686 : The Silver Trough.

Three Word Wednesday requires participants

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

The words this week were: aspire, beast and slurp.

The Silver Trough.

When they first aspire to govern,

Bright-eyed and oh-so keen,

I believe they feel a calling,

‘Til they meet the party machine.

It kills

Any urge to cure our ills

It’s appalling—

The faithful, I know, will scoff, 

But the beasts patrol the coven

And slurp from the silver trough.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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685 : A Paste Limerick, or two.

Mad Kane has a weekly limerick challenge.

She provides the first line rhyme word,

The rest is up to us:

A wallpapering woman spilled paste

That trickled down south of her waist.

She explained to the guys

That while sex was unwise

She was stuck up rather than chaste.

◊◊◊

The tassels were held on with paste

So her nipples were nicely encased.

But the erotic effect

Had a practical defect

As her breasts drooped down to her waist.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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684 : The Life Saver

Sunday Whirl (Wordle #149) presents a list of words

that we must incorporate in a writing piece.  

The words this week are:

eggs, trust, test, not, high, course, peep,

mug, trial, form, bring, blown, stick

The Life Saver

I

Popular wisdom says that you shouldn’t

Put all your eggs in one basket.

But what if you only have one basket?

II

It is an act of blind trust

To board an old fishing boat

And set course for a foreign land.

But the decision is not hard

When the horror being left behind

Is greater than the unknown

That lies ahead.

Do you stick it out?

Watch your life and loved ones

Be blown apart?

It is really a case of all or nothing.

Save what eggs you can.

III.

As we sit in our 

Comfortable homes

With our mugs of organic tea

Watching the TV shows that let us 

Peep into the fake lives

And contrived high drama

Of fictional people

It is worth remembering 

The real trials of real people

The horrible form these trials take

And the desperation


That has driven them

To leave the land of their fathers

In search of safety.

IV

It is a test of our humanity

That we are willing to provide

That safety.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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683 : Stacked Against Us

Three Word Wednesday requires participants

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

The words this week were: feral, insatiable and shred.

Stacked Against Us

We, as a species,

Are faced 

With a problem—

With an insatiable appetite

For resources,

For energy,

For growth.

We must deal with

An economy

Gone feral,

Driven by the need,

For growth,

Blind,
Relentless,
Growth.

But we live 

In a  bottle garden

Where unlimited growth 

Is unsustainable,

Where there is not 

A shred of evidence

That we can continue

In our headlong

Push for growth—

Growth of population.

Growth of consumption.

Growth of pollution.

The bottle is only so big

The odds are stacked against us.

The logic is stacked against us.

But, blinkered and fearful,

We rush ahead.

Hopefully.

.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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682 : The Apartment

Image: Universal Studios Lot, Instagram by sessepien  (Modified)

Imaginary Garden with Real Toads invites us to write a quatern.

The Mag provided the image prompt.

The Apartment

They’re side-by-side but still apart,

The product of a building art

That gives a person somewhere to stay

But, in effect, locks them away.

Forming a body, but lacking a heart,

They’re side-by-side but still apart.

You can lie in bed through the night

And listen to some strangers fight.

The occupiers will seldom meet

As they scurry to and from the street

They’re side-by-side but still apart,

And interactions are à la Carte.

They’re called ‘apartments’ with good cause,

Boxes huddled on successive floors,

An architectural mockery of Descartes,

They’re side-by-side but still apart.

.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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681 : The Ideologue

Three Word Wednesday requires participants

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

The words this week were cruel, ghastly and unkempt.

The Ideologue.

He’s more callous 

Than cruel—

Ideological.

How much harm 

Can he really do

In just a 

Three year spell?

We’ll see

Just how dry 

Our life can be.

But who

Wants 

Such a ghastly nation?

Where, 

Unkempt and unemployed, 

You’ll subsidise 

The corporation.

.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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680 : The Stream

Sunday Whirl (Wordle #147) presents a list of words

that we must incorporate in a writing piece.  

The words this week are:

gather, grasp, gutsy, routine, stream, body,

flow, invisible, pluck, list, ring, type

The Stream

[Narrator]

In the sprawling mess that is a city,

People gather like fish in schools

While we with an odd type of curiosity

And, invisible, peer into their limpid pools.

Watch the ebb and flow of daily bliss

See the humdrum routines and their ilk,

See her give the perfunctory kiss:

[Fish]

“And don’t forget to bring home some milk”.

[Narrator] 

But before he’s even left the street

She’s on her phone to ring a friend,

Though it’s really more of a passive bleat:

[Fish]

“Do you think this week will ever end?”

[Narrator]

In front of the mirror, a teenage girl:

[Fish]

“My body’s awful, gross and fat!”

I’m the most ugly creature in the world,

The magazines have told me that”.

[Narrator]

When dissatisfaction is on the run,

Parents are just like their teens.

[Fish]

“I think I’ll have a boob job done”

[Narrator]

Then just sit around their TV screens

Illuminated with a ghostly glow

They grasp the issue and freely scoff:

[Fish]

“I cannot stand the trash they show!”

[Narrator]

But don’t pluck up the will to turn it off.

[Fish]

“Next year’ll be different, just you wait!”

The opportunity will not be missed!”

[Narrator]

But when they’re pushed to the starters gate

They quickly abandon the resolutions list

In the dull comfort of daily routine

Few will fight to reach a dream.

There are no gutsy salmon to be seen;

The fish are all swimming down the stream.

 .

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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679 : The Brick

Three Word Wednesday requires participants

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

The words this week were accelerate, rogue, and passive.

The Brick

Consider, if you will, the brick;

A passive sort of block.

An over-baked lump of clay,

A better class of rock.

No rogues are found in Brickland,

They’re conforming little swines.

They join the right wing parties

And vote on party lines.

They stay exactly where you put them,

Slothful, cold and stiff;

They only ever accelerate

If you push them off a cliff.

.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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678 : Nouvelle Cuisine

Mad Kane has a weekly limerick challenge.

She provides the first line rhyme word,

The rest is up to us:

A fellow was making a scene,

When partaking of nouvelle cuisine.

“The portions are so small 

They’re not there at all,

You can’t even see where they’ve been.”
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A bit of a flurry of limericks in the comments section too.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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677 : Noah's Emissaries

Sunday Whirl (Wordle #146) presents a list of words

that we must incorporate in a writing piece.  

The words this week are:

balance, edge, alternate, former, open, others,

sense, potential, tiptoed, synergy, bucolic, miss

Noah’s Emissaries

Shipped out into the world

Two by two,

House by house,

Neat and clean, 

A little too much so, if truth be known.

Where others have hidden 

Behind curtains,

Would have tiptoed away,

I would have opened my door 

And shown them in,

We had a synergy, we did:

Game on.

Tell me, I used to ask them,

Do you believe in Zeus?

Or Ra?  Or Shiva?  Or Mother Goose?

Is golf played in heaven?

And what of fairies, elves and trolls??

And what do the placid lions eat?

And is the bread flat or leaven?

Are there raging thunderstorms

And hot and stormy summer nights?

Can I still roast my meat

Or is lunch forever salad rolls?

Do pretty flowers ever die?

Can my Granny see me have a shower?

Are Brussels Sprouts there, as well?

Or are they the exclusive food of Hell?

And do those folk with Alzheimer’s disease

Spend eternity looking for their keys?

I often sensed they were a bit on edge

And tried to hedge their answers too

But these are the questions,

That, on balance, 

I needed them to give me answers to.

Those door to door 

Purveyors of an alternate religion,

With their bucolic visions

Of a sunny and grassy heaven,

With lions beside the lambs,

All sunshine and light,


And young children

Gambolling through 

Fields of flowers—

They don’t visit me any more.

They are former visitors now,

I think my gatepost bears a mark

“Demons live inside this park”

So they don’t visit as before,

Two by two, at my door,

They had such potential

To explore the things 

So distant from

The daily list of 

Hum-drum chores.

I miss them 

Now that they have gone.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2014

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