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| shooting passersby with a water cannon, Branson, MO |
two lovers
hug the street corner,
pretending
& how can i really know,
the way their hands hover near, faces
creased with white teeth, they banter
back & forth, together and with others
as buses pass tossing trash
into the air or along curbsides
perhaps it's my own heart that colors
them, you think---eXperience,
maybe
we only see through the lens we create
he grips the metal stop sign post,
an anchor in the spinning, she checks
her make up briskly, he the cell for email
a few words, the horizon of their eyes
never settling
on
each
other
no kiss
that is not it---a simple PDA preference,
they dress stylish enough to play the part,
but you can't argue statistics
flip a coin to find the ending
the
light
changes
& they
follow eXpectations
WALK WALK WALK
---only solid for seconds then begins
to flash, but they make it without effort
another 3 minute love story
i'll never know
what's missing,
the tension's un-hidden
no matter how hard
you try, i
know this, but can't give them answers,
i choose though
to write them happy, he home already
when she arrives, a back rub, tears,
kids at the sitter, as they
TALK TALK TALK
in true, intimacy---
period my verse, close my notebook
then turn to you.
Over at dVerse Poets, I am hosting Poetics today...hehe...it is also my son Cole's birthday...but today is write like me day...haha...ok, so I set myself up with an easy prompt because I am always PEOPLE WATCHING, just saying. So go find someone to watch, write it and then come tell us about it...see you at 3 pm EST.
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88 comments:
One
I don't find street corners a good spot to show intimacy anyway
Good observing. So many details. Tension unbidden. But good to make a choice to write them happy. I liked the ending ......the 'turn to you.' Very effective. Happy birthday to Cole.
Unhidden ........sometimes the iPad autocorrect is wrong!!! And sometimes I don't notice until too late. Grrrrrr.
I love the title. And the exercise. I'm glad your narrator character wrote them happy, can't be too sure how much power you have when you hold people in your light!
I love people watching and let my imagination run away with me...
Love your words too Brian and have read them several times, each time enjoying and appreciating more than the last.
Anna :o]
Just a respite by the street corner, crossing the street on 'Walk' and back home {apparently holding hands all the way) A happy couple there is! And you captured all those. Nicely Brian and Many Happy Returns of the Day to Cole!
Hank
"two lovers
hug the street corner,
pretending..."
Hi! Brian...
Thanks, for sharing your very [descriptive] and [very] poetic words too!
[As you, use your sharp eyes like a "hawk" and people "gawk..."] lol
Tks, for sharing the image Of you, and your sons and Happy Birthday! to Cole...too!
[I hope that you, and your readers, have a great weekend... too!]
deedee :)
Hi Brian,
You are always the romantic! It is what makes your stories and poems so wonderful. This one paints a beautiful corner picture. Really nice.
Please tell Cole Happy Birthday. Hope his day is blessed with lots of happy wishes and joy.
God bless.
love the poem ~ brilliant as always! love the photograph of you and the boys!
love that you gave us a heads up on your dVerse prompt ~ thanks!
Happy Birthday to Cole. my daughter's birthday is Sunday. Libra's are the best!
♥
nice...happy birthday to cole.. we watch people and see them always through a lens...through our own experience..so true...so there's no such thing as an objective observer i guess.. i love that you chose to write them happy (shows your heart) and i love the turn to your wife in the end
One of my favourite hobbies...... people watching! Lovely poem.
Maggie X
Nuts in May
Like this very much. It settles comfortably into the reality I know - and great to realise that I share a birthday with your lad - 79 and boasting!
Happy Birthday to Cole :) I hope he has an amazing birthday. people...and people watching...love to do it and you always write it so well.
YOu can see the tension and emotion in anything, it seems. Good description and we have all been there and done that, methinks.
I would choose to write them happy, too. Lovers emit a vapor that makes it unmistakeable. You walk the walk and talk the talk, Brian. :-)
Oh, I love this one very much, Brian. How many 3 minute love stories do I see in a day and never notice? And Happy Birthday to your boy. They are growing so fast!
Happy Saturday to you too Brian - and sorry should have wished Cole a Happy Birthday.
Poem re your excellent prompt will be posted soon and linked up when link available.
Anna :o]
Always lots of different ways to look at things as an outsider. But one never really knows the truth within.
Oh, Brian... I love this, especially:
we only see through the lens we create
... and the ending really touched me.
P.S. Happy Birthday to Cole!
love the way you make stories with one simple idea and some well chosen words
Watching through a lens of not
You sure get a whole lot
Those Gawker powers gawk gawk gawk
As the lovey dovey couple walk walk walk
And do you really want the cat to be like you?
Oh the things that could come due
I'm glad you chose to write them happy. Loved all of this, it's true, we see things through the lens we create.
'we only see through the lens we create'... or through the lens a gifted poet hold up for us. You rock, Brian.
Walk and talk- the ingredients of a successful relationship- so color them happy and turn to your wife. I like seeing this scene through your lens.
Happy Birthday Cole.
I felt like I was the watcher in this one. Perhaps because I do that too, watch people, observe their behaviors and make up stories. Maybe we all do that.
I like that you chose to imagine happiness for them. Why not? Maybe that transfers into a little prayer and ultimately helps them to disregard (negative) expectation and create something like love.
I need to learn to people watch without the mirror I have in the lens I view the world through. I liked this story of the corner.
I like "we only see through the lens we create". That is so true. Our life experiences definitley affect our interpretation of things.
Hmmm... gonna have to find me some people to watch! I live out in the country. I've been wanting to try this though.
Happy Birthday to Cole!
I certainly understand...
"we only see through the lens we create"
Again, a wonderful poem with a killer ending.
I love people watching too and it's great to observe through your eyes, your words Brian.
Happy Birthday to your son too! Love his name btw.
It's fun to imagine people's lives and what they do. And you being a hopeless romantic? Eh, we know where the story is going! *wink*
Happy Birthday to Cole!
Another great people watch full of all kinds of small details and all relevant to the picture you paint. Glad it has a happy ending, I do love a happy ending :)
Love it!
Great take on your chosen theme, love the snapshots, the feel, what life is all about, really.
I do love people watching ... sometimes feel like walking up to them and wish them well and tell them ... it'll be alright ... it'll be alright ...
"perhaps it's my own heart that colors them, you think--eXperience,
maybe..."
BRILLIANT line!
Happy birthday to Cole ~
I always enjoy your poetic eyes ~ I agree that our perception is colored ~ Also enjoy the walking and talking ~
I am not good in people watching but I do try nowadays ~ Happy Weekend ~
Wonderfully captured and expressed. I love writing which captures the uncertainty of a moment and allows you to wonder. I often catch myself ascribing characters to the people I see in the street. Fabulous. :)
Brian. this was great. i love how you filled in the story for the couple. well done. Especially liked "we only see through the lens we create" so true.
Like you had to tell us this was a setup? Seen right through ya, dude! This is a good one, too. Very familiar scene, and I like how you ended it the way you hoped it ended. Nice one, Brian!
Happy Happy birthday to COLE! Hope you are having a wonderful time and eating lots of cake!!!! xx
Happy Happy birthday to COLE! Hope you are having a wonderful time and eating lots of cake!!!! xx
I hope your son is having a wonderful birthday!
As to the poem, I love that you've chosen to "write them happy" - you could have gone either way and today it feels right that they've given them a positive ending.
I wonder what people are to each other too. One just doesn't know how things are-- happy or not, sad or glad?
we only see through the lens we create... and you have a very clever and creative lens... I like how you chose to write them happy...
creating other people's unseen life stories is a great occupation, bread and butter material for a poet!
Happy birthday to Cole:)))
This is really nice Brian!:)
I love the switch at the end, you're so involved in the couple, their dynamics, then SNAP, your attention turns to your own life and love affair - marvellous.
the light changes/and they follow expectations...too true...too often. You play the fly on the wall so well...and I mean that as a most sincere compliment.
Happy Birthday, Cole!
You are the best when it comes to people watching, Brian!
People watching is much fun! Writing about it....I leave to you, the pro, my love. :) Love your reference to writing through colored lenses. I hope for happy endings in those who pass by but there are times you can just see the sadness....
Love ya!
Def a warm spin to this piece, brother; no sarcasm while laboring in the big city; just a poet's heart, and poet's lens. Love /we only see thru the lens we create/ been saying something like that to my film club members for years as we argue over the artistic merits of a movie.
Hey when you do the prompt, you get to pick, and this is indeed your strong suit. You make your characters seem always themselves, their own as much as yours, and that's a true gift. I like the jagged feel to this one--like a busy street with a thousand jangling noises and sensations, the thread of love lost to sight but still felt somewhere underneath.
Or they could end up looking like my family - Everyone sitting in the living room with a laptop, talking now and then about what each is doing/viewing. Comfortable, but plugged in.
well, we like you to gawk, so you can tell us about it. :)
cute pic.
happy birthday, cole!
I love this prompt, Brian, as nothing fascinates me more than peoples' amazing stories. I love this tale you told, and am glad you colored them happy. I people watch all the time......it is endlessly fascinating.
The best part about people watching is that you never really know... you just have to imagine and I like that...the mystery. I hope Cole has a great birthday... and thanks for a terrific prompt.
Street tensions -- too bad you couldn't chat.
Great work, Brian! You make me feel like I am one of those people, while I am reading your prompt. I enjoy reading your post.
I wish I could watch you watching. Now that would be inspiration.
teach those kids, Branson
Aloha from Honolulu,
Comfort Spiral
=^..^=
> < } } ( ° >
Happy Birthday to Cole! I love that you question the lens and role of the observer. Part of the postmodern world to blur subject/object into subject/subject and I think we are better for it. Great prompt and for some reason I did (sort of) write like you - smiles.
another 3 minute love story! this is my fave line here. I do think we color the lives of others with our own stories. thank you for the specific prompt. It inspired me to visit the new candy store in town. have a wonderful weekend!
Your ending is beautiful, Brian. I choose to write them happy ... then turn to you. Fantastic. There's no sense dwelling on someone else's heartbreak or state of tension and pretending.
Excellent use of the strategically placed capital X.
Love this: "only solid for seconds" ... Also "period my verse" and "the tension's un-hidden"
What a wonderful piece---such a sad story, but redeemed by your creative ending. Maybe there's hope. Who knows?
smiles..i gets it now...ah you know i love people watching ! and capturing them how i see them...in my head...
but we see what we want to see ...we show..what we want to show..rest is all make believe...wonderfully penned brian...
We only see through the lens we create - how true and beautifully written.
Excellent piece Brian. Love the ending, it's perfect.we only see through the lens we create-such a logline of sorts, perfectly placed within and it becomes one of those lines we are thereby forced to ponder upon. Awesome theme tonight. Thanks
I've probably told you this before, but my mom always talks about being left in the car, along w/ her younger sister, while my grandma grocery shopped. The two of them--just little girls--used to make up stories about the people they saw coming and going. You make me remember that very often. I think your heart is better than mine, b/c, at best, I watch people and think of them as sinners and, at worst, imagine them as criminals. One would never know how suspicious I am by the way I interact w/ strangers. I hope they're more as you imagine and less as I do. And I hope your son had a very happy birthday!
You Brian are the people watcher extraordinaire!! and this episode is as wonderful as every other you have every written. You're preferred ending to this write is a fine example of the kind of lens that you see through Brian. A beautiful, kind & hope filled lens. I hope all is well in your world and warm birthday wishes to your son. Cheers Kath
Reminds me of one of my games of watching strangers. I love seeing them talk and seeing the unregistered flirting
Beautifully imaginative.
Loved the dance!! Beautifully described....I felt like I was right there...standing next to you...watching...seeing....loved it.
Hugs
SueAnn
we only see through the lens we create
So true.
People watching is an art ... I could watch all day and wouldn't see what you see, Brian.
yes, i love people watching too....so many people so many stories...i like this one!
Don't know if my comment got registered.
Appreciate the way you observe people. Here, PDA is still a taboo...but, am all for holding hands and just be.
Seeing others through our own experiences sort of limits the view, so learning to see without including the past we bring with us is an art, is mature, and healthy, in my opinion. I work on that all the time. People watching and people accepting go hand in hand.
Brilliant one, Brian! I love how you observe and put that into words. Always very interesting. And I cannot but agree with the 'we only see through the lens we create'. Many people forget that, the lens and the fact that we create it, and can shape it differently by learning from what we see.
Great prompt also, and since I only see this now I know I'm a day too late, but still: happy birthday to Cole!
First - love the pic from SDC with you and the guys - and I love the idea of you telling the couples story with your own happily ever after. : ) K
I really like your immediacy here, and the unpolished feel, a gathering in of perceptions and speculation-- we never know what lies behind a pair of eyes, yes?
BTW perhaps you and Claudia might consider lifting my probation for Poetics some time-- love, j
I want to write nice things about the people I watch the way you do. I truly do. I love people watching. My problem is this dern sick sense of sarcasm I carry within my withered heart. :-)
"a few words, the horizon of their eyes
never settling
on
each
other"
aaah wonderful choice of words!
loved the poem, a great write
Thanks for the great prompt, Brian. I think most poets must be people watchers--I know I am. The only thing that made this one difficult for me is I was set for a decidedly non-people-watching day: getting my garden ready for winter, no human contact expected. So thanks for the good excuse to go out for breakfast first. :)
I think the thing I enjoyed most about your piece was that you weren't just people watching--great details surrounding the humans, like the buses and trash.
your poems always lift my mood :) so glad you chose to write them happy..
Very nice, Glad you do turn to us. k.
I love people watching too. I used to make up stories for my sister of people we would observe walking in the mall. She loved my tales, and I wonder if I ever hit the mark or just relayed stereotypes.
Bummed I missed this one, but you are the master of this. Once again, you've made me further paranoid that someone, somewhere is watching. I always tell my husband someone is watching. Maybe he knows it, too, but just doesn't care, lol It's all about expectations and perceptions.
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