Wednesday 25 August 2010

The Poetry Bus - Overslept

Well, the Muse stayed in bed all day Monday and Tuesday, the lazy mare.  She finally showed up, half-dressed, her hair and make-up a complete mess and smelling of drink.  I was going to send her home as being unfit for work but, hey, at least she got here in the end.

This week's challenge poetique was set here by Chiccoreal.  I chose the morning-related prompt and this is what transpired:

Monday

The alarm’s diamond drill-bit
Whines, and cracks go spidering
Across the surface of my dreams.

The fish-head man, the flooded bathroom,
The argument we were about to have,
And the apples with human faces shatter and fall.

I unglue my eyes into waxy morning light.
I cannot yet escape the gravity-well of the duvet,
So I savour the delicious warm lethargy awhile.

But Monday is calling and will not be denied.
My bare feet touch the bedroom carpet
And I’m surprised it’s not covered in pieces of dream.

14 comments:

  1. Better late than never, they say, and in this case they are definitely right! I love the way you manipulate the image of shattered dreams. And the wife has mastered the art of savouring the "delicious warm lethargy" in the morning. Thanks for this!

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  2. Astonishingly effective imagery. I particularly like the "gravity-well of the duvet." - could you link the "So I savour" line back to that image? My thoughts turn to "its delicious warm event-horizon" (But maybe that's too cosmological?)
    Your last line surely earns you a season ticket on the Bus.

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  3. Love the fish-head man! And the pieces of dream at the end.
    x

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  4. I like the apple faces! withered can be scary!

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  5. pieces of dream...shiver inducing. In a good way.

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  6. I love your vivid imagery here! Well done, disheveld muse and all.

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  7. I like this one Argo, one to keep for sure.I like the cracks ' spidering
    Across the surface of my dreams.'

    I like the notion of 'the argument we're about to have' and the last line is the pumpernoodle on the nishkebar!

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  8. So liked this, captures so well the feeling of disorientation when you awake from vivid dreaming and find yourself in the real world, and you're not quite sure which is which.
    thanks for sharing
    cfm

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  9. I love the images here - I dream like this quite often (which makes the intrusion of the alarm that much more annoying).

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  10. CL - Thanks! I'm sure your wife and I are not alone in savouring the delicious lethargy. I think it's pure psychology: the lethergy seems nicer when you know you have to get up.

    Doctor FTSE - Ilike your thinking about expanding on the black hole of the duvet image, your suggestion could work!

    Rachel - Not sure where fish-head man came from. I actually made him up, but all the other things were real things I have dreamed of. Maybe he's in my future somewhere now.

    Izzy - The apple-faces thing was part of a dream I had in which I had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. In the dream I was walking along the High street and the apples were in a greengrocer's store.


    Jessica - Many thanks!

    Jeanne Iris - And thanks! Yeah my muse is a bit like me, likes to dress casual.

    TFE - You're too kind sir!

    CFM - The feeling of sleeping/waking worlds not quite separating was what I was aiming for, thanks!

    Bug - Darn that pesky alarm! It's always the most interesting bit of the dream that gets ruined as well, have noticed that?

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  11. Fab, I love the dream images too, but even more so that luxurious third stanza, the delicious warm lethargy, gorgeous

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  12. Yes, this is really very very good. Why can I never think to use nouns as verbs, like 'spidering'?

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  13. cor.. I seriously loved reading this. It was so very tangible!

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