The Sound of Ink

"The Sea Inside"   painting by  Samy Charnine Seated in the eye of my aquarium I am a spectacle drawing stares from transgressors fishing windows for reasons to protest. Plastic tongues spill their pollution against glass that muffles the noise into harmless gurgles. Unaffected by the frenzy of sharks I cast my eyes toward white clouds and slip into the dream of a blue-sky ocean. ©Susie Clevenger 2020 The Sunday Muse #105

Where eternity slips through the narrows of the moon, time flies with dragonfly wings through Adam’s rib to test how much weight Eve will be pressed to carry. ©Susie Clevenger 2020 #napowritmo2020 Day 24 Inspired by #skyloverwordlist - narrow - Real Toads - April 2020 - Day 24

“You've got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down.”  ― Annie Dillard   On this mountain where nothing grows but stones I must seed the wind with wings, and learn to fly when I leap into the unknown. ©Susie Clevenger 2020 #napowritmo2020 Day 22 Inspired by: #skyloverwordlist Real Toads Poets of April Real Toads - April 2020 - Day 22

Across the street a gray and white cat stations itself on a square of sidewalk and waits for me to open my front door. We are both hungry, he for the food I scatter, and I for the purring comfort of trust. It is our streetlight ritual where peace isn’t bound by rules of separation.   ©Susie Clevenger 2020 #napowritmo2020 Day 18 Inspired by: #skyloverwordlist - stations Sometimes poetry isn't a grand work of wording...It's the echo of honesty. Real Toads - April 2020 - Day 18 Flash Fiction Friday 55

Bitter likes to talk behind your back, carve your bones into its distortion. Conversation’s acrid knife searches tears to judge its wound. Put trust in your own reflection, not the cutting silver of wicked’s tongue. ©Susie Clevenger 2020 #napworimo2020 Day 16 Inspired by: #skyloverwordlist - Conversation And this image from Real Toads In The Remains of This Month (April)  taken by Karin Gustafson Poets and Storytellers United ~ Writer's Panty #29   Real Toads - April 2020 - Day 16

Head On A Stem, 'noir' by Odilon Redon A fairy moon blooms among bones in Insolent’s garden of sticks and stones. Seeded to grow where wishes aren’t fed, she bonnets her dark side where anger is led. Daughter of sky and siren of sea she drinks light from a candle and brews impish tea. In the hail of scissor wind she boldly protects her stem so harrier blade can't cut her. ©Susie Clevenger 2020 #napowritmo2020 Day 10 Inspired by: Real Toads ~  Art of Odilon Redon Real Toads ~ April 2020 Day 10

Refusal sits among no and deny like a crow charm amongst imitation pearls in a thesaurus bracelet. It is the black onyx and body language jewel that outshines the duller sheen of noncommittal and withholding. Words have value…I need to be cautious on how much worth I place in syllables. ©Susie Clevenger 2020 #napowrimo2020 Day 7 Real Toads April 2020 ~ Day 7

Mars has no ink, no ancient paper notes of how and why or caution for men drunk on dominion. It travels the universe through the eyes of men who hope to spoil its surface with a of plunder of flags fighting to upend primordial. Time hangs its clock where time has no meaning, and ticks the days of Mars closer to boots of men building walls with the irony of illegal immigration.  ©Susie Clevenger 2020 #napowrimo2020 Day 5 Written with inspiration from @skylover word list and  Physics with Bjorn Real Toads ~ April 2020 ~ Day 5

The sun is blind and the moon sings arias to my curtains. I wish I knew where I crawled through the mirror, but exits can knife when reasons don’t matter. Pandemic visions worry my madness until the voices in my head reach the noise of my tongue. Isolation, the grit of must, gives me too many hours to pimp introvert to extroverts who hate spending time listening when they are hungry to speak. Does anything make sense when half the population is brave enough to nest while the other half insist on their right to roam. I’m here in the where I should be. I’m a sister to Alice and a cousin to White Rabbit…. Time is too much in the fear of too little.  ©Susie Clevenger 2020 #napowritmo2020 Day 3 Real Toads ~ April 2020 ~ Day 3