Poetics Aside Prompt:
Today’s prompt is a Two-for-Tuesday prompt. For those new to the challenge, you have the option of writing to the first prompt or the second prompt–or even both if you feel so inclined. Here they are:
I found an old appointment calendar while cleaning out a drawer;
now that busy splattered page is nothing anymore,
but numbers testifying in modest simplicity
the heart's wildest undoing where the present used to be...
Today’s prompt is a Two-for-Tuesday prompt. For those new to the challenge, you have the option of writing to the first prompt or the second prompt–or even both if you feel so inclined. Here they are:
- Write a bright poem.
- Write a dark poem.
I found an old appointment calendar while cleaning out a drawer;
now that busy splattered page is nothing anymore,
but numbers testifying in modest simplicity
the heart's wildest undoing where the present used to be...
In the after-light of day
When toil and turmoil tested fray
Have donned their shrouds of whisper-gray
A digit on Time’s chart
Its nullified numeric stance
Veils the shadow where now we dance
Hungry for laughter and romance
To ravage mortal heart
The dark and light soon coalesce
Upon the parchment-metered tress
Where only you and I caress
Its darling memory
For at the stroke of midnight chime
We render our stuttered rhyme
Into the number-crypt of Time
And past’s eternity
How mute those numbers on the page
Sealing upon its mystic stage
The echo of age upon age
Suffered with hand and heart
The ravaging of Time’s bequeath
The shuddering of heav’n and earth
In the intangible half-breath
Of numbers on a chart
© Janet Martin
