His waking coiffure
shaped by pillows and static
a cockatoo's crest
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Glutton eyes binge on
Glutton eyes binge on
imaginary fillips,
avid to jostle
a brain grown weary trying
to stem their unthinking bloat
imaginary fillips,
avid to jostle
a brain grown weary trying
to stem their unthinking bloat
Friday, October 30, 2009
Carnival's Valor
Two amorously leaning props,
they duel to woo her,
a far-glowing mistress,
with their neon spins
and flash-bulb reels
that burn untempered torches
against the black-lit night.
The first flings his golden lines,
tracing over-stated claims
to crowned velocities.
The next, more simply,
rolls a sapphire eye
in an unblinking hope
of whirled persuasion.
All the while above,
their cratered princess,
attracted to much more
subtly fired revolutions,
looks down in yellowed yawns,
unimpressed at their boasting
a carnival's valor.
— Francis Scudellari
This poem is written in response to Read Write Prompt #98: Whee! at Read Write Poem. The challenge was to use a photo prompt (click the link to see the image), which I interpreted in my usual strange way.
they duel to woo her,
a far-glowing mistress,
with their neon spins
and flash-bulb reels
that burn untempered torches
against the black-lit night.
The first flings his golden lines,
tracing over-stated claims
to crowned velocities.
The next, more simply,
rolls a sapphire eye
in an unblinking hope
of whirled persuasion.
All the while above,
their cratered princess,
attracted to much more
subtly fired revolutions,
looks down in yellowed yawns,
unimpressed at their boasting
a carnival's valor.
— Francis Scudellari
This poem is written in response to Read Write Prompt #98: Whee! at Read Write Poem. The challenge was to use a photo prompt (click the link to see the image), which I interpreted in my usual strange way.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
My sign of the times
My sign of the times
teetered slowly down the sidewalk
a discounted pizza box
balanced precariously
on her head
teetered slowly down the sidewalk
a discounted pizza box
balanced precariously
on her head
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
I changed my part
I changed my part
from right to left
not to better my look,
but to skip over
this rut
from right to left
not to better my look,
but to skip over
this rut
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Homunculus
Plump-fully fleshed, it sits
to me not unlike
a cloth of sacked potatoes,
though it's so pinkly dripped
and more misshaped
in its stranger bulgings.
This would-be man's clubby arms
and double-stubbly legs
tacked onto a drooping goop
that he eyelessly affords to
flap and flop around,
as a foundling seeking
its comfort's sorting out.
His sweet-meat rolls,
and summery salted stumbles
lead him to the final fall;
a downward folly
lacking its expected thud.
— Francis Scudellari
This poem is another one inspired by a dream. It was, needless to say, a strange and disturbing one, and I've softened it up quite a bit here.
to me not unlike
a cloth of sacked potatoes,
though it's so pinkly dripped
and more misshaped
in its stranger bulgings.
This would-be man's clubby arms
and double-stubbly legs
tacked onto a drooping goop
that he eyelessly affords to
flap and flop around,
as a foundling seeking
its comfort's sorting out.
His sweet-meat rolls,
and summery salted stumbles
lead him to the final fall;
a downward folly
lacking its expected thud.
— Francis Scudellari
This poem is another one inspired by a dream. It was, needless to say, a strange and disturbing one, and I've softened it up quite a bit here.
Monday, October 26, 2009
My choices fall
My choices fall
in do's small
drops,
each splashed no-doubt
kicking out
dust
to carve a did.
Then crooked
rills
of when converge,
timely surge
back
to push my why.
Blue-tossed I
lifts
up on white-capped
and oft-happed
am;
was carried down,
struggling drowns.
My
now, cleansed by here,
is no mere
chance.
in do's small
drops,
each splashed no-doubt
kicking out
dust
to carve a did.
Then crooked
rills
of when converge,
timely surge
back
to push my why.
Blue-tossed I
lifts
up on white-capped
and oft-happed
am;
was carried down,
struggling drowns.
My
now, cleansed by here,
is no mere
chance.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Pulling its blade from stilled flesh
Pulling its blade from stilled flesh
he touches the weeping
tool that bends his once
too-simple faith
he touches the weeping
tool that bends his once
too-simple faith
Saturday, October 24, 2009
His daily drip of words
His daily drip of words
become a gushing leak,
he shaves the faulty pate,
heads off to nearby shop
fetching, a tarry patch
become a gushing leak,
he shaves the faulty pate,
heads off to nearby shop
fetching, a tarry patch
Friday, October 23, 2009
Coiled care's deadened weight
Coiled care's deadened weight
sliced by tempered hand, soul lifts
cerulean bliss
sliced by tempered hand, soul lifts
cerulean bliss
Choppy blade strokes churn
Choppy blade strokes churn
downward flows from source to mouth
clarity muddied
downward flows from source to mouth
clarity muddied
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Back to Belly
I'm finally returning to my short story Belly, which I abandoned early this year after posting the first four chapters. I'm going to start anew with a revised prologue below, and I hope to post at least one chapter a week... but don't hold me to that.
Prologue: A Circular Journey
It starts and ends here: The heavy head of a man, who is perhaps too cleverly named, jumps skyward as if it were tugged by a puppeteer’s unmeaning and graceless twitch.
The man is called Jonas. That’s a variant of Jonah, and this is, after all, a tale of bellies.
The invisible hand behind the tugging is the jostling force of Jonas’s week-linked commuter train. The tethered box in which he’s nestled is the first belly of this narrative, and it carries him halfway along its circular journey. It’s a trek often punctuated by fits, false starts, and sudden stops, and one such regularly irregular interruption pulls Jonas from a dreamless sleep, punching up his ragdoll’s chin to bring him gasping back into its interior.
First to wake are his limpid blue irises, which struggle to emerge between black-lashed lids, straining against the flood of pallid light. His nicely rounded ears, more prominent for the lack of hair surrounding them, rouse next rudely reconnected to crashing waves of cartoonish sounds as the mechanical beast regains its stride. Last to stir are the nostrils of a rather plain nose, which flare to gulp some fueling air then spit back the pungent smell of perspiration, mixed with wet wool.
“What time is it?”
These whispered words, voiced as an aside, cue Jonas’s left arm to lift up, but, so long wedged against the steel wall, it misses its mark. A livelier right hand, eager to assist its fellow player, leaps their lapped divide and massages the deadened flesh. It’s a lovely and successful gesture, and the blood gradually returns, bringing with it pricks of tiny needles.
This first dramatic stumble gotten past, the action proceeds as scripted. The left arm rises dutifully and its opposing hand slides back a pale blue cotton cuff to reveal two silver strips spread like an open scissors attacking the white disk.
“Seven o’clock still, but that can’t be.”
If his eyes and memory don’t betray him, and after the arm-lifting mishap he can’t rule out their collusion, time’s usually steady gait had limped to a halt and then reversed path back to the moment icy winds ushered him onto this round-about. Or, it could be the watch. Jonas taps the glass crystal, but it offers no signs of life.
The rounded square of a window, backed by an early winter morning’s confounding darkness, gives him no clues either to his place in this oft-repeated story’s book.
“It doesn't matter.”
Suspended inanimate within these vibrating walls, Jonas lets the wash of artificial light and heat coax him back to unconsciousness. The troubling city sprawled out below him fades further into the black. His once-sharp calling recedes with it to the indistinct mumble of words spoken long ago, far away, and in a forgotten tongue.
Overcome by sleep’s welcome eraser, Jonas’s shoulders slump and his head nods, their controlling strings severed anew.
Prologue: A Circular Journey
It starts and ends here: The heavy head of a man, who is perhaps too cleverly named, jumps skyward as if it were tugged by a puppeteer’s unmeaning and graceless twitch.
The man is called Jonas. That’s a variant of Jonah, and this is, after all, a tale of bellies.
The invisible hand behind the tugging is the jostling force of Jonas’s week-linked commuter train. The tethered box in which he’s nestled is the first belly of this narrative, and it carries him halfway along its circular journey. It’s a trek often punctuated by fits, false starts, and sudden stops, and one such regularly irregular interruption pulls Jonas from a dreamless sleep, punching up his ragdoll’s chin to bring him gasping back into its interior.
First to wake are his limpid blue irises, which struggle to emerge between black-lashed lids, straining against the flood of pallid light. His nicely rounded ears, more prominent for the lack of hair surrounding them, rouse next rudely reconnected to crashing waves of cartoonish sounds as the mechanical beast regains its stride. Last to stir are the nostrils of a rather plain nose, which flare to gulp some fueling air then spit back the pungent smell of perspiration, mixed with wet wool.
“What time is it?”
These whispered words, voiced as an aside, cue Jonas’s left arm to lift up, but, so long wedged against the steel wall, it misses its mark. A livelier right hand, eager to assist its fellow player, leaps their lapped divide and massages the deadened flesh. It’s a lovely and successful gesture, and the blood gradually returns, bringing with it pricks of tiny needles.
This first dramatic stumble gotten past, the action proceeds as scripted. The left arm rises dutifully and its opposing hand slides back a pale blue cotton cuff to reveal two silver strips spread like an open scissors attacking the white disk.
“Seven o’clock still, but that can’t be.”
If his eyes and memory don’t betray him, and after the arm-lifting mishap he can’t rule out their collusion, time’s usually steady gait had limped to a halt and then reversed path back to the moment icy winds ushered him onto this round-about. Or, it could be the watch. Jonas taps the glass crystal, but it offers no signs of life.
The rounded square of a window, backed by an early winter morning’s confounding darkness, gives him no clues either to his place in this oft-repeated story’s book.
“It doesn't matter.”
Suspended inanimate within these vibrating walls, Jonas lets the wash of artificial light and heat coax him back to unconsciousness. The troubling city sprawled out below him fades further into the black. His once-sharp calling recedes with it to the indistinct mumble of words spoken long ago, far away, and in a forgotten tongue.
Overcome by sleep’s welcome eraser, Jonas’s shoulders slump and his head nods, their controlling strings severed anew.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Burgundy seed pods
Burgundy seed pods
in honey locust dangle
bumpy lobes curling
anxious for fall's first strong tug
and the peace of raked earth beds
in honey locust dangle
bumpy lobes curling
anxious for fall's first strong tug
and the peace of raked earth beds
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Monday, October 19, 2009
Distance
In the heat-tricked mirror, he sees
crafty miles creep up with vital intent,
toeing waved lines.
A pair of vultures glide in lean routes,
marking bold exes across the grain
of age-stained charts.
Their sudden runs on scented organs
made with strong swoops to fleshy thresholds
of life's tipping.
He discovers in this scaled calculus
that distance, moist but listing, travels
in taut cycles.
It can't defeat the curse of lifting
unbalanced loads with back pushed against
jaundiced fingers.
Ten peckish tips, waiting for victuals
they smell buried in gusty legends
of cornered maps.
— Francis Scudellari
This poem is written in response to Read Write Prompt #97 at Read Write Poem. The challenge was to use the "cut-up technique" of picking words at random. I used words from five recent haiku and short poems, so its a cut-up plus a mash-up. The result is pretty abstract.
crafty miles creep up with vital intent,
toeing waved lines.
A pair of vultures glide in lean routes,
marking bold exes across the grain
of age-stained charts.
Their sudden runs on scented organs
made with strong swoops to fleshy thresholds
of life's tipping.
He discovers in this scaled calculus
that distance, moist but listing, travels
in taut cycles.
It can't defeat the curse of lifting
unbalanced loads with back pushed against
jaundiced fingers.
Ten peckish tips, waiting for victuals
they smell buried in gusty legends
of cornered maps.
— Francis Scudellari
This poem is written in response to Read Write Prompt #97 at Read Write Poem. The challenge was to use the "cut-up technique" of picking words at random. I used words from five recent haiku and short poems, so its a cut-up plus a mash-up. The result is pretty abstract.
The world may refuse
The world may refuse
words I toss out, more refuse
atop littered piles
but this trash, offered humbly
is my only true treasure
words I toss out, more refuse
atop littered piles
but this trash, offered humbly
is my only true treasure
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Turntable: Regret
This is part two (you can read Part I: Love is here).
Turntable
By Francis Scudellari
II. Regret
slips through, skipping over hairline scratches
etched by fitful nudges. The crooned once-so
simple and soulful, become fragile when
poised on wound-up platter. Needling him back,
that night their conversation broke to-be,
and was followed with a pause, he stretches
on each wobbly replaying. Then picked up,
he'll tuck it back in a wax-paper sleeve
corner-chopped to stash among discounted
bins of ballads rhyming her without him.
Turntable
By Francis Scudellari
II. Regret
slips through, skipping over hairline scratches
etched by fitful nudges. The crooned once-so
simple and soulful, become fragile when
poised on wound-up platter. Needling him back,
that night their conversation broke to-be,
and was followed with a pause, he stretches
on each wobbly replaying. Then picked up,
he'll tuck it back in a wax-paper sleeve
corner-chopped to stash among discounted
bins of ballads rhyming her without him.
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