not in the attic,
or under the bed.
nor the rank basement should we dread.
fear not dark spaces,
there’s no compare
to phantoms in the head!
Category Archives: I wrote this!
a little ditty about chemistry
december
solstice sea
lush calm black
can take it all
frigid current, soft and cruel
one less fool
forget forget forget
morning again
for lack of
Thank you!!
one perfect night
drifting honeysuckle perfume bliss
wraps this perfect summer night
a pause before the abyss
skyward screaming flames arise
conjure peace
our sacrifice
radiance obedience silence
forgotten lines of ley
sacred circles decay
abandoned vigil, false prophesy
life is power, we are alive
there is no eternity
wives’ tales
eternally broken hearted wallflower
Featured
Eternal wallflower doofus. I pour my heart out, it’s uncool. Heart on a sleeve. I am a novice poet, I write, I learn. After going through the typical twin failures of marriage and a disappointing career, I began to experiment with verse. Poetry satisfied the artistic and emotional gaps I had struggled with. The challenge to represent this experience (and let’s face it; revenge fantasies) kept me motivated and engaged with the outside world. Stripped bare and dumbfounded, I squelched out a bunch of silly, silly poems. Research, a bit of naïve bravery and the helpful critiques of my friend Cathi led me to find a new voice. The baseline: it makes me happy, I enjoy the process. Posted here are my first efforts at poetry up to the present day. I penned a few articles and poems for the “Gypsy Curse” a zine founded in New Haven, Connecticut by Melissa Daily McCormack sometime at the beginning of the 00’s. I chose the posts from my Nom de plume, Prudence Duchamp, these are actually pretty funny IMHO. Creating this blog forces me to closely look at what I’ve put on the page. Emo crap? Probably. Someday (I hope), someone will read, get what I’m saying, and connect. Someday, maybe I’ll get it. Please check out my work, scroll down the page, or look just to the left menu for haiku, Gypsy Curse and other stuff. Feedback is important to me! Improvement is impossible without it. Share your thoughts so I may endlessly analyze the crap out of them! (The only image not made by me is the portrait below. Adrian Waggoner painted this at Lyme Academy of Art, July 2007.)
Thanks,
Patty
it’s all the same to me
the ups and downs of crude
Hello plastic spoon, you saved my life today!
-then I threw you away
many eons packed tight, deep under earth’s crust
we drilled a huge hole, sucked you right up
hey! algae bloom, why would you choose
to reconstitute as a disposable spoon?
caught forever in this shape you are
could have been diamonds, a kilowatt hour
a second eternity, I threw you away
a dank airless place, there you will stay
passing
turn away
Chill in the air
Keep walking by, my name stuck in your throat.
The brush of my lips, the warmth that you felt.
Now a vague memory, it slips from your grasp.
Who was I, now just out of reach?
My touch and my heart, I took it all back.
Keep walking by, that name stuck in your throat.
I have no use for the clear blue sky
a minute, a moment
before chance
Something I lost
time travel
glittering moments
glittering moments and the rustlings of ghosts,
slide past and through and around
that which we share, caught in gravity’s sphere
flickering and sighing, beautifully bound.
this precious mote, each shining grain-
(the nodes of joy and rasping pain)
tumble spin collide
negative space
Contours form in the emptiness near,
Incomplete; all boundaries, not object, not air
negative space is not real; but what relates
No depth, no detail, no substance, no place
Blank reaction, edges drawn by events
It’s the part in between
Ultimate Wallflower
Sidelined in a hopeful trance
always looking for one big chance
Participants gather and disperse
a sensitive nature is such a curse
Smiles intent on games being played,
oblivious to my suffering shade
We are all of us one
Everything old is new
What is left to say about love?
It’s all been done.
Those without cry for the day
when two are one.
Illusion Conclusion
Tomorrow’s City
Crystal walls enclose a world
Fractured towers pierce the air
a breath
a fingertip
Dissolving
to form again
Tomorrow’s City
on my window pane
Spring Dreams
Bitter Rail
Bone to metal
betrayal and pride,
in the boxcar
for a white knuckle ride.
fists clenched, face pale
raging, racing
along the bitter rail
Destination: nowhere,
brutality and hate.
A useless course
a pointless chase.
Hang on and fail,
wasting life
along the bitter rail
Standing Stone
The wheel of the year will pass me by,
as I stand
my head in the Sky
wasting time
There’s something out there
better for me
than wasting time
on passing Misery
All in ruin
May 21, 1999 A True Story
Screaming and crying can’t bring you home
Face down on the couch, I’m all alone
I’ll fold your clothes and wash the floor
You don’t love me any more
memory of a love poem
Do I know you?
Whose hand smoothes tears from my face
Whose sure voice cuts to the chase?
Who squeezes my heart in just the right place?
It only hurts a little
Who are you?
Who lets in light, throws curtains wide
Who breaks through my brittle pride?
Who clears the shards that would pierce my hide?
But I put them there
I remember you!
Who swallows the bitter pill?
Who pushes my weakest will?
Who tells the world to go to hell!
Oh yeah, I do
Chain Reaction
Mutually held in the spiral dance,
Chain reaction, there was never a chance.
Fusion quick mind, glacier slow heart
Our end was known from the start
The super nova is all for show
Implosion is the only way to go
Red hot surface, reserved at the core
When the reaction is over, we will shine no more
It happened so fast, this primal shift,
at the speed of continental drift
Now the cinder moves quietly through the ink
It was over in a cosmic blink
For Me and the Sun
will you come out and play? (one day out of thousands)
I fell, skinned both palms and knees. Tiny pebbles
embedded the skin, thin lattice of blood
seeping through. Laughing, (it was
funny when someone else got hurt) you went inside
leaving me mute angry and hurt feelings.
Later that night, hands throbbing on the pillow,
eyes smarting, I stared at the ceiling, life is so unfair.
hope
threads of brightness
shot through the dread,
life’s dreams woven
into the web.
Patterns of influence appear
renewed with change.
Shifting on the moving air
China Cupboard, for my Mom
Crystal, silk, gossamer wings-
My mother’s dearest things,
beckoned my curious grasp.
Cracked and torn,
rumpled and shorn.
She donned acceptance with careworn grace.
An indelible mark
is etched into my heart.
A shining memory of the beautiful and fragile
Whole.
Finally
Essentially. Me.
Daughter. Friend. Wife.
All I can be. The end of life.
Pretense crumbles: I prepare to take flight
Swirl away, fly today, wisp of light-
As the layers give, with moments to live
You are the last I will let go