Thank you very much to NilavroNill Shoovro and 

his team for publishing my three poems in the April 

issue of Our Poetry Archive (OPA).

https://ourpoetryarchive.blogspot.com/2020/04/linda-imbler.html

Placeholders

There are people with whom you do not stay

romantically involved.

Their presence and bond quite fleeting,

the connection dissolves.

The ones who occupy your attention for a time,

those you’ll forever dub

as placeholders, who remain

until your true love does show up.

The De-Evolution Of Bandaids

Remember when bandaids came in a tin box

instead of flimsy cardboard?

It’s as if the hurts

don’t need to be protected as much as they once were.

The glamour and illusion of safety

in childhood is today dispelled

whiskered chins

and palsied hands

offer no safekeeping

and the mitigation of unhappiness

is no longer a hope

the illusion of size to security,

shattered

falling is still an option,

but now it’s so much harder to get back up.

The Fruits Of Their Gluttony

Like grapes plucked

and placed in a huge bowl of fruit,

perched upon a buffet

for folks to find,

anxieties,

deep within

their whirling, swirling minds.

Life complicated

by dreams unfulfilled,

and the rapacity,

the bottomless pit

of wasted desires.

No contentment,

just resentment,

and bitter remnants

of now useless peels of hate as produce,

strewn across chaotic sideboards,

where live

people with greedy intentions.

Thank you to Credo Espoir for publishing 5 of my poems today.  Here are 3 of them.

Open Spaces

It feels great

to be out from under

rolling carpets of steel and stone.

I’m standing with outlying anonymity,

breathing in the glory of solitude.

Enjoying the simple subtraction 

of so much weight from shoulders.

It’s so easy to forestall deep sorrow here

while feeling the deepening rumble

of a wet, thunderous afternoon

within my chest.

The wind battering from all sides,

turning my hair like the Medusa,

as I wait for the open spaces,

and the nighttime canvas of midnight blue

to be painted across the sky.

Piccadilly Dreaming Away From Shore 

Ice cream,

Slow time,

Colors are vivid.

Music makes the feet move,

Times are good,

And people are in love with life.

They all watch mundane things

with great gusto-

clouds:

high and wispy,

slender vapor,

a sky full of ships

and waves

flowers:

full of kaleidoscopic, 

vibrant color,

swirling soft petals,

boat propellors above the sea

Brown rice:

nutty flavored part of a seafarer’s diet,

chewy on the tongue

with that periodic crunch,

a dollop of honey atop

hats:

perched on heads as pirate scarves,

hat bands and feather accessorizing,

brims overhanging

the beautiful faces of the romantics

tea:

strongly brewed,

poured into patterned teacups,

quixotic ideas drunk in

not unlike a sailor’s rum

Idealists with

big thoughts,

breaking chains,

Piccadilly dreamers floating upon the new ark.

Bicycle-Life Cycle’s Rise and Fall

The world no longer shines gently as the yellow season.

There are no cooling features to this day.

I can hardly bear the oppressive heat in clothes.

Ceramic birds fly,

and from my once elegant arms,

my wings beat,

growing from seeds of bruise and laceration.

Sitting upon this vehicle,

drawing upon my will,

I find I have gears I’ve never used.

I feel the burning strain in my lungs,

hear the clamor of oxygen for space.

My wheels find purchase as I climb

and finally respite.

I have arrived at the signaled end and beginning,

a place of silence and no regret,

my stele now planted at the apex.

And over the hill,

I see no poverty of rainbows.

The swirl of the stars grows,

even as the moon slips from behind thin clouds,

even in the sun’s silver flame.

The bicycle gains speed in my ceremonial descent,

dropping all falsehoods in its wake.

I am no longer its captain

and all at once I am homesick

for a place I’ve never been.

Someone once asked me

how much does light weigh.

I think I know.

Two poems from my latest published book "Bus Lights, Travel Sights (Nashville and Back)."  See sidebar or click here for book details/purchase.  Paperback ($7.99) or Kindle ($2.99) version available.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/170132976X/ref=sr_1_5?keywords=linda+imbler&qid=1584903864&sr=8-5

Ozzy and Elvis

Madame Toussand,

mistress of this mum universe.

Jerry Lee Lewis-the poser rocks,

an advancing royal emerging—the King!

This non-verbal tribe

of musical celebs,

they candidly convey

each individual extraordinary size and shape.

Visitors make a cold diagnosis

of the famous,

they, built from bones of steel and clay.

Their wooden features

exhibited through waxen physicality.

Actual clothes, hair, and props

lend realism to each display.

3-D still lives,

Shaped by knives,

Positioned to sit or stand,

Leaders of their bands.

Hooch

Abating sentries of rev’noors,

these now impeccable brewers

offer steep drink within lawful lines.

They’re no longer part of a sinning legion.

Once clandestine lodging of glass bottles,

hidden under haystacks, 

and behind hollow brick facades.

Chosen by disobedient revelers,

with a glib indecency,

and a whacked fetish for drink.

The history of moonshine reflected

in poorly remembered scenarios,

in suppressed neighborhoods,

along some preferred mazes

of streets and alleyways.

A nauseous whirlwind

of heavy boozers weaving their way home.

And wives with no resolute sleep,

offer a dramatic welcoming back home.

Their ramshackle boom,

loudness in the living room.

In a lunar instant,

a starlight grenade he offers in response.

And landlords cite an embarrassing dread,

as families face a rancorous displacement,

and bags of empty vessels are left behind.

Kentucky stills now in the open,

Pray no more families become broken.

8 a.m EST.  It will be recorded so you will be able to listen to it later.  You will be able to download the episode.


https://strengthtobehuman.podbean.com

Thank you to Mark Antony Rossi for publishing two of my poems today in Ariel Chart.  Here is one of them:

https://www.arielchart.com/2020/03/sinking-ships-where-there-are-no.html






Sinking Ships Where There Are No Rainbows


Negativity,

caught in a web,

having emptied power

from your own hands.

Grown old before your time,

having forgotten the directions

to the jolly pathways of childhood.

Bad habits,

stirring the air as if ringing a vesper-bell.

Reservoirs of goodwill quickly depleted,

shackling you to servitude

of repeat performances.


Past Failures,

sitting on your chest,

so you can’t pull yourself up,

drinking so reverently

from the bittersweet cup of temerity.

Wasted time,

continually dodging 

all the need-to-dos.

Guitar strings unplucked,

flags not unfurled.

Pointless fears,

Worry and fretting

about small things 

that creep and crawl through

one’s tunnels of consciousness.

Do not let these weigh you down.

For too soon,

you will be naturally seeping

into the earth.

Thank you to Mark Antony Rossi of Ariel Chart for publishing this poem today.

https://www.arielchart.com/2020/03/mediterranean-charm.html







Mediterranean Charm

Near Mount Olympus where

it’s theorized that gods from

Aphrodite to Zeus played

lyres, we enjoy the mindless

delight of deliciously catered

Koupepia and Cypriot brandy

served by quick, accommodating

waiters. To complete the evening,

we sip after - dinner coffee and

then descend the stairs to better

hear the cicadas sing and to

watch the citrus grow.

Thank you to Mark Antony Rossi of Ariel Chart for publishing my poem today.


https://www.arielchart.com/2020/03/shape-shifting-while-my-pen-empties.html







Shape Shifting While My Pen Empties





As if a boy with tripping feet,

I fall out of the day,

and into the nightfall,

where shadows tell me secrets.

Thus, 

the diminishing veil 

of thought to pen 

peaks at invisibility.



An emphatic play of syllables begins.

I see them becoming assembled,

gathered,

the same way I should be collecting butterflies, buttons, or coins.



My once inaccessible pen

now smoothly streams.

My mind will break open

against the blank page,

and I’ll find the words flowing

as rivers do,

to where I write words that heal,

words once hidden in my troubled soul.



And so follows,

the flurried edit,

mad digits write with a beat,

as I shape shift into the continual writer,

writing to the world.