Comet and Ghost Head

one windy October night
long after the sun grew cold

somewhere out in distant space
at cross-quarter point of time

a gathering storm stumbled
upon the great Ghost Head Nebula

Comet Holmes tracked the moon
blazed a trail with dragon flames

the sky split with ghastly light
I prayed ET would phone




Prompt by 3WW, Phone, Stumbled and Windy

fractals

Haunted

feathered ghosts
float over mangroves

white egrets




The Morning Bird Rises, Original Watercolor

'Haunted' Prompt by Writers Island
poetry watercolor

A Halloween Treat - Travels

Gorgeous Gill sent this surprise treat to be passed on to random visitors...

And beautiful Redness, sent it to me! Gotta love bloggers!!

So, with that thought and thanks in mind, I'm forwarding this sweet treat to

This Girl Remembers,

Pen and Sword

and

Michelle

Happy Halloween, Everyone!!

Change ~ Haiku

golden light
spreads diamond dust
decorates frost


iPod plugs
thumbed text blurts replace
porch gliders




Fractal created in Fractal Explorer
Change is the prompt issued today by One Deep Breath

fractals

Sunday Scribblings, Hospital

Eyes
stalk
nurses
pacing man
recognizes cry
primal response to newborn son

gift shop volunteers
candy stripers
cheerful buffers

daughter retrieves
repaired mother from the orderly
executes chair wheelies

Fractal and Digital Photo merged and processed.
Prompt, Hospital, from Sunday Scribblings
poetry and photos

October

wind rains pinecones
needles and hail
twists saplings
shatters old growth

wind unzips the sky
dumps hemlock seeds
to set fresh roots
in farflung spots

wind invisible
as the trail of a bird
spreads within
to strike end notes of time

October Fractal created in Apophysis
Near Year of Tumblewords Blog available at Lulu Publishing
poetry and photos

Winged

One feathered flock of
tumbler pigeons
guide a herd of clouds

to overwrite the
hum of earth’s turning
stage a showy lomcevak

defy calligraphy
of August dawn where
an eclipse marks the spot




Original Watercolor by Sue
Other Abstracts are shown on Art Gallery
Winged is the poem for the Totally Optional Prompts Thursday

poetry watercolor

3WW Poem and Photo

3WW Prompt for this day: care, unexpected, weekend.


an unexpected squall
stormed from the south
screamed past local dopplers
brought ice to our weekend

sassy plovers chilled
feathers flipped forward
exposed goose-bumped skin

crows, too mean to care,
cawed harsh ridicule
before wintry weather retreated
leaving Sunday far behind



Digital Photo. I like this photo but don't know why.
Other digital photos at my gallery on Better Photo

poems and digital photos

Stranger

hard yellow daylight
dropped in her window
harsh wind barked at the roof
tones of irritants rang bells
buzzed out their warning ~
each man she conjures
out of the morning glow
becomes a midnight stranger




Fractal created in Fractal Explorer, edited in IrfanView
This post comes the 'Stranger' prompt by Writers Island
fractals

Two Haiku and Fiery Sunset

For One Deep Breath prompt: 'Closeness'

Four alarm sunset
Hugging tree-pocked mountainside
Flashes unity

clutch of local crones
brown bag Monday at old park
Recall third grade days

Digital Photo courtesy of TKTurner
poems and digital photos

Sunday Scribblings #81

Sunday Scribblings prompted:
I thought I would lighten things up a little bit this week. The prompt this week is: "My first act as Queen/ King of the World will be..."

This is my response but I didn't write it until I watched the nightly news, so my levity lessened:

My first act as Queen of the World will be to demote all queens and kings, rulers and presidents, congress and attorneys.

The next: rescind all laws except for the original Ten. Use them.

If I survive that, repair social security, the infrastructure and send warmongers to a man-made island without food, pensions or communication.

Then I’ll inject drinking water with common sense and kindly thoughts.

Elevate education to the level the world needs. Direct the hackers and spammers to improve communication, software and Internet safety and freedom.

To make life better for the living. I’ll not save everyone by medical intervention only to let them starve while trying to pay their medical bills.

Money spent for meds advertising will be diverted to repair those whom the meds damaged.

A maximum wage rather than a minimum wage could stop the corrupts whose annual income would be capped at three million a year. Surely that would cause them give up their frenetic screwples.

Now at the end of my first day, I’ll go to sleep with a smile of security and happiness on my queenly face. Tomorrow is another day.




Fractal created in Fractal Explorer, processed in IrfanView

Measure of Blue

Lesser finches churn the chill
to a threnody of summer,
ten thousand golden leaves
trill their melody of release.

Impassioned by August heat
and shackled by its passing,
I shuffle through a frosty fall
chastened by its blazing pigments.

This was written for the prompt as posted on Totally Optional Prompts...a totally delightful site!

Autumn Fire, Digital Photo by Sue.

Other Digital Photos at Better Photo Gallery

poems and digital photos

3WW Haiku

Prompt words from 3WW: field, second, hide. Three haiku.

second sharp-shinned hawk
spins circles above the field
feral kittens hide

pickers hide
field of glads blooming
second time

seconds hide
in minutes of hours
field of days



Clock image is a combined digital photo and fractal
poems and digital photos

Message in a Bottle

Writer's Island Prompt for today...

chiming like a sailer's bell
a sea glass bottle
tumbled through the tide

screw top bottle
not the cork of an elite
was salt-sealed tight

an odd natal chart wrapped
a tiny parchment paper
bearing an astrologer's stamp

startling aspects in your chart
send money for the news ~
no return address



Tide Pool, a fractal created in Fractal Explorer

Feel free to visit my Photo Gallery at Better Photo
fractals

Balance Haiku

One Deep Breath is a community of poets writing and sharing haiku, tanka, and/or haibun. Each week we will offer up a new prompt which we hope will inspire your writing.

campfire
shooting stars
loon’s cry

uncurling green
pinch of red
spring blooms

black and white
fencepost sitter
magpie

cave-dark night
absence reigns
hear the sky

The Old Fishing Hole, Original watercolor

Balance. The prompt by One Deep Breath Haiku

poetry watercolor

Scribbling Job

This job might be my best one. Thinking...

I own my time, my chair, my computer and my own clutter but being the boss without employees produces a series of serious downfalls.

For example, when the weather is -20 and the milk carton runs dry, I must take the frigid trek. Hmm. In my other life, I did that, too. Come to think of it...

When my coffee mug is empty, I must push the button that refills it with my choice of flavor. Come to think of it...

When the office needs cleaned, it's always my turn. Come to think of it...

My income is scattered, miniscule and most times has gone missing entirely. Come to think of it...

I am my own cheerleader. Come to think of it...

With the exception of a twice-weekly yoga class and several monthly painting or writing meetings, I rarely see bodies other than family. Come to think of it...

This may well be the best job. Come to think of it...

Fractal created in Fractal Explorer and altered in Digital Image Suite.
Abstract Watercolor Gallery

fractals

Poefusion Friday Five

Poefusion today presents these five words: pinion, mizzle, bloodshot, gypsy, thirsty. In a fit of overwriting exuberance, I attempted to use all five. Sigh.

Titlefree

near the end of the ides
a bloodshot sunset dropped
down the hollow, mizzle
dulled the gypsy soul now

thirsty for love and weary
of the intractable pinion
birthed at the black moon

autumn forged a heady brew
carried angst to light,

set her spirit free

Fractal created in Fractal Explorer, altered in IrfanView.
North of Summer, A Decade of Poetry is available at my bookstore at Lulu Publishing
fractals

Wicking - A Pleiades Poem

Poefusion prompts poets with forms and experimentals. This form is called Pleiades. Visit Poefusion for descriptions, prompts and postings.


Wicking

wicks of low white candles
whisper into the dark
waltz minute by minute
with washboard harmonics
whistled up by the wind,
wise beyond spoken words
willowy shadows bend




Fractal created in Fractal Explorer
North of Summer, A Decade of Poetry is available at Lulu Publishing
poems and digital photos

Paradox

the patron saint of criminals
calls forth the ides of hell and

angels churned from milky whey
spill across horizon’s line

hieroglyphics prick the night
each close re-draws a dawning

infinity begins
where gray covers black and

a white slice of moon on a string
spins the shape of absence

where the past climbs over the future
on the stair steps of Escher

Altered Watercolor

Totally Optional Prompts posting for Thursday.

North of Summer, A Decade of Poetry is available at Lulu Publishing.

poetry watercolor

Old Time Radio

Did you listen to The Shadow Knows? Or The Green Hornet? Or Sky King?

In our kid years, my younger brother and I evaded the nightly 'lights-out' issue in our shared bedroom by using a crystal radio with earphones while we were scared into silence by listening to these ghostly tales where crime doesn't pay and heroes are heroes.

Recently, I purchased a crystal radio but it just wasn't the same. No wonder I was delighted to find these old time radio programs on the Internet at the time I finally splurged and converted to broadband.

A large smile limbers my lips for the entire half-hour of each program. It's one step back and a step forward all in one.





This fractal was created in Fractal Explorer and post-processed in IrfanView.

A Near Year of Tumblewords Blog (2006)is available in e-book format at Lulu Publishing
fractals

3WW Tanka

On Three Word Wednesday Bone posts three (or more) words. The mission is to write something using all of those words. It can be a few lines, a story, a poem, anything... Today, those words are: Initial ~ Knock ~ Weather and I've chosen to write a tanka.


with no warning knock
spring's initial breeze blows in
loosens winter freeze
soothes and softens, wafts away
weather of the icy heart



An ink and watercolor bookmark is shown here.




poetry watercolor
North of Summer, Poetry of a Decade is available at my bookstore on Lulu Publishing

Renewal

strings unbound
tendons are loose
old glue is gone and
connections dissolve

bridges burn black
to castles of ash
a bell jar of wax
winks through night's coma

memories depart
bury the plot of old dust
leave the future behind
...transformed by the dawn




Prompt by Writers Island
Digitally Enhanced Fractal
fractals

Simple Pleasures

impulsive
family cluster
joie de vive

old jokes told
laughing tears rolling
silliness

artlessly
pressed against my arm
child's warm hand

launching spring
sap green sprouts peeking
first robin

coffee aroma
arrival of a new day
possibility




Original Watercolor by Sue...feel free to visit her abstract gallery
Prompt by One Deep Breath
poetry watercolor

Apology 101

Born to bear
a mouthful of sorry,
sown like apple seeds
on bone-dry dirt,
she reaps a paltry crop.
I’m sorry, she said
when masses burned
kiddies went hungry
when elders were uncomforted
companies failed
when people lied
emperors were nude
when relationships shattered.

One day she said,
Sorry,
I have no more.

Heart, unprocessed fractal created in Apophysis
Non-prompt from Sunday Scribblings
Near Year of Tumblewords Blog available in e-book format at Lulu Publishing
poetry watercolor

Birds

stealthy hawk
soars astride thermals
winged eclipse


out of bounds
raven on the wing
lobs cackle



This image is a digitally altered fractal originally created in Fractal Explorer. I have a love/hate relationship with birds due to a few harrowing experiences and this image reflects that.

Birds: the prompt issued for October 3 by Inspire Me Thursday.

fractals