All writing

To figure out who's pot, who's kettle,
no need to use a color chart.
Whichever one is tougher metal,
the clue for telling them apart
is neither color nor complexion;
nor is there need for vivisection.
For the solution, look for sound.
That's where the answer will be found,
because you see, though both may bristle,
too hot to handle without gloves,
do not let pushes come to shoves:
the one will boil; the other, whistle,
and you will see, as like as not,
which one is kettle, and who's pot.

buttons and knobs, chrome and metal
union jobs, 'lectric kettle
future seemed permanent then
where did it go to, and when?

Author notes: image from Facebook

Pray tell, but have you heard of any prophet
predicting nearly anything but doom?
Today they're likely running a non-profit,
reach followers on TikTok and on Zoom,
or flying out to Davos on their jets,
to party and test out their new toboggans,
while heretics, still smoking cigarettes,
build barricades and circle up their wagons.
What's left then for a modern Jeremiah,
when everyone who's willing to be saved
is praying to a different messiah?
To free them, they must surely be enslaved.
Good news, though, there's a sale on doomsday clocks.
It's tough out there, for prophets, and their flocks.

One last chance: stay in the water
is he worth it, this young prince?
Dwell on it, Poseidon's daughter.
Every step on land, you'll wince,
live in agony and pain.
What is there but love to gain?

Author notes: artwork from Facebook

if haggis is as haggis does
then one must simply say because
there aren't any rules or laws
that say you can't
(though decency demands a clause --
ok I shan't)

and so I open up my jaws
to ridicule and to applause
and then a gulp of scotch, no straws
and as they chant --
I hear their laughter and guffaws
but can't recant

If God be Love, and Love be kind indeed,
then isn't He the God of tender mercies?
Dispense then with your virtue. Let's proceed
with pleasing Him. I've had enough of curtsies,
of furtive glances and of deeper sighs --
an abbess would be proud of your resolve.
But hunger, real hunger's in your eyes,
a hunger no confessor could absolve.
Shall I then be the shepherd, you the sheep?
Or would you rather have me in the saddle
and let love run its course, so very deep.
Perhaps you're not a stranger to the paddle,
lips reddened by another kind of rush?
A slap? Oh well, at least I've made you blush.

Author notes: Prompt 1

With labels like "fair use" and "prior art",
Derivative defended its existence:
"Oh surely you can tell us two apart?
This nitpicking, this insolent insistence
that every sentence be a pure creation --
are alphabets exempt from this demand,
or do they too require a citation?
How would a reader try to comprehend --
without a common canon on their tongue --
the latticework of paragraphs and commas
that place a given writer's work among
those that transcend their periods; the dramas
that we still cherish -- and their use is free.
How are we then to be, or not to be?"

blood red poppies in her hair
eyes that make you stop and stare
necklaces of gold and garnet
is she Lust, Desire incarnate
down to Earth to reign supreme
or a poppy driven dream

Author notes: image from pinterest

I've been observing expeditions
out to the point of no return.
Despite the challenging conditions,
and often showing scant concern,
they sail in any kind of weather,
with slogans such as "come together",
designed, it seems, to drive apart,
though hard to know another's heart.
Reluctant, or enthusiastic,
what makes these people leave behind
their membership in humankind?
Conformist, or iconoclastic,
what drives the few that want to rule?
The theory of greater fool.

Unauthorized biographies abound,
but I, for one, feel ready for the spotlight.
Am I a worthy subject? Pound for pound,
I'm neither the receiver of a Fulbright,
nor scholar, Rhodes or otherwise. MacArthur
would not have deemed me worthy of a grant.
A laureate gig likely a non-starter,
and I cannot philosophize, no Kant.
And yet I feel that I contain a story;
there's something that's demanding to pour out,
to claim its place in gloried inventory
of masterpieces one can talk about
without having read them. Coffee table.
I'd like to place it there if I am able.

Still looking.

That's what I tell people
when they ask me: where do
you want to retire?

Oh, there's a perfect place.
I can see it as clear as I
can see myself in the mirror.

High up on a granite cliff
overlooking the Pacific
as it fights to claim its
piece of the American Dream.

That's where I'd like to
retire. Right there, where
the eternal sunshine lights
up the angry, futile spray of the
waves, and the bracing wind
fills your nostrils with the scent
of salt and iodine as you sip
your coffee, and you say

dammit, but I've made it,
I've made it to the best
place on Earth, and the stirrings
of the planet's crust way
down below may be a
warning sign, but you can
ignore it, because there's
still time. There's still
time.

Isn't there?

Arithmetic, try as you might to sate her
with decimals and fractions of the whole,
demands more than a common numerator
when adding, as a point of protocol,
uneven parts. And ditto with subtraction.
Multiplication, that it does with ease,
both top and bottom get in on the action,
achieving simultaneous release.
(I might add, parenthetically, division,
the long one, and the short of it, in kind,
when otherwise unwrecked by indecision
won't pay an operator any mind)
So calculating, you might call it scheming,
though I believe that quality redeeming.