CDLIII - Food of the Gods

Theme Thursday has the topic 'Chocolate'.

Chocolate, or cocoa at least, has the scientific name 

Theobroma, 'food of the gods'.  Which begs the question: 

Can an atheist eat chocolate?

Food of the Gods

Forget the fishes and the bread,

Shun the wine and wafer,

If you’re seeking a god’s favour,

Giving chocolate is much safer.

Rejoice in the god’s food of choice!

Savour the plight of the infidel!

Facing eternity ahead

With no chocolate in his hell.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDLII - A Silly Walk Through Life.

Carry On Tuesday asks us to use the line 

“When all is said and done” in a writing.  

The line is the title of an Abba song.

A Silly Walk Through Life.

Some days are just filled with shit,

While others gleam like gold;

On some days you can have it all,

On others you get rolled.

Decide to take it in your stride:

Recall, when all is said and done,

Our life is what we make of it

So it might as well be fun.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDLI - Reflections

Sunday Whirl (Wordle #93) presents a list of words

that we must incorporate in a writing piece.  

The words this week are: 

chimes, curved, edge, mirror, mist, raw, scale, scattered, skirted, straw, tattered, vast.

Reflections.

We never really see the good times

Skirted until well past.

Reflections are distorted, curved,

And our memories don’t last.

The clock of life moves on and chimes

To mark the life we’ve cast:

Life is short, as someone observed,

And the scale beyond is vast.

So, in the tattered fragment of life

Given to us to share,

The edge, raw as it draws nearer,

Is a straw that we must bear.

Existence is scattered with strife,

Though hope beats back despair;

And hearts drawn in mist on mirrors,

Are a fleeting sign we care.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDL - Justifiable Homicide

Three Word Wednesday requires participants

to use the three words of the week in a composition.

The words this week were 'brag', 'icy' and 'polite'.

Justifiable Homicide

The women he’d happened to shag

Didn’t mind him remembering his bag,

But he met Death’s icy look

When he disclosed on Facebook:

It just isn’t polite to brag.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLIX - The Good Life

It’s Australia Day.  Time for a parody.

The Good Life

(To the tune of “Botany Bay”)

Throw chops on the barbie this evening,

Crack open a stubby of beer,

Some sauce will do as a salad,

And the neighbours will quickly appear.

Chorus

Singing white bread, fried onions and sausages

Singing white bread, fried onions and chops

Singing white bread, fried onions and sausages

Ah, the good life, it just never stops.

There’s the missus, as is our companion,

There’s the dog and a moggie or two,

There’s the kids from over the neighbourhood

Who appear at a good barbeque.

Chorus

‘Taint eating a tossed salad we cares about,

‘Taint one of our diet’ry habits,

‘Cause green’s not really a food colour

For anything other than rabbits.

Chorus

Now all you young wankers and wowsers,

Who dine on the cuisine nouveau,

Who whine that a barbies too common,

Well, youse know where you can all go.

Chorus.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLVIII - Sticky Buns

Magpie Tales had the above photo as a prompt.

Sticky Buns

“Come on” he said and took her hand

“I’ll show you a sweet place,

Where spiders spin their webs from gold

And dreams are spun from lace.

It’s true!  I wouldn’t lie to you!

Behold the fabled wishing tree!

And, when we’re safe back from that land,

There’s sticky buns for tea!

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLVII - Lead, Follow

Sunday Whirl (Wordle #92) presents a list of words

that we must incorporate in a writing piece.  

The words this week are: 

art, pearls, sticky, bone, filaments, charge, beware, call, skin, air, cell, knocks, linen.

Lead, Follow

(Waltz tempo)

Fur and pearls

Bobs and curls

Well dressed gent

Posh accent

Ruling class

Crystal glass

Art and tea

Society

Lead follow

Lead follow

Lead follow

The quick charge was gavelled in,

Coarse linen, rough on tender skin,

The fetid smell of the unaired cell,

Small insect share the room, as well.

The sticky floors and bowls of swill,

The bones, aching from the chill,

Justice is now a relative concern:

Much depends on what you earn.

Fur and pearls

Bobs and curls

Well dressed gent

Posh accent

Ruling class

Crystal glass

Art and tea

Society

Lead follow

Lead follow

Lead follow

Beware of the mistake of complacency

When unravelling filaments of decency

The rules you set can rebound on you

What cooks the goose, gets the gander too, 

When things upset your house of cards

And you have alienated all your guards,

When the mobs rise and storm the wall,

Who'll be there to take the call?

Fur and pearls

Bobs and curls

Well dressed gent

Posh accent

Ruling class

Crystal glass

Art and tea

Society

Lead follow

Lead follow

Lead follow

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLVI - Pavlov's Dogs

Three Word Wednesday requires participants

to use the three words of the week in a composition.

The words this week were 'dismal', 'luscious' and 'waffle'.

Pavlov’s Dogs.

The news is bad, it always is,

We’re told that that’s what sells;

Disaster, death and mayhem rule

Like Pavlov’s dogs, with bells.

It’s hard to filter truth from dross

Within the stuff they throw us

When we only ever get to see

The bits they want to show us.

The steroid-boosted waffle spot,

The sports report, by name,

Tells us, one night, why we’ll win

And the next night calls us ‘lame’.

The highlight of the dismal show

Comes toward the very end

Where some luscious, busty blonde

Predicts a fine weekend.

At last we get the closing shot

To try to ease our pain

It is a token good-news piece

Of a kitten, rescued from a drain.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLV - No Need for Stars

Sunday Whirl (Wordle #91) presents a list of words

that we must incorporate in a writing piece.  

The words this week are: 

bends, breaks, burden, diminishing, ditch, drunk, 

palace, poetry, room, steps, virtue, wish

No Need for Stars.

In the dark palace of my mind

There is a room for you;

Where, unburdened by our duties,

Our wishes can run true.

Where poetry breaks the confines

And steps where few folk do,

Where inner and outer beauty

Are seen as a virtue.

The diminishing urge for flight

Reveals just who we are—

Lets us ditch a pretence or two

And bend the cage’s bars.

The heavens are a marvellous sight

And sparkle from afar

But ‘til I’ve drunk my fill of you

I’ll have no need for stars.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLIV - The Miraculous Migration

Poet's United has the prompt 'Wonder',

largely directed at the Seven Wonders of the world.

To me the greatest 'wonder' is that we are here at all. 

If any other one of the billion or so sperm on that fateful night

had been first to reach the egg, I would be someone else.  

The Miraculous Migration

Two bodies, close and intertwined,

Their hormones ebbed and flowed,

And a billion sperm disembarked

To find the mother lode.

Rough words

For what has just occurred,

But mark the magic of the tale

So many set out but fall behind

And only one prevails. 

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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Repost - A Chilli Reception.

A dangerous past time!

A Chilli Reception

I was feeling like making a spicy sauce;

Something with chillis, with bite, of course.

So I took to the kitchen all fired up

To make a chilli sauce, a hot ketchup.

I boiled a brew with the desired effect;

Satan, I think, would give it respect.

It’s an oddity of English (there are a lot)

That chilly is what the chilli’s not.

Late at night, far removed from the sink,

I tenderly toyed with the moist and pink.

With a scream that surely woke the dead,

My wife exploded from the bed

And stood in the doorway, off in the gloom,

Yelling obscenities across the room.

Remember this friends, that chilli juice lingers

And be really careful to wash your fingers.

.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLIII - Truely Naked

One Single Impression has the prompt "Naked".

Truly Naked

Skin on skin is a lovely part

Of any sweet embrace;

Bodies entangled in a knot,

Ignoring time and space.

Despite this dance of nude delight:

It’s not how many clothes you shed:

Until you open up your heart

You’re not entirely naked.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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Repost - The Dark Ship

A repost.  I wrote this a few years ago,
not long after my father died.

The Dark Ship

What ho, my Captain! What lies ahead?

He stood a while, as savouring the brine

Before turning and locking eyes with mine.

He spoke and, with a hollowness, said

“I sail the dark seas in inner dread,

Dark is the world within my head”.

And the ship sailed on through the night-o,

The ship sailed on through the night.

What ho, my Captain! What hope is there?

Surely there’s hope the dark will lift

When your vessel is strong and travelling so swift?

Wont you progress past the seas of despair?

He reached and gently touched my hair

“We’re going at speed but I know not where.”

And the ship sailed on through the night-o,

The ship sailed on through the night.

What ho, my Captain! Can you be saved?

This took him aback and he thought a while

“I can” he said “but the voices beguile.

Our thoughts are to darkness enslaved,

No matter how much release is craved,

We are on a trip that cannot be waived.”

And the ship sailed on through the night-o,

The ship sailed on through the night.

What ho, my Captain! Can we turn back?

“There’s no going back, what’s past is done.

The only way’s forward once it’s begun.

And this is why things look so black

And things weigh heavy upon my back

But I look for some light, the barest crack.

And the ship sailed on through the night-o,

The ship sailed on through the night.

What ho, my Captain! When comes the dawn?

“For every dawn, must precede a night

Passage through these cold waters is a rite

That lives in you, it is never gone.

At best, the dark is just withdrawn

And we can but bravely struggle on.”

And the ship sailed on through the night-o,

The ship sailed on through the night.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLII - Resist Maturity

dVerse Poets has the prompt "Growing Up".

It irks me somewhat nowadays that, if I make light of something,

it automatically gets ridiculed as a "Dad Joke"

- a less than subtle jibe intended to make me 

'grow up', 'act my age', 'be more mature'.

Well, fuck that for a joke.

Resist Maturity

We succumb to daily pressures

To meet the status quo;

The system loves to remind us

That it controls the show.

While adult life has pleasures

That children cannot know,

It also serves to bind us

And limit where we go.

Our children are unrestricted

In what they ask and do;

The world to them’s a playground

Where everything is new.

While we adults are constricted

Kid’s dreams can fly the coup;

Would the world stop spinning ‘round

If we went with them too?

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXLI - The Lady of the Door

A different slant on Magpie Tales' prompt.
My first attempt, A Sweet Divinity, is here.

A lady who stood at a door

Wearing lace and nothing much more

Explained, when she was pressed,

That the sight of her breast

Attracted more men to her store.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXL - High Tea for a Tortured Soul

Sunday Scribblings had the prompt 'Paradise'.

High Tea for a Tortured Soul

In paradise we’re told we’ll see

A pure, bright world, in symmetry;

Ruled by God and heavenly choir

With haloes, harps and white attire.

How bloody awful would that be?

Like some wretched afternoon tea

Endured for an eternity:

Existence would be dull and dire,

In paradise.

Where is the grass and shady tree?

Or the glass of chilled Chablis?

Or discussions held ‘round a fire?

Or the joys of carnal desire?

Seems there’s nothing to attract me

In paradise.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXXXIX - The Fall

Three Word Wednesday requires participants

to use the three words of the week in a composition.

The words this week were 'focussed', 'pair' and 'vacant'.

And, guess what?  If you look closely

you will find a Herrick's Stanza!

The Fall

Quiet.

Focussed.

Vacant even.

Blankly hiding intent.

Cards held closely.

A prayer—

Requests divine consent.

But then—

The need to beat three tens—

A pair.

That’s it.

All gone.

Forlorn, he walks,

Numbly,

Leaving behind his all.

And more.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXXXVIII - A Sweet Divinity

Magpie Tales, has the above picture by Daniel Murtagh as a prompt.

As is my want, I have framed it.

I am still playing with Herrick's Stanzas.

A Sweet Divinity

There is a sweet divinity seen in the naked form;

An image that nature endows that’s comforting and warm.

And yet —

What far too many forget

Is how stressing the outer sheath

Of open femininity

Ignores the heart beneath.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXXXVII - The Secret Garden

Three Word Wednesday requires participants

to use the three words of the week in a composition.

The words this week were 'pace', 'idle' and 'nagging'.

Carry On Tuesday asks us to use the line 

“There is a place where I can go” in a writing.  

The line originates from a Beatles track, "There is a Place".

And, for good measure, I continued playing with Herrick's Stanzas.

The Secret Garden

There is a place where I can go,

Beyond the bustling pace,

Beyond the forward estimates

I’m expected to embrace.

A place with needed breathing space,

Ornate as I should wish it be;

No nagging at the set tableau, 

No voices disagree.

A place where idle thoughts can grow

To meet the whim at hand;

Where cities rise, or love is true,

Or dragons walk the land.

Once more I walk up to the door,

Step through and turn the key.

There is a place where I can go,

Where I can just be me.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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CDXXXVI - Reality Check

It is my view of resolutions that you are far better off resolving to improve

what you currently do rather than change something major. 

That’s not to say some people don’t pull off major changes but most of us don’t.
But you will get more success and pleasure from improving an existing skill.
Like cooking.  Or poetry.  Or being a friend.

Reality Check

A ‘clean slate’s just a metaphor,

Not a really apt one.

While resolutions come each year

No-one’s ever trapped one.

And yet —

It seems we do forget.

Each year

We will, as I have found,

Do the same things as before;

With high hopes, each time round.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2013

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