Boogie Fever

Boogie Fever by Cornelia DeDona

Make Your Own Book

Meadow Pause

Meadow Pause by Cornelia DeDona

Make Your Own Book

Bossy B’s

Bossy B's

Bill’s biplane

buzzes blind blond bombshell.

Blowsy blueprint

boasts blue-cheese.

Blue whale boggles

bohemian.

Bonze boos boodle.

Bonny buxom bookworm

butters butcher.

Bumptious Bookie

bugs bookseller.

Boor borrows breast plate

brakes bramble branch.

Biological breach

breeds bucolic buddy.

Bulky buttock

bypasses Byzantine bystander.

Warrior Cat

Go to http://hazardcat.blogspot.com/
to see my poem, published 5-7-10

Accruing A's

Accruing A’s

Aseptic arm

articulates assertive

abeyance astride

assassin.

Abandoned arboretum abuts

arid archipelago

anticipating anticlimax.

Antique apothecary

appends appalling

Antler art.

Adios, Adieu, Arrivederce,

Auf Wiedersehn

Aloha!!

Paradise Found

I’m calling down my muse.

He’s calling up the ocean’s warrior fish.

The carp swim.

The tilapias continue to breed.

The golden koi fountain shoots water 24/7

calming the inner crimson and

the outside world dissolves

into pink, indigo

and jade.

The days roll by

flipping their tails at us

circling

jumping and splashing

in spring fed ponds

fertilizing

plum orchids

basting orange

bromeliads and

healthy green papaya

dripping

in the sun.

Gray Dawn

Gray dawn yanks down the covers

and proceeds to pour in light

 shifting the mask.

Emerald cliffs loom from the shadows

sharp points and dark outlines

line up and

demand recognition

as green splashes against gray

waving at an orange beauty

by the water’s edge

blushing content

finally

from the notice.

MOM--Six Word Memoirs

Calms outbursts tucks hanky in sleeve.

A safe port in fierce storm.

Irreplaceable treasure, guards key to contentment.

Uses Seeing Eye dog when necessary.

Pulls rabbits out of hats daily.

The best medicine, money can buy.

Unpaid cook, maid, and phone operator.

Domestic goddess trained on the job.

Gray hair, chipped nails, bright smile.

Sensitive tornado sweeps away unreasonable conflict.

MAY SLips in

May slips in unannounced




humming


bringing style and verve


as last month’s voice loiters


in a sad corridor


released from the cast.


A bouquet of white and purple lilac follows


freshly cut and arranged.


Their sweet scent lingers


long into the night


exciting


young noses


singing


a new song.

Mendacity

Mendacity

detects you from a corner

next to the potted Anthurium,

a poster child for normal behavior

in the ghetto.

It sneaks up and tries to get cozy

then proceeds to suffocate you with an invitation

to ponder

justifying past deeds,lining them up for the firing squad

aiming for the whites, in a sea of gray.

Drowning in delusion

it comes up for one last gulp

one last vain attempt,

to stay alive.

Lawns Horses and Pigs

We moved into our new, old house in 1985.

A new adventure, on
a dead end road in the country,
away from the noise and traffic,
a piece of the rock to call our own.
2.1 acres that we had to rope and tame
rough doesn’t even begin to explain it.
Imagine carving out a lawn with hand tools
and brute strength and doing it after work with lanterns into the night.
It took years to even think about having a lawn,
fifteen years to be exact, by then we had two houses
and a three car detached garage.
Add fruit trees, flowers and a pond not to mention a giant lawn.
Our ancestors would have been proud.

In the beginning we purchased a bull
and went to work.
During the day we had our business to attend to
Roofing and Vinyl siding, when it was slow we painted and did interior renovations, hell we did it all.
After work sometimes by flashlight
we would pull weeds, and hack away at California grass
about six feet high tough and tangled
choking upon itself in the humid tropical clime.

Bully the steer was our first new addition to the family, and then before I knew it we had Billy and Jennifer, two goats and then chickens and roosters, not just any chickens mind you, we had feather dusters. After that the ducks came along, six of them, and they would be joined by six geese, two horses Beauty and Hoku, which you couldn’t ride just one, both had to ridden or else, and I began to think the farm life was for me--except for one thing

I object to ducks swimming in my pool-- too much poop
and with the poop came the flies, so many flies
that I couldn’t enjoy laying out by the pool in the sun after work when I wasn’t doing anything--yeah right!

Oh and did I mention the pig--

did you know that horses and pigs don’t get along?

Excavating Bones

Inspired by Poem a Day--Academy of American Poets April 2010 and by Spencer Johnson's, "Who Moved My Cheese."

Excavating Bones

Skeleton in ice

gently thawed

and cradled;

hair
and bone

worn down to marrow.

Frigid strength

icy lover;

your contact sears

callous scrutiny.

I can hear your muffled scream

preserved

in time’s frosty cavern,

concealed in cheese

station C, and me

in E, advanced and alone.

Caterpillar Dreams

Caterpillar Dreams

Inch your way

on tiny feet

climb into the tree of dreams.

You are not yourself

the monarch lurks inside.

Spin

a strong silk pad.

Sleep,

you are not yourself

the monarch lurks inside.

Hunger for

red clover

goldenrod and

fluttering breezes

beneath the cool shade

of the

stately palm.

You are not yourself

the monarch lurks inside.

Awake

from nature’s baptism.

Shed your former skin.

Declare your magnificence.

Dance atop

yesterday’s fragile petals

soar into the callous wind.

Fly

dazzling insect.

Show off your large

tawny orange and black wings.

Rise

potent prince,

wander throughout the provinces.

You are magnificent.

You are Mozart’s Symphony No. 40 in G minor.

Fly brilliant monarch,

Fly!

Compost at Dawn

Up at Three—not a pretty sight!!


They say the older you get the less sleep you need.

I’m here to tell you that they are WRONG whoever THEY ARE.

It is a bald faced LIE.

Those THEY’s need a good bitch slapping

and I know just the person to do the job.

No thinking about it or talking it over--just a grim reaper.

That’s what you get when you mess

with a crazy person—two shots directly

into the brain—no questions

no dilly dallying

just cold hard steel

right between the eyes

and then I’ll go work in my garden,

start a compost pile.

Don’t you love fertilizer?

The flowers love it

I can hear them screaming now

pile it on—we’re starving here!!

And by the way--Have you ever heard of this other element—it’s called WATER!!!

We don’t have any feet or THUMBS,

so if you could just

pay us some attention

we will show you

something nice to look at

tomorrow morning,

when you are still awake

and NOT SLEEPING!!

Sneaking up on Roosters

They wander the windward campus

 clucking amongst themselves.

Searching for the most juicy bug, fighting

for crumbs tossed by meandering poets and writers,

breaking for lunch and a stroll.

Intellectual folk who thirst for

candid photos of roosters

and hens, stray cats, grasshoppers or

even dead centipedes, adjusting optical zooms

and praying for that perfect shot.

The shot that will

inspire; stop them dead in their tracks,

produce sighs and email home clearly, to Mom and Dad.

Contemplating the Wind

The wind rises at three a.m.

still drunk as it rushes about

looking for things to stir up.

It snakes the orange and pink bougainvilleas

as it reshuffles their geometry.

It blusters at the Manila palm

who bend and bow

as it howls at the front door

demanding to be let in.

It spews loose sediment

as it turns away

relentless and finally settles

on a blade of grass

and lifts it up

skipping it across the driveway.

A Call to Reason

The thing about reason is it
gets raped from behind;
leaves too many doors open
to getting your head chopped off.
As an infant, we start out with infinite trust
and if we are lucky we leave this world
relatively intact, abused but whole.

Time is the key.

Since the beginning man
has killed. It is instilled
into our hard drives. We learn how to protect ourselves
from an early age something that never loses its
significance lest we fall victim to indifference, obscurity
and terrorists plotting to infuse us with their religion.
We sit on a lower rung
on the ladder of evolution
pushing all the wrong buttons
pondering the ape/man ratio
erasing unpleasant history from memory
like a crack addict obsessed with getting his next high.
We live in a world where
stupidity reigns alongside legalization
brothers on the same see-saw.

Only until we are able to
subdue these primal urges
will we ever be able to move up
the ladder, whether it be here
or as a future virus on a brand new planet.

Time holds the key.

Life in a Glass Bottle

Circa: Earth Day 2010

Life in a glass bottle

longs for a calming breeze

butterflies and bees.

Hears the pop of

daylight, dawning

as it rises yawning.

Is pitched by cobalt seas

and daring fish that please

to give you the evil eye

and consequences ply

as they nudge you

and toss you in the bay.

But then let us say

that you are not tossed and

Abused by the cost

and still float aimlessly about

and get hooked by a snout

of a humpback whale and her calf

out for a laugh

swimming and diving at play

that manage to avoid the plastic nooses

and glass ball cabooses

aluminum cans, fish net and twine

dumped and left behind for

a poor fish to find

strangled alone on the reef

hooked like a thief in the night

By this human blight that litter and waste

proud and uptight, in childish haste

Now concerned about the earth

pondering its worth

on a planet

spewing rebirth.

A Mother’s Strength

A preview from my new book Letters To A Prisoner

Crawls on bloody knees to protect her young

would rather die than betray her child’s blind innocence

chokes on the creaking silence of an unanswered call

lies awake in empty rooms fighting back a flood of tears

summons courage from deserts of dry wells

shows up with a pail of forgiveness every morning

stares down dismay for years on end.

Her love is fierce.

Her love is granite.

She is god.

Shama Thrush

White-Rumped caller flaunts

black feathers, chestnut belly

trills rich shy solo.