Official DUP NaPo/GloPoWrimo 2020 Competition

EPISODE 9/30

"Captain's Log, Stardate April 9th, 2020

I'm not even sure why I am bothering with this. The power has been out for nearly twenty-four hours now ever since T'PoetsRevenge disabled the entire starship with the Electromagnetic Ellipsis. I might as well be talking into my finger.

Anyhoo, the Vulcaness's quick thinking had saved us from sliding through Typer Space, but now the Stanza is drifting aimlessly through . . ."

THUD

". . . Normal Space."

DUG squinted through a porthole on the starboard side and said, "It appears we have encountered a giant metal object."

The eyes of Bones McTallen became so big, they almost popped out of his skull. "It's an industrial sized tin of Bacon Flavored SPAM! HOORAY! We won't EVER starve! These scrumptious things have no expiration dates!"

True, but only because it was not real food.

McTallen refused to listen to anything other than his stomach. He  recruited rowantree and hepcat into a spacewalk for the purpose of retrieving it. Due to the power outage, Kinkpoet performed a manual override of the Caps Lock, allowing them to exit the ship.

Once outside the Stanza, it was discovered that the giant can was blocking everyone's view of a an even greater object.

"My goodness!" Poppykat Janeway cried out. "That's no moon! It's the Smorgas Borg!"

They all witnessed the gargantuan cube pulsing with lights rapidly approaching.

"It's a trap!" Warfyroo exclaimed ... but it was difficult to take him seriously, because that line was even more blatantly ripped off from Star Wars than the previous.

It was hopeless; everything and everyone was caught up in the tractor beam of the Smorgas Borg, slowly being pulled into its Cornucopia!

9/30

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush

I read myself into your fairy-tale
and head wrote extra chapters,
embellished the new characters
with parental ticks and DNA swabs.
We made our wax dolls but the pins
produced predictable responses.

To keep a princes's tired hand
any King would demand a quest.
I forged my own folded sword,
rode elephants into distant battles.
Brought back my own severed head,
and a quiet that looks for noise.

When happily never ever fails
the poison needs to be sucked and spit,
the apple needs un-eating.
My castle was just a gatehouse to you,
happy to be the keeper, and so the bluebird
sings and sits on a white picket fence,
content with what he brings to the garden.

9/30

[ NapoWriMo 2020 Collection ] Survival

Qinghai,Tibetan Plateau  
Guliya Ice Cap, 12,979 BC  

[ . . . ]

Part II – Denisovans

Baishiya Karst Cave
10,761 ft above sea level  
Ganjia Basin, 12,979 BC

i

Flames engulfed lumped charcoal—
spitting, smoking, crawling
across a rock ceiling, dissipating
down the high altitude's throat

Below, the Ganjia Basin—
salt marshes, deposits
and sparse desert vegetation
covered in ice, gave rise
to extended hunting parties

Positioned on a goa skin
a woman threads a red deer
tooth pendant with a bone needle—
while an adolescent girl carves
a chloritolite bracelet
with a flint bladelet

White-bellied rats could be heard
above the crackling fire—
their foraging sound echoing
from the cave's stony bowels  
. . .



Words; 84
Unique: 74

#9
Gusty Weather

weather man
said twenty-one miles per hour with
gusts of twenty- seven

relentless wind
continuous now for
twelve hours

twenty-one miles per hour
gusts of twenty- seven

desiccating desert draft
howling without
remorse

toppling furniture  raising
towering
swirling dust devils

twenty-one miles per hour
gusts of twenty- seven

birds flying
sideways
off course

once we found
a pelican on the
golf course

two-hundred
miles from
the nearest ocean

twenty-one miles per hour
gusts of twenty- seven

tried to fly
a kite but the
cord came off

the spool so fast
feared it was
going to catch fire

twenty-one miles per hour
gusts of twenty- seven

weather reports are
often somewhat
inaccurate

today is no exception
wind gusts surely more
than twenty-seven mph

my neighbor just
flew by the window
without her broom

twenty-one miles per hour
gusts of twenty- seven

(nine of 30 - Official DUP NaPo/GloPoWrimo 2020)
omphalos

i have been more than ready
i know because

the stars look like
street lamps, lighting

yellow tails of comets
black holes biting

my way out of
befuddled expanse
often driving me into
a dark astrophysical
place where I know
is not my home

but the hub of my
distress.

with my path now
illuminated &
mapped out
i can swap
illusion for ascent
to the multiverse

my celestial
sanitorium
awaits. . .


__________________
#NaPoWriMo2020
70 words  
58 unique

9/30

Calling on Gods I Don’t Believe in

my sleep paralysis demon
is an asshole
poised at the edge
of my bed,
ready to catch me
unaware,
in the space between
dead and alive;
we’ve been playing
this cat-and-mouse game
for three decades now;
we met when I was sixteen,
and like most of my choices
in the opposite sex,
I used all his red flags
to make my own bindings

he’s the hunter
watching his prey
from afar, waiting
for the perfect shot;
he enjoys the sport,
dreaming of my head
mounted on his wall
in the empty space
where he already has
my name engraved;
traditional in his proclivity,
it makes him downright giddy
when I struggle
against my restraints;
fear mixed with a generous
dollop of loathing
makes the meat sweeter,
and he’s always hungry

my mind rouses
to consciousness,
but my body
is made of stone;
wickedly gleeful
in his whispered tales
of death and destruction
and everything
I’m most afraid of;
his single voice
made of thousands
reaches ears
that can’t retreat,
and I often wonder
if he’s ever going
to get to the point

gooseflesh rises,
my skin stands
at full attention;
a cold sweat breaks
across my brow;
my futile attempts
at moving are thwarted
by limbs dried
in cement;
calling on gods
I don’t believe in,
he feeds on my terror
while I scream silently
from my useless mouth

Unique Word Count:  159

9/30

Sleepless Nights in The Devil’s Playground
The 4 Horseman

Part 3
The Black Horse:

His eyes are sunken
His nose is flat
His teeth are black
His head is shrunken

His clothes are ragged
His stomach grumbles
His feet are bagged
His walk is stumbled

His breath is rancid
His body has sores
His diet is planted
His life is chores

He sleeps with bugs
His food is trash
He longs for hugs
He has no cash

His sign reads help
His soul cries despair
His life needs help
His attitude is fair

His lifestyle was grand
His pockets were full
His integrities in hand
His job had pull

His family was loved
His kids well cared
His bills were gloved
His influence was sincere

Famine is his name

scribbles in a poet's diary #09
(09 of 30—Official DUP NaPo/GloPoWrimo2020)

09 of 30

scribble #09:  fruit of the womb, odessa comes

papayas
sweet mid spring tropic fruit
so mild from pulp to shoot
with peppered seed, gut flora kind
bright orange clad its rind
bananas—
ripe finger berry rows
cavendish, apple, gros
michel, robuster, lakatan
—share dna with man’s
hosanna

fruit of the womb, odessa comes
kiss nectarred by peach, pear, and plums

© Copyright 2020 April 09
by Clyve A. Bowen♫
_________________________________
NaPoWriMo2020—April 09
Total Words 52
Unique Words 50

I misnumbered as #6 and #7, #7 and #8 yesterday.

9/30
Bad Ideas

There is a hum in the air
Palpable when
The professor walks into a room.

A hush of quiet --
A gaggle of girls ready to giggle
At the next dry quip,
The typically bored boys sitting straight
Both in fear and respect.

Mr. D.
History.
Solid chest and firm arms,
A half-smile and dance moves probably as
Lethal as his combat skills --
Won him a few battles as well,
Left a few women and men wounded,
Scarred…
Marked and barely walking…?
Probably?

Ah, stupid head!

Every word in class was warm honey
And wood after cool rain
At dusk…
Hot chocolate and soft pillows of
Marshmallows melting
Me.

I tilt my head and stare at blue green waves
That stared back, back when we swayed
To a band and their Beach Boys cover --
Stared back when a clever bird chased me to
Crashing into him.

(I wondered what it would be like --
A further crashing and burning.
A more involved swaying…)

A girl's laugh brought me back to the present.

A hand up next,
And the questions flood again --
Amidst the whats and whos,
And especially history's whens  --

There
Are multiple versions of a question even I
Would like answered:

"Is there a woman in your life, Mr. D?"

And as if he
Can hear the crazy ramblings of my head,
He looked at me --
Quirked an eyebrow
And shot me a knowing half-smile…

Goddammit, stupid head.

My cheeks warm --
And all the bad ideas start up again.

256 words
171 unique

# 9 of 30

Covid19: Brother's Birthday

April Nine is my youngest brother's birthday
And since we live far from each other
We only greet each other through a phone call for every important occasion in our lives
But today I failed to make a call
And I almost forget his birthday until I saw a post from my memories on facebook for the last two years

Since this pandemic
My sleeping pattern has been changed
I have become an insomniac
I wake up late each day and start my routine in the afternoon
Whatever I have thought of doing for the day slips from my mind like making a simple call to my brother to greet him
I'm glad there's  Facebook to remind me of important  dates and memories  to remember when my memory fails me

9/30
A Poem Without Title

I’m not sure what this poem is about
it could be about anything and everything
things that matter without pitter-patter.
In the dust, in the gust without much fuss
and it will never be construed for its depth
or linguistic artistic expressions.

Revisions, provisions or any kind of vision
envisioning the worse like blank piece of paper
mockingly grinning in its invisible threads
despite the ink splattering in the brain;
a Pollock painting disrupting all the grey.

But what does it really matter
without a subject and ample time
when I can’t even weave
two words to make a rhyme.
Ahavati tells me to just write
unfurling
uncurling
unctuously
unassuming
ad lib!
O’ so liberating
on and on and on…
To pour wisdom and elegance
like the greats: Keats, Poe and Loa
timeless thinkers and takers
inhaling earth’s grime and dirt
exhaling beauty and wonder
back to universe.

Although, I’m proud of the title
It’s everything
if nothing.

Original
unique
unpretentious.
Perhaps I’ll call it
“New and improved’
Soliloquy
solely
mine at qua.

09/30
la vie de bohéme ~ {v}

from the shroud ov my withers, bath'd in
blood orange {&} pomegranate seeds:-
wring my bloodlessness like an avian throat
into clawfoot'd bowels ~ in which we steep
perfum'd as tho illusions ov cleanliness
could mask how monstrous we are___ down to the marrow
when our skin has been flay'd from burnt bone
contort'd, warp'd by the hellfire ov us as we
pyrograph our dysfunction across
each other's corneas
{&} look at the world thru gore shap'd glasses

#9 of 30

The fingered flea

You solstice on the blood,
on the crane’s bill,
If I could just let its veins wander,
let them jar between the jamb and the sill.

Setting  snow on fire,
in june-bug assassinations
moon-drugged catechisms
caught in the syrup around a lash.

Was a dirty child once,
was someone’s reason,
nudge,  wink and  whistle;
what was desired,
what was expected turned into a lifetime.


this self-attachment being the first sign of madness
flinging, yearning to keep rhythm
with the counter beat
of god’s clicking yellowed finger.

61 unique words of 91 total

9/30

[ NaPo 2020 ] In So Many Words

IX.

When the fight is taken out of you

resistance removed from the
equation = energy no longer
channeled into creation of
obstacles

which affords All That Is
all the opportunity in the world
to get a word in edgewise

Or words, I should say

A whole lotta word play

I was awakened

by Ahavati, tugging me loose
from my home spun sleeping bag

We had fun!

Still do after three years!

And while poetry
being artful communication
keeps us knitted tightly
into one other's lives
it is but one tie that binds us

for I immediately knew
though here in free willed
challenges of her own design
she was sent to help me find
the EXIT from this house
that Jack built

A-maze-ing — its construction

Minus the Minotaur, of course

Time was at hand
to stop being so bullheaded and
accept this gift of companionship—

allow myself to be friended by an honest
woman worthy of the name Arachne
with her Ariadne's thread unspooled

instead of falling for the same old lines
I had strung myself along with

In so many words

Not all Greek tragedies end in disaster