(Poem 278 for 2024 – I am writing a poem a day)
If this
was my room,
I would never
do
anything
but nap
and watch
the weather
change her mind
and write silly
poems about
dappled light
and dancing clouds,
and daydream
after reading
old love letters
while listening
to “Bésame Mucho”
on Spanish guitar.
@Home Studio – 278th poem of the year
(Poem 263 for 2024 – I am writing a poem a day)
I’m zipping
through the streets
of Italy
on a motorbike,
past the Colosseum,
looking with my eyes,
not my phone.
Being beside
things built
to last
slows
the pace
of time
to cobblestone
roads
that lead
to fountains
and statues
who’ve seen
many iterations of me
over the last thousand years
gazing back
at them.
Buongiorno,
they cheer across the plaza
to welcome me back again.
@Home Studio – 263rd poem of the year (inspired by an episode of Emily in Paris set in Rome)
Star, Darren, et al. Emily in Paris. “Roman Holiday” Los Angeles, CA, Paramount, 2024.
(Poem 248 for 2024 – I am writing a poem a day)
To be without Beauty
feels plain and bare,
lacking in something.
A presence at once
regal and understated
has gone missing, and
in its place is an ache,
a pang, maybe a twinge
of listless longing for
some undefined touch
of elegance that is both
gracious and aloof,
familiar and unknowable.
@Home Studio – 248th poem of the year
Runner ups for the Losing Beauty photos to accompany my poem:
1. Beauty & Kage on guard duty.
2. Chika, Beauty, & Cotton Eyed Joe snuggling.
3. Beauty & Chika sharing my chair.
4. Beauty holding hands with Kenji.
5. The last picture I ever took of Beauty—Beauty & Aiko holding hands.
(Poem 235 for 2024 – I am writing a poem a day)
Beauty bows her dainty
head to mine, bent brow
an offering of friendship.
She looks into my eyes
with a gaze that says we
know each other’s souls.
@Home Studio – 235th poem of the year
(Poem 190 for 2024 – I am writing a poem a day)
AI Generated image I prompted on Gencraft.com https://gencraft.ai/p/Sa2iIv https://gencraft.ai/p/WKPxbw https://gencraft.ai/p/pOcgWm
The uterus is a universe
of endometrial enchantment,
a whispering womb,
a reproductive realm,
a cervical sanctuary,
and the cradle of life;
the hormonal harmony
in that pelvic paradise
creates menstrual magic
from the ovarian orbit
and fallopian fantasy that
results in a cycle symphony
…until it becomes something else…
a pelvic painscape
due to hormonal havoc
that creates womb woes
due to cervical crisis,
ovaries who are outraged,
frustrated fallopian tubes,
endometrial eruptions,
menstrual mayhem,
cycles of chaos,
a fertility fiasco,
and the reproductive riot
that brings only destruction.
@Home Studio – 190th poem of the year
Runner ups for the Uterus photos to accompany my poem:
(Poem 186 for 2024 – I am writing a poem a day)
Fireworks make my daughter’s emotions swell,
a lump in the throat, eyes fill, heart tight, why?
The beauty of communal celebration, delicate
power on display, explosion of color against a
black background, the artist’s palette consisting
of aluminum and titanium for bright white stars,
copper for the luminous blue, barium for green,
strontium and lithium salts for red, sodium yellow,
calcium orange, the light like a warning, reaching
our eyes a bit before the slower sound can assault
our ears, rattle our chests, and make us nostalgic
for our own births and deaths…the short answer—
she resonates with the message the fireworks
attempt to share, the poetry of imitating the stars.
@Genuine Joe’s – 186th poem of the year
(Poem 137 for 2024 – I am writing a poem a day)
My cat and I had a little talk
before she went into surgery.
I was warned by the vet that
this could be the end for Beauty.
Her heart is now much weaker,
not as strong as it once was.
Removing the growths on her
chest might need to be put on pause.
But my sweet girl is miserable,
I can tell because I know her well.
She needs help, comfort, relief,
my poor lovely, gentle belle.
I told her she’s been so strong,
served as my constant friend.
It’s time for her to rest for now;
let her body have time to mend.
@Home Studio – 137th poem of the year
(Poem 120 for 2024 – I am writing a poem a day)
Our most fragile young
sleep in giant moonflowers
and sip the nectar if they are
hungry between feedings.
When they outgrow the
petal-perfect beds nature
constructed just for them,
they learn to sleep on the
knit hammocks strung
delicately between the
lowest branches of the
swaying willow palm trees.
The cloth is woven from
flower stem silk and the
bedding is fresh layered
petals changed nightly.
Our skin becomes the
fragrance of the flowers,
for we are inextricably
intertwined with the vines
and the leaves and the
fronds and the buds.
Then, when we grow too
old to see the stars with
our own eyes, too old
to hear the song of the
silver sycamore boughs,
too old to feel the velvet
of the lambs’ ear bush,
too old to taste the nectar
of the purple dragonmint,
we enter the heart of the
forest to create a nest of
shaggy moss and jelly lichen
cushioned with sweetgrass
and honey death fungus,
and cover ourselves with
layers of galaxy orchids and
phoenix lilies so we can
join our brother flowers in
eternal sleep.
@Home Studio – 120th poem of the year
Runner ups for the Alien Flowers photos to accompany my poem:
All images created by Rebekah Marshall’s prompts using AI on Gencraft.com website.
All images created by Rebekah Marshall’s prompts using AI on Gencraft.com website.
