Poetry challenge! Keep it going

Happy Friday! So I was a bit nostalgic today, remembering Baby Rainbow's endless lists of prompts... and I was thinking each person could write a prompt for the person below. You can write the most ridiculous rules or restrictions or scenarios, and the person replying has to do their best to fulfill that then challenge the next person.

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Write about your feelings when driving and hitting a HUGE pothole:

Got it!

Edit:

The Pothole

Driving may not be intended to be effortless,
perhaps it is wrong to go into dream-state;
but on the open road it happens sometimes,
they call it highway hypnosis and it’s bad
especially when on good Texas concrete.

There are things you come to expect for sure
like smooth surface and traction for real
and the primary hazards are other drivers
so when the road betrays - badly hits you
you take it personal and seek answers.

Headed to Houston from Dallas on I-45
the most traveled road in the Lone Star
passing through the Corsicana road work
BAM! The wheel jerks and twists starboard
barely avoid doing a 360 in traffic .

Limp to the shoulder front left sagging
somehow not killing anyone else
or even myself - miraculous feeling
like a Ninja Dale Earnhardt Junior
pulling into the pit stop with a blown tire.

Since 1970 this stretch of road has been
constantly under construction never done
whole freeway systems have aged out
while one has been in near fifty years
busy in a permanent breach birth.

Damn Corsicana and all its mysterious
delay to innocent travelers held
powerless to temporary one-lane traffic
and rotten roads with potholes to
destroy a person’s road bound reveries.

Pop the trunk and find the jack
before the Corsicana gypsies
Steal me away to the wilds.

Next challenge:

Write about finding the dog of your dreams running loose in a park.

Thanks, Larry! Also, feel free to post here! I was thinking like a rapid fire poetry on the spot kind of thing. But posted to your account works too :)
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Ears droopy,
mouth open,
I see him gallop
with a big adventure
planned.
He looks happier
than I've felt
in awhile.
My heart moves
me forward til
he turns to me,
a smile ready,
paws on my chest
as I see he wears
no collar.
We lock eyes
and I sigh
"where are you from?"

_____________________

Write about waking up to find that you're in somebody else's house, someone you don't know, and have no idea how you got there.

Chirrup
Chirrup. . .
Light flannel flows
Over my eyes
Mixing with song
And
Unaccustomed shelter
The birds sing of freedom
As I wake in my brand-new
Dog's bed

-----------------------------

Beneath the waves you swim searching for...

Beneath the waves,
you swim

searching for a land under the stream

ONE

where you can breath
what you haven’t been able to do
above the sea

——————————

Write a poem in couplets

Guys!!! Have I ever told you?
I probably haven't, but I love you!

You guys are poets
and you all know it and show it

yet have I ever really told you?
that with you I feel renew!

It's just that YOU poets
You really know how to show it

yet I don't think I ever really told you
but you are an amazing crew!

Prompt: Write a poem using abab abab rhyme

A flower, surrounded by trees,
once said,
to hardworking bees,
“I’m dead.”

The trees looked down at the bees,
scared.
But down the road came a breeze,
and said,

“Oh flower, my dear, be at ease,
instead.
I know that from you, these bees,
have fed.

But flower, my dear, please...
look ahead.
Those fields that you seee
blooming, red.

Are blooming like this, due to these bees,
that spread,
from flower to flower, the pollen, they seize,
from YOU, my friend.”

Prompt: blue

Code Blue! Code Blue!

You gave me your heart and...

I took it for granted

now...

you say you're leaving and

I ask,

Can I come too?

Prompt....

Getting to a place you've dreamed of when you have no money.

The weatherworn traveler, covered in dust
pulled a cart made of tin and rust
Over the lonely mountains came
With ne'er a penny to his name
Traveled past glimmering ocean caves
Past silent monarch's humble graves
under the trees and over brooks
past castles painted as in books
Quietly walked to a wooden gate
Where only the ivy lay in wait
Up to the cozy wooden door
This was at last what he'd waited for
Entered the house and stayed up all night
Reading good books by the firelight

(edit)Prompt: write about fireflies/lightning bugs on a summer night

I miss when I
used to dance
with the fireflies,
believing they would
share their light
and that I, too,
could glow.

Now, the air is
devoid of rhythm,
as my eyes play tricks
and I look for spirits
in flight.

_______________________

Write a poem personifying a stapler.

Stapler:
I spew out metal, puncture wood
I draw together a childhood
I pin your papers all together
But it won't hold in soaking weather

I crush metal (if it's thin)
Be careful 'cause I'll go through skin
Sometimes I'm an idiot
Cause I decide that I'll just quit

If I'm empty, I've no use
I can't hold up to much abuse
A fragile helper on your table
But I'll help you when I'm able

prompt: write about your happiest memory

^ I love that so much!

Though my memory often
fails me, heartbroken and
scarred, I'll never forget
how loved I felt when
we adopted you.
My mouth never knew
smiles could last that long;
you chose my pillow to
rest your head,
and the nightmares
of hospitalization faded.
You brought forth sunshine
with each delicate paw
and I was proud to call you
rescued,
as I myself became saved
by your arrival.

___________________________

Imagine you are caught in a tea cup (think Alice in Wonderland taking a pill to become small). What are your feelings? How will you get out?

The teacup:
The walls are slippery
and I find no door
No windows or drapery
A curve for a floor

My socks are quite soaked
In some herbal tea
I'd just like to know
Why'd this happen to me?

I raise my fist up
And pound on the side
This porcelain cup
can't keep me inside

I know at some time
A crack will appear
I'll use it to climb
Till I get out of here

prompt: staying cozy during a snowstorm

During winter, my soul sleeps
Dreams of summer my mind keeps
As the winds outside prove their fury
And snow stills the judge and jury.

I make a nest of antique books
Full of adventure, love and crooks
To spend each hour near the fire
Where stories entertain and inspire.

Even though the snowbanks rise
I do not let boredom be my demise
For I have new worlds to now explore
As I dive into such enchanting lore.

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Write a poem where you are the hunter. What are you chasing? An animal? A person? An idea?

I’m a hunter of ideas
who shoots at random thoughts
I chase them in a jungle
made of words

though
like pumas,
they growl at me afar the distance
sneaking quietly,
quietly sneaking
sneaking closer
to my bow

until my arrow hits them
and they go...

bleeding ...
bleeding ...

leaving trace

Though
I’m a hunter being hunt.

Prompt: airplane

It's as if I hope to see a sign in the clouds
or perhaps a promise from waves below -
a reassurance that the world isn't ending,
that I won't disappear without a trace,
sinking into cerulean oblivion.

The woman to my left nods to her music,
the man to my right reads Bukowski while
nurturing the idea of sleep,
and I fall somewhere between
nightmares and the breaths of poems breeding.

__________________________

Prompt: Write about the sun as if it was a character chasing you or stalking you.

Fiery Sun

Barely grasping my breath,
as the chase melts down the
ice cream in my hand.
I run...
Sweat dripping..
And then
I feel the heat grabbing
my shoulders,
So I...
try to escape from your
burning arms.
_____

If you were an insect what would you be?

Black witch moth

A harbinger
of farewell,
a soul returning
to say goodbye.
Misunderstood
that my presence
means misfortune.
Why can't you
let me haunt
these surroundings
I am too afraid
to explore in daylight?
The hearts that
still beat and oh,
how I miss the way
I could sleep next
to their rhythms.

Trust me that I mean
no harm but
everyone bleeds
paranoia from
their veins
all the same.

I am not at rest,
a butterfly of death.

_________________

If your favorite song could take the form of a painting, what would it look like?

Within a canvas,
I find myself sitting on the edge
of the treehouse we built.

Reading the letters you sent,
looking for somerthing to rely on.

Listening to the river running
beneath the oak tree.

And you from far away,
hidden within the bushes
watching me.

So I called you with the
lyrics of our favorite song
“And if you have a minute why don’t we go,
talk about it somewhere only we know.”
_______
If you should paint your life with one color what would it be?

PS I truly love this thread, it makes you write whatever comes to your mind.

^ I LOVE Keane! This brings back memories. My friend's mom was going to throw away their "Hopes & Fear" album because certain parts kept skipping but she saved it and we would always listen to it together.

I always dream
in color,
but life is often
perplexing
with its fake vibrancy
and shallow brilliance.

I find wonder
and sometimes fear
when I open eyelids
to find an abyss;
shades of black
still speak,
of everything lost
of everything found
of the void
where colors fail
and silence
still mourns.

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Write a poem inspired by this random quote (can be amusing, dark, whatever):

“Just picked up a black pair of scissors thinking they were my glasses.
That definitely would't have enhanced my eyesight.”
- Phil Lester

I picked up the blade
like it would help me sow
my seeds, my potential

just as I picked up
sorrow on the side of the road,
gave birth to shame
and somehow never knew
I could distance myself,
start on another path

that my sight, my mind, my soul
could be nourished
without self-inflicted harm.

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You are driving in the country and are on a deserted road. You see a figure in the middle of the road but can't make out if they are okay. Do you stop and help or swerve around? Write a poem about it :)

The Shade Less Taken

Two paths emerged on an uphill grade
one around and one to stop and see
what need might be held by the shade
which stood wavering, seeming frayed
as a beacon of warning, perhaps in plea.

Slowed and peered at the face hid
behind nebulose veils and unseeable;
then around the road for clues to bid
whether to stop or flee not stop amid
troubles that may not be agreeable.

Both alternatives presented equal risk
whether to abandon a human in need
or present myself and feel the whisk
of deadly fires or spinning disk
rather than obey the urge to speed.

Chose the person, pulled to the side
and let myself out to the dusty road
heard faint thank you as she sighed
and her arms in pain opened wide
she collapsed, I took up this load.

Many cars had passed her by
and only I had stopped to aid
the clinic saved her, she did not die
never once aloud did she even cry
I never regretted the choice I made.

(apologies to Robert Frost)

Write about your kitchen "junk" drawer

Mama would always send us to the
kitchen drawer for such odds and ends,
a button here, a button there
scissors and safety pins everywhere.
I would always stretch my hand to see
how deep the space went
until fingers became jammed,
my skin suddenly scrunched and crammed

and I would grunt, returning
with nothing but a sticky note and
bruised skin for all my troubles.

______________________

Write about what immediately comes to mind when you think of the word "magic".

a woman without a head
a man with a saw
a stage

That’s magic

a stage
a man with a saw
a woman without a head

Write what immediately comes to mind when you think of the word “miracle”

A miracle of love,
A daughter of the stars
Trees intertwining their
Stories on her arms.

She joins her other half,
A woman who rests behind waterfalls
And they create an eternity
Where no one will fear them.

Love so bountiful
No human could separate.

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Write from the perspective of a bird's nest knocked over by the wind.

All but one egg cracked, she notices,
cane set aside the hemlock tree as she bends over,
cupping between weathered hands the nest of a young robin

Her hair, white as her bones, whips in the wind like wild tentacles
Tears sting her face when she gazes up to mama bird
Circling and crying, not understanding what has happened

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After writing that, I reread the prompt. I didn't quite get it, my apologies, MA.
---

Write a poem about lying awake in bed for hours, unable to sleep.

Jane, what you wrote is heartbreakingly lovely. And no, it's totally up to you how you take or read the prompt! :)

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I'm familiar with her shadows,
with her insistence that I am
the lesser version of who
I should be.

I turn at every angle,
but sweat still mocks my spine
and the sheets are too sharp
in their crispness;
the night knows not of mercy.

I agonize over what I could
have done better, the person
I could have been at the start
of the day.

And soon, dawn draws near,
my thoughts still circling,
bones tired of being me.

_________________________

You are stuck in traffic and a person ahead of you gets out of their car and starts dancing to a song on the radio, while waiting for the traffic to clear. What song are they jamming out to? Write about this encounter!