Official DUP NaPo/GloPoWrimo 2020 Competition

2 of 30

Bound

Fog takes center stage
as time is truly lost
bled out into the wild
where souls are bound then tossed

day into night into day
a thirty six hour affair
one enters
then disappears

cold steel, spiked with violent heat
mystical moments melding into place
warm lips centre
a forgotten human race

we're stuck
open palms impressing upon bare bottoms
tops rising to the god
the machine spins and we cycle

eyes mist towards the wonderment
has spring begun her rise
it's not goodbye nor hello but happiness
that waits for tomorrow's song

2 of 30

"I Could Eat that Off a Bumper!"

We don’t ask for much
from each other.
We demand all the
given things:
respect, loyalty, friendship,
pleasure.

But everything else has just,
over the course of fourteen years,
settled into place.

So when you asked for
never before made
Orange Dreamsicle 45th Birthday Cake,
I knew I would oblige.

The vanilla flavors, I had under control.
But orange?
You don’t do anything,
at all in life,
artificial.

Research kept telling me:
orange soda, orange extract, orange oil, orange….

I started looking at orange jelly, marmalade, compote, curd.
Then, by chance in our weekly
middle of nowhere
grocery store wander,
blood oranges were on sale.

“What’s the difference between oranges
and blood oranges?”
We didn’t know.

That evening, together (just like everything else),
divine red juice dripped
from our fingers.
Standing at the sink we laughed
and kissed
and shared new.

Watching you peel another orange
eyes crinkling with laughter,
and wayward juice,
I knew this was meant for cake.  

With a whisper of a recipe,
I dived into a concoction
of blood orange zest and juice, a lemon,
egg yolks, and butter.

“I’ve never made a curd before!”
Stirring and stirring and stirring
until forever seemed to pass.
“It includes sugar. You’ll be fine!”
My ever encouraging love.

When I declared it done,
you declared
“I could eat that off a bumper!”

Three things found me that night:
My own recipe for blood orange curd,
a perfect orange flavor for an orange dreamsicle cake,
and the knowledge that love
will try new things.

#2
At Roost Oh Ray (an nun scents poe m an dee anguish languish)

(Eye am  bagging  in thee
poe ant tree campy tension
wet a disk lamer:

Reed an privet.
yore murdering  fodder
may nut udder stand.

Reed oat load
an yule udder stand
bedder.)

At roost oh ray

Yore nut gun two
be leaf disk tory.
(Debt’s jest hormone nurture)

Wan loaf lea moaning
eye rows earl lee,
bout son rice

Halve as leap
eye herd
an noggin.

Noggin noggin
noggin noggin
ad deaf rondo.

An rite dare
on may  bet, ware
a rave in.

Aye larch,
shine knee
rave in.

Inner rave in
sate berry cheerily
“in ever more”.

Wail, eye toad ewe
ewe wooden
be leaf  disk tory.

Be leave adore
nut
it’s true.

Lake adore nut,
eats yore joist.

An reel member:
poe ant tree dozen all ways rime
an dozen all ways make scents

But poe ant tree
yews you lea
antler taints.

(translation follows below)


A True Story (a nonsense poem in the english language)

(I am beginning the
poetry competition
with a disclaimer:

Read in private.
Your mother and father
may not understand.

Read out loud
you’ll understand
better.)

You’re not going to
believe this story.
(That’s just human nature)

One lovely morning
I rose early,
about sunrise.

Half asleep
I heard
a knocking.

Knocking knocking
knocking knocking
on the front door

And right there
on my bed, was
a raven.

A large,
shiny
raven.

And the raven
said very clearly
“never more”.

Well, I told you
you wouldn’t
believe this story.

Believe it or
not
it’s true.

Like it or not.
It’s your choice.

And remember
poetry doesn’t always rhyme
and doesn’t always make sense,

but, poetry
usually
entertains.

#2 of 30

Indulgences that do not belong.

This field in its wash-basin’s verdigris;
its thick ablution of the mistle
buried in the fur.
Then the Proustian morning
pallor in the milkweed,
in the tea.

A wristful of cufflink marks
and a memory of a pearl string snapping
under a stampede of clumsy hooves.

If I could only drape the tapestry clean.
But I lost all the details.
I had forgotten all the drama.

The sealing wax in the squinting
of whatever this colorblindness is,
what its shyness is, hardens.

Hesitant
I see your earth
coming through the moor.


54 unique words of 92 total

2/30

The Every Day: Hair

The mirror and I...
poor bedfellows.

What I see is a
great imposter, staring
at me with my
own eyes.

Change has
been a lesson
in acceptance; and it’s
hard to accept.

My identity-
wrapped
up in my hair.

Tightly wound.

How did I miss
that detail? Why did
an uncontrolled
mass of
black curls define me?

Why did I care...

Shaving my head
was the pinnacle
of self
loathing. Unwanted,
yet necessary.

Bald is beautiful!

Right. I wouldn’t
be caught
dead without a cap (No
difficult task, considering).

Re-growth is a shocking
study in silver (I’m told
girls pay top
notch for this color).

Congratulations.

Will you be growing
old gracefully?

I suck at graceful.

I’ve heard that a
woman’s hair is
her crowning glory.

What is my
crown now?



* NaPoWriMo 2020*
85 unique words
132 total words

2/30

Dancing With the Inevitable

the face of my impending eclipse
glares back from the deep,
fashioned from my shadow
hand-stitched with memories
caked in dried mud
(cold comfort at its finest);
the abyss calls my name
using that dangerous, seductive tone,
enticing me with the sway of melodies
that loudly mask the cadence
of feet shuffling automatically
towards cymbal-crashing crescendo -
the rising tempo of the inevitable;
it’s never been a thing I can ignore
with any degree of success
-or maybe I just won’t,
(it’s hard to tell sometimes)
the tapping on my shoulder
never ceases;
the trick, I suppose
is to simply get better at pretending
it isn’t standing behind me
waiting to dance

Unique word count:  86

# 2 of 30

Covid 19: Faith in God

In this trying time
When all efforts have been exhausted
When all means have been tried
We can only wait
For this darkness to fade
For light to break through
For miracles to unfold

We can only hope earnestly
For divine intervention
To deliver us from this pandemic
To lift us from these grounds of misery

We are powerless against our unseen enemy
Our vast knowledge
Our enormous wealth
Our power on earth
Are rendered meaningless
When this enemy breaks us

In the face of grave danger
When our life hangs in the balance
Only our faith can sustain us
As we surrender everything into His hands

For only God has the ultimate power
Over all things
On earth and in heaven

2/30

[ NaPo 2020 ] In So Many Words

II.

Now, that actualized individual
holding the space
where innumerable paths diverge
towards potentially prosperous
Future outcomes is actually
me

... which means the other fellow?
trying to get his attention??

Well, so is
he

I suppose that sounds
a bit convoluted, as if
we
were people counting three

Let this be assured to everyone
despite a track record of running around
in poetry circles as other personas—
such isn't the case

I am not

because for as long as
I can remember, I was
A  L  O  N  E  R

all of which was immediately forgot-
ten about when My Love manifested
in the form of a woman three years earlier

See,

in so many words

I'd become a whole person
again through her

#2 of 30

Hopes & Dreams


My travels to the stars of hopes & dreams!
For in my mind I’ve walked the galaxy;
The spiraling adventures of extremes
Were marvels to a vision I could see.

It showed what I could be & crystalized
My travels to the stars of hopes & dreams.
The people that I’d meet were mystified;
They never thought it possible, the themes!

I had an “aha” moment for a scheme,
And asked who’d like to go when I assign
My travels to the stars of hopes & dreams’,
They shouted instantly ‘where do we sign!’

It’s been a century since that was said,
There’s only two of us sharing our memes:
(We still meet twice a year, the rest are dead)
My travels to the stars of hopes & dreams.

2/30
Origin of Friendship

Liquor in his hand, the drunkard sat
and listened as she told it from the start:

In the final days of that most recent flood
when all of us, displaced, corralled, encamped
felt the force of hunger in our pits,
when also was the White Plague freed from ice,
I first met Hul, the boy who trailed The Man.
Though monstrous was The Man, who cained and beat
as though we poor were mongrels, groveling
at supper-time, embarassing the master,
young Hul would look upon his master’s works
with pangs of empathy behind big eyes
that cruelty trained to mute as best it could.
Though all The Man abused, Hul’s pity graced,
with me alone was he compelled to act.
I, too, was green and little then. But seven years
had passed, my skin so relatively thin,
and yet we knew, despite our age, the weight
upon our lives the other would exert.
Just as the planets tether moons against the void,
so we against the grave, in orbit, swayed.
For I was small and brave enough to risk
and steal from underneath The Man his crumbs,
divided them amongst us after hours
to stave starvation, so for months we’d lived.
One night, The Man arose to find our feast,
and sloughing off his sleep emerged enraged.
Then pulling me by collar dragged me in
the horrible seclusion of his tent.
Delivering a blow he rendered dumb
what wits I had, and in the state,
I watched as he prepared my punishment
to teach me what my place to him should be,
through knowledge I would never seek to know,
an apple shoveled down my child’s throat.
Holding fast my child’s wrists in vain
I kicked, then suddenly was free again.
Opening my eyes I saw his own,
some sudden shock had widened them; he fell,
and standing in the shadow he had cast
was Hul, a knife besmeared with blood
clenched in his fist, his eyes alight as well.
He spoke then, or rather tried to speak,
but when he raised his tongue the sudden shock
prevented words to flow. No matter that--
his impulse was, to me, the beauty of
a thousand wordless poems of relief.

scribbles in a poet's diary #02

(02 of 30—Official DUP NaPo/GloPoWrimo2020)

scribble #02:  odessa keeps fresh vigil still

second chance
though fallen in life's race
rising is no disgrace
odessa keeps fresh vigil still
upon her little hill
sing and dance
your burden clouds away
'tis april's second day
two-timing challenges will come
death rents an empty tomb
in advance

but april when spring skies are blue
humours no random rendezvous

© Copyright 2020 April 02
by Clyve A. Bowen♫
___________________________
NaPoWriMo2020—April 02
Total Words 53
Unique Words 50

2/30

...Flow Into the City

There is a calling.
So I bought a ticket to far away from here --
Beyond old dreams,
Beyond the sea --
While keeping my bones with me,

And my inks and pages.
To newness in the old --
To the city,
Bustling electric and mythic --
That people wonder where God's
Mind was when its walls were built,
When its seeds were sown,
When its seas were filled.

Wonder where the devil's mind was when its night sparked to explicit life,
When its passions caught fire,
When its men where swimming in its power.

Mine --
Was in awe,
Shaking at the rattling of my safety and
My lonely --

Radio me alive, would you kindly?
New city, new atlas --
Thrumming parties at midnight,
Midnight transactions in unmapped alleys.

Then --
Whispers of dames and gents about
Knights from beyond flying
The skies --
And magic sparks
From under the sea
Sang about by girls playing 'ring around the rosie.'

Your reputation precedes you, city.

Your newness might save me
To the skies,
Your newness might drown me
To my death,
Dear,

All these I knew when
I let my dreams
Of all good things
Flow into the city...



192 words
115 unique

2/30

4 Walls


You used to make me feel so safe
With no care in the world;
A refuge all my own
Secured when the doors were locked.

You were my fortress, my castle
The guardian of my body;
Any insecurities I felt
Were dropped off at the door.

My birthday suit was my best garment
My invisible robe of kingship;
All that I owned were my subjects
Gracefully bowing upon my command.

The sea within my bath
Expedited my pirate excursions;
My rubber ducky was my vessel
Plowing through the waves.

My TV instigated my mind
A colorful rainbow of excitement;
Immersed with infinite obsession
Chain-linked to my ps4.

My bed was soft and cozy
An unbridled cloud of relaxation;
An elopement of dreams and innocent thoughts
Boogying to their amusement.  

Now there’s a threat to my existence
Cutting strings to my sanctuary;
Everyone is getting sick
And this quarantine is full of ….

So now that safeness I felt in you
Is replaced with bitter insanity;
Its been days on end since I left you
Claustrophobia is setting in.

I can’t deny that I’m not safe
But you’re becoming more like a prison;
My loyal subjects that I once loved
Have now betrayed me like prison guards.

My bath is no longer enjoyable
Its only use, to keep me clean;
My care-free play time is washed away
My rubber ducky now sits alone on its dry docks.

My birthday suit is now subdued
Always clothed with fitted p-jays;
My royalty is mocked with boredom
But this new found time is just embarrassing.

My bed no longer feels as safe
The care-free dreams are now a nightmare;
The softness has turned to stone
As my body aches from sleepless nights.

My ps4 is my only savior
Keeping me sane enough to battle this boredom;
Video games, movies and Netflix shows
Is the only thing I care about.

I still love you my 4 walls
But once this Covid-19 is over;
I’m getting far away from you as I can
Only returning when I need to sleep….