Merely Rhymes?

Over at dVerse, Bjorn has asked us to write poetry using kennings.

“A kenning,” as Bjorn explains, “is a very brief metaphoric phrase or compound word and it means “to know” (derived from Icelandic, but exist in many other languages like Swedish and German). It was used extensively in Old Norse (later Icelandic) and Anglo Saxon poetry as a mean of adding both color, and better meter to the skaldic songs. For instance “whale-road” was used as a kenning for the sea in Beowulf, and “wave-stead” replaced ship in Glymdrápa.”

What is poetry?
so much more than merely rhymes
of some word-slinger
or the fancy metaphors of a thought-dancer
it can be, but…
it can be so many more things
to so many writers
and even more things
to those who are word-imbibers

sometimes it is love-music,
sung onto paper
sometimes it is grief-tears
wetting the page
it can be God-worship
pencil-prayed to the Almighty

or this…the one you’re reading right now
an ode that streaks in binary-bits
from my computer screen to yours

poems are difference-makers.
They’re thought-shapers and
revolution-sparkers.

They’re composed
by poet-warriors who come
armed to do battle with their ink-swords

poems are game-changers
and I…
I have the humbling privilege
to write

The Old Lift

Margaret always thought that the old lift seemed incongruous with the the modern sky-scraper.  Like all the other people who worked in the building, she avoided it at all costs, presuming it to be unsafe.  Besides, the glass elevator on the building’s exterior gave a much more thrilling view!

She arrived to work late on Thursday, just in time to miss the departure of the elevator and hear the guard say that the elevator was being closed for maintenance.  She’d have to use the old one.

Reluctantly, she stepped in, pressed “36” for her floor, and found herself there…in nineteen-thirty-six.

image: Copyright -Rochelle Wisoff-Fields

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Written for Friday Fictioneers.  Each week, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields gives us a picture as a prompt, and then we get to write a story of approximately 100 words on any topic we can come up with, as long as it’s inspired by the picture.