Treading the edge of the void

Have missed a lot of plans this week. I missed Rose Drew's Wednesday reading, missed Conflencia, Hudson Valley Writers open mic, and finally Shijin/SubQ. This has been a tough week. I am stressed and weary. Mom is home from the hospital this afternoon, after a fall when she was out visiting friends on Wednesday afternoon. It's been a week a very little sleep.

It seems we have lost a lot of folks lately and I am painfully aware of the fleeting nature of our lives. This makes me want to persist even in my current misery and make videos and write poems and paint paintings every day, even when I am living quietly and small, cheap and close to home. Who knows how many days we may have.

April 18 Poem - Home care

the prompt is to write a poem about an interaction

Home care

One woman bends
straps the blood pressure cuff
on the other who rolls her eyes
tries to relax

One woman dabs gauze
sprays wound wash
the other wonders
if the next fall will be her last

She's had this thought six times before
or more, the other listens, concludes
the blood pressue is still too high

Doc will tweak the meds,
but no answers today
They both smile.

--Mistryel Walker

April 17 Poem - "All I Want is _________"

The prompt is the title

"All I Want is _________"

All I want in this moment
fits easily there:
One second
then another
Breathe in - Dasein - Breath out

-- Mistryel Walker

April 16 Poem - Grey

The prompt - write a poem with a color as the title.

Grey,

by pigment: an amalgam of compliments
like lovers drawn to the qualities they lack
which in the end, they cannot bear.
First black: when painting with light
it's drawn with absence; In pigment,
with an absorption of all light,
Add White? In light it's too much
of a good thing, everything all at once.
In pigment white loves too much
is all reflection, gives everything away.

-- Mistryel Walker

April 14 Poem - Phooey on Pollen

write a poem on love, then an anti love poem:\

Phooey on pollen

1
Fickle bees approach
broach the hidden ledge of
nectar's privileged vault.
They buzz but never linger
though they find no fault.

2
But Venus fly trap's
always splayed
dew-drenched, friendly, baited
and hence the greater irony
that visitors are eaten, never mated

--Mistryel Walker

Christian right's odd position on Illegal Immigrants

A while ago, a relative who is a member of a "born-again" type church was talking to me about the "rightness" of arresting and deporting illegal immigrants. She quoted her pastor on the matter. As "de-converted" former believer, who is essentially an atheist, (though perhaps more of an naturalist), I thought this was an extremely odd position for an evangelical to take. The following is adapted from a letter I wrote to her.

Dear .....

I have been pondering how fundamentalism could have joined the bourgeoisie. I was under the impression that if you are an evangelical christian, your task is to spread "the gospel" the supposed good news so that "souls" can be saved. I heard you are "fishers of men" not "fishers of law abiding citizens and men with green cards."

According to the gospels Jesus had lunch with outcasts. Do you think that today he might be visiting the homes of illegals who are as reviled as the tax collectors, harlots and lepers of his time?

The gospels don't mention a single instance where Jesus hailed a Roman soldier or one of the High Priests and asked that a harlot get the punishment the law required. Nor did he ever ask that a homeless leper be escorted to the city limits. "Go and sin no more," isn't the same statement as Romans! Police! deport this criminal! Read your "holy" book, and think about the way a god who supposedly loves all humans and wants to "save" them would want you to behave towards the precious and possibly "unsaved" souls you want to deport.

Just a thought from your friendly local atheist

=========================================

April 13 Poem - The Palette

write a poem that incorporates a hobby

The Palette

Alizarin Crimson - a blush
Burnt umber lush garden earth
ochre fields of wheat
sienna in her sweet hair,
grey sky of mourning or
ultramarine in a starless night
Phthalo green, earth-marble sheen
cerulian blue sky-bright, the cadnimum sun,
the cadnium brothers are clean but loud
need to be heard, undiluted orange,
red and yellow burley fellows, raging
raging against this stretched white expanse..
Titanium laughs.
Ivory Black revels in its contradiction....

--Mistryel Walker