National Poetry Month--Dia Nueve--Royal Rhyme--The Battle Royale--Free Verse--The Aftermath

 

 Today it's going to be a Royal Rhyme, a form of septet. I know. I had no idea either. So I went here. Then I came back and wrote this:

The Battle Royale

 

No one wakes the badger up

Unless they want a fight

Not he, his wife, nor any pup

Or risk a vicious badger bite

Lions, cobras, feel his might 

Also hippos, humans, and the bees

If you try and capture him he flees

The honey badger is a pro

At getting out of places

He uses rock or mud or hoe

And flaunts it in our faces

To make his escape he races

To fetch his favorite honey

On his success I would bet money

©2021 by H. Linn Murphy

 I wrote this second one as a freestyle poem--sort of an answer to yesterday's Claw poem.

 

 

THE AFTERMATH

The Claw came not yesterday

They must have been busy

I should have gone over to 

Gather the things

I wanted to liberate. 

But sometime in the night,

The metal fairies came

And took the items

For which I'd shopped but not 

Taken away

Except for the glass

Because none of us

Could get the screws out.

Now I hear the scrape of the claw

It's jaws devouring

All in its path

Hungrily chomping into

The broken and forgotten

Couches and shelves

Chairs and lives

Messy eater, The Claw

It leaves behind 

The little things

Like screws and splinters

And things the owners

Can clean up themselves.

Things we should have

Taken care of

But were too busy

Or lazy

Or overcome 

To fix.

Those things

The Claw leaves

For second chances.

 

Every year I vow again

To beat The Claw

To the good stuff

And every year

I let what people think

Effect the way I act.

Someday soon,

I'll stop being embarrassed

For finding new ways

To value old things

Others have not 'seen.'

Instead of watching 

The Claw devour them.

Someday soon

I will be the one 

Reaching down

To liberate the unwanted

Because of the potential

I see in their hearts.

Someday.

©2021 by H. Linn Murphy

 

National Poetry Month--Day Huit--Octopoem--The Claw--and more

 

Today it's an Octopoem. If you'd like to know more about this poetry form, go here. To explain today's poem:  During Brush & Bulky Pickup in this city, The Claw comes to crunch into people's old couches and giant screen TVs to lift them into the trash compactor. Highly entertaining at a very cheap price. Here it is:

The Claw

In the shell pink of the morning we hear The Claw's silvery jaws devouring the piles.

It's spring, when the buds are new, when the weight of winter has fled to the edges of the year 

Down the street and up the lane it comes, roaring as it crunches, filling its belly.

Rain or the ubiquitous sunny days make no difference to The Claw's hunger.

We run out in sweats or jammies (luckily no towels) to watch the beast crunch into people's junk.

It devours couches and entertainment centers, boxes of flotsam, drifts of branches, broken chairs.

The Claw tempts Hoarders (not my husband) to release their broken bits to fill the maw.

We have in the past taken popcorn out to watch the spectacle. No time! It's coming!

©2021 by H. Linn Murphy

And an extra, in the vein of our DEAR Dr. Seuss:

AVOCADOS

Avocados are the best

Better than the bestest rest

I would eat them in the rain (if it ever did that)

I would eat them on a train.

I'd spread a burger with their flesh

With everything the fruit does mesh

I'd eat them bathing at the beach

And on a cliff if I could reach

Avocados make me grin

They improve most all I have them in

The hubby thinks they're pond scum icky

He's just so incredibly picky

Avocados are super food

Potassium in them is really good

Bananas I need not consume

With avocados in the room 

Give me elegance of gooey green

And I'll stop being hater mean

Avocados make my day

Unless they're 'off', what can I say?

©2021 by H. Linn Murphy