six declarative sentences on cold warming

Posted on April 7, 2013 by Susan L Daniels

The blame for this cool spring points to the apices of the globe.
It is the fault of unchained jetstreams, tied to polar ice each year.
Freed by melting, they loop lower than arctic air in winter,
allowing this continent to skip heat the way a child jumps rope.
Still, the light has changed, and the crocuses know it.
Open in April, where February called them up last year.
I dream of long days and budding.
Who knew warming could be so cold?

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , | 13 Comments

yellow crocuses

Posted on April 6, 2013 by Susan L Daniels

a month later
than expected
if they were planned

this squirrel-planted surprise
threads beneath my window
in a thin, military row–

small defiant suns
shouting through frost

 

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , | 13 Comments

On the Bluebird to Rochester

Posted on April 6, 2013 by Susan L Daniels

The man next to me bummed a cigarette
outside, and right after, smoke
still strung between us, says
he can see my breasts
under my blouse.  I smile,
say that’s what bras are for
and that’s all he’ll get
out of me:  A Malrboro Light
and a show.  Everything else
has a pricetag he can’t match
since it’s measured
in books he’s read and what plays
he’ll sit through and I’m betting
not one.  He has a wife
in Medina, the stop in between
our two cities, and I can field him
by reading Queen of the Damned,
the miles flickering past
to when I will see you.

You, who told me last night
because I wasn’t there to stop it
you shaved off your beard
and clipped your hair
to a velour nap just this side of bald
after our fight; a gesture of penance
or defiance.  I will not know which
until our eyes meet
in another 25 miles.

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , , | 55 Comments

spamimals

Posted on April 6, 2013 by Susan L Daniels

Animals think
they’re pretty smart
shit on the ground,
see in the dark

but they do see
to not step
in their own shit
so they are smarter than us.

 

***A found poem (the first part), from my spam queue

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , | 24 Comments

If you think I will be nothing without you

Posted on April 5, 2013 by Susan L Daniels

What was I before you

(?)

A halfbaked dream cupcake woman
needing icing and your tastebuds
to fully become

only while being eaten alive?

Posted in New Free Verse | Tagged , , , | 36 Comments

eggshells

Posted on April 5, 2013 by Susan L Daniels

bright cracked confetti
of Easter hunts, now emptied
and deviled for lunch

Posted in Haiku and Related Forms | Tagged , | 21 Comments

April: A cinquain

Posted on April 5, 2013 by Susan L Daniels

Snow lies:
spring is here, coiled
in curled fiddlehead ferns
unfolding under snow, a thaw
I taste

Posted in cinquain | Tagged , , , | 18 Comments