Thursday, April 9, 2015

2015 Progressive Poem -- My Line

Welcome to latest installment of the 2015 Progressive Poem! I'm going to honor the changes Irene, our fearless leader, made to the layout. She writes,

"You'll notice a couple of changes in this version of our poem. Jone's first line has been edited slightly, at Jone's request. (She and Joy decided "deposits" was redundant.) Also, I've broken the lines into couplets (one way to add white space to long lines.)"

I'm a flatlander from the arid prairies of eastern Colorado. I know nothing about deltas, let alone mermaids. This will be a stretch for my imagination! Excuse me for a minute while I go do some research!

...I hope Irene won't mind if I change her period to a comma! I'll leave my line unpunctuated for Michelle (Today's Little Ditty) to do with as she will!



She lives without a net, walking along the alluvium of the delta.
Shoes swing over her shoulder, on her bare feet stick jeweled flecks of dark mica.

Hands faster than fish swing at the ends of bare brown arms. Her hair flows,
snows in wild wind as she digs in the indigo varnished handbag,

pulls out her grandmother's oval cuffed bracelet,
strokes the turquoise stones, and steps through the curved doorway.

Tripping on her tail she slips hair first down the slide... splash!
She glides past glossy water hyacinth to shimmer with a school of shad,

listens to the ibises roosting in the trees of the cypress swamp







16 comments:

  1. As you said, nothing weird. Quite nice, in fact... somewhere I'd like to visit. :)

    I'm off to consider the possibilities....

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ooohhh - love all those delicious s'ssss and more short "I" sounds. And you handled the steamy southern environs just fine, Mary Lee! Well done.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks! I loved Laura's line and wanted to keep those wonderful sounds going! I'd love to go there in person some day!

      Delete
  3. Beautiful Mary! Everyone is using such fine vocabulary. I'll have to swallow a dictionary before next time.

    ReplyDelete
  4. It's delicious!
    Now I have to get off the rock bound coast here and start researching, too! Our mermaid are a hardy lot, with no water hyacinth, nary an ibis nor a cypress...and she would have been swingin' her hip boots, and her hair really would have snow in it... Oh, Google! Where are you?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Donna, I hope I get to meet you someday in person! You make me LAUGH!

      Delete
    2. Ha! I always have to be careful with my humor...some people who don't know me take me seriously. After working with one principal for about 4 years, she admitted she had just realized that I wasn't always serious! That's the problem with deadpan humor. I was panic stricken, trying to remember all the things I'd said that were silly, sarcastic or just plain ridiculous that she'd thought I really meant! That being said, if you ever get to Maine, let me know! We'll go get lobster on the dock. Seriously.

      Delete
  5. I just thought we needed to slow down a bit, savor the moment before the action continued...

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thanks! (I am pleased with how it stands alone, and how it plays with the others!)

    ReplyDelete
  7. It seems that she is sinking beautifully into the aura of her home, but you've added some tension too because of the listening. I'm wondering what other sound will appear? Nice additions, Mary Lee.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I do like how you have put in the listening aspect....what is she thinking, our delta mermaid? It is so interesting to watch these PPs grow over the month. And the words wash over us, like the water, the ibises, the hyacinths.....

    ReplyDelete
  9. I'm catching up now, and what a transformation! I think that curved doorway was magic, and I think the ibises in the cypress swamp are magical too. Lovely!

    ReplyDelete
  10. We just visited the National Aviary last week...so I can really see these Ibises! And now I can hear them too. This poem game is so much darn fun.

    ReplyDelete
  11. I'm loving this! I can picture this swamp! Now what will come next! (It's kind of fun to be a little late to the game and play catch up!)

    ReplyDelete
  12. You enter the dark water terrain sounding like a seasoned & lyrical local, Mary Lee - brava!

    ReplyDelete