Random Acts of Poetry

L.L. Barkat has an interesting poetry challenge this week. Go read about it here. She talks about word-collecting (which is one of my favorite things!) and using those gleanings in a poem. My collection is not yet robust enough to craft anything meaningful, so I thought I would post a silly poem for RAP this week. See if you can figure out what I’ve been up to this week…

The Vacation Bible School Blues

I threw in the towel

around about six—

My knees were all achy;

my back full of cricks;

Painting the VBS backdrop

day two

Was starting to get me downhearted

and blue.

“We’ll help you,” they said,

I replied, “There’s no need.

No VBS backdrop

will get the better of me.”

So now my garage

is a bayou—

As a tarp with a swamp

in painted on hues

rests in the place my

minivan should be parked;

Now she must sleep outside

in the dark.

My studio is quite cramped

as I start to work

in garage where lawnmower

and bicycles flirt

But, oh, never mind,

we shall overcome.

And I picked up right where I left off

on day one.

I ran out of paint

before the swamp was complete

The trees had no foliage,

I was all out of green

I decided to water

down what was left

and dig in my paint box

to mix up the rest.

While still in the house,

elbow deep in my paints,

the sky opened up

it was downpouring rain;

Desperate to save

my meager attempts

I closed the garage door

but the tarp was already damp.

No biggie, thinks I,

it will soon dry;

and I set back to work with a brush

and a sigh.

From mixing and sloshing around and

rolling row after row

I’m covered with paint

From my head to my toes.

I threw in the towel

around about six—

My knees were all achy;

my back full of cricks;

“Never again,” I said to myself

washing ibuprofen down with a beer--

Then I realized:

Isn’t that what I said last year?