The weather and calendar turn to spring. Invariably, there will be picnics. Here’s a writing prompt. Build a scene, story, or poem around it.
Category Archives: Photo Finish Friday
Photo finish Friday: “Starting off”
Photo prompt: what’s the first idea that comes to mind?
Filed under 2015, photo by David E. Booker, Photo Finish Friday
Photo finish Friday: “13 divided by pie”
What did the guru say?
I went into the woods today
a question on my mind.
I did not expect it,
but a guru I did find.
Young and fair of hair,
she sat in the eye of a thatch.
Bright were her clothes,
brightest thing in the wooded patch.
I approached with care
afraid I might frighten her away.
She bade me come closer,
“Do you have a question today?”
I said that I did
and proceeded to try to ask.
It was about triskaidekaphobia,
but she said that would simply pass.
“It’s a silly number
falling on a Friday.
If that is all you have,
then you have no reason to stay.”
I turned to leave her,
feeling suitably rebuffed
when she said she had a question
if I thought I had the right stuff.
Then she paused a minute
and I told her I would try.
She said she wanted to know
about this day they called pie.
“What types of pie,” she asked,
“will there be on pie day?
If I come out of the woods
can I taste whatever I may?”
I thought it through a minute
then realized what she meant
but if she were looking pie
this might not be her event.
I told her 3.1415 was
what this day was about.
She looked up to the sky
and then I heard her shout:
“Just another lousy number
when all I wanted was a slice.
Take two radii and form a wedge
of blackberry would be nice.
“Add a scoop of ice cream
to this little wedge of pie.
Is that too much to ask?”
and then I heard her cry.
I quietly left the woods
tiptoeing over roots and rocks
vowing never to complain
to a guru with golden locks.
–photo and poem by David E. Booker
Filed under 2015, photo by David E. Booker, Photo Finish Friday, poetry by author
Photo finish Friday: “Time’s up”
The spring has sprung
Savings Time has fell
and here comes idiocy
cold as hell.
Daylight Savings Time
by David E. Booker
Time to lose an hour
What else can I say?
It’s coming March 8th,
Early A-M that day.
Clocks will spring forward
Even though I may not.
An hour will disappear
But in my body, not forgot.
Charge ahead we must
Into this time-warped fray.
It is a stupid thing
to give an hour away.
‘Tis a great shenanigan
A political cluster duck
That has led us to this day
With which we now are stuck.
So when you go to vote
Remember who took away
This hour of sleep or fun,
And all without any pay.
Filed under 2015, Photo Finish Friday, poetry by author, Writing Prompt
Photo finish Friday: “Ice on a wire”
Ice encrusted plastic beads on a metal wire.
Filed under 2015, photo by David E. Booker, Photo Finish Friday
Photo finish Friday: “Bug out”
The attack of the metal-eating bugs from Mars was stopped dead in its tracks not by military firepower or industrial genius, but by rust and cold weather.
What will happen come Spring? Nobody is sure.
Photo finish Friday: “Strata”
Ages from now, when archeologists dig up the strata of our time, it won’t be rock, but miles and miles deep of processed paper and envelopes.
Filed under Photo by author, photo by David E. Booker, Photo Finish Friday
Photo finish Friday: “Little brown apple”
Apple on a fence.
I don’t know, but maybe I ought not
to have shoved this apple onto this spot.
For here it will remain
with no one to explain
as it shrivels away and begins to rot.
Poor little apple in my lunch
I spiked you away just on a hunch
that that brown spot
looked like food rot
and not something I’d want to munch.
Children are starving in places like China
or just down the street from a nearby diner.
Yet food by the bunches
goes uneaten after brunches
from fast-food shops and places much finer.
Bugs may come and have a heyday,
picking at the remains of the apple’s decay.
Eating away this fine shiner,
once bright as a light to a miner,
it’s soon dull and brown and shapeless as clay.
Good or evil? Oh, what have I done?
I’ve not fed the apple to anyone.
No nutrition for play.
Oh, how I’ve gone astray:
I should had eaten it or given it to someone.
I don’t know, but maybe I ought not
to have shoved this apple onto this spot.
For here it will remain
with no one to explain,
and even a homeless man will leave it to rot.
–by David E. Booker
Photo finish Friday: “Lights out”
[Editor’s note: usually my Photo finish Friday has a photo I have taken, but today, I am taking on off the Internet, along with the story. Below the photo and story is a poem “inspired by actual events” as they would say on the TV show Law and Order.]
Christian mom alarmed that school bus tail lights form ‘pagan’ pentagram
(Screen capture) The bus and lights in question.
by David Ferguson
A Christian mom in Cordova, Tennessee is worried that occult influences are lurking in her town and showing their presence in the unlikeliest of places, the red tail lights of local school buses.
Memphis’ Action News 5 reported Wednesday that Robyn Wilkins snapped a photo of the tail lights while she sat behind a bus in traffic. To her, the pattern of tiny light bulbs under each brake light’s red plastic lens looked like inverted five-pointed stars, which form the ancient symbol of the pentagram when enclosed by a circle.
“Anyone who fears a God, if not God and Jesus Christ, should be outraged,” the worried mother told Channel 5.
Pentagrams are a sacred symbol to various ancient faiths. Some Satanists and occultists have adopted it as their holy symbol, but other faiths use it as well.
Wilkins and other concerned parents have taken to social media to protest the brake lights, which they say constitute a sacred symbol emblazoned on a government vehicle.
“If you can’t put a cross on there, you cannot put a pentagram on it,” said Wilkins.
She believes the lights should be removed from the buses and replaced with a single red bulb.
The Shelby County School District declined to comment to Channel 5 about the brake lights.
To see a video report, go to: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/01/christian-mom-alarmed-that-school-bus-tail-lights-form-pagan-pentagram/
***
Poem inspired by actual events.
I heart for Satan
by David E. Booker
I heart for Satan,
the Star of all consternation.
He sends me into shambles
when I see pentagramables
on buses near and far
even the one in front of my car.
My child rides that school bus.
It must be driven by one who lusts
for my child’s immortal soul —
O’ the future is foretold.
He’s lost to education
in this god-forsaken nation.
O’ when will it ever end
so that my life can begin again?
I heart for Satan,
the Star of my consternation.
It is Him I love to hate
and blame when my son self-relates.
His powerful stain is everywhere —
my whitewashing work cannot compare.
I heart for Satan,
the Star of my consternation.
Someday my child will move away
and then Satan and I can play.
Filed under Photo Finish Friday
Photo finish Friday: “Stealing one last look”
Before the holidays slip completely into memory, let’s steal on last look … or present.
Filed under Photo by author, Photo Finish Friday
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