Monday, September 7, 2009

140 characters (or less)

I've been toying with writing 140 character poems -- the length of a Twitter -- just to keep up with poetry's latest trends.

Here are my first attempts (with their character counts).

140
The B swaggers across the room,
looking from side to side
with a judging pursed-lip smile
on her face. Doesn’t she know
that will cause wrinkles?

138
Wildfire smoke obscures
the Santa Monica coast.
It dissipates into Georgia O’Keefe clouds
that hover over our quiet beach town
to the South.

140
Shopping in Beverly Hills
for finely tailored Italian clothes
after two drought years,
good for the economy
or just a way to shore up my closet?

140
Swarthy vs blonde
Artistic vs scientific
Insensitive vs an abundance of tears
One birthday is 2/3/1937
The other is 2/4/1937
I married them both.

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