The Sickening

You can sit
by a green river
flowing beneath
tourist-packed streets

drink green beer,
share stories about kissing
the Blarney Stone
or four-leaf clovers
found in a field of green
stretching on and on and on

like the depth of your green eyes
luring me in with unspoken words of love,
words I know I can change, feelings
you (a master of manipulation) hide,
create lies to cover up your change of heart.
When I look deep enough, I see a faint spark
lurking in those green eyes.

It calls to me, begs for me
to pull it out from places deep within,
the light before a train appears
in a tunnel-vision mind,
the spark I know is there
but you let die that day in March
green became the color of my skin.

**

Poetry inspirations:
dVersePoets oetics~ It’s Not Easy Being Green
The Sunday Whirl 100!- master, street, change, share, train, die, calls, stretch, march, words, places, create, faint

Are the Stars at Night Big and Bright?

A circle of cracker crumbs
around my “cherub” face,
under the shelter of my highchair,
tossed into the fern beside the window
I left when we ate out.

It might have been Café du Monde
where the beignets melt in your mouth,
powdered sugar sticks to licked fingers
like baby powder to a diaper-
but I wanted Saltine crackers.

And the place called Ruby Reds,
our after-church-at-the-cathedral spot,
I learned to love the next few years
peanut shells tossed on the floor
crunching as I walked by the sturdy cabinet
filled with New Orleans’ souvenirs.

For my First Communion it was
Commander’s Palace, where Eggs Benedict
with Hollandaise sauce was to DIE for,
and I told you I wanted a job there when I grew up,
then wished I’d never said a thing, although I
already knew how to handle it. Sshh!

Moving back to our home state at the age of ten,
we sang, “the stars at night are big and bright”
~~~~clap! clap! clap! clap!~~~~
as we crossed the Louisiana/Texas border
and I wondered if that meant my wishes would come true
while big sister kept score with my guilt.

Those tumultuous years?
I’d never recommend sharing bathrooms
with another teenage girl you’re related to
but really don’t like because she pinches you
before school unless you wake up at five,
try to keep the inevitable from happening;
a silent guide, the words I kept inside.

*

Prompt inspirations:
dVerse Poetics: It’s About Time w/Mary
The Sunday Whirl (10-21-12): recommend, happening, cabinet, cafe, shelter, sturdy, handle, peanuts, fern, job, guide, score, face

Misperceptions, Take Two

Daddy’s going to get you,
I texted, pushed send before thinking
about how that really sounds. He’s
coming to pick you up, is what I
meant; my penchant for after-
thoughts a menace once again,
my distraction the quaint

old lady across the way
stopping to smell her rose
garden, her tidy utopia, I’m
sure to her a herbarium
for green thumbs; but
to me a (neuro)nuisance.

My dad’s the one with a knack
for growing hale and hearty vegetables,
flowers pretty as a National Geographic
photograph; a master at whatever his
obsession at that time, and with his own
unique slant. He didn’t pick me up much as I
grew, his over-indulgence an onus, but I
always knew he would get me.
And in my darkest hours,
at the lowest points in my life-
when I found myself
lower than a wilted petal
fallen to the ground,
he was the one
reaching out to
clasp my hand.

*

Prompt inspiration: Shawna’s (Flipside Records) words- penchant, menace, master, indulgence, distraction, clasp, utopia, quaint, photograph, slant, herbarium;
not used- reluctance, inquiry

Also shared with dVersePoets’ OpenLinkNight

More Than a Feeling

I’m sitting in a bed
of mint leaves
like a Buddah statue
in lotus position,
with hands at my side
palms turned skyward

only I’m not still
and there’s an absence
of peace in my mind.

My thoughts drift
to our wedding in June
and the plans we have
six weeks prior-
the parties, the pictures
the need to smile
when all I want to do is cry.

In double time, I scoop the fumes
from ground to stuffy nose
inhale the natural healing power
one, two, three- help me now!

I wonder if a mixture
of salt and aloe vera
would nourish my body
repel this cold
feeling I have.

©laurie kolp

Linked to dVerse Poets- OpenLinkNight

Prompt inspiration: Rosemary Mint Monday Melting, week 11, words-

1) mint 2) nourish 3) natural 4) aloe 5) salt 6) healing 7) June 8) drift 9) absence
10) grass

~~

I’m so happy to be featured today at Cara Holman’s Prose Posies

Don’t Feed Maps to the Goats!

The callow pygmy goat caromed off the hay
landed at my feet one glistening day
at the petting zoo, his pen a chalet
homey-like for young sprigs at play.

The spry little thing did a jive-y leap
an electric infusion of energy sweep
averted himself like a manic peep
ate the map in my pocket-y-deep
then went to sleep.

@laurie kolp

It’s Open Link Night at dVerse Poets… come join the fun!

Prompt inspiration: Rosemary Mint’s Monday Melting

Words-

carom
pygmy
glistening
spry
chalet
electric
sprig
aver
callow
manic

Cooking with Words

Thrust into the dark and narrow corridor
raw meat thread between opal fingertips
dripping clots of blood internal doubt;
an omen butchers sheep within my mind.

I yearn to escape this hellish train
boarded each time failure haunts me
but ‘His Highness Muse’ speaks with verve;
I hear his hopeful voice chant:

Prepare this meal you’ve begun
season bland recipes with spicy words
aromatic as homemade garlic bread;
 timeless diligence kneads rewards.

Looking through the steamy mirror
I wipe the moisture with shaky hands
pick up tools I need to follow through
abandon thoughts of fear and start to write.

@laurie kolp

Prompt inspiration: dVerse Poets and The Sunday Whirl for 9/18/11 (raw, sheep, verve, yearn, fingertips, omen, muse, mirror, strengthen, opal, corridor, thrust, thread)