My apologies.  When I logged in this a.m. I saw that I accidentally scheduled two prompts today.  I’m leaving them both up since poets have started responding.  😦  At any rate, if you want to participate – and I hope you do – please feel free to do so for both if so inclined.  Thank you! 

.

The days were as golden as the sunsets

when we played on the Jersey Shore,

sandy and fevered in the summer heat,

the sun fading our hair and swim suits,

the evenings finding us a motley bunch,

hungry, ready to ply some old tin forks

to my aunt’s mac and margarine.

.

After dinner we tossed our gritty bodies

into a claw-footed bathtub. Sand swirls

where once the tub was white and scoured.

We’d move on, impish, soap-scented and

clean from the bath to our cots and lay on

worn sheets. We were quick to transition to

a sound-proof sleep, comforted by breezes

lapping at the open windows, leaking

promises of more romp and wrestle days.

.

While the moon-lighted nights pondered and

kissed broken shells and unkempt seaweed,

a cold custard of salty-wet beach waited …

for us, the dawn and our small bare feet

in blithe dance to a rowdy morning swim.

.

But these were short stays. Sunday would

arrive, unwholesome and unwelcome, time

to pack our bags and our laundry, our aunt

and uncle – raw-edged nerve – and we kids,

our spirits subdued, our skin browner-hued.

.

© 2013, poem, Jamie Dedes; I have no photographs of the Jersey Shore. This one is of Seal Beach in Northern California

---

WEDNESDAY WRITING PROMPT

Well, this one is akin to the first composition assignment on returning to school after summer vacation:  Tell us about your most fondly remembered vacations.  Perhaps you enjoyed it because it involved family and childhood.  Perhaps it was a dream vacation come true. Or, maybe it was an unexpected adventure.  Or, perhaps your best vacation is the one you are planning now. Tell us about it in poetry or prose and, if you feel comfortable, share your work in the comments section below or leave a link to it.  Responses will be published here next Tuesday.

---

We continue with the current recommended read: On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder. Left, right or center – American or not – it’s a must read.

LESSON SEVEN Be reflective if you must be armed. “If you carry a weapon in public service, may God bless you and keep you.  But know that evils of the past involved policemen and soldiers finding themselves, one day, doing irregular things.  Be ready to say no.” Prof. Snyder,  On Tyranny, Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century

THE WORDPLAY SHOP: books, tools and supplies for poets, writers and readers