Alice Gone Wild
Our girths and portals swell and shrink,
Adhere, adjust to what we eat,
Our appetites great stones that sink;
Condemn our home for taste of meat,
We lie and kill and steal and cheat
To have first choice to fuck hot pink.
Design the odds; we can’t be beat.
World by the tail – or so we think…
Now comes a-creep, a tiny thing.
It wears a crown, up close we meet.
“I’ll kill you all.” Now here’s the thing:
It walks the walk, pandemic sleet.
We lock things down, evade complete —
Until impulse does howl and sting.
“No bug can curb our stomping feet!”
Our doors explode; our anguish rings.
Corpse fertilize green living things.
We are no more except to feed
Now balanced chain; our absence sings.
A soft goodbye whispers the trees.
Today’s offering is a quatrain with rhyme scheme abab, baba…
Anmol (alias HA) is today’s host of dVerse. Anmol says:
I would like you to think about portals today and write a verse based on your understanding or taking inspiration from the ones that I have shared here.
How well you’ve captured today’s environment, fears and challenges.
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Thank you, Sadje. I think we’re at a crossroads.
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We are. I hope we can negotiate it to the benefit of all humans
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I am standing at my desk and clapping! BRAVO!
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Linda, I’m humbled. Thank you ❤
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BTW- are you on FB? Asking because there are more to hoots of Bella on my FB.
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Linda, no, not on FB anymore. How is Bella doing??
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She was here around 10:30 for a while and hasn’t been back. But usually she comes around dusk. And so it’s still early. She doesn’t look well but is still flying. 🙏🏻❤️
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….and we thought we were in charge ….
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Wow. That’s a powerful poem that describes our current situationwith chilling accuracy.
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It’s like a blot on the sun 😦
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An accurate description of our Through the Looking Glass World. I like your wordplay with corona/crown.
(There’s a theme about Alice in Wonderland in Star Trek: Discovery).
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If it ever comes to netflix or hulu I’ll check it out.
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The pandemic sleet is wiping and rearranging our time and life. Need to reconsider now what is essential or not. Be safe and well.
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Yes it it, Grace, and yes, we do. Thanks for your well-wishing and wishing you the same, my friend.
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Very nice Quatrain! Love the idea of pandemic sleet!
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Dwight, thank you so much.
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You make a quatrain sing and cajole and sting and offer succor. You blend Lewis Carroll and today seamlessly. Your words are jabs and uppercuts, kidney punches and knee capping. What a ride.
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What a fun comment, Glenn ❤
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Our absence sings…that sums it up. (K)
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Yes 😦
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Ooh! That is quite a journey down the rabbit hole. I love your diction and rhythm here — there are surprises and hard-hitting emotions that tell such a vital story of our times. I loved it!
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Anmol, thank you very much. Glad you connected with it.
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Wow! Brilliant, that was so good! The last four lines gave me a chill!
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Thank you and glad you liked it.
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Your quatrain is an eerily dark take on Alice, Lisa, which has conjured weird pictures in my head! The rhyme and rhythm remind me of the cautionary tales for children by Heinrich Hoffman and Hilaire Belloc, although yours is most definitely not for children! I love the way you personified the virus as ‘a tiny thing’ that wears a crown – great wordplay!
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Thanks for your insightful commentary, Kim. Poetry has been a big blessing in venting some stuff.
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Nice line: “Our appetites great stones that sink;”
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Thank you, Frank.
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I love how the imbalance is righted by greening and singing…and witnessed by the trees.
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Thank you, Victoria 🙂
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Very intense Jade Li.
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Interesting rhyme scheme, you make it look effortless. I think you are right, but hope I am wrong about the twin dangers of privilege and impatience. Spoiled we are.
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Thank you for your thoughtful comment. Yes those two are double trouble.
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That ending! Turnabout/fair play? Well done.
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Thanks much, Ken.
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oH LisA, tHis is JuST stupEndUos!..!
That second stanza is where we like to live, but life and death can get us by the throat, I have realized I can’t design the odds, but I still want to figure out what to do with the hot pink 🙂
Lisa, I will take this and Grace’s piece as my fav Coronaverses this trail. 🙂
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Dear Lona, so glad you connected with it 🙂
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☺️
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Marvelous… life seems like it’s going back the rabbit hole these days..
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