By starlight she scales the walls to right the wrongs of evil men, fully masked, cloaked by night, emboldened by years of inequity. A virgin widow determined to defend the oppressed and forlorn, she must fight her own instincts by day and bide her time under the withering weight of custom. A knight for the suffering meek, a flower who must learn to bloom.
@Home Studio – 203rd poem of the year (Based on the Korean drama Knight Flower.)
Jang, Tae-yoo. Knight Flower. Lee, Hanee, Lee, Jong-won, Kim, Sang-joong, Lee, Ki-woo, Base Story, 12 Jan. 2024.
Runner ups for the Knight Flower photos to accompany my poem:
10,000 American military women served in Vietnam and risked their lives right alongside the boys sent to die in the boonies and crash in the Hueys and swelter in country. Doctors, nurses, air traffic control, intelligence, not to mention the civilian women who were news correspondents, or worked for the USO, Red Cross, Special Services, Donut Dollies, the list goes on… witnessed the atrocities of war, the wounds that have yet to heal, the loss of limb, life, sanity, and humanity that stole the future of so many who perished there in the jungles or continued their descent to despair for years to come thanks to Agent Orange, depression, Hep-C, cancer, and a big giant dose of PTSD. And then they were welcomed home by jeers, protests, being spit on and insulted, reviled for their sacrifices, and despised for their acts of service. They were lied to and lied about, but mostly they lied to themselves to survive each day; how else could they believe that all would be well, and unfortunate sons and daughters would get together and be alright?
@Home Studio – 199th poem of the year (After reading The Women by Kristin Hannah.)
Hannah, Kristin. The Women. St. Martin’s Publishing Group, 2024.
Runner ups for the Vietnam photos to accompany my poem:
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:
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