#TANKA TUESDAY #POETRY CHALLENGE NO. 215, #POET’SCHOICE
Don’t
You know
Tomorrows
Ghosts looking back
They forgot to say
Of yesterday’s best play
Had fallen short of screaming
Looking now to send chills down spines
Beware of ghosts that see tomorrows
Fear that lives under beds, behind curtains…
© Anita Dawes 2021
February 25 2021, prompt: In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story using the word frozen. It can be descriptive, character focused, action driven. Go out onto the ice and find a frozen story.
Frozen with horror by the razor-sharp edge,
the blade at my throat, the overlapping fear of warm blood
Free flowing from my body, zoning out into darkness
Falling into a world of blank memory, near to death
I see the dark cloaked figure of an angel gently waking my sleeping body
Not realising, my spirit had decided to jump around the room with joy
Without letting me know where the happiness comes from
I lie there wondering why I had been sent an angel wearing L plates
Would she pull the two halves of my body together in time?
© Anita Dawes 2021
I told my story to the empty streets of London
While the stars stood witness to my pain
The day I witnessed Heaven burning
Leaving me with no way home
I fell to earth before the flames could reach me
My story told, before I reached this realm
With so little truth to tell
Yes, my wings are less than white
Because my tongue I could not hold
For speaking out against the Mighty One
Now they are singed beyond repair
I cannot go home without His help
Sorry is the hardest word, it burns my throat
I must find a different way
to find my rightful place among the stars
Leave the empty streets of London
To their own way of sinning…
© Anita Dawes 2021
There is a tiny devil inside my mind.
Stroking my ego, telling me how clever I am
He is forgetting one thing.
I have looked into the darkness.
And wondered, what kind of devil lives inside his mind?
Is his ego stroked into believing
he is the best there is, no one above him?
Some days I see him in my mirror.
A dark cloud waiting to break.
That’s how I know the day goes.
Like thunderstorms inside my mind
Darker, when I must bite back my thoughts.
Not everyone would be ready to hear my opinion of them.
Growing up, I would be told,
keep your tongue between your teeth,
don’t let the devil out.
I have not managed to keep the devil down.
When he is telling me I am right
I can often put my foot in it.
The older I am, the smaller he appears to be.
The days less stormy, clouds part, I see the sun.
Yet I know he is waiting in the wings.
Ready with his gentle touch…
© Anita Dawes 2021
#TANKA TUESDAY Weekly #POETRY CHALLENGE NO. 214, #THEMEPROMPT
This month’s theme is:
Does
Dreaming
come from a
different bed
Do we dream their dreams?
Is it sad and lonely?
Do we enter the unknown
A universe of do it twice
Where any old dream they think will do
for a night spent in someone else’s bed…
© Anita Dawes 2021
Fandango’s Flash Fiction Challenge #107
For the visually challenged writer, the photo is of a human skull placed on top of an old book. To the left is an hourglass and to the right is a single smoldering candle in a glass candleholder.
Time has taken its toll on book and soul.
The candle has gone out
The egg timer no longer flows
The devil called with death on its tail
Its quota must be met.
Those dodgers of time must be caught
They’re messing with the universal vibration
Their presence is abhorrent
They make no attempt to cloak their actions
Their aliveness
A slap in the face of the universal plan
Each story must be told as written
The hole in the net must be mended
For death to breathe a sigh of relief
For he too can die again…
© Anita Dawes 2021
Double Down
The distant echo of your voice calling me home
Across fields of new mown hay
I turn my head away, I do not want to go
Your soft whisper follows, I feel your longing
I am not ready to take up an angelic post
Snow white feathers would not suit me
Or God forbid, the other place where coal is needed
Did I slip into a place where the forked one gave me a large spade?
I love you still, alas I have much to do
All the things that frightened you, I understand
There are mountains to climb where you would not go
Your fear of the unknown kept you locked inside
There are snow slopes calling, louder than your echo
Do you now have eternity to roam?
© Anita Dawes 2021
Is this one poem, or three? What do you think?
I swallow my words, a slow-moving bitter taste.
Full of broken glass that burns my veins.
A storm raging inside, a fire that cannot be quenched.
Fuelled by anger, disappointment, loss,
a life lived too long.
The past doing what it does best,
haunting, stirring the mind to self-destruct.
Ghosts of those once loved smooth the sharp edges
of the hills and troughs dug by bitter memories.
It is better to have loved.
A life lived without is a hollow bubble.
The space inside too hard to handle.
So my friend if love is offered,
Take it, keep it safe.
Don’t live life in an empty bubble…
© Anita Dawes 2021
Thursday photo prompt: Deeper #writephoto
For visually challenged writers, the image shows a sheer drop from old stone… a bridge, perhaps, or the battlements of a castle… there is no way to tell… Below is deep, dark water, swirling, fringed by autumnal trees…
Don’t stand and stare,
The dark water may drag you deeper
to a place you do not want to go
Throw your coin, make a wish, do not linger.
The autumn tree to your right,
Never moves into summer.
If you want to see another sun filled day,
Move on swiftly.
This stretch of dark water has a reputation
For calling sad souls to let go of life
To enter the world below
Those that have slipped below the water,
Lie in wait, lonely, needing new heartache
To feed their dark world
Let your wish be, to bless the water.
Send those sad souls on their way…
© Anita Dawes 2021
