WISTFUL (photo) & RAINY DAY BLUES (three scifaiku [non-dream]) by Roswila

RAINY DAY BLUES


kissing your
evaporate form
dew on my skin

* * * *

held only by
this planet's rings
solo dancing

* * * *

no one to feel her death the last empath

* * * *


[Three separate scifaiku written respectively sometime in 1999, May 2006, and March 2006. It's been a while since I've shared any of my scifaiku (check out that link for details on the form), or even written any. And life for me has been feeling rather alien or surreal, so I went to my scifaiku file. Judging by the ones that caught my eye I'm also feeling rather more alone than usual. Of course, it's a rainy day (all to the good given the drought here in CA) which also makes my old arthritic joints ache. Yet even with all that said it's not really what I'd label a bad day. Just what it is; a distinctly atmospheric "what it is." Photo "Wistful" (3-18-10 10032e) by Roswila]

PLEASE NOTE: in most browsers you can click on the above image for a larger version. Also, the photo accompanying a post is not necessarily meant to illustrate it, but to reflect some small, even slant aspect of the verse, similar to Japanese haiga (illustrated haiku).

There are many other sorts of posts on this blog. I indicate which are about or influenced by dreams. Some non dream focused posts are book reviews, "regular" poems (some by other writers, as the above is), scifaiku, writing exercises, Tarot haiku, photos, haiga, and so on. However, most of those are in much older posts. There's a listing by month going back to early 2006, at the end of the sidebar.

* * * *

until next time, keep dreaming,

[a/k/a Patricia Kelly]
**** If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's connections & other blogs: Charter Member of the United Haiku and Tanka Society (UHTS); ROSWILA'S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA'S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.

IF MEMORY SERVES (photo) & "movie or real life..." (dream tanka) by Roswila

movie or real life:
a night time ride past Broadway's
well known lights and ads
it’s not this "Great White Way" I've missed
but a sense of the familiar


[tanka on a dream of 10-05-09; slightly revised from previous posting in 2009. I've been thinking about New York City a great deal recently. It's where that "Great White Way" is, and where I resided all of my life prior to moving to CA in 2008. I suppose CA will never have that same sort of deep familiarity that the place I lived in from early childhood until I was just short of 65 years old still has. With respect to this specific dream, there's a wealth of associations for me to Broadway -- NYC's famous theatre district. And they go way back beyond memories of wandering it and going to movies and the theatre, as I was born into a family of singers and performers. Photo "If Memory Serves" (12-20-14 009v2b) by Roswila]

BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO DREAMKU (& PHOTOS):

But first, a request: please let me know of any typos or other sorts of blunders in my posts. As my eyes age I'm finding more mistakes are creeping into what I put up here no matter how many times I proof it all. Thanks for any help!

The dream-based poems posted on this blog -- dreamku, tanka, two-liners, monoku, free verse, dream narratives -- are offered in the spirit of collaboration. I have done my part. Now it’s your turn to jump in and see what comes up for you. I.e., there is no right or wrong way to relate to any of these dream offerings. Even my own understandings of them change over time. And it gives me joy when a reader sees something in any of them that I have not. (This all applies to any of the non-dream poems posted here, too.)

Also please note that a dream poem or narrative is not intended as an interpretation of a dream, or even a complete and accurate rendering of one. It is my attempt to get down dream imagery/action that grabs me and, as I write about it, elicits my conscious written association and response. Nor do I believe that one has to remember dreams in order for them to do their work. In my understanding, we are much more than our conscious selves.

You may also note in any further reading on dreamku (the specific forms of dreamku, tanka, two-liners and monoku) you may do here, that in the beginning I stressed "showing, not telling." However, this has been changing for some time. I now tend to "show" (the dream story) and cap if off with a "tell" (some reaction and/or insight I've had to the dream as I was writing about it). This also pretty much applies to my free verse dream poems as well. As to what I have begun calling dream narratives, they are a different animal, probably most akin to prose poems.

For more in-depth exploration of the dreamku forms specifically and one post in which I also address my photo choices:

-- very brief comparison of dreamku and haiku: DREAMKU ARE NOT HAIKU

-- a brief post about both dreamku and my photos THE AREN'TS OF DREAMKU & ACCOMPANYING DIGITAL PHOTOS.

-- detailed three-part post about dreamku: "A DREAMKU PRIMER: Writing Haiku-Like Poems About Your Night Dreams": PART ONE: Introduction & Writing Dreamku as Dream Work; PART TWO: Elements of the Haiku Form Used in Dreamku; and PART THREE: How to Write Dreamku (the second and third parts have some overlap).

-- a short up-dating post about the three-part "A DREAMKU PRIMER" -- Important Up-date to A DREAMKU PRIMER....".

* * * *

‘til next time, keep dreaming,







If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's connections & other blogs: Charter Member of the United Haiku and Tanka Society (UHTS); ROSWILA’S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA’S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.

FADING OF THE LIGHT (photomorph) & UNTHINKABLE (dream tanka series) by Roswila

UNTHINKABLE

my good friend's sister
and I watch the T.V. drama,
we've not seen the play
before and when it comes to
a death we both choke back tears

the main character's
mother, still youthful looking,
dies with her daughter
at her side, her Clara Bow lips
deeply blue with death's shadow

I turn to this sister
sitting beside me, seeking to share
what we're each feeling,
before I can say more than "How sad..."
she fiercely changes the subject

sigh, this will not be
the first time I've swum through shared
feelings in silence
and she clearly finds the risk
of expression unthinkable


[four tanka on a dream of 2-4-15. Just in case it needs pointing out, note the layers in this dream that put distance between the "I' and the dying mother. Seems I'm as unwilling to risk direct experience in my own way as that friend's sister. The "I" isn't even directly connected to the other woman, she's someone's sister. However, I see this dream to be more about how when we don't express the necessary, we die a little. Which puts me in mind of what the haiku master Basho said: "Before the light which all things give off dies in the heart it must be expressed." Photomorph "Fading of the Light" (2-3-15 001v9) by Roswila]

BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO DREAMKU (& PHOTOS):

But first, a request: please let me know of any typos or other sorts of blunders in my posts. As my eyes age I'm finding more mistakes are creeping into what I put up here no matter how many times I proof it all. Thanks for any help!

The dream-based poems posted on this blog -- dreamku, tanka, two-liners, monoku, free verse, dream narratives -- are offered in the spirit of collaboration. I have done my part. Now it’s your turn to jump in and see what comes up for you. I.e., there is no right or wrong way to relate to any of these dream offerings. Even my own understandings of them change over time. And it gives me joy when a reader sees something in any of them that I have not. (This all applies to any of the non-dream poems posted here, too.)

Also please note that a dream poem or narrative is not intended as an interpretation of a dream, or even a complete and accurate rendering of one. It is my attempt to get down dream imagery/action that grabs me and, as I write about it, elicits my conscious written association and response. Nor do I believe that one has to remember dreams in order for them to do their work. In my understanding, we are much more than our conscious selves.

You may also note in any further reading on dreamku (the specific forms of dreamku, tanka, two-liners and monoku) you may do here, that in the beginning I stressed "showing, not telling." However, this has been changing for some time. I now tend to "show" (the dream story) and cap if off with a "tell" (some reaction and/or insight I've had to the dream as I was writing about it). This also pretty much applies to my free verse dream poems as well. As to what I have begun calling dream narratives, they are a different animal, probably most akin to prose poems.

For more in-depth exploration of the dreamku forms specifically and one post in which I also address my photo choices:

-- very brief comparison of dreamku and haiku: DREAMKU ARE NOT HAIKU

-- a brief post about both dreamku and my photos THE AREN'TS OF DREAMKU & ACCOMPANYING DIGITAL PHOTOS.

-- detailed three-part post about dreamku: "A DREAMKU PRIMER: Writing Haiku-Like Poems About Your Night Dreams": PART ONE: Introduction & Writing Dreamku as Dream Work; PART TWO: Elements of the Haiku Form Used in Dreamku; and PART THREE: How to Write Dreamku (the second and third parts have some overlap).

-- a short up-dating post about the three-part "A DREAMKU PRIMER" -- Important Up-date to A DREAMKU PRIMER....".

* * * *

‘til next time, keep dreaming,







If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's connections & other blogs: Charter Member of the United Haiku and Tanka Society (UHTS); ROSWILA’S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA’S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.

BACKING OFF (photomorph) & WHAT SHE'D WANTED (mixed format dream poem) by Roswila

WHAT SHE'D WANTED

he apologizes
to his teenaged daughter
for being so cold
and controlling, and gives her
the space she'd demanded

she relaxes calm returns to the room

this was all she'd wanted, what she'd been
crying out for beneath her wild behavior:

for him to stand back long enough
to clearly see himself


[a tanka, a monoku, and two 2-liners on a dream of 2/3/15. The roots of this go waaaaay back. It was triggered by a Jungian book I'm reading. ("To Love, To Betray: Life As Betrayal" by Aldo Carotenuto; mixed feelings about it so far, but it is definitely stirring me up.) Photomorph "Backing Off" (12-23-14 012v7a) by Roswila]

BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO DREAMKU (& PHOTOS):

But first, a request: please let me know of any typos or other sorts of blunders in my posts. As my eyes age I'm finding more mistakes are creeping into what I put up here no matter how many times I proof it all. Thanks for any help!

The dream-based poems posted on this blog -- dreamku, tanka, two-liners, monoku, free verse, dream narratives -- are offered in the spirit of collaboration. I have done my part. Now it’s your turn to jump in and see what comes up for you. I.e., there is no right or wrong way to relate to any of these dream offerings. Even my own understandings of them change over time. And it gives me joy when a reader sees something in any of them that I have not. (This all applies to any of the non-dream poems posted here, too.)

Also please note that a dream poem or narrative is not intended as an interpretation of a dream, or even a complete and accurate rendering of one. It is my attempt to get down dream imagery/action that grabs me and, as I write about it, elicits my conscious written association and response. Nor do I believe that one has to remember dreams in order for them to do their work. In my understanding, we are much more than our conscious selves.

You may also note in any further reading on dreamku (the specific forms of dreamku, tanka, two-liners and monoku) you may do here, that in the beginning I stressed "showing, not telling." However, this has been changing for some time. I now tend to "show" (the dream story) and cap if off with a "tell" (some reaction and/or insight I've had to the dream as I was writing about it). This also pretty much applies to my free verse dream poems as well. As to what I have begun calling dream narratives, they are a different animal, probably most akin to prose poems.

For more in-depth exploration of the dreamku forms specifically and one post in which I also address my photo choices:

-- very brief comparison of dreamku and haiku: DREAMKU ARE NOT HAIKU

-- a brief post about both dreamku and my photos THE AREN'TS OF DREAMKU & ACCOMPANYING DIGITAL PHOTOS.

-- detailed three-part post about dreamku: "A DREAMKU PRIMER: Writing Haiku-Like Poems About Your Night Dreams": PART ONE: Introduction & Writing Dreamku as Dream Work; PART TWO: Elements of the Haiku Form Used in Dreamku; and PART THREE: How to Write Dreamku (the second and third parts have some overlap).

-- a short up-dating post about the three-part "A DREAMKU PRIMER" -- Important Up-date to A DREAMKU PRIMER....".

* * * *

‘til next time, keep dreaming,







If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's connections & other blogs: Charter Member of the United Haiku and Tanka Society (UHTS); ROSWILA’S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA’S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.

POP! (photomorph) GAMING WITH PLOSIVES (free verse dream poem) by Roswila

GAMING WITH PLOSIVES

precious babies! paintings of birds! bright butterflies!
hm, can I fit in any more plosives?

let's see! ah, that boy with a beaming face ... well,
not really a boy, just a very young man but he's still
not given birth to that baby that was about to burst
from him in that dream a couple nights ago

(hey, so what if I'm playing with plosives, I woke
in a peckish mood and find the game pacifying)

then there's that parade of people from both my past
and present, one of my longest standing pals
pestering me to take a group picture of them
with my new high pixel count camera

a perennial patsy, I agree to do it, even though
I have to do it blind (don't ask, any explanation
would just be so much blurbling, I'm sure)
which casts a bit of a pall over
the usually fun process for me

it's good that dreams need not sound plausible
because then I have to call that pal, that pesky
buddy who'd gotten me to snap the picture,
to even find out if I'd pinned them all properly
within the shot's parameters

but lo and behold! a belligerent switchboard
operator just keeps balking like a mule
not willing to plug me in to that pal out of my past,
while I hang on to my temper as if I were perched
precariously on a bucking bronco, persistently
refusing to lose my grip

but the dream pops like a proverbial bubble
and I'm left to bumble my way back around
through this game of plosives to the same
preposterous and ultimately befuddling stand-off


[free verse poem (kinda, sorta -- might better be called a narrative?) on a lengthy dream of 2-2-15. Photomorph "POP!" (8-7-14 002v25) by Roswila]

PLEASE NOTE: in most browsers you can click on the above image for a larger version. Also, the photo accompanying a post is not necessarily meant to illustrate it, but to reflect some small, even slant aspect of the verse, similar to Japanese haiga (illustrated haiku).

There are many other sorts of posts on this blog. I indicate which are about or influenced by dreams. Some non dream focused posts are book reviews, "regular" poems (some by other writers, as the above is), scifaiku, writing exercises, Tarot haiku, photos, haiga, and so on. However, most of those are in much older posts. There's a listing by month going back to early 2006, at the end of the sidebar.

* * * *

until next time, keep dreaming,

[a/k/a Patricia Kelly]
**** If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's connections & other blogs: Charter Member of the United Haiku and Tanka Society (UHTS); ROSWILA'S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA'S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.

MOONLIGHT RAMBLE (photomorph) & ON BEING LOST (dream narrative) by Roswila

ON BEING LOST

that old cow path, Broadway, pretty much
defines one edge of this artsy village
and as ever I have no idea how to find
my way around the even more twisty
little streets that branch from it
especially at night with all these
tourists wandering around
probably as lost as I

and as ever I ask someone which way
is north, for then all I have to do is
start walking that way and I'll eventually
come out onto city streets laid down
in that sensible grid the vast majority
of Manhattan is built in

however north is not the way I'm shown
and I wind up walking deeper into
unknown territory where no tourists
have wandered, nor even it seems residents
for the street is empty, the store fronts
closed and dark, with only the moonlight
glinting off an occasional window

I come to a single sidewalk café table
with one customer sitting at it
the waiter turns as I pass by
insisting very nicely that I join
the vague figure sitting there
and asking for my order
all in one breath

it seems the restaurant is just opening
for the first time tonight, is not even
really finished being built much less
decorated which is clear as I look
after the retreating waiter then sit
across from the shadowy person
at the small round table

the waiter calls back over his shoulder
that I should try a large plate
of their delicious pasta dish
I don't know which makes me more
uncomfortable, the closed down
person across from me or the idea
of taking a chance on a pasta dish
stimulating a huge appetite

I decide to get up and keep on walking
it seems I'm not as lost as I think I am
I know the company I'm willing
to keep and what I want

far better guides than I've had in the past


[narrative on a dream of 2-1-15. This dream was set in Greenwich Village, an artsy small corner of New York City's borough of Manhattan, whose streets are as difficult to navigate as described in the dream. At least to me, who never got to really know them in all my decades of living in that city. Unlike my dear friend still living in New York, who knows them like the back of her own hand. I hasten to add, though, that it was fun to wander those streets and explore the shops even without a knowledgeable guide. Also, Broadway was actually a cow path back in colonial times, with the bulk of the borough neatly and sensibly laid down later in a grid. And last but most certainly not least, I was delighted with that choice made re: what not to eat. Seems my changed food "life style" (if you will) has taken deep root if it's showing up in a dream. (BTW, I've now lost 80 lbs.) Photomorph "Moonlight Ramble" (3-21-10 10013ev6a) by Roswila]

PLEASE NOTE: in most browsers you can click on the above image for a larger version. Also, the photo accompanying a post is not necessarily meant to illustrate it, but to reflect some small, even slant aspect of the verse, similar to Japanese haiga (illustrated haiku).

There are many other sorts of posts on this blog. I indicate which are about or influenced by dreams. Some non dream focused posts are book reviews, "regular" poems (some by other writers, as the above is), scifaiku, writing exercises, Tarot haiku, photos, haiga, and so on. However, most of those are in much older posts. There's a listing by month going back to early 2006, at the end of the sidebar.

* * * *

until next time, keep dreaming,







[a/k/a Patricia Kelly]
**** If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's connections & other blogs: Charter Member of the United Haiku and Tanka Society (UHTS); ROSWILA'S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA'S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.

CLOWN FISH (photomorph) & AFTER FELLINI (free verse dream poem) by Roswila

AFTER FELLINI

the memory --

the traveling strong man fakes
everything but his abuse
of his fey woman who even so
offers a parade of discovery
through the dark night of his life
but his habit of fakery is stronger
than her fragile light
and he cannot see that he is lost


the dream --

circus folk are gathered for their
evening meal
a raucous crew
she wends her way through them
her passage leaving purpose if not
quiet behind her

she briefly greets her ex-husband
a visitor for the night
their violent past become a truce
a flicker in a rushing draft of ghosts

another visitor trails distantly after her
a menacing unknown
her ex collars the would-be molester
tossing him into the frigid night
like a bundle of rags or old news

warming to the truce between them
she invites her ex to travel with
this motley crew
this circus of a family
if only for a while

raising the pale jewels of his eyes
to hers he politely declines
“I have other plans” he says
“If they will accept me
maybe seminary”


[Written about a dream I had on December 27, 2000, many years after seeing and being deeply moved and disturbed, and in an odd way validated by the movie La Strada, by Fellini. It's the film that's referenced in "the memory" part above. I am all but certain I posted this two-part piece here in an earlier form but cannot find it on this blog. The entire month my records indicated it should be in is not listed in the archives. Fortunately, I thought to check my Word Perfect files on my computer for a copy (I've been working exclusively in WORD for years now.) So it was an interesting archeological dig in a couple of ways to find and polish up this old piece a wee bit. Why go digging at all? Because I'm at a crossroads similar to the one that precipitated this dream. One I come to again and again, learning from it at a deeper level or picking up something left behind, unfinished. Photomorph "Clown Fish" (11-14-14 034v5a) by Roswila]

PLEASE NOTE: in most browsers you can click on the above image for a larger version. Also, the photo accompanying a post is not necessarily meant to illustrate it, but to reflect some small, even slant aspect of the verse, similar to Japanese haiga (illustrated haiku).

There are many other sorts of posts on this blog. I indicate which are about or influenced by dreams. Some non dream focused posts are book reviews, "regular" poems (some by other writers, as the above is), scifaiku, writing exercises, Tarot haiku, photos, haiga, and so on. However, most of those are in much older posts. There's a listing by month going back to early 2006, at the end of the sidebar.

* * * *

until next time, keep dreaming,

[a/k/a Patricia Kelly]
**** If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's connections & other blogs: Charter Member of the United Haiku and Tanka Society (UHTS); ROSWILA'S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA'S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.