Zombie Flamingos

Welcome to my April 2026 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

I’ve revealed my theme (A poem a day…maybe even with pictures), and of course, I am unashamedly blogging my theme letters on the fly.  So, here goes nothing!

So, without further ado, V is for … Very close to the end…

Nature’s “Candy”

You, you shriveled
face of elder grapes,
bruised skin
of rotted purple.

You, you shrunken sugary,
pitted mummified
fruit, gritting sand
on my tongue.

You, you leather
pips, poor
excuses for the nature’s
candy they claim you are

at Hallowe’en. You,
you shameful chocolate
chip in disguise, ruining
cookies in your wake.

You, you who hide
in folds of cinnamon
buns, a foul joke
with our morning coffee.

Thanks for visiting my 2026 A to Z Challenge – Letter V.

Welcome to my April 2026 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

I’ve revealed my theme (A poem a day…maybe even with pictures), and of course, I am unashamedly blogging my theme letters on the fly.  So, here goes nothing!

So, without further ado, U is for … Using lines from other people’s poems…a Cento man.

Dressed for Peace: A Cento

I’ll wear it like bones, like skin.

It’ll be the goddamned dress they bury me in.

I swear, you will wake
& mistake these walls for skin,

vague as fog
and looked for like mail.

Draw us into daylight in our beds
and clear away what presses on the brain.
As freedom is a breakfast food…

questions prowl
stream-like through the dirt —
it’s late

but everything comes next.

From:

Ocean Vuong, Someday I’ll Love Ocean Vuong
Kim Addonizio What do women want
Sylvia Plath, You’re

Elizabeth Bishop, love lies sleeping
ee cummings, Adult Nursery Rhymes III

Laurie Sheck, In Curious May

Naomi Shihab Nye, Jerusalem

Thanks for visiting my 2026 A to Z Challenge – Letter U.

Welcome to my April 2026 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

I’ve revealed my theme (A poem a day…maybe even with pictures), and of course, I am unashamedly blogging my theme letters on the fly.  So, here goes nothing!

So, without further ado, T is for … Telephone Wires, Ode To

Ode to Telephone Wires

Crisscrossing the skies
Spiderwebs running currents
Lead us into light

Thanks for visiting my 2026 A to Z Challenge – Letter T.

Welcome to my April 2026 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

I’ve revealed my theme (A poem a day…maybe even with pictures), and of course, I am unashamedly blogging my theme letters on the fly.  So, here goes nothing!

So, without further ado, S is for … Split poem.

So this poem is supposed to be in two parts, unrelated to each other, but the second part using the same words as the first part. Wonder how I did.

Day and Night

Clouds of soft dust swirl
circles in light sheets.
As floors warm under foot
eyes close, holding
onto darkness.

Darkness holding light;
eyes close in clouds
as circles of soft dust
onto floors under foot —
warm sheets swirl.

Thanks for visiting my 2026 A to Z Challenge – Letter S.

Welcome to my April 2026 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

I’ve revealed my theme (A poem a day…maybe even with pictures), and of course, I am unashamedly blogging my theme letters on the fly.  So, here goes nothing!

So, without further ado, R is for … Rhyming, a little.

Innocent

I walk into the kitchen, find glass on the floor
I think, I cannot take this crap any more.

I call out “Oliver” but no one replies
I walk to the hallway to look into his eyes

“Not I” his face tells me, I do not believe
He’s innocent. No, he will always deceive.

He tries to convince me “It’s Lucy, I say.”
But I’ve got his number, this cat won’t get away.

And yet later, when my workday has piled up the shit
Oliver nudges me and on my lap he sits.

No matter the assholery he might cause
I will always forgive furries breaking the laws.

Thanks for visiting my 2026 A to Z Challenge – Letter R.

Welcome to my April 2026 Great and Powerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge!

I’ve revealed my theme (A poem a day…maybe even with pictures), and of course, I am unashamedly blogging my theme letters on the fly.  So, here goes nothing!

So, without further ado, Q is for … Quickly post this before anyone notices that I forgot…

Music Festival for Nervous Musicians

Rows of seats wait
outside closed doors.
You hear faint screeches —
violins, clarinets —
perhaps a paradiddle
from within.

A woman, hair in bun,
stereotypical glasses
of one with nothing else to do
but greet competitors,
look them up and down,
direct them to “Sit…
Wait to be called in.”

So you sit, and others sit,
clutching flutes, violas, trumpets,
or the nothing at all
representing pianists or sopranos.

You appear from warmup rooms,
dens of intimidated or intimidating.
Hoping you are good enough,
ready to perform

in front of judge, jury.
Executioner.

Just kidding.

Only an examiner…
and someone else’s mother
throwing shade as you play.

Thanks for visiting my 2026 A to Z Challenge – Letter Q.