Awake again, only the sky has not changed. Every hour looks the same. The instant coffee crystals of time Melt in hot water till I can’t remember If days ever had edges. I contemplate dissolution myself, Until the gentle purring Of deadlines over my shoulder Turns to incessant growls, Clawing me back.
***
Written for Twiglets, FOWC, RDP, MVB=Prompt#129, MVB-Prompt #130, and The Sunday Muse
Jewish Young Professional 
Love the poem and was hoping it would continue to fill in more details. No resolution on a wintry day, I suppose.
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Yep. Dissolution on a winter day, not resolution 😉
Thanks for the feedback. I considered fleshing out with more detail but I felt like it would turn into an essay and I wanted to keep this one a poem. But worth an experiment for draft 2.
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Very clever and snappy response. Your poem, write it as you want. 😉
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Of course! But it’s always good to be open to feedback and potential revision
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Nice mood poem 💕
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Thank you 💕
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A very enjoyable read.
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Thank you for the Twiglets inspiration!
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Like the bunny-boiler in Fatal Attraction, kitty will not be ignored! Yikes.
Hey…I have started doing a weekly word list prompt at my blog, if you’d like to try your hand at it. It’s currently the second post down, but is active thru Friday. It would be awesome to have you there.
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Deadline kitty definitely won’t be ignored alright!
Oh cool! Thanks for the heads up on your new prompt
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Nice poem.
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thank you!
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Fantastic poem. I love the imagery of trying to remember whether days have edges in the sameness of winter darkness like instant coffee dissolving. Deadlines have a way of growling more than purring. Wife just interrupted to talk about her queer reading of Beowulf. Did you know Beowulf was gay? Something to contemplate in your dissolution.
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Good point. I’ll admit I only used “purring” to link to more prompt words. Screw purring, the deadlines are gnawing off my leg over here.
Yeah, between the winter darkness, working from home, and my own deeply screwed up sleep habits, it’s really easy to miss the edges of the individual days.
I did not know Beowulf was gay. I have learned something!
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Deadlines are a lot like “Coyote Love” you want to gnaw your arm off just to get out from under them.
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So true. So many self-destructive avoidance tactics to avoid the deadlines leading to disaster.
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I have ended up with a deadline to update demographic and economic data for a school district master plan, because the planner is leaving to go out on her own. I was told all I have to do is add the 2020 data. Yeah right. I’m finding a lot of sloppy work and bad data in the presentation I’m updating, so I’ve having to completely redo major sections. Really pisses me off. This work reminds me why I got out of planning and went into IT and facilities management.
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Ugh, that’s awful when what was supposed to be an easy, straightforward task becomes anything but!
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That’s an incredibly accurate portrayal of a workday morning in winter. Fabulous.
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I’m glad it’s not just me!
Thanks!
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Love the lines “till I can’t remember / If days ever had edges” Great work!
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Thank you! An accurate description of how I’ve been feeling about the passage of time lately
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The imagery here is amazing.
I especially like “if days ever had edges.” Well done!
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Thank you! Honestly, that’s how I have been feeling about the passing of time during coronavirus/work from home/winter lately.
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Wonderful poem! Love the idea of days having edges.
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Thanks! I do feel as though coronavirus / working from home / winter blurs those edges and distinctions between the days
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Absolutely!
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Enjoyed this, JYP. Dissolution always comes up against deadlines doesn’t it?
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It would be awfully tempting to use dissolution as an excuse not to have to meet deadlines, but alas, that doesn’t work
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I hate the feeling of things being the same but then being forced to attend to something I really don’t want to. It’s like you have all of this time but really no time at all, you’re losing out on something meaningful.
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I totally hear that. On the one hand, staying home and not doing anything is bad. But on the other hand, there becomes this sense of inertia that makes it harder to move out of the doing nothing state, even if doing something would benefit you
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It’s even more existential than that..
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Yup. Definitely
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a fine piece of writing ; love the images asp days having edges —
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Thanks! I feel as though the days do have edges when gridded onto the calendar at least. As you experience them it can be less obvious
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aha ; indeed ; I loved the whole poem, short, succinct, sharp —
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Thanks! Those are the 3 “S”s of poetry right there – short, succinct, sharp!
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Oh those dreaded deadlines. I’m now retired, but I remember oh so well how they would hang over my head like dark, cold clouds.
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Yeah, they really do hang over your head in an ominous and foreboding way.
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I guess I moved away from the USA before the deadlines there started purring… cuz I never experienced anything like that 🙂
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I was expecting you to say that the instant coffee was the part you didn’t identify with. You strike me as too much of a coffee drinker to go for instant 😉
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In all seriousness, you’re not wrong. Deadlines don’t purr, regardless of where you live. The second half of the poem doesn’t work as well as the first. I’ll openly admit that I mainly wrote it to tie in with more prompts. If I were revising this / writing this for life outside WordPress, I’d probably replace the second half with something else entirely.
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Wow, a wonderful poem!
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Thank you!!
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Awesome! And like many others, I love the line about days having edges. Brilliant!
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Thanks! Yeah, I’ve been feeling that tension between knowing the days are separate and distinct on the calendar,yet experiencing them as more blurred, and it was something I wanted to explore.
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It’s a fabulous line. When you think about it, it’s pretty blurring anyway to have a calendar day start in the middle of the night.
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You know, in the Jewish calendar, the days actually starts at nightfall. It’s interesting when it comes to balancing the start times of Jewish holidays with secular life like work and whatever going by the Gregorian calendar, but it does make one much more aware of the way the sky changes at certain times.
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Wow. Quite a balancing act!
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I love the instant coffee allegory and the powerful photograph.
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I can’t take credit for the photograph, which I pulled from The Sunday Muse prompt, but I’ll gladly accept your praise for the instant coffee allegory!
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“The instant coffee crystals of time
Melt in hot water till I can’t remember
If days ever had edges.” Oh, I can relate to that. Perfect image.
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Thank you! I’ve been feeling that way about the passing of time lately, and I’m glad it resonates
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Love the subtle and brilliant metaphor crafting at the end. Wonderful!!
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Thanks! And thanks for the inspiration photo!
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I’ve read each comment … every one of them touched on a thought or two or more I had. I thoroughly enjoyed this, recalling deadlines with a scowl on my face.
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Thank you so much! I think that’s one of those universals re: deadlines!
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Some things have to be done. It’s just better to be over with them…but then there’s always more waiting…Crap! Nice one. Wonderful pic. 🙂
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Exactly. The deadlines don’t get any quieter if you ignore them. They just get worse.
I can’t take credit for the pic – it’s from The Sunday Muse prompt!
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“instant coffee crystals of time” love that line. Deadlines are pests. Great writing!
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Thanks! Yeah, I feel like it really captures how I been feeling the way the days lose their distinct separations.
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It is healthy to wander on the way from time to time…
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[…] of this piece for dVerse, Poets And Storytellers United, and The Sunday […]
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