090.365 - quatrain 90.2017 mysteries

tire pressure
steering wheel
rearview mirror
why do we make two words of these?

089.365 - quatrain 89.2017 living old

Methuselah reached out his arms
and smiled, it's a helluva world
but I can't for the life of me say why
I don't give it all up and die

088.365 - quatrain 88.2017 "Oh, I don't know, you pick!"

oh, peaches and carrots and Dumbledore querrots!
oh, pieces of normal life turned strange!
oh, family and petticoats and whistles and sleighs!
oh, best of nights!  best of days!

087.365 - quatrain 87.2017 I want out!

Sandy said to Mandy or so Mandy said to me
"Believe nothing that horrid Bill says
he lied that much to me," but Bill says Mandy lies and so
I think I'll go to France

086.365 - quatrain 86.2017 decapitation

my mother, my brother, my uncle, my aunt
sat on the sidewall and couldn't dance
they glowered and frowned and citied and towned
and chopped heads off with wishes each round

085.365 - quatrain 85.2017 scent

once he brought gardenias
once she used perfume
but now he thinks just coming home
should be bouquet enough

084.365 - quatrain 84.2017 balance

one of these quatrains should be here for balance
all kindly, and smiles, and polite
without a hint of anything dark
or a vestige of what crawls in the night

083.365 - quatrain 83.2017 justice

"as Mother is my witness," the poor boy said,
"I never shot no Lord that day or any other!"
"Eh?  What?", his mother said, "What's he sayin?"
they hung him at sundown

082.365 - quatrain 82.2017 splanation

this is a quatrain, he explained, to fit into my blog
it can be serious or funny, wise, silly, or quite fogged
it can make sense or independence, or dance, or leap, or cheer
it just can't do any one of those with much skill or flair

081.365 - quatrain 81.2017 war precision

the young men climbed the hill
the young men came down the hill
they left a squad to hold the hill
and prowled off for the next

080.365 - quatrain 80.2017 disappointment

when God looked over the world one day
looked it over again without much to say
He made an annoyed face and snapped His finger,
but couldn't figure out just then quite how to start over

079.365 - quatrain 79.2017 glory

sometimes it takes a bit of glory in the night or dawn
to shift us sideways half a step in how we see the world
some people call it angel sight, some fairy,
I just wish the rest of us could share in its magnificence

078.365 - quatrain 78.2017 the gift

nebbish and skolar and querkus and rat
decided it was time to belle the cat
so they found him a kitty all lissome and lean
and brought her to him, as he woke - and that was that

077.365 - quatrain 77.2017 cleanup

"how do people do that?" the cop decried
"plead, and beg, and carry on, but wait to die?"
he shook his head and kept cataloging bodies
and every one of them built up his "why?"

076.365 - quatrain 76.2017 idyll

this is the story I'd love to spell
the pretty young dancer and the soldier tell
stories and tales and what-you-need-to-know
then disappear in the glade for long happy hours

075.365 - quatrain 75.2017 damned ankles

there's no male hurtin' I've read about
greater than my ankles know
unless maybe what my heels have found
as all this talkin' comes to ground

074.365 - quatrain 74.2017 I hurt

oh damn, I hate to sing again, "I hurt!  I hurt!  I hurt!"
but what's a body left to say, "I hurt!  I hurt!  I hurt!"
painkillers don't and what's left is, "I hurt!  I hurt!  I hurt!"
please, body, bring me some new song, "I hurt!  I hurt!  I hurt!"

073.365 - quatrain 73.2017 narrative

oh what the hell was supposed to go here?
it was clear as day when I had it in hand
but I set it down and turned around
and nothing I see now fits with the title of this

072.365 - quatrain 72.2017 we won!! we won!!

the clouds are weeping orange and blue
and grey and black too
and the kids who watch them smile at the show
the clouds missed the wedding you see

071.365 - quatrain 71.2017 mysteries

sometimes reading the lives of artists
one imagines everyone out on the afternoon sidewalks of Paris
all but tripping on each other, but steadily, steadily
keeping faces carefully averted

070.365 - quatrain 70.2017 plan

let us praise what we must praise
and decry what needs decrying
let us sing what we must sing
and let others sing our dying

069.365 - quatrain 69.2017 unrash

Regis and Reginald and Reynard and me
climbed the base of the old apple tree
and when we'd climbed as high as we dared
we climbed back down to the ground again

068.365 - quatrain 68.2017 cross your heart and do what you know better than

the teenaged girl meets your eyes
with poise you couldn't have known at her age
"the time is now," she says, "the place nearby,"
she takes your hand and tugs, and if you are a fool, you resist

067.365 - quatrain 67.2017 play

music!  television!  our own bed!  well, for one of us
returning home after a night away has the joy and excitement of kids at play
about some things it seems we never grow up
and what a kick that this is one of them

066,365 - quatrain 66.2017 squeeze

writing a quatrain in the squeeze of time
as midnight approaches and ten o'clock recedes
is even trickier when your network connection
sizzles and separates, rejoins and disappears

065.365 - quatrain 65.2017 unmaintenance

there once was a cock-pistol quite manly
it went off every night or two
but the owner was careless of where he put it and used it
and now dark nights parade all unfired

064.365 - quatrain 64.2017 starters

if rose hips, pearl onions and catnip will do
as starters for homemade wine
do you think it might simply be true
Californians make anything remind them of you?

063.365 - quatrain 63.2017 bleakness

Oh I still need one to hide in my blog
maybe it can be sunshine and gladness
nope they're all freezing and wet and trying to forget
and hoping at best for madness

062.365 - quatrain 62.2017 points

Tommy read a recommended book
and Lou Ann wrote a letter
And Betty rode her horse around
what the hell can I do better?

061.365 - quatrain 61.2017 Napoleon

Napoleon placed his cannon, Napoleon placed his horse
and counted on his infantry to fight and march and fight
they did it with precision, they moved as if in flight
then they turned and fought again where he wanted, of course

060.365 - quatrain 60.2017 seriously

perhaps quatrains can satisfy more
if one treats them seriously and lets them store
philosophy and wisdom and knowledge galore
which might require me to get wiser f'shore