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Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Personal Challenge # 4

I was munching on Christmas cookies,  
when the talented Mama Zen handed the personal challenge baton to me: 

if everything was different 
Since I am on vacation, my first thought was to go to a salon. 
Here is my changing room ~





paint the day in lavender black
burnishing hair in purple night
bold as your lacquered nails,
tip tapping along window's edge 

close your dark crow eyes tight
imagining the room bare of clothes,
mirrors changing faces, and 
polished floor reflecting you, just you

for once

instead of spraying the walls all white
creamy and dazzling for other people, 
rearranging furniture, spotless clean
until you are a pale shadow lamp

that once wanted to burn
both ends of the yellow taper candle,
while replaying the short grainy film of
you, wrapped in your lover's rapture

the first

in black and white frames, 
the yearning in your bosom stirs,
churning your belly’s gut sideways,

you rip away maple leafed wallpaper,  
tilt the domed ceiling closer to Pacific sky,
lie on native bamboo bed, unspooled,

if everything was different, 

i want to live


me       

  
Words by Heaven


15 comments:

  1. Wow! Grace, I'm blown away by the magnificence of this piece.. each stanza is a gem perfectly placed within your interesting structure, and these are words I'm sure we can all feel in our heart of hearts.

    A hearty round of applause from me!

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  2. Beautiful. I loved the last full stanza and the two following lines. A well done challenge indeed.

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  3. This is what I posted on your blog:

    Ahh... this is beautiful... rich with such vivid images. Ripping away the wallpaper... I like that.

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  4. Thank you ~ I appreciate your kind and encouraging words ~

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  5. oh this is great - well done! so many good descriptions - love the "paint the day in lavender back" and "you rip away maple leafed wallpaper, tilt the doomed ceiling closer to Pacific sky" - you paint a picture! nice!

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  6. As I read this piece, I could tell it was your writing. You have a wonderfully distinctive style-very physical, beautifully descriptive. I love the lines "polished floor reflecting you, just you...for once." You really captured something I think many of us feel with this one. Bravo! And Happy Holidays!

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  7. OT and Lolamouse, thank you for your wonderful comments. Happy Holidays too ~

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  8. Wow! Such fantastic writing. One of your best, I believe. Rich in images, and rather haunting. Your writing inspires me to dig deep - makes me want to write something, too.

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  9. That first stanza is fantastic. Every word.

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  10. Amazing. I was captured by the "lavender black" in the first stanza, and then the images became more and more vivid as I kept reading. I applaud you! A wonderful poem.

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  11. This is just fantastic, Heaven! What an amazing approach to the prompt. This feels deeply personal, but speaks for a lot of us, I think.

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  12. 'unspooled' ... such a word.
    excellent in every way.
    loving the challenges!!

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  13. Sherry, Shay, Mary Ann, Mama Zen, Kim and Shawnacy : thank you for your wonderful comments. Yes, these challenges are fun ~

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  14. I loved it...amazing imagery and I love the layers you shared~
    Well Done!

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