So there is this thing that happens every year. I get home and think, yeah, I’m gonna write for an hour and get something workable down… and then I get an invite to do something else… something… not writing.

It happened tonight, but despite that I tackled a poem… This is a haibun. The form is basically a prose poem followed by a haiku to form a unified poem.

He wakes from a dream, drenched and trembling. Sitting alone in the dark, composing his thoughts and gathering his nerves. He gazes out the window into a full moon night. 

She is there with him
Across moon soaked winter miles...
Her eyes haunt his thoughts.

I have found that this challenge often takes a few days to get into the flow. I am not there yet. The words are not flowing and the ideas feel jammed up. It is a result of getting out of practice, I know. The more I write the easier (maybe not easier, but quicker) the ideas will begin to flow.

If you are reading I invite you to share a response to any of these poems using the same style or a style of your own in the comments. I dare you to write something.

Cheers.

Part of the challenge is to write and publish a poem (or poem like thing) in the course of a day. It makes it much more difficult and the final product is often not exactly what I would want to be representative of the work I would expect of myself. The thing is, it is an exercise in discipline, pushing through to complete a task to which I have committed.

Writing in general and writing poems specifically is initially an act of control for me. Taking my thoughts and responding to them and through them, giving them form and perhaps substance. Much of what you will see here over the course of the month will be sloppy first or second drafts of poems that will possibly take shape over time to become finished products… I’m sharing them here now simply to have a reason to get something done each day.

So, here’s what I came up with…

Lost

You wander in the morning light
defy the night
and never sleep
secrets to keep.


Your thoughts betray your lonely heart
and from the start
you kick and scream
stuck in a dream.


Your mind reels in the morning chill
you feel him still
although he’s gone
the dream goes on. 

A “minute poem” lives up to its name by being 60 syllables which means at one syllable per second it should only take a minute to read.

©2020, TIm Geoghegan, All rights reserved.

2014, I had a little too much to drink sometime in November and as a result talked myself into writing a poem a day for the month of December. It seemed like a creative challenge that would both amuse and challenge me. Somehow, I managed to complete the challenge and subsequently I did it again in 2015 and 2016 (the first year I didn’t finish). In 2017, 18, 19 we saw varying levels of success.

2020 had me seriously considering just taking the month off. This year has a negative rating on the Pritchard Scale . After much deliberation, here I am again, albeit with no ideas to speak of. So tonight I am just trying to get something down to share..

The poems I wrote in the past years were indicative of the things going on in my life. The years I didn’t finish also said something about those years for me. This exercise is mainly for me, but if in sharing it I bring you some joy, or spark something in your own thinking, I am happy. Feel free to converse with me through the month. See my commenting page for guidelines and buckle up… It MIGHT get interesting. For tonight…

Whiskey, no ice please.
I like it neat, like poems,
sippable and warm. 

Heres to December 2020, Cheers!

©2020, TIm Geoghegan, All rights reserved.

Moving Beyond 
- A Pantoum

We walked, cold and slow,
Stopping from time to time.
You were saying–
“I am here for you.”

Stopping from time to time,
We looked up at the stars.
“I am here for you.”
Your eyes were shining.

We looked up at the stars.
“Go beyond your reality.”
Your eyes were shining.
“Be patient, it will work out.”

You were saying–
“Go beyond your reality.
Be patient, it will work out.”
We walked, cold and slow.



©2010, Tim Geoghegan, All Rights Reserved

It’s been a crapper of a year and so you might think I would have a lot to write about. I do indeed have a lot of new material, but I am not sure how it will play out yet. Part of me just wants to forget the whole thing.

I will be back writing daily. I intend to do a poem each day, but you might find that I diverge from the poetry and try some other posts. Hopefully whatever I post, you find entertaining.

December 1 is speeding up on us now… Get ready!

Well… tonight you don’t get a poem. You get a super short story. Enjoy.

Getting To Know You

I sat down at the bar and ordered a whiskey, neat. She sat down next to me a few minutes later. We exchanged greetings and continued to drink in silence for a quarter of an hour. Somewhere around the beginning of my third whiskey she struck up a conversation. I learned that we were from the same county and had lived most of our lives within thirty miles of each other. She told me she was recently widowed for the third time. Not knowing what to say I turned back to my drink.

The drunk to her left asked her, “What did your first husband die from?”

“Food poisoning.” was all she said. 

“Well, what did your second husband die from?” he continued on.

“Food poisoning.” she responded and took another drink. 

“So, let me guess, the third one died of food poisoning too, right?” the fellow was belligerent.

“No,” she said quietly. 

“Well, what did the third guy die from?” he bellowed. 

“Knife wound.” she said, looking into her glass.

“Knife wound?” he was puzzled.

“Yes, he wouldn’t eat his dinner…” she whispered. 

________________________________________________

Cheers!

I was asked to be a bit more proactive in my warnings when my thoughts are not all happy, happy… Proceed at your own risk…

I tried on your shoes today 
 the ones with all the holes
 in the toes and heels and soles
 and covered in filth unknown.
 
 They tell me to truly understand,
 I need to do this. You know…
 walk in someone else’s shoes?
 For a mile or so… or less.
 
 I went about a hundred feet
 and I could feel the tongue
 twisted over and tucked under, 
 I started to adjust it out...
  
 but then I thought... No!
 This is dumb. I have my own shoes
 and they are much nicer and cleaner
 than these ridiculous things.
 
 I took them off and tossed them. 
 They landed in the gutter 
 by the curb where you had been 
 sitting quietly smoking weed.
 
 I don’t want to understand
 I don’t want to carry that load
 It’s not that I don’t care,
 it's that I don’t have the will.
 
 I walked away and as I turned
 from that street to another
 I saw you sneaking back,
 squatting to reclaim your shoes. 

Copyright ©2019 Tim Geoghegan, all rights reserved.

Cheers!

Loneliness begins at arms length
 and continues into time away 
 crescendos in a dark room
 with the hotel light flashing
 vacancy, vacancy, vacancy
 outside all night.
 
 Yes, it is a vacancy after all
 when the "love" is no longer enough
 and the laughter quit long ago
 as the walks grew shorter
 and quiet like a church on
 Tuesday morning.
 
 So desire wanes into acceptance
 that this is all there is
 and nothing can cure loneliness,
 not the booze or drugs or whatever,
 so you quit and find a certain
 hollow emptiness...
 
 and it fills you, that emptiness,
 with bitterness, grief and hate...
 but you never say a word 
 because it’s not proper 
 it's not ok to tell them
 how you feel.

Copyright ©2019 Tim Geoghegan, all rights reserved.

Cheers!

I couldn’t think of anything to write today. I was blank. In these moments I have often tried to break the dam with a freewriting activity I call a “brain dump”. I set a timer and force myself to write for that specific amount of time. If I can’t think of anything I just repeat things until a new thought floats to the surface. The biggest thing is I keep the words flowing, even if they don’t always make sense.

This entry is what, I guess, you might call a found poem. I pulled words and phrases from the 549 words I wrote to try and capture a theme. Is it a “poem”? Sure. Is it a good poem? Who cares? It was the output I could muster in my allotted time. Remember, I’m not aiming for great poems, but to simply finish the challenge by writing something each day. Four days to go.

Here ya go:

It's Your Move

I don’t want to play this game 
 anymore, it has gone on and on
 and it doesn’t make any sense
 to waste another day pretending
 that any of this means anything. 
 The cards are shuffled and dealt
 the time has come to go all in
 or fold and walk away. It’s time. 
 It’s time to be honest.
 it’s time to speak truth.
 it’s time to make a difference.
 it’s time to stop hiding. 
 it’s time. It’s time.

Copyright ©2019 Tim Geoghegan, all rights reserved.

Seems like I need to do something… 😉 What do you need to do?

Cheers!