Friday, September 30, 2011

Maximos of Tegucigalpa, here’s your Triolet!

 

I make the peanut butter sandwiches to the tune of time
Then steal moments to rub a tuna melt on the boss’s tool-kit lock
Ted, the chef raises a knife to salute a greasy dime
To make a million more sandwiches to the tune of time
Ted ground fresh tuna fish into Ponzi-burger, then commits a crime
I vomit out a brain as I work around the clock
Making peanut butter sandwiches to the melody of time
I rob the boss’s time to rub a tuna melt into the restroom lock

 
Maximos of Tegucigalpa (I think the name and the place is fake) requested a Triolet on 9/7/11 from these two lines:
  • “Making peanut butter/tuna sandwiches to the tune of time”

  • “Taking time to rub the tuna on the lock”

  •  

     


    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Thursday, September 29, 2011

    We Wrote In A Room Next To The Park Beside Philip Bernier-Smith

     
    Star Journey

    In the amazing maze of wonder
    admist piles of baggage on the starship
    hold me closer as we look back
    towards the globe that gave us birth.
    Blue green dot hanging
    in the velvet deep of bedazzling gems.
    Left behind are all the old familar faces-Di Di Di Di Di
    Left behind are the fleecy skies
    and the bright blue days of childhood.
    We have left without dinner
    and we are bound jitterbugging towards
    stars of amazing strangeness.
    There natives on their quasi-polynasian planet
    savor uncooked food that
    appeas like grubs or worms.
    Fear not but hum an Edith Pilaf tune and
    think of Paul Gougan.
    Do not cry like a cat
    but take to the journeys sleep
    like an abandoned child, dropped beyond nightmare
    into a dream of cornmeal, flour and bacon sizzling.
    I will be seeing you in the distant morning sun
    when the cold crossing of night is through,
    perhaps there we shall walk new blue highways
    or yellow brick roads till
    the time our flesh falters decomposing
    and our skulls contemplate
    orbs of multiple moons.

  • by Philip V Bernier-Smith, Saturday, September 24, 2011




  •  
    Prompts were:
  • Earth-we pray for one lasting on the globe that gave us birth, let us rest our eyes on the fleecy skies and the cool, green hills of earth..Robert A Heinlien

  • -The Green Hills of Earth Water Witch- by Cynthia Felice and Connie Willis- No Dinner and those natives who eat worms

  • John Crowley -Little Big - Auberon was awakened first by the crying of a cat "An Abandoned Child" he thought and went back to sleep

  • Blue Highway-"A Journey into America" by William Least Heat Moon- "The only baggage the boys carried in addition to the mail mochila-was a kit of flour, cornmeal, and bacon plus a medical kit of turpentine, borax, and cream of tartar."

  • To A Dear Fellow Traveler

  •  
     


    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Wednesday, September 28, 2011

    @Tmacn21 Your 2-Lines Get One More!

     

    Roll up those intellectual sleeves I say
    The silky wreaths on effete wrists
    A kinder gentler compulsory way
    Enforced by more than tolerant fists
    Flashing pictures filled my mind
    A crucifix attacked by art
    All for one offered to all
    In groves of pulsing neon sign
    Flex the muscles of a heart
    Hung suspended on the wall

    ---by Don Comfort, 9/28/2011

    Don comfort is an old friend I met at a writers group in 2003. It met and still meets at the Coffee Cottage in Newberg, Oregon.


     
     

    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    @Tmacn21 Gets More Than One Piece

     

    You are Love

    Roll up your tolerant sleeves and show your intellectual fists…flex the muscles of your mind. Open your mind and heart to the Higher Power within you. Meditate and be still. Listen for the silence in your Heart. Look inside to know your Soul and be open to the knowledge the One is here to teach you. Inside there is no judgment, no violence, no pain, no prejudice. All that exists is love. You are love.

    As you meditate in silence reflect upon the friendships and relationships in your life. Take this moment and send love to all those who have touched you. Give it to all those who hung pictures of you on the walls of your heart. Give it to those who made you shine and glow not only in your heart but your soul as well. Give it to those who took those pictures knowing you are imperfect and quirky yet made you a King or a Queen. Look on the walls of your heart and see how they all saw you. See and believe you are loveable, worthy, unique, and perfect just the way you are.

    By Sharon Meixsell, 09/27/2011

    @Tmacn21 Gets More Than One Piece

     

    I’ve been kneading
    two lines over and over
    said to me by a lover
    like how a pioneer might,
    full of dreams
    on the high plains of Pittsburgh
    build,
    out of dirt and straw,
    a house.
    This domicile
    that should have been our home
    realized it was alive.
    At the same instant
    that you departed like sand
    through the willow wasp
    of an hourglass.
    Grain by grain
    you dribbled out of me
    painting movies
    of some strangers life
    our parents wanted us to lead
    on a barrier
    locked away
    in someone else’s mind.
    It unfolded
    Beating vividly in my chest
    throbbing like my thumb did
    after I crushed it
    with a hammer
    when I tried to nail that portrait
    of an existence
    I never really wanted
    onto walls of mud.
    I rolled up
    bloodied sleeves
    gritted teeth
    blackened by rot
    and accepted the pain
    clenched between
    two intolerant fists.
    My intellect rejected it
    as I flexed the muscle of a brain
    given to me by those
    who hung pictures
    of you in that skeleton
    they called a heart.


     

    This has been the most difficult 2-Lines poem to write thus far. Tmac, who is a slam poet from Pittsburgh, I salute you! She submitted on August 12, 2011: “roll up your tolerant sleeves And…..show your intellectual fists .....flex the muscles of your mind,” and “Give it all to those who have hung pictures of you on the walls of the hearts.....” I’ve also gave these two lines to two other friends to see what they could create out of them. One of my ponies has already come in and that piece will post at noon today. And the third one, if it manifests, will arrive tomorrow night.

    In mulling these over, I wanted to hear the poem she extracted them out of, but I knew to do so would ruin all chances of me creating anything at all. Perhaps she’ll submit it to my new Live Literary Journal: Randomly Accessed Poetics, I’d love to publish it, sight unseen, there.

    Smiles

    Monday, September 26, 2011

    Write At The Park With Purple Mark ---Philip's Go Go Boot

     

    In the remains of the tea cup, you gaze to see the ghostly future, the scent of marsala green chai tea from Impla tickling your nostrils. In it white boots from bosnia dance to a music mix froma tape of seventies tunes~ The Carpenters, John Denver, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young drawn in neat small letters on it's faded memorex label surface. You had smiled remember how you were astounded when you found it in the wee hours of this morning, this morning of your father's death. It was in his rope box, which sat in the carport for years neglected next to the bright printed California Garlic woodbox that smelled of his hippie flower child days. The box was still rich with the aroma's of garlic, patchouli, and far east curries.When had that rope box arrived there? at somepoint after his and your mom's divorce, although really they were pagan handfasted or something years ago in the eighties. He had hung out with mysterious diva's with names like Trembling Rose, Agate Star, and Violet Dawn. You think of him now, looking into the cup, and you wonder about the white boots from bosnia, their slick surface and how you stomped about in them when you were nine or ten. Where are they now you wonder? Somewhere you suppose dancing glorious in the moonlight where faeries swirl their eyes like cats on hashish, mushrooms and acid. Then you go out to call your brother to tell him the funeral will be on Tuesday at the Freewill Mt Baptist church promptly at 10 p.m. You wonder if his son will or won't wear his new nose ring.

  • by Philip V Bernier-Smith, Saturday, September 17, 2011


  •  

    Prompts were- White plastic boots from bosnia brought by purple mark, a bag of Impla Chai green marsala tea brought by me, a musix mix card pulled from carla's deck, and a prompt slip from carla-Dad's rope box sat next to a woodbox that read California Garlic.

     
     

    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Write At The Park With Purple Mark ---Carla's Go Go Boot

     

    Splitting My Sympathy

            I should say right up front that I’m a racist, just so you know. My companions and I watched the white guy beg, insistently and aggressively, asking everyone for a dollar or some change, in between talking on his cell phone. He was styling in clean low-slung hip-hop jeans, a pristine white T-shirt with a black band logo on it and some jewelry: a heavy chain necklace and two bracelets. His running shoes were white, and looked very expensive. He sported a close-cut beard, the kind that needs constant grooming to keep just the right length.
            We were at Dick’s Drive-In, standing at the outdoor counter eating the best $4.62 fast-food burger and fries in the city. The guy was nearly in our face. There is a law against aggressive panhandling in this city but why kick someone when they're down?
            As a racist, however, I would have been happy to see this handsome, intelligent-looking white male taken to jail.
            "There also may be anatomical correlates with splitting." The comment came off two men walking down the street, leaving me to forever wonder what they meant.
            Out of my bias and racism, I blurted to my companions in burger bliss, the two strangers across the counter, that “I didn’t have much sympathy for white males.”
            A young woman who had just told her mother by cell that she’d gotten back to the States from Zagreb last night; or some such Balkan sounding country or city or whatever, informed me “that she had sympathy for everyone.”
            "Oh, really," I shouted, "just wait til that same young man makes twenty grand more than you for doing the same damn job just because he has a penis and you don’t.
            At least, I shouted that in my mind, hoping the Saint of Dick’s Drive-In would quickly experience someone she, in fact, didn’t have sympathy for and her soul would burn with coals of fire for her holier-than-thou comment. I just smiled, put my trash in the approved receptacle and walked on, in my cheap black shoes, no expensive running shoes and cell phones for me. I was an old white woman with a good job, but those were luxuries, too steep for my budget.
     

    By Carla Blaschka, 9/24/11, Experienced the day before...:)


     
    Prompts utilized:
  • Shoes (PurpleMark brought some white go-go boots made in Bosnia)

  • Quote: "There also may be anatomical correlates with splitting," (Sometimes I Act Crazy: Jerold J. Kreisman M.D. & Hal Straus, pg 47)

  • Trashy Treats (from a card of Things to Do When I”m Blue)
  • Composed at Cal Anderson Park alongside Priya, PurpleMark, Philip, Shannon, Zoe, and Bill on the phone.

     
     
     

    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.


    Sunday, September 25, 2011

    Random Poetry Found While Packing -- 6

     

    A Poem by Sherrie Kotka 2002

    desire dashed upon the rocks of decision
    doubt dangling as a not so distant could
    discouragement descending as a desert storm

    battered and bruised my stride has been broken
    burdens to heavy to bear have bended my back
    blurred vision and breathless, barely alive

    laying as Lazarus, I hear the Lord calling
    look, I say, you're too late my life is gone
    leaning in close, I can see Him laughing, i learn...

    divine deliverance sings like a white dove
    detangeling the death chords that had destroyed my life
    defiantly free, dancing dangerously

    Saturday, September 24, 2011

    Cliff Hanger From TWITER Submitted 2-Lines & Asked For Potted Meat

     
    Bubbly Butt Billy couldn't fit into his jeans
    His mother used oodles of duck fat
    To cook a golden pot of weenies and beans
    They shoveled it in their mouths and gave a tin to the cat

    His mother used oodles of duck fat
    To slide off her pants to uncover bulging spider veins
    They shoveled goulash in their mouths and fed a spoon to the cat
    Kitty lapped it up like a ravenous eating machine

    She slid off her pants to uncover bulging spider veins
    They fell to the floor making a noise like a splat
    Kitty ate into it like a giant vacuum machine
    Butt Billy threw his plate like a Frisbee at a rat

    It fell to the floor making a noise like a splat
    His mom glanced back saying, “know what that means?”
    Butt Billy threw his plate like a Frisbee at a rat
    Kitty jumped, he tooted, and knocked over the beans

    His mom glanced back saying, “know what that means?”
    “Yeah,” he said, “I’m gonna kill that duck with a bat!”
    The kitty jumped; his toot knocked over the pot of beans
    “Iron it flat,” she said, “and hang up your hat!”

    “Yeah,” he said, “I’m gonna kill that duck with a bat!”
    Then slow cook it with a pot of weenies and beans
    “Iron it flat,” his mom said, “and put on your pink bikini hat!”
    Bubbly Butt Billy tried, but couldn't fit into girly jeans
     
     
    On September 14, 2011, Cliff Hanger from Sacramento, California submitted these 2-Lines: Bubbly Butt BIlly couldn't fit in his jeans & His mother used duck fat.
     
     
     

    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Friday, September 23, 2011

    We Wrote In A Room Next To The Park Beside William James

     

    Haru parked on the forth floor of the Chemeketa Parkade. She grudgingly took the stairs. Her head throbbed like a bad high school pep band rhythm section. The elevator was her usual mode of transportation, but today it was out of service. He favorite café coffee shop was the Coffee House Café on Liberty and Church Street. That was two blocks up and two blocks over, she calculated in her head—long walk for a Saturday morning, especially, a Saturday morning hangover. She kicked herself for not parking closer, but there probably wouldn’t have been a spot in front of the door, anyway.

    All during the five-minute walk, Haru was looking forward to a pastrami on rye slathered with vegan mayo, hot Chinese mustard, sprouted grains, tomato, American cheese, and a single dill pickle on the side. She salivated over the orchestra of flavors she’d soon be experiencing.

    When she reached her destination, the sign on the door read closed. “Shit,” she said, as she turned on her heels, “what am I going to do now!” the best coffee place in Salem has gone out of business. Angry, she walked a half a block back to the Starbucks.

    The line was ten people deep and only one worker was servicing everyone. “Fuck,” She said to no one in particular, “This is going to take for ever!” An old man in front of her frowned. He looked like Danny Quayle. He drawled out in a musical tone, “watch your tongue missy!”

    “Yes, Sir,” she said sharply and added in hung over tones, “I stand by all the misstatements I’ve made.” The old man looked puzzled by her remark. Haru wondered if he caught her sarcasm. The old man took out his wallet and handed her a small tract. She unfolded it. In bold print it read “Four Spiritual Laws of Happiness.”

    “Great,” she said as she handed it back to him. She tried to hold her tongue, but “fucking Jesus freak,” slipped out like a baked bean fart held too long. The man simply said, “it’s your soul, do with it as you please.”

    After 20 minutes Haru finally made it to the counter. The weary boy asked her what she wanted. “I want a quad tall soy late with extra sugar,” she pissed out in a stream of annoyance. The boy smiled back a fuck you and said, “that will be $4.69 mum.” Haru reached into her purse and fished out a Styrofoam Jack-in-the-Box head with an “O” face, purple pointy party hat, a noisemaker, and a card that read feed me.

    Here are the prompts Carla gave me to work off of:


  •  “Haru turned on her heel, ‘yes sir she said sharply.’”
  •  Place: My favorite coffee house.
  •  Person: Dan Quail: “I stand by all the misstatements I’ve made.”
  •  Object1: a “Jack in the Box” head with a New Years Eve hat blowing a horn
  •  Object2: Card — “Feed Somebody”


  • Here’s the odd thing about this weeks write in the park session. I found out afterwards that part of the exercise was to write about something you wouldn’t normally think to do. I guess even though I am separated from the group by 230 miles, I was able to sync up with everyone on a super-conscious level. It is odd how the group mind works. But I wasn’t expecting it to happen from such a great distance. I hope I will be able to stay with this group for a long time.
     
     


    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Thursday, September 22, 2011

    Enkidu Experience (A Video Poem)

     





    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Wednesday, September 21, 2011

    Random Poetry Found While Packing -- 5

     

    Meaning:

    Random mutated syllabic sonic discharge
    beat out rhythms in cochlear (ear) tissue
    generate syncopated pulse strums
    sound doldrums steel tongue springy jaw harp
    ectoplasmic explosions arc blue-electric
    rivers cross diametrically opposed synaptic poles
    interface multi-collateral smoke signals
    disrupt monopolic cell stasis gongs
    Mercator colored light emoting diodic arrays
    stimulate corresponding logic interludes
    trigger thermal fission event horizons
    reverberate singularity parietal bone density
    ricochet through rubikal gray rictus antimateral
    revest mastoid mobius process thought
    translates redactive hegemony mensurable intrusive
    meaning:

    It Is What It Isn't


    The poem was found while sorting through my Seattle life on Wednesday, August 23, 2011.





    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Sunday, September 18, 2011

    We Wrote In A Room Next To The Park Beside Purple Mark


    The Noisy Bridge Rod & Gun Club

    Settled back into their seats, smiling:
    The stories were especially good tonight.
    Proud of their Hunting and Fishing Tales
    They relished those adventures where
    They hadn’t triumphed over their Prey
    And of the scenery where their exploits
    Had occurred.

    The Wind and Water had cut the Canyon
    Wall into peculiarly sensual shapes
    Which could harbor who knew what rare
    Animals if they only knew where to look
    Or what kind of bait to use.
    It almost seemed that the Beasts
    Which they couldn’t see were more real to them
    Than the ones they could.

    People needed to Believe in Gods
    If only because it was hard to Believe in People.
    Their talk was about their Search for the Divine in Nature
    And their Hunts were the way they went about it.

    She leaned tiredly against the wall
    For a moment, wishing She had the Power
    To feel where Harubiki was
    As easily as She could feel the Water.
    She was the only woman in this group
    But She too was on this Quest
    Disguised as Hunting and Fishing
    Tales among this group of City Dwellers.

    From a Radio in a nearby room
    The sounds of ‘La Vie En Rose’
    ‘Those Were The Days’ and Swing
    Punctuated the Silences in their Tales.


    ----by Purple Mark 09/17/11

    The Exercise this week was to write about something you wouldn’t normally think to do. Reading a few lines from John Crowley was the catalyst that set the whole thing off.

    Prompts Utilized:

    1)“The Noisy Bridge Rod & Gun Club settled back in their seats, smiling,” (from ‘Little, Big’ by John Crowley).

    2)“Wind and water had cut the canyon wall into peculiarly sensual shapes,” (from ‘Blue Highways’ by William Least Heat Moon).

    3)“People needed to believe in gods, if only because it was hard to believe in people,” (from ‘Pyramids’ by Terry Pratchett).

    4)“She leaned tiredly against the wall for a moment wishing she had the power to feel where Harubiki was as easily as she could feel the water," (from ‘Water Witch’ by Cynthia Felice & Connie Willis).





    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Saturday, September 17, 2011

    2-Lines from http://shazzasbedroom.blogspot.com/

     

    Grandma climbed up on the roof and shook her cane
    Gramp’s had a fit and threw the bread into the clothes hamper
    It bloomed into a fruit that became her bane

    A deer wandered by, but it was lame
    He grabbed his WWII luger from behind a box of soiled pampers
    Grandmother climbed up on the roof and shook her parrot cane

    The head snapped off and rolled into the storm drain
    Then it grew legs and began to scamper
    A moment later it bloomed into a fruit that became her bane

    My grandmother thought she saw an alien, but she was silly insane
    She ran headless like a chicken, banged against bedroom walls in the camper
    Mrs. Mad climbed up on to the roof and shook her cane

    She fell off the ladder, threw out her back, and howled in pain
    While Grandpa whittled a stick to ram down a flintlock as a tamper
    But it bloomed into a fruit that became another dreaded bane

    I stomped in the puddle just as it began to rain
    My kid came home in a mood that was a stormy stamper
    She threw a French loaf into the dirty clothes hamper
    As grandmother climbed up on the roof to shake, at the moon, her cane




    Also check out my new wordpress website. It's a literary journal called Randomly Accessed Poetics! Submissions are open. We've also recently published our first e-literary mag. It is available for $1.99 at amazon.com. It is called: Randomly Accessed Poetics, Issue 1: The Texture of Words.

    Friday, September 16, 2011

    6 Words From Francis Mount Requesting My Six Word Poetic Form

     

    The joyride was her badge she carried it like rage
    on a ruffled polka-dotted clown sleeve.
    In the hollow of the wilderness, a hidden place of terror, Joy found a g-spot.

    Gee spotted a stain on her sleeve. It became a badge
    she wore throughout her life like rage.
    Hollowed out and wanting, her life wasn't, so to speak, a joy ride.

    Hollow was the rage that drove Joy to ride
    her police woman's bike; there was no courage in her badge.
    A mime's sleeve was found in a dumpster soaked with Gee's Spot.

    Cut my sleeve, saw into it like your g-spot, it's not hollow.
    Jam it in, twist it around, I want your joy ride
    in me like a purple clown's rage rewriting hope into my badge.

    Francis raged into Joy, riding her g-spot
    just as Joy demanded till Francis was as hollow
    as the badge she wore on a bedraggled clown sleeve.

    The badge Joy wore was hollow like plastic beads sewn on a sleeve.
    There was no happiness to be found on Gee's spot.
    When Francis' joy ride concluded all that remained was a cave of rage.



    Francis Mount, on 9/11/11, submitted these six words: Joyride, Badge, Rage, Sleeve, Hollow, and g-spot using the 6 Word form above. You too can submit six words to me and I will craft them into something disastrously dangerous.

    Wednesday, September 14, 2011

    Write in the Park Exercise---Philip's Push-Up



    Inside 120 seconds

    Inside 120 seconds
    like unto silk scarfs kissed by frenchmen
    black gold a whizz buzz fuzzes
    spitting saliva of wretched objections towards
    a groaning grand mason of illness
    poised resting on dew begemed grass
    where No dramas of Japanese blossoms aren't.
    Hidden in the shadows
    I await thee Pan lord of words
    under a raincloud ready for gloom instrument
    for banishing mr blue sky
    photons of raging hydrogen rays signal
    Apollo's attempt to sway me
    by tattooing angst in red upon my exposed neck
    his jealousy I ignore
    My lord for thy favor.
    My orifices of round contemplation
    observe carefully clipped
    bits of time and place
    windows into elsewhere
    shoplifted out of magazines
    brought home from dental palaces of tooth decay
    with words like unto
    metals, wreath, furniture, odyssey, crafts,
    fisher forge etc, etc,
    etched in Raven caws
    on their obese backsides
    of squaredom.
    before this being who was I
    in a torn away patch of emerald
    on the sodden grave
    of planetary crust,
    rests gently near
    my drink of lemons
    one crumpled end
    of a tobacco users afterthought;
    It awaits the finality
    of human civilization
    and the time of insects and worms.
    Top of Form
    Bottom of Form


    ---Philip V Bernier-Smith September 10, 2010

    Prompts were the word Hospital, a picture picked at random, mine was of a red boat dock with white framed windows and fishnets, with the words frame on it also there were fishing boats and nets in the background. On the backside was a picture of a green wreath. and a number of words for different places to visit which I used. The object was to describe the word rather than use the words some of which I did, some of which I punted. Words and images were Hospital, pipe-stem creek, metals, wreath, furniture, odyssey bulbs, crafts, fisher forge, plants, studio, Hinkle chair, red building, fishing boats, framing, white windows. I was sitting in damp grass in the shade with my black umbrella.

    If you like Philip’s work, subscribe to his RSS feed here: Philip V Bernier-Smith’s Facebook Notes.

    Tuesday, September 13, 2011

    2-Lines from @TheStrangerPage on Twitter


    Silly old Charlie was a kitty cat
    He sat on the bus waving a big black bat
    The obese driver shouted, “Don’t forget to floss!”
    Charlie pissed on the seat reserved for the boss

    He strutted on an Express with a big black bat
    Gagged a tall Pabst can down before he sat
    Charlie pissed in the seat reserved for the boss
    Silly old Charlie forgot to floss

    He ate smelly caned smelt before he sat
    Fell asleep with his feet planted on a floor mat
    Silly old Charlie cracked his mouth open to floss
    left a rotted fish between his teeth from a tooth he lost

    He fell asleep with one foot on a floor mat
    Big Bob said, “Don’t forget to floss!”
    With black between his teeth from a tooth he lost
    Silly old Charlie was a bad kitty cat


    On August 29, 2011, a twitter stranger from LA submitted these two lines: "Silly old Charley was a kitty cat & Don’t forget to floss," requesting potted meat. To check out his website go to www.TheStrangerPage.com. He has a lot of fun pages like "Face Cards" and "MEAT Clown."

    You too can do this by going to my static page "2 Lines" and challenge me to create a disasterpiece for you.

    Thanks!

    word

    Monday, September 12, 2011

    Write in the Park Exercise---Purple Mark's Yellow Calisthenic

     

    The Second or Third Thing

    The narrow brick-lined way led not to the Mountain Fountain,
    but to a Cirque whose liquidity
    mirrored the fact that its source
    had retreated from sight and gave no credence
    to its name.

    The carmine skiff sat above the calmly reflected sky
    as though its occupants
    might soon return to drift downward again.
    Yet they were invisible to the film plane
    at this juncture.

    Maybe they had happened on a road
    and they could not come back,
    thus leaving the boat bereft of purpose
    riparian the ex-boulders strewn
    along the weedy edge.

    In the Sfumato distance masses of wetness
    were snagged upon the upthrusts
    of the Metamorphic crusts carved by
    the sweep of Air and frozen Water
    into this sheltered landscape.

    Although the afternoon was brilliant
    the possibilities of the approaching murk
    were evident and the rubescent craft waited.
    When would its motivators advance their
    quest for the second or third thing?


    ---PurpleMark 09/10/11

    Prompts: A cobbled Alley, The Portage Bay Glacier and a photograph of a red canoe on the beach at a mountain lake with the clouds coming in.

    The process rejects the first thoughts of description and goes with an alternative to the first thought and sometimes also rejecting the second idea in favor of a new idea.

    Sunday, September 11, 2011

    Random Poetry Found While Moving -- 4

     

    Invisibility Complex

    Do you ever feel invisible?

    Being yourself doesn't seem to be good enough these days. It is not an effective strategy to combat the loneliness of being single. So, you go out of your way, do gross feats of acrobatics, just to be noticed.

    Your overtures to the other gender are constantly unreciprocated for a variety of unperceivable reasons. You are always attracted to the wrong person and the wrong person is always looking back at you. They become angry for your intrusions upon their invisibility and you become deflated for trying to be noticed. It is an endless cycle of the worst kind of pain.

    What you really want is for another to like you, like you, just as you are. Who enjoys spending time with you. hanging out, smelling your farts, letting your hair down, and becoming mutually acquainted with one another's strengths and weaknesses. Someone you can learn to love in all seasons of life.

    The reality is this: Time goes by and you're still somehow alone. Perhaps there is something inside you that is off. Everyone else can see it, but why not you? When you realize this truth, you create reasons for being alone and thus remain invisible.



    ---January 26, 2003. The piece was found on Wednesday, August 23, 2011

    Saturday, September 10, 2011

    Write in the Park Exercise---My Burpee

     

    Puffy Leads the Way

    Puffy pulled on the leash. The cord reeled out as he nosed his way into a small patch of grass in front of St Nicholas cathedral. A whiff of golden light glinted into my eye. I pulled Puffy away from a purple Rhododendron he was gleefully pissing on. I walked up the stairs of the porch to examine the image nailed above the door. A wizened black bearded man in a funny hat was framed out in gold. He had penetrating eyes. He looked like he’d be more comfortable in the halls of power at a byzantine palace than on the front of this church.

    Puffy strained on the leash urging me onward. Two blocks south Puffy entered into another yard. A lopsided spinning object fascinated him. Wide wings wound lazily round and round around a black and white tuxedo painted on an old board.

    Fred came out of his house. He cradled a floral mug of Folgers in his hands. The steam that wafted out of the cup smelled like a Denny’s at four AM. As he talked to Puffy in soothing tones, I watched his wife in the upstairs window smoothing out a purple polka-dotted dress over plump curves.

    Puffy yanked hard on the leash. He lifted his twitching nose high in the air. He was ready to forge on. Puffy led the way up to Union and then over to Spring Street. On the corner there was a small patch of browning grass, a picnic table, and a swing set. A beagle played tag with his tail unfettered by his leash. His lady stood watching talking on the Bluetooth. She folded her arms into a tight scowl across her breasts.

    I let Puffy go. He ran to the beagle and squared off. They exchanged sniffing greetings. The lady stopped talking. I approached cautiously. She fisted a blue doggie bag. One end flapped around in the morning breeze. I croaked out a nervous hi.




    Purple Mark and Priya Keefe conducted the aerobics at the park today. I attended via Shannon Kringen's telephone. The exercise was to use descriptive language to describe things without mentioning them. My targets were dog park, a penguin whirligig, and a photograph. Other attendees were Philip and Carla. They all read their pieces to me over the phone.

    Friday, September 9, 2011

    Disaster peace...In a submissive line

     

    I hammered words into the page
    like unto
    nails into a cross
    or a stake into a Vampire
    after which there was a calm.
    The page bled for a moment,
    ink in splatters stained my thumb.
    writing writhed in its ropes of horny
    thought, no cruel thorns just roses
    of ides in bloom.
    Disaster gave way to peace
    I had my way with the white page
    with its cruel blocks
    at last crumbled like so much
    feta cheese.
    In a submissive line
    what hero in a Gyro I am
    laughing in Tazaki sauce.



    ---by Phillip of Facebook

    Thursday, September 8, 2011

    Purple Mark continues the writing in the park series - Carla's Story

     

    Happy with Bed Bugs

    I pulled my credit card from my wallet and a little bit of paper fluttered onto the check stand. I handed the card to the cashier, paying [with plastic] for more plastic to deal with my bed bug infestation and she handed me back my fortune.

    "The current year will bring you much happiness."

    Well, the year had started well. I was eager to pursue my plans and dreams and ready to go on January 1. I made a point of following my dad's approach to life. He tries not to let his future slow down its pace and growth, but he also takes care not to rush ahead of it. He believes in making goals but lives in the moment. He and Mom were forty years married. We just celebrated their anniversary and they danced to their favorite song by the Righteous Brothers, the lyrics I've heard them serenade each other with all my life: "If you believe in forever, then life is just a one night stand," Mom would sing, then Dad would reply: "If there's a rock and roll heaven, well, you know they've got a hell of a band," and then they'd kiss. That was the song playing when Dad proposed to Mom. They were flower children, hippies with a van traveling the open road until time turned them into a chemist and a teacher. I considered myself lucky I wasn't called Sunshine or Tarot.

    I was so excited this past New Year's. Jessie had proposed and I spent January having visions of walking wedding cakes dancing in my head. But it was September and Jessie was long gone. A lost job became an excuse to drink and then his parents died at Niagra Falls. They'd been trying to recreate the Kate Winslet & Leonardo DiCaprio "I'm Flying" pose from the Titanic movie and had both fallen over the railings. He went back to live in his family's home and I hear he hasn't stepped outside yet. I was comforted by knowing he had a lot of family to look after him, but clearly life with me wasn't a big enough draw to keep him interested in living. That could be depressing if I let it. But I have my fortune, happiness is a choice, after all. In spite of bed bugs, dead parents, lost fiancés and...Wait on...I heard a crash and turned to look out the shop windows. A black VW bug had backed over my mountain bike while parking and was in the process of trying to detach it from his rear wheels by dragging it forward and back again. Huh...or even flattened mountain bikes.


    ---September 3, 2011


    Written at Cal Anderson Park: Purple Mark’s Write in the Park series.

    Present: PurpleMark Wirth, Isla, Shannon & Philip
    Prompts: Fortune from PurpleMark's an authentic I Dream of Jeannie's bottle, a quote from The Dictionary of the Khazars by Milorad Pavic, Song lyrics, a tarot card (which showed a 3-tiered box with stick arms and legs), and the phrase, "wait on."

    Wednesday, September 7, 2011

    Random Poetry Found While Packing -- 3

     

    Through Clenched Teeth

    It's a jack shit fuckin' day
    the body's at work
    mind's out to play
    the sun's bright
    its great outside
    numbers keep dancing off the page
    I ain't doing fuckin' jack today

    I left in the middle of what I was doing
    cataloging shoes
    ordering inventory
    the phone is ringing
    fuck it
    I don't care
    told that shit head boss of mine
    I needed to go use the can
    ' was too lazy to lift the lid
    I let it piss all over the dam seat
    she can sit in it
    It's a jack shit fuckin' day

    Here alone
    selling z-coils
    no one's come in the door for days
    I need more coffee
    but ten bucks is all she pays
    I ain't supposed to leave
    I'm tired of fuckin' instant
    the sun is out
    Pine Street looks great
    walkers have long legs
    but you know what?
    I ain't doing fuckin' jack today.

    Fuck You Boss
    I'm gonna play



    ---William James, February 22, 2005. The piece was found on Tuesday, August 16, 2011 while sorting and packing

    Monday, September 5, 2011

    Purple Mark continues the writing in the park series - My Mish Mosh

     

    Hitch Hikers Potato Gun Explodes

    Milo was laid up. Down for the count. The potato hit him in the head.

    An old man was working on his truck. When he cranked over the engine, the tail pipe exploded.

    Milo didn’t know what had hit him. His mind was without foundation. They found him face down, greasy, in the Kung Bao Chicken. He was clutching a fortune in his hand. Bloody from shattered glass. The emergency medical crew pried his fingers open with forceps in the ambulance.

    It was a mistake to believe that you could enjoy your company without true friends. The Tarot card revealed it all in his delirium.

    When Milo came too, the nurse was wearing sloppy clothes purchased from Jippies Super Wal-Mart. She looked like Ms Potato Head dolled up in blue.

    Next to the empty vase was a copy of the Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy Milo had stuffed into his back pocket before going on to eat. It was a hot day when he left the house. The grass was brown. That was when he decided to go to the Dragon Gate. On a whim, Milo shoved a potato into a tail pipe of a friend’s enemy’s car parked outside the Rootless Herb Shop.

    Milo wished he’d gone to the river instead.


    ---9/3/11 written in Grand Ronde the prompts given via telephone.


    Purple Mark's Prompts Used:

    Fortune Cookie: Enjoy your company; they are true friends.
    Tarot Card: The one… Mind is rootless and foundationless
    Laid Up: You will discover that for yourself without assistance.
    Douglas Adams: “It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problem just with potatoes.”

    Saturday, September 3, 2011

    Purple Mark continues (where I left off with) the writing in the park series


    A Kiss Is Close At Hand

    A Kiss is close at hand is what the Fortune indicated,
    Yet was this Kiss an actuality or just a Wish?
    He had to think about it for awhile,
    It had been so long since he had shared one.

    His last Lover had told him:“You are dangerous
    Cause you are Honest. You are dangerous cause
    You do not know what you want.”That was too True,
    he was split between Desire and not Desiring.

    It was a curious state of being to Want
    Yet avoid the attachments of Wanting.
    Was he a Narcissist because of this?
    He did not think so, but from the outside it might appear that way.

    He did well with others, but chose to keep them
    At a arms length perhaps to save his Heart
    From the inevitable pains of Heartache.
    So, maybe the Kiss meant that once again,

    He would open himself up to the Possibility
    Of another in his closed existence.
    He thought about it as a collection of Sentiments
    Just as sleep leaves a dusting of sand in the eye.




    ---Purple Mark 09/03/11

    Prompts: Fortune: A kiss is close to hand.
    Card from Love Is God Tarot deck: Think about it for awhile.
    Lyrics: You are dangerous cause you are honest. You are dangerous cause you do not know what you want - U2’Who is gonna ride your wild horses.’
    From the Dictionary of the Khazars pg. 9: Just as sleep leaves a dusting of sand in the eye.

    Friday, September 2, 2011

    Completed Publicly Constructed Sestina

     

    At Yid’s market Za’er bought a half dead cow
    As Za’er opened up Is'eem's gothic toy box
    to crack a fortune out of a cookie, Is'eem, a mystic seer
    gave Za’er a stern warning about the practice of doting
    on strangers. As Za’er drove down Turnbuckle Road
    she thought about George the bull being chased by Charlie, her big black lab

    Yesterday, there was this funny incident that happened at the bovine laboratory
    Cassiopeia, a narcoleptic mucker, fell asleep on the job and the cows
    escaped. All thirty of them were found wandering down the road
    Milky, the prize milker got hit by a tractor and was put in a refrigerator box
    by Mo Ron the trucker. Cassiopeia felt so guilty she doted
    on Milky until she was so exhausted she received a vision like Nostrum the Seer

    Her boss, who nodded sympathetically while sensing the problem by a pc seer,
    said this was not a job she signed up for at the laboratory.
    As much as he understood the nature of bovines she doted
    on, a cow is after all just a cow.
    After sending her home, he removed Bessy (because Milky sucks) from the box,
    and loaded her on the butcher's truck and waved it down the road.

    Is’eem lived at the end of the street, ten miles down a very bad Road,
    only the truly desperate would employ her services as a Seer.
    Her other job was teaching the cows to box.
    A big company wanted her expertise to help them in their Lab,
    But she liked her spread, but her cows
    were like her children on whom she loved to dote.

    Do you remember what it meant to be a doter
    a hitchhiker wandering down stray desert road
    leading on a long chain a string of mad cows.
    If you went to the psyche seer
    She flipped a card that sent you to the lab
    that’s not the worst of it she said reading from the Wheaties box.

    The dust, noxious and aggressive, seeped out of the truck's gearbox.
    It was foolish for him to shun the engine and always on the lacquer dote.
    The cabin was up a nearby hillock, atop which perched a federal lab.
    But this was not a healthy sylvan road
    Tight-lid skies had turned it harsh and it was hard to see the seer.
    The machine faltered, spluttered and then died. The driver Jack Ennui climbed through the heat, his secretary's nagging hit his ears; she'd been right, it was no ordinary cow

    At the lab Za’er found the missing computer in the cereal box
    It was the good stuff they fed the cows the secretary doted
    Over. After a long drive down the road they eventual found Bessy the bovine seer.



    After 222 days the publicly constructed sestina is now complete. The final six line stanza was added by Purple Mark. Other contributors were Carla Blaschka, a visitor from New Zealand or Australia, an anonymous person, and myself. Thank you all for your contributions!

    This was Fun.

    What shall our next one be?