Art du Jour 86

This might win the prize for most minimalist thing I’ve ever done in mixed media, supposing I stop now and leave it alone.  There is no sealer on it yet.  Like that would stop me if I decided to go nuts with the ink sprayers.

Nope, gonna control myself and start something else instead.

The page a day calendars which were supposed to motivate the hell out of me in the form of inspirational blog fodder have been disappointing.  Or maybe I’m just unmotivatable and it’s not their fault.

Take these, for instance, and judge for yourself.

When a guest, don’t be the first to arrive or the last to leave.

Stupid advice if everybody invited takes it seriously.  No one will show up at your door until they see someone else go through it.  Or, towards the end of the evening there will be a mad rush for the exit with no one wanting to be the last one out.  This is why I don’t throw parties.

A little attitude goes a long way.

What does that even mean??  Attitude comes in different sizes?  And where is it headed?

Here’s another funny thing, or maybe I haven’t said anything funny yet, but here’s something else anyway.  I have been blogging for SO long that sometimes people will like an answer to a  Wordpress Prompt that I wrote two or three years ago, because the prompts are being recycled and my post somehow pops up in a search.  And nobody pays attention to dates.  Or however that works.  The more I write today the more confused I appear to be.

So I will leave this alone too and go finish the laundry.  One of these days I will have something astounding to say and something brilliant to show you.  You will just have to wait for it.

 

No Looking Back

 

He leans over the balcony railing with her note in one hand and his half smoked cigarette in the other.  Can’t stay, sorry love, pressing matters, no point waking you up to say goodbye… So many lies.  He wants to believe them and doesn’t know why.

The paper crumples in his fist, drops to the patio stone.  He watches it skitter and dance in the morning breeze.  Imagines her leaving, how she walked, the set of her shoulders, the swing of her hair.  Gone, like that.  With no looking back.

He slowly exhales.  His head hurts.  So does his heart.

**********

Light and Shade Challenge – 100 words inspired by the above picture and this quote:  She tells enough white lies to ice a wedding cake – Margot Asquith

Tell Me Something

Once I believed life was all uphill.

Every day made for gaining ground,

Chasing dreams,

Pressing on to reach the top.

Can you imagine that?

The battle nearly killed me.

What’s so different there?

It looks a lot like here, to me.

 “Tell me something, old friend: why are you fighting?”

 

Stargazing

https://www.flickr.com/photos/nickydoyl/6861479921/

 

Surrender,  let the night embrace us

There is light in deep dark spaces

Inky, pitch black, sunless places

See the truth in the cold night sky

Where Pegasus and Auriga fly

Transforming harsh to calm and kind

Tracking moonbeams where dreams unwind

 

 What’s so amazing that keeps us stargazing?

First Gargleblaster Writing Challenge

Got 42 words?  Click on the link and join the fun.

Selfie

Is this cheating?  Yeah, I guess it is since I’m not this cat.  But it’s just so ME I couldn’t help it.

Cin’s Feb Challenge on Witchy Rambles

Subnivean Meltdown

Welcome to our subnivean world

Where the sun will never shine.

I sense your uneasiness with the gloom.

You wonder why we choose to exist

In this silent and cheerless place.

I will play the morosoph to answer;

The decision was ultroneous,

Simply because we had no other choice.

And now there is nowhere else to go.

Perhaps this is also true for you.

See how our refuge keeps us sheltered and warm?

Here we are safe from the rasorial creatures,

Far from the predators in their bosky copse

And the bitter cold above us.

Here there is little to fear.

Stay with us and let your anger soften,

Your fighting spirit and your bitterness melt.

Bear us no ill will and you will be protected.

You will be one with us.

We will play cockal in the darkness

To while away the winter hours,

Nights and days passing in a fog of promnesia.

I think you will get used to it, this somnolent existence.

If not, the alternative is to leave.

Perhaps to die.

Ah, I see you have made up your mind.

A wise decision.

Welcome to our subnivean world.

~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~

No excuses for missing a Trifecta Challenge since now there will be just one a week instead of two. This weeks word is the 3rd definition of “melt” – to make tender or gentle, soften.

I have never written a blog post with footnotes (and I’m not about to start) but I am including some definitions of weird words of the day from Wordnik so that the above will make some small modicum of sense. I love learning new words.  If you don’t need these definitions – wow, you have a very impressive vocabulary. If you do need them, you’re welcome.  Make these words your own and impress your nerdy friends.

subnivean  – Situated or carried on under the snow, an insulated area between packed snow and the ground where small animals take refuge

morosoph –  A philosophical or learned fool, jester This word comes from a Greek phrase meaning ‘foolishly wise.’

promnesia  –  The illusory consciousness that an event, now happening for the first time, has been experienced before.  Also paramnesia, deja vu

ultroneous – Spontaneous; voluntary, from the Latin ‘ultro,’ of one’s own accord.

rasorial  – Given to scratching the ground for food, as poultry;

cockal  – A game played with the anklebones of a sheep in the place of dice.

bosky – Woody; consisting of or covered with bushes; full of thickets.

Limericks for Jack

Tanner’s Jack, from Morland Brewery (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Why is my life so damned boring?

Yelled Jack, with little forewarning.

His friends didn’t know

But suggested he go

Drink some ale to calm down his roaring.

~~~

Since the bartender never stopped pouring,

Jacks head was soon muddled and soaring.

He fell in a bush

And injured his tush.

It was hard to explain in the morning.

Trifecta Week 106  33 to 333 words using the Yiddish word tush – 3rd meaning – buttocks (slang)

Dear Breathing Space

 

My Dear Breathing Space, Blog of My Life, Disturber of my Good Nights Sleep:

So sorry for blatantly ignoring you lately and being a bad blogging friend so that no one wants to read you because you have nothing to say.  I have lots of great reasons and excuses, but you’ve heard them all before so we’ll just skip that tedious part of this letter and get right to the point, which is my ingenious Plan To Do Better.

1.  Every Monday I will write a poem, giving all of us just one more good reason to hate Mondays.  I will incorporate whatever the Wordnik word of the day happens to be.  I apologize in advance, and will find nice pictures that may or may not be relevant to take your mind off the fact that it’s poetry.

2.  I will do a Just Jazzy 24 Day Advent Calendar from the first of December to Christmas Eve.  It will involve more creativity than putting the numbers from one to twenty-four on twenty-four bottles of red wine.  Although that might also be fun, involving a Christmas I wouldn’t be able to remember…..

3.  I will answer at least one Daily Prompt a week, no matter how hard the topic makes me roll my eyes.  It’s time to stop being such a critic and just answer the damned questions.

4.  Trifecta is brilliant, the writers are brilliant, and it would be brilliant of me to take every one of their challenges.  I will try.  I cannot promise brilliance, but it would be brilliant to have that aim.

5.  I will also try to respond to comments because I love getting them and it’s horrible bad manners not to.  I’m basically a really nice person, albeit a ridiculously lazy one, but being rude is never acceptable.  Why do I keep forgetting that?  It’s not okay.  Smarten up, you inconsiderate moron.

Okay, that’s it.  It’s worth a try.  November was a write-off for a post a day for me.  There was too much to read.  On line and off.  Here’s to a better December 2013 book of days.

Love from your Omnipotent Creator

(who will sleep better tonight, unless she starts worrying about breaking these promises, in which case we can both disregard all of the above nonsense.)

Just kidding.  I love you.

Round Prompt (Photo credit: creativelenna)

 

The Art of Deception

Empty Eyes (Photo credit: Mire74)

***

With craft and cleverness he fought to own her,

With pledges and promises, halcyon gold.

But only emptiness burned from his eyes,

Dangerous, sinister, forbidding and cold.

She put their betrothal on hold.

***

This weeks Trifecta Writing Challenge:    33 to 333 words using the third definition of the noun CRAFT – skill in deceiving to gain an end.

The Closest of Confidants

We were kids pretending, playing roles

Being the characters, wearing the clothes

Making up stories, saying the lines

There were no limits and no confines

But no matter who we decided to be

You were you and I was me.

Together now it seems as though

Our grown up selves are just for show.

The walls come down, the pretense dies

We see through each others thin disguise

No matter how old or long apart

You know my honne, I know your heart.

We are at peace and safe and free

When you are you and I am me.

Prompts for the Promptless:  Honne is a Japanese noun referring to the behavior and opinions someone truly believes in– often displayed with one’s closest confidants.

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