DWT Poetry Competition: Fifth Round

1. A Mustache for Everyone by Garrett Burnett

A lip looks too bare without any hair be it lady or gent or tiniest tot

It’s clear a mustache delivers panache, style that cannot be sold or bought

No matter the gender or age, it will render each wearer a look debonair

But if you can’t grow one, you still ought to show one; a ‘stache doesn’t have to be hair

A grease smudge or marker, whichever is darker; bristles from combs or toothbrushes

Rope, string, and twine are equally fine; use feathers from sparrows or juncos or thrushes

Draw it on, glue it on, tape it on, screw it on; put on your mustache however you must

Human biology owes an apology, handing out whiskers, innately unjust

Mustache-based fashion has stirred up our passion; all the imposters must go

Beards are too much and sideburns too little and goatees have drifted too low

Pencil thin or curled at the ends, like Salvador Dali’s or Errol Flynn’s

Bushy, dapper, dappled, svelte, walrus-like like Roosevelt

Snidely Whiplash, Fu Manchu, surely one is right for you

Empty and bare a lip, like the Sahara, could certainly use an oasis

A “mo” should spring forth just a bit to the north and be groomed on a regular basis

Sculpted with wax in reds, browns, or blacks; distinguished when white or when gray

A suitable face is the one that is graced by a line that bisects it midway

2. Kamikaze Text by Pete Calderone

Digital discourse
With a buzzsaw bravado
Renewable force
Once incommunicado

Kamikaze text
Serrating protection
Defenses now vexed
Aortic dissection

3. The Invisible Entertainer by S. Winter-Hudelson

An hour before nine strikes,
He paces floors, forehead in hand.
Finally, Pianoman’s feet drag his body
to the bar

He enters Rosie’s and pours a Pabst,
Slips five-ones in his bowl
And slides behind the spinet,
seen by none.

Fingers leap-frog ivories
And tunes fight smoke
Begging for claps
rarely heard.

He croons “Moon River”
Then a version in jazz to self-amuse
A lone fan cheers,
most are numb.

Wobbling, slobbering bejeweled old fools
Stuff ten spots in tip bowl
And request words and music
he knows not.

Breasts pressing his arm,
Two too red lips exhale stench to
Breathy beer strains of sexy songs
known to most.

A stupored couple staggers toward the stage
Holding more than dancing.
When beat and step don’t match,
neither cares.

The crowd, drowned in liquor downed long ago,
And four hours crawl to an end.
He covers the keys and rotely winds the cord
to his mic.

He exits stage left,
The bill-brimming bowl
Tucked under his arm,
his sole reward.

4. Christmas Search by Marilyn Donnell

Shepherds from the hillside bound,
Left their stock and came to town;
Searching for a baby dear,
Worshiped Christ as they came near.

Swaddling clothes, stable dim,
Manger cot, what Joy: it’s Him!

Wise men coming from afar
They were searching for a Star.
Its guiding rays through darkest night
Led them on with Hope, Truth, Light.

In that stable, in God’s good time
Found Jesus, Savior for all mankind.
By this Babe, God’s Own Son,
Came Good News for everyone.

Searching for Redeemer Child
Sent from God, Savior mild.
I will follow, like them will find
Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Divine.

5. Dreams by Robert Fenhagen

When I was a child.
Vivid dream that I remember.
Standing atop a circus trapeze pole—tall, very slender, very scary.
I wasn’t scared.
I dove off of the platform.
Flying down very fast to save a woman.
Life went on.
Trying to save others from killing themselves—I can’t.
But I can dream.

6. Untitled by Ginger Dexheimer

I never thought the valley could run so deep
But I have walked here for so long upon these tired feet
And I have stumbled, falling, into it’s darkest pit
Clinging to the edge by my fingertips
Crying “Lord help me, lest I fall and be no more.
I’ve just lost the strength for the battle that lie before”
Then softly, so gently, I feel Your embrace
Holding me to Your heart, wiping the tears from my face

7. How to Create a Ballerina by Terry Coffey

Our dog whirls and twirls in dizzying swirls
Front paws outstretched, big ears pointing straight back

The day they found her she was skittering
Back and forth across a busy highway

Aimless, friendless, alone in the wide world
Her heart full of worms and her ribs showing

It took six hot dogs and much cajoling
To coax her shaking frame into the car

Doses of arsenic rid her of worms
A steady diet hid her ribs again

Every day I walk her down to the park
Every day she dances with excitement

Shaking off my emotional baggage
Breaking through my jaded, cynical crust

All it took was six hot dogs to create
A hairy, 50 pound ballerina

A dancing miracle of renewal
Proof of the power of love and hot dogs

8. The Voice Within by Salvatore Buttaci

In her last years she explained it away
by saying she was afflicted with
a touch of poetry. Her lungs rasped
with words that had strayed from a heart
heavy with secrets to confess in metered lines.

A touch of poetry in the trembling
of her gnarled fingers that gripped the pen
against the white field of paper, shaking
out words like seeds dreaming of springtime,
like the hand wave of a queen tossed at crowds.

She had spent her days in the busy vocation
of housewife and mother. In good health
she did her best to make a difference
in all their lives, but for herself, she ignored
the voice within that begged her time.

A touch of poetry in the way her thin lips
quivered when she mouthed the rhythmic words of
a heart bursting with the need to dictate
those escaped moments, those tiny joys and sorrows
she had experienced once and needed to write down.

The years had galloped by. Evenings she lay in bed
remembering and could not sleep. The years
had galloped by. And her pen would tell the stories
line by line: ink and tears, tears and ink—a legacy
of sorts. She hoped they would find her in those verses.

She’d go to sleep and dream herself away.
A still life, old woman with folded hands,
mother, wife, friend, neighbor, recorder of dreams.
What, they’ll ask, took her from us? She seemed fine.

And if they read those notebooks lying there,
read each poem that filled her lungs, coursed through
much traveled arteries, spoke to her in lonely times,
said all of her reasons for being born and living long,
they will be comforted and treasure those words she touched.

9. The Sweet Taste of Chocolate Melting on her Tongue by Rachel Green

In the door of the fridge is a bar of dark chocolate,
a good third of it eaten but still plenty left
she eats a single square when she gets an urge
for the stuff, it saves her eating a bar from the local shop.

Not that she minds the walk –
it’s not far and she can take the dog
his eager paws pulling her down the hill
until she yanks on his chain with a cross ‘stop pulling’
and he bows his great Shepherd head as if he knows
he’s been too boisterous and he’s really sorry
for at least a few seconds until he remembers
the wood is just through this snicket here –
Are we going to the woods, mum?

Through the woods and left through the estate where dogs bark
and she does a shuffle step dance to avoid the litter
and the dog mess other people leave;
past the council bins and the repossessed houses
to the open-all-hours except lunchtime
where she ties up the dog and pushes open the door,
the shrilling bell announcing her appearance on the CCTV.

Milk today, and tea bags and a loaf of bread –
medium cut means more slices for the money –
and her fingers linger over the chocolate bars.
No. Not today. She has that stuff in the fridge.

10. Untitled by Claire Collins

And God said to me
“If you wish it
You may go to Earth
For a visit.”
And I said “Sure!”
And God said,
“Are you certain?
There is great despair
and unhappiness, there.
They kill each other
and threaten the planet.
Here it is calm and serene.
Are you sure you want to go?”
And I said, “Sure!”

93 years later, I returned
and God said, “Well?”-
“Oh, it was just as you said-
death and destruction,
despair and unhappiness.”
“You regret it then?” God asked.
“Oh no,” I said,
I saw a daffodil and a seagull.
I ate an apple and smelled bread baking.
A man held me in his arms,
and I held a small child in my arms,
and I saw the sunset over the water.”