I Am the Egg Woman (ii)

The satisfying
thwack
of spoon
on eggshell

make it crack
peel away
the top

reveal the
white mound
ready for

scooping.
Spoon poised
then it goes in

like predator
with prey
struck helpless
and dumb

(Hannibal
Lecter
with one of
his victims)

dip into
the swimming yolk
not quite solid
yellow-edged
raw lava centre
relished on tongue
mmmmmmm

pure protein power
for pint-sized
proportions

I carefully
scrape out
and consume
every last remain

as if I’m eating
a tiny brain.

I admire
the hollow shell

somehow
still perfect
in its emptiness.

Tapering
ovoid
contains
the void.

What more
beatific form
exists
than this?

Nothing.

Nothing
whatsoever.

_{^{© N Nazir 2022}}

_{^{© N Nazir 2022}}

Shared for dVerse Open Link Night, hosted by Sanaa.

The Sum of All its Parts

The weather sneezes
through a crack in the windowsill.
The moment changes course.
Somewhere, a sound like
a thrumming microcosm.

*

I have a circus of blood inside me
and the workings of my body are beautiful.
As it is, exactly as it is.
The inconsistency of vision
the oversensitivity of skin
the dryness of hands from overdoing
the non-Platonic proportions
the passing tension from being so good
at shouldering burdens.
This good machine deserves good clothes.

*

Some houses are ill and lean a little to one side.
They wish someone would place a lantern
in their naked hearth and stroke a hand
along their walls as they keep at bay
the hollering elements
the ceaseless intelligence of rain
the hornets and lions and zombies.
All that hard work they do, for you.

*

Other houses are an ambient sadness.
Only laughter can shock the molecules,
break the trance of inertia. Music too,
awning outward in smoke ring vibrations.

*

Still others offer themselves to you like a hug
in their strength, their completeness
in how much they were loved before you
and love you with their love excess
being taught so well, all that warmth
soaked in the walls and buzzing still.

You sleep well there and dream
of origins close to the ocean
some ancestral morn-song
and realise once again that
the season turned on its axis
as you honeyed through your slumber.

_{^{© N Nazir 2022}}

_{^{Stork, © N Nazir 2020}}

Written for Shay’s Word Garden, this week hosted by Hedgewitch (Joy), who gives us inspiration with the legendary poet Pablo Neruda.

Written also for dVerse Poetics, hosted by Lillian, who invites us to write a poem using one of the given proverbs / adages. I was inspired by:

“Things are not always what they seem.” – Beekeeper and the Bees, from Aesop’s Fables.

Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall

They say vampires don’t have a reflection. Which might explain why I haven’t been feeling myself lately. This morning when I tried to apply lipstick, I missed my mouth, well, because I grew faint and then vanished altogether. Mirrors don’t lie. How did I procure this ailment? Did I frolic unwittingly with the undead whilst I was out and get nipped without my knowledge? How does one catch vampirism…? Oh well, I thought, as my reflection emerged again slowly before my eyes. There’s nothing I can do about it now. Perhaps no one will notice.

_{^{Evocation, Shirin Abedirinad, 2015 (Mirror in Desert, Tehran)}}

Written for Sammi Scribbles Weekend Writing Prompt: Mirror, 95 words.

What Shape is this Waning?

The
washed-out
planet is
euphoniously shifting.  It
creaks and grinds with turning
but cannot escape from itself.  From us.  It
writhes in its own hot soup, trying to
heal.  It doesn’t want to
fail.  We mustn’t.
And yet
and
yet –

***

The
moon
has turned
away from me
tonight.  It peered over then,
having colluded with the sun earlier that day,
simply shrugged and slipped under a blanket.  Still,
I’ll wait for it, until
it’s cast off
its pall,
until
tomorrow.

***

Change
is
afoot.  Sands
of time glide
underfoot, slipping, never not shifting.
Nothing is still though it appears to be.
Light and shade persist in their love affair
defining this, that, you, me.
Merging only at
twilight before
parting
again.

^{_{© N Nazir 2021}}

_{^{Photo by Geni Hoka on Pexels.com}}

Written for dVerse poetry prompt: Concrete or Abstract? hosted by Ingrid. The challenge is to write a poem using only concrete nouns and imagery. Hence, the following words are banned: soul, love, lust, dreams, sorrow, suffering, heartache, wonder, etc and any other such abstract nouns.

* * *

I have used two lines from previous poems as prompts for these poems, using the Fibonacci form. I came across this form whilst doing NaPoWriMo earlier this year. It comprises of the following structure 1-1-2-3-5-8 though I have mirrored it backwards to make it longer: 1-1-2-3-5-8-8-5-3-2-1-1, mostly, because I enjoy the shape it makes 🙂 Plus I get more words to play with.

The line “the washed-out planet is euphoniously shifting” is the title of a poem I wrote a few months ago which you can read here if you so wish.

The line “the moon has turned away from me tonight” is from a poem I also wrote a few months ago entitled Caught In-between an Ache and a Dream which you can read here if inclined.

Thank you for dropping by ❤

This Poem Needs Tuning

My little finger strains to meet
the string two frets away.

Some chords will never be played.
I have been a novice at this for years.

I concede it is not my gift given, only
an ever-straining desire of the muscles

and that’s okay.  There’s no time
to do everything after all.

And sometimes
winning is a hollow thing.

^{© N Nazir 2021}