Hello, and welcome! This is 15 Words or Less Poems, a low-pressure way to wake up your poetry brain (guidelines here), and I’m very glad you’re here. I am also so grateful for all your support as I announced the hiatus of 15 Words or Less. I hate announcing when I’m going to be ending something. It’s much more fun to announce beginnings! Please do remember that if you’re a teacher using these images with students, or a poet using them for inspiration yourself (or both), you can find my 15 Words or Less posts going back years and years here.
While Christmas is a time of joy for many, I know the holidays are also extra hard when we’re grieving or going through tough times. So I decided to share a very silly image today. This is my husband, Randy. When we took my research trip on the fabulous Great Lakes freighter, the Paul R. Tregurtha, there was a safety drill. We were to take our immersion suits to our muster station when the alarm rang. Randy decided to go one better and try on the suit first. Yep. I didn’t filter this one because, well, it already seems surreal.
This image makes me think of several things:
- Gumby (of course)
- those horrible waving things (okay, I see they are called air dancers, skydancers, tube men, and more)
- a lobster
And here’s my first draft.
It’s your turn! Have fun and stick to 15 WORDS OR LESS! (Title doesn’t count toward word count.)
20 Responses
Immersion suit
fluorescent glow
next haute couture highlighting
Chanel runway show
Love this! Makes me smile 🙂
LOBSTER
by Dianne Moritz
Lobster, oh so hard to eat,
but once you find the meat…
a treat!
Dianne, this brings back some memories of our daughter’s trying crab legs for the first time. Thanks for the laugh!
Emergency! Emergency!
Don your Christmas immersion suit!
Only five more shopping days!
Immersed in the holidays, indeed!
Love your neoprene lobster. Laura. And, to quote Bob Hope (showing my age), “thanks for the memories.” I wish you only the best as you enter the next phase in a successful career.
Behind Every Successful Man … .
Tantrums won’t work
you know better
white yellows
moths lunch
Christmas letters
kids deserve better!
.
Thanks so much, Martha???? I’m trying to figure out exactly what this poem is talking about. I can interpret it a few different ways. Would love to hear what you were thinking as you wrote it!
Love the goofball grin on your sweetheart–I hope he doesn’t mind that I’ve turned him into a lobster.
Randy the Lobster
Lobster waves his lobster claw,
stuffs his catch in lobster maw.
Haha, Buffy! He is a big fan of lobster, though he’d rather eat one then be one:)
Yay, time to write during break while subbing. How could I resist?
A Man, A Plan, A Quandry:
Ode to dear Randy
Smiling, dancing Santa?
No beard, no gifts displayed.
Perhaps “just” a novice
practicing for Christmasday?
Please note I admit cheating!!!!
I love it. He’s just a beginner Santa–heehee
Going Incognito
I’m going by my pseudonym.
So no one knows
that I’m with him.
Oops, sorry. Randy’s red suit made me think Santa Claus. Mrs. Claus has been nagging him to check his suit, at least twice. White had yellowed and moths were hungry,
One should not have to explain one’s poem. Yikes and thanks.
No apologies, martha! 15 words is SO short to get a point across. This was the explanation I was leaning toward, and I’m happy to have it confirmd :>)
poem By Jessica Bigi
Storybook Hearos
Gee
Randy
gingerbread
Jamey’s
smiley face mittens
moon-boots
sneakers
running
wail little ones
giggle
the end
Little kids are often laughing at Randy! Love the picture you paint with gingerbread jammies and smiley mittens:>)
I can certainly understand how you might have read it as negative toward Randy. For that I really apologize. Merry Christmas!
Oh Martha, stop! I never took it as anything negative towards Randy, and you have nothing to apologize about! I was just wondering if I was interpreting it correctly. The details seem to give me that general picture, the one you explained, but I just wasn’t quite sure. That’s all. No need for apologies or feeling bad about anything! Xoxo, Laura