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nicole Feb 6
1-25-25   9:56pm

sorry that my lips tasted like crayons when we kissed, my lipstick is expired
Because a losing player tosses
Monopoly boards and their houses
Sharp corners await
Mom in her bare feet.
The agony one board-game causes!
I promise this is the last limerick about Monopoly, at least for a while.
Psilocybin silly when the
cops arrive.
Sitting on the couch naked,
laughter, aching jaws.
They ask where my wallet is?
I ask, where are my pants?
Even they laugh.
I can't say mushrooms are
all bad.
They are the catalysts that
brought me back to the
hospital to deal with the
real killer...
*****.
True Story.
I recently did an open mic via zoom at the writer's workshop in Iowa City.  Here's a link.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKnpk9OMWXg&t=25s
I do not yet know your name,
though I imagine it pretty or plain:
Elizabeth or Ruth, Amara or Yue,
Claire or Bethany who lives by the zoo.

You'll be seven foot tall, and four foot three,
Stand with bowed legs, and sing in your sleep.
You'll know mathematics, like seven times one;
Add us together, and make for the sun.

Less would be shameful, this we'll both know;
So we'll zip from the ground, fired from bows.
The stars our audience, we'll burn to a crisp,
We, a miracle, sealed with a kiss.
Anais Vionet Feb 2
Maybe I’m too simple
or too shallow
but I’m not angry.
What’s wrong with me?

I was trying to think
of someone I hate,
Jews, CIS guys, republicans,
palestinians, blacks, democrats,
the left handed, authority figures,
central americans, parents, vagrants,
the usual suspects, but I’m coming up empty

Things aren’t perfect
don’t get me wrong
I’ve got a pug nose
a flat chest
a giant forehead
and too much work to do
but I’m trying my best—

Worse yet, I’ve no plummeting anxieties
no obvious neurosis
—that one could be a misdiagnosis
no painful hangnails
no sad life tales
no addictions to defend
or hated ex-boyfriends
I have no emo hooks to pin my verse.
no current melodramas to cozen and coerce
between you and me, I think I’m off the rails
It’s really no wonder my poetry pales.

Yeah, that’s what’s wrong with me.
.
.
Songs for this:
Gee, Doctor by Dimie Cat
Sweet Lovin' (feat. Anna-Luca & Iain Mackenzie) by Club des Belugas
BLT Merriam Webster word of the day challenge 01/11/25:
Cozen = to win over, or coax.
Anais Vionet Jan 31
This poem was mused by:
"Shakespeare won't look at me" by ThomasW.Case
-----------------------------------  -------------­-------------------

We fill our lives with work and stress
in the lust for new possessions
we're taught that this is called success
and it makes for good impressions

But pleasures we’re taught to suppress
so our souls will fly up to the heavens
but this flesh that god has gifted us
are our only true possessions

If we find ourselves casually undressed
which is frankly, our natural condition
and if ****** needs should be addressed
there’s no need for ****** confessions

for pleasure is something to be expressed
if we’re alone or in a marvelous coalition
So I wish you satisfaction in elations quest
as you work the knobs, slants and levers
because this isn’t some kind of competition

P.S. Will Shakespeare was familiar with *******'s guilty thrills.
"The expense of spirit, in a waste of shame is lust in action"
.
.
A song for this:
Flowers by Miley Cyrus
For a contest. This poem was mused by:
"Shakespeare won't look at me" by Thomas_W._Case © Anais Vionet
Traveler Jan 30
Footsteps grow stronger
when you leave your path and wander.
Sedentary is a lump of dying flesh..
Take that walk, get some fresh air.
You can clear the mind out there!
Or you can set there on your device,
until there’s nothing left..
Traveler 🧳 Tim
Anais Vionet Jan 29
It was dark and cold night. Looking back and up, the moon
was a thin and useless crescent, barely visible.
‘What a wasted moon,’ I thought.
“A stupid moon,” I mumbled to myself as if to finish a conversation.
It looked deflated, artificial, soulless, and cold. Not poetic at all.

I’m coping with tough decisions
a victory and perhaps one martini too many.
Peter (my bf) called, when I was at Toads (a local bar).
We usually talk on Tuesdays at about 11.
It was noisy in there
I was a little tipsy.
He became a little irritated.
It didn’t go well.
Martinis and authority don’t mix.

I handed my thesis in today, 80 days early.
I've been working on it obsessively.
finger to lips, like a secret  I can be obsessive.
It’s a 60 page ‘first draft,’ theoretically.
“Can I turn in a first draft for your review?”
He looked surprised, “Sure.” I handed it over, and that’s that.
Every ‘first draft’ I’ve ever handed in has gotten an A.
“You’re CrAzY,” Sunny chuckled, “We gotta celebrate!”

“Please don’t hold the door open,” the librarian said.
I jumped, I hadn’t seen her sneaking up on me.
How long had I been standing there?
I’d been lost in thought.
I focused on her now.
She was 50 maybe, or a hundred—who knew?
Her face needed moisturizing badly,
her wrinkles were like cracks in marble.
She looked frowny.

Why is everyone frowny tonight?
“Sure,” I said, facetiously, throwing my arm up like the door was hot.
The door was now free to close.
And the world was a better place.
Once I’d turned and stepped into the library,
I decided It was too bright and too hot there.
So I left.

The second I was outside, in the refreshing cold, Sunny appeared.
“There you are,” she said, like she had lost something.
“You walk too fast,” and the girl with her laughed.
Sunny can always pick up a girl—it’s like she’s magnetic.
"Let's go home,” she added, “we’re going to pay for this tomorrow.”
She hooked my arm in hers and we followed the path,
the three of us, like the yellow brick road.
.
.
A song for this:
Drunk On Love by Basia
Data & Picard by Pogo
BLT Merriam Webster word of the day challenge 01/29/25:
Facetious a remark meant to be humorous that’s actually annoying
My grandfather said 'smile things could be worse - so I smiled and things got worse.'  vjkelly

'I did all the wrong things to get to the right place'  vjkelly
laugh
Anais Vionet Jan 27
Fight the algorithms
that tell us what to do,
to make us predictable,
unoriginal and bankable.

Have you witnessed how
increasingly bland and homogenous
our lives are becoming?

Choose freedom
avoid the diaries of commerce
that riff on the ubiquity of apps

resist the reductive tropes
of our published and circulated,
perspective customer identities.

Fight the algorithms
with their embedded backlot
familiarity, built around class
and consumerism.

Try to understand the
vague, inscrutable and
purposefully circuitous.

Or stop overthinking
and embrace liberating surrender.
That’s the path I’ve chosen.
.
.
Broken People by The Narcissist Cookbook
Talk Down Dijon
BLT Merriam Webster word of the day challenge 01/26/25:
Circuitous = winding, indirect and perhaps unclear
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