Junkyard Quote X, Week No Longer

1. the gauntlet of sexism

Improv 5, Week 12

I laugh on the tongue like alabaster, all my A's
pummel. When I'm in the word I tumble:
the great down up of a Shakespeare recitation.
Call us something, call us sonnet
but do we really need to name this thing?
After all, what's the purpose
and the sanity of relationships? They hurt,
yes, but sometimes feel like something
slipping, falling like night on the names of gravestones.
Hands in death. Hands til death. Hands took
all purpose, my purpose. What is this?
 Step up, you've had ample time
to watch me, failed and miserly.
Now grab me at the wrist, squeeze tight,
I'm going to open.

Improv 3-4, Week 12

Improv 3

Which is Why I Told You to Leave

In middle school, newly acquainted with the treasures
ofpuberty continuously swelling along my chest, I though
I would take care of my cousin's boy problem,
and putting on my tightest shirt, I pressed myself of his door post,
hip riding its wood like the juke joint singer in the Color Purple.
He was Hispanic, his name---Vladmir, and as he watched me
the contours of his shorts bloomed like marigolds.
Another night, huddled in dark, his tongue popped like Prosecco
against my teeth as he rolled words like girlfriend against gravel,
across the fence post. This is how love starts, I decided.
Hard as a tulip bulb, waiting to pierce the brush
and all that sexy hubbub that comes with growing
and flaunting one's leaves to the north wind, though, like you
a flower can never brave the winter.

Improv 4 (loose move to iambic)

Which is Why I Told You to Leave

In middle school, newly acquainted to the jewels
of puberty chiseled along my chest,
I thought I'd take my cousin's boy problem--
put on my tightest shirt and pressed myself
against his door, hip riding wood like House.
Hispanic, Vladmir watched, while contours bloomed
like marigolds inside his shorts. One night
we dressed in dark. Our tongues rolled like merlot.
Love starts this way, I knew, all packed and hard
as tulip bulbs, waiting to pierce the brush
and all that sexy hubub that comes with growth
and flaunting one's own leaves to wind. Although,
like you, a flower never braves the snow.

Critical Response 1, Week 12

Response to Kelsey's Williams Improv, Week 12:

Addressing the Williams improv: Though the alliteration in "hesitated" and "hospital" presents itself nicely in the ear, there seems to be a prose feeling to this particular draft that makes the first line seem long and clunky. Consider removing "I must admit"? All in all, there's nothing surprising to the first line. It doesn't push me as a reader in any particular direction and though the looked enjambment is doing something, I don't know if it's enough something to keep pulling me forward. "Profound change" is incredibly abstracted and "awakening" doesn't add much to it. What does something profound or changed look like? "Saw" in line 2 weak in comparison to "gripped" in the fourth line. Ratchet up to gripped like proportions or beyond. In the third line we have that return to the "new world" reference you seem to fixate on in some of your drafts. I totally follow your interest. Leap away with it, I think new world can work here if we're talking about a woman who changes. How is the new world "stiff and defined" when created by a woman "awakened?" Familiar--abstract. Sudden emergence of the word "your" in line 5. Now we have 4 characters, if we include the daughter, and the your kind of just slips in and falls off. Reconsider the POV, perhaps? I like the last line, though I'm not sure how toes can be fallen or who they even belong to.

Write on,
Diamond

Improv 2, Week 12

Reworked beginning of "The Abandoned" which is no longer "The Abandoned"

If she could talk she'd tell him the right shade,
gold to accent the red tweed folding against her limp hands
or "Terra-Cotta", a cap to the foundation of her blue eyes.
Instead, her neck, like a glorious Greek pillar

crumbles, and her husband chooses his own hue.
His hand sweeps her cheek. Together, they move on.
Tomorrow he will paint her sweet with all his words,
force the flush back to her sallow face. Who is he kidding?

Junkyard Quote 1-2, Week 12

What Would I Say FB generator:

1. I laugh on the tongue.

2. I laugh on the bandwagon with this insane piece of technology. I wouldn't have to recite Shakespeare.

3. When I'm in the word!

4. A relationship needs titling?

5. Hands took the purpose, my purpose!

6. the purpose and sanity of relationships

7. It hurts but it seems like slipping and falling on a package in my stomach.

8. He's had ample time to watch something failed and miserly.

9. But I have to get their names inscribed on their gravestones.

10. I'm going to open.

Improv 1, Week 12

Elegy for my Grandmother

For you, Sunday breakfast was grits, fried grouper and anything
reclined in the freezer with a crown of ice.
Your knuckles, swollen like ripe grapes, swayed and stuttered
through biscuit dough as my sister and I ducked
in cabinets and pantry shelves to bring you whatever you called for.

I remember you in the kitchen of my one-bedroom apartment
while I fret over the blunt edge of a knife that barely carves
past the hirsuit flesh of a Kroger-bought peach to its core.
Not once did you ever make us cobbler, not once
did cinnamon dust your wrist red with crushed spice or
the slough of burning stars you'd one day hide behind.

While my maternal family progressed northward to bury
the fruit of your bones in a Carolina plot,
I was at the mall, teasing the pleats of a star-studded skirt.
I didn't remember you then.

After breakfast we'd crowd around your wheelchair,
watch television. You'd rest your hand on my head, fall asleep.
Your touch washed over me like syrup.
I loved you when you lived.

With the cobbler done, I take a hot scoop with ice cream. One bite
and I can tell something integral is missing.

In memoriam, I obediently release balloons for your birthday--
July 4th. My only hope
is that the fireworks do not pop them before they shrink
to an indiscernible seed in the sky.
I never cry. Rain doesn't fall up.