Pooched for Kisses

Last night I wanted to be Marilyn Monroe with her dress blowing in the hot air, her wasp-waist and her red lips pooched for kissing. My poem reflected the reality of it all. Mimi remarked that she had been thinking about the word "pooch" recently. Odd.

Mimi brought her annual Elvis poem (yes, the King is dead!) which everyone liked. It is hard for me to imagine our sensible Mimi as "boy crazy", but that is what she admits to. Philomena, with a last minute entry, asked the pitiful question who am i.

Art's poem was visually pleasing to me, with a recurring line of "sometimes I ask too much of chance." It also struck a chord (sorry) with a reference to Sibelius' 7th, rising and hanging in the air. Dan, our opera singer, particularly liked that, too.

The stout-hearted Scottish wanderer continues his journey. Mark responded to our questions for further explanation about ULLANS, the language he has been sleeping with. He is able to access the words through glossaries and other writings to establish their meaning and usage, which I didn't understand. I thought he was just making it up as needed.

I was happy to see Paul at the Ernie Williams concert Wednesday night. It was a great evening. I love Ernie. Was wishing Tom was there to hear the sax player who was phenomenal. Paul's poem was very strong, about an old man dying to sounds of a baseball game outside his window. We all offered a little trimming advice and I suggested a title change to "Crossing the Plate".

Napoleon at Elba was well served by Dan's verse. In fact, we all wanted him to continue it beyond the four stanzas he had started with. A Napoleonic epic.

I got a little carried away with rearranging Cathy's effort at comparing pelican flight to the Blue Angels, although she took it graciously. My excuse was that I liked the concept so much it needed to be made stronger. Cathy won a nice cash prize in the Greenville All Arts Matter contest for her poem about driving with her oxygen. Good woman.

BTW, Cathy will be deciding soon whether or not to continue with Lifelines this fall. Anyone who wants it to keep meeting should be ready to make a real commitment to the group. Think about others you might recruit and contact Cathy at 861-8067. Any of you who are also prose writers might want to sign up for a writing workshop I have scheduled here in October with local author Elizabeth Brundage. Details will be coming out in the next Bookworm at the end of August.

Mimi was featured at Cafe Lena this month. I am going to be at the Lark Tavern in September. Mike Burke appeared on Mimi's program on Bethlehem TV last Thursday. I missed it.

Someone made a suggestion (after I ripped up Cathy's pelicans) that we pick a short poem and all write our own versions of it. Something simple, for example, the WCW poem about the plums whose title I can't come up with. We also mentioned another group topic night, which I always find interesting. Anyone got a topic?

Love and kisses, Marilyn