Amy at The Poem Farm

29 Donna at Mainely Write

30 Matt at Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme