2025 Yahtzee Roll #2: Fill #3

Title: Touch
Rating: Gen
Poetic form: ghazal
No. of lines: 14
Prompt:
Summary: a ghazal about handholding on the playground

Touch by okapi

through frayed denim gash, cold air lingers much
and pokes worn underwear as fingers touch

cream-colored cabled wool cat-claws raw skin
each honeycomb akin to stinger’s touch

in grey, in black, fleece soothes and snaps, coos and
zaps like lithium, like moodswinger’s touch

a beat of hesitation: who’s watching us?
flinching memory of right-winger’s touch

then hands join in playground pinkie-swear
and why should they not? a gunslinger’s touch

cold chains, cold swings, cold monkey bars, cold slides
warm laughter, warm smiles, joy’s deadringer’s touch

then eyes share what fingers share what hearts share:
a look, a piece to rhyme, to sing her touch

Poet's Corner: Keats

We are already four days into poetry month, and I haven't posted any Keats. *the Dude voice* This willll not stand, you know! This lack of Keats will not stand, man!

When I have fears that I may cease to be by John Keats

When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain,
Before high-pilèd books, in charactery,
Hold like rich garners the full ripened grain;
When I behold, upon the night’s starred face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love—then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.

Collage Journaling: lemons!

I wasn't happy with Wednesday's collage, so I made another attempt in my planner and I like it much better.