Poetry from Julie Jordan Scott

Word Triumvirate

What is a "bad mother poem"?
This word triumvirate has lollygagged in
my mouth and my mind since
I first read it, somewhere in
an interview with someone, some poet
an essay which felt like an interview
She wore glasses, I remember -
a single mom on a single
quest for a single residency
which she won but at the sheer
distaste of an old school ring
leader who lamented, "She has
a child, she might only write
bad mother poetry!"
I put the poet
and the critic
and the everything
about that out of my mind
(Like the critic who
stopped the poetic pen
of Anne Morrow Lindbergh)
I can not stand to taste
this thought for another
moment but it is more
textured and flavorful
than the wilted French fries
I last ate so I go to google
but it gave me back nothing
No listerine or scope or
even baking soda to scrape
the taste of those words away
maybe I'll write a collection
of poems for mothers, bad or
good or indifferent -
and that will wipe what is
tugging at me away

Special Services line, LAX (160 Poetry)

Brown eyes hold worry
her diamond bands can't deflect
Saints around her wrist
hush the baby in her womb
Plaid shirt wearing husband's
comfort doesn't calm her

Nothing Usual (From a Magpie Tales Poetry Prompt)

The folks at Magpie Tales gave us a beautiful image prompt though for whatever reason the poem that was born has the same poignant theme so many of my poems have had lately. It won't surprise those of you who have been following my words recently.

She saw nothing usual, nothing
familiar or ordinary through
her Bakersfield dust coated eyes
She peered through the pines to see
something akin to the place where
Hansl and Gretl's father lived
or perhaps Maria von Trapp
spent her girl hood Summers

She could hear her heart
through her ears

This was the door her daughter
would open, squeaking happily -
both of them- and then
move through to start her
new life: dust-free and humid before
the snow comes rather than baked stiff
and crackling before fog drifts in - -
She will start waking up, over
there, on the other side of the
continent. This place unbeknownst
to this mother she had become
and to the place her daughter
would become a woman
out of sight, out of scent range
deeply entrenched in
her heart, her mind, her
memory wanderings

She saw nothing usual, nothing
familiar or ordinary through
her Bakersfield dust coated eyes

 

Facts and Figures

So Little Done

So much to do

Most important

Forever now is true

The facts and figures

Equal, always,

I love you

This poem was inspired by the prompt from Keith's Ramblings and Carry On Tuesday - the line being from Cecil John Rhodes on his deathbed, "So little done, so much to do."

E is for Eccentric

Elaborate, colorful, glitter-for-her

Loud, boisterous, embarrassing-for-others

Intriguing, electric, silent-once-in-a-while

Mad Scientist, Prolific Breakthrough,

Crackling cadence: all and more

Fill my home with (Dare I admit

This?)

Eccentricity

This post is brought to you from prompting from the dear folks at ABC Wednesday!

Pictures to Pull (A Blitz Poem)

I discovered the Blitz Poem through Robert Lee Brewer of Poetic Asides. I had never heard of the form but it’s a keeper – one I will use and return to and probably, like so many others – eventually teach. 50 lines, three words each for the first 48 lines.

Read and… see what it says to you.

 

Create a life
Create word pictures
Pictures tell tales
Pictures don’t lie
Lie to me
Lie big monster
Monster to drink
Monster for hire
Hire this servant
Hire this woe
Woe to you
Woe is I
I have fear
I have fear
fear has nothing
fear is powerless
Powerless without me
Powerless all alone
alone is fine
alone welcomes solitude
Solitude bears promise
Solitude holds fear
fear gives in
fear cries gratitude
gratitude sings joy
gratitude opens up
Up look up
Up sky clls
calls Julie Hi
Calls Blue eyes
eyes see light
Eyes see dark
Dark hides facts
Dark brings fear
fear whispers faint
fear urges more
more terror here
More frustration there
there isn’t here
there isn’t now
now breathe slowly
now really hear
Hear dark words
hear tough lessons
lessons arrows find
lesson’s gentle pull
Pull my soul

Pull my pulse

pulse…

soul….

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Julie Jordan Scott delivers conscious inspiration in the Daily Passion Activator, - insights in essays and poems delivered directly into your email box. Why not Subscribe today? It's free.

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A-ha: What do you have to tell me? (A Pantoum)

Continuing from yesterday’s thread.. I knew a pantoum would open new awareness free verse would leave untouched. I tucked in a bit of a prompt from Keith’s ramblings and Carry On Tuesday, but I think I will save that one for later in the day. This a-ha has created a life of its own… a very necessary life of its own.

 

While I have you fear, you are not me.

I am not you. Though if you were i'd slice you

cut you unstitch you and examen you

the scar you left behind, the life birthed

 

I am not you, though if you were i'd slice you

fear: sticky red gooey tar, sucking my hope

the scar you left behind the life birthed

from the spot after I burned myself free

 

Fear: sticky red gooey tar, sucking my hope

I take judgment off your glue and look, just look

From the spot after I burned myself free

The core is the same? The core is the same - the same

 

I take judgment off your glue and look, jsut look

love: i've lost count of the numbered site - it's you?

The core is the same? The core is the same - the same

White, waiting - wistful fresh-after-rain-morning

 

love: i've lost count of the numbered site - it's you?

Breath lost at first touch of toe to dewy grass

White, waiting - wistful fresh-after-rain-morning

Knees buckled by laughing tears, "Hello!!"

Breath lost at first touch of toe to dewy grass

cut you unstitch you and examen you

Knees buckled by laughing tears, "Hello!!"

While I have you fear, you are not me.

^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ 

Julie Jordan Scott delivers conscious inspiration in the Daily Passion Activator, - insights in essays and poems delivered directly into your email box. Why not Subscribe today? It's free.

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A-ha Birth - (A Poem Honoring Moments of Breakthrough)

Today's poem is also seen on "Monday Poetry Train Revisited." Meet up with other poets there and post your word-offerings (poetry and prose, too) each week.

An a-ha moved through me today

Breathed it up and out and swoooosh -

I held it in my waiting arms and fed it

Through my aware breast milk

I felt the tingle of the let-down as I

nourished this a-ha, this beloved,

this moment of “ohhh, there you are

I have waited so long for you” - -

Look into its blinking wide blue

unmedicated eyes --

A-ha, beloved one, beguiling and

charming insight

What are you here to teach me?

I feel a foundling sob rumble so

pulling the babe-a'ha into my heart

We nuzzle each other

and know this is it - -

Julie Jordan Scott delivers conscious inspiration in the Daily Passion Activator, - insights in essays and poems delivered directly into your email box. Why not Subscribe today? It's free.

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New Poem: Kitchen Table, 10:03 pm on a Saturday Night in August

This was written very quickly and in it I use a lot of techniques I abhor, so please – I request your forgiveness in advance. There is something here for me, though. I need to be present to that and I need to share this for reasons unknown to me.

 

And a nod to e.e. cummings and Rumi, who both get a nod woven into my words…

Sitting at my kitchen

Table, 10:03 on a Saturday

Night in August

Expecting wanting nothing

 

Golden brown hair dye tickles

My tendrils and I wait

While ten-year-old untended

Dreams sit, lame ducks, waiting

 

- - They shout - -

 

Pay attention, not-so-young-anymore

Julie. Wake up and smell the stench

And the beauty that lives right here

Wanderlust calls? Listen, closely

 

You heard Rumi’s field today

On the movie screen – go there

Don’t just sit at your kitchen

Table, 10:03 on a Saturday

Night in August and call it a night

 

Step into the night

And hear what it has to tell you

Perhaps it will share

the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

 

or the direction to the field, out

there, beyond wrong doing and

right doing but you

won’t have a clue if you

 

follow that familiar trail

sit on that same old chair

and allow your dreams,

ten-years-or-ten-minutes-old to

 

lay fallow, lame, passive, weeping

Don’t just sit at your kitchen

Table, 10:03 on a Saturday

Night in August and call it “fine”

 

- - They shout - -

 

Pay attention, not-so-young-anymore

Julie. Wake up and smell the stench

And the beauty that lives right here

Wanderlust calls? Listen, closely

^ ^ ^ ^ ^

 

Be My Next... (Poem for Magpie Tales)

This poem was birthed from this photo from the Magpie Tales Blog.

I fell in love with the photo and was perplexed with the "what to do with it" until I just sat down while free writing and let go of what would be born. I think I have proven I am such a hopeful romantic, I can romanticize anything and everything. ^Giggles^ What do you think?

Mottled blue-grey gunk is it? Outside the
underneath within the
hidden floorboard
Your conjoined metal
moans, “too hot, too cold”
in January and yes, early
December mornings
Reminding me of my
leaky, mottled blue-grey
gunk, that pushing together
that I would rather now,
more than perhaps, to-do
Not ever let it be seen in its
rusted, less-than-beautiful-than-most
be my next sunrise
be my next astonishment
be my next pronouncement of
lusty awakening
underneath, hidden, foreshadowing
the groans of release
right around the
unveiling ceremony
declaring “just right”
and “bridge of knowing”
and “movement enabled”
and “finally, finally, finally!”