Poetry For a Grey Saturday (that’s not actually a Saturday anymore)

Yes, yes – I know it says “for a grey SATURDAY” and today is, in fact, Monday. I wrote this Saturday and intended to post it then, but then was notified about my Major Award, so this post got bumped…

So here we are, a grey, soon-to-be-rainy Saturday, and I’m feeling a tish inspiration-less, blog-wise. I had a GREAT fiction writing day yesterday. Nearly 4000 words flew out of me in a relatively short amount of time, on two different novel ideas – hooray! – plus I got a slew o’ things done around the house, so all in all a tres productive day. As a result, I’m sort of in a creative writing-ish mood. Which means, lucky readers, you are going to get some random writing from me today. Hooray, she said!

I have these ongoing novels in my head, so didn’t want to separate my brain from them by writing other fiction. So I went through my list of writing exercises gleaned from the magical Internet, as well as my list of blog-topics-for-a-rainy-day and, even though today is in fact rainy (it started while I was writing), none of them jumped off the page. So I said to myself, “Self, what on earth will we do that is creative-ish and interesting both to me and to other people?” And Self replied. Yes, it is a sad but true fact that I do actually talk to myself, out loud. I also respond to myself. Yes, I am more than a little crazy – what was referred to as “touched” back in the day. Sigh. Although, as my friend Grip used to say “my neuroses are what make me interesting” – and dear lord I hope that’s true!
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Anyway, as Self was saying, “why Jill Elizabeth, remember how much fun you had writing Ode to Mother’s Day (Literally) as an actual ode in rhythmic meter? Why don’t you pick a random bunch of poetic forms and write some random stuff that way?” So that’s what I’m going to do. I hope they will make you giggle a little and smile a lot, and hopefully they will hold your attention enough to make you read through all the way to the end… 🙂

Haiku
Rain falls on my head
Pouring down from blackish clouds
No hammock today…

***

Flowers in the yard
Burst into bloom when it rains
Soaking up new life

English Sonnet
I love when the world goes quiet and still;
When everything stops, pauses, ceases for a moment in time.
Unlike many, this absence goes not give me a chill –
Rather, I find it perfect, peaceful, sublime.

If it were up to me, there would be mandatory silence
At regular intervals throughout the day –
Required time to just sit and be ruled by calm and patience;
Empty time, devoid of work, absent all play.

I need time to just be – not be helpful or be clever or be nice,
But to just exist, lost in my own world, my own head.
I am not a rock, don’t want to be alone forever, am not made of ice;
I need interaction too, need love and conversation as much as water or bread.

But handfuls of placid moments, scattered here and there
Are essential to my psychological welfare.

Cinquain
I think,
Therefore I am.
But what am I she asks?
Wondering if she will ever know
The truth.

***

We live.
And then we die.
What really matters though,
Is the aggregation of bits
Between.

Acrostic
Just in the nick of time,
I figured out that who I am does not have to be who I was.
Looking backward, I was trapped in selves that no longer fit.
Looking forward I am completely free, which is a trap all its own.
Everything is possible – or is it?
In any given moment,
Someone, somewhere is stuck between a rock and a hard place –
A sword and a stone.
When you don’t know what you are looking for,
Rarely will you find it.
I see that now, and realize
There is no need to fear freedom or worry about what I will find if I look.
Everything has a time, a place, a reality of its own –
Reaching for it can only help.

Limerick
There once was a girl named Jill-e
Who was ridiculously insufferably silly
Since she started a blog
Her head’s in a fog
And she writes about things willy-nilly.

***

So I’m trying to write a whole book
And get people to come take a look
But the words from my head
And the things that I’ve said
I’m afraid seem like gobbledy-gook!