Take The 'Some Blues Of Summer' Poetry Challenge
Create a blues poem based on the picture below and enter the 'Some Blues Of Summer' Poetry Challenge. Below is a couple of stanzas showing how blues is used in poetry.
from The Weary Blues
by Langston Hughes
To the tune o' those Weary Blues.
With his ebony hands on each ivory key
He made that poor piano moan with melody.
O Blues!
Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool
He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool.
Sweet Blues!
from Twenty Notes Gone South
by R.D. Armstrong
remember those beer-stained nights
of rompin', out-of-focus blues
when couples squeezed onto crowded dance
floors
to dance the crazy-legged be-bop & jive, or
jumpin' at the woodside, or
doin' the crosstown, las' chance fo' romance-
closing-time boogie
Blues is said to have come out of Africa and born to the USA with the slave trade. From cotton fields to Blues and Jazz Clubs to Beatniks and Coffeehouses the Blues live on in both music, poetry and art. Think culture, dignity of man, yearning for a missing love. Blues is almost always sad but behind the sadness in blues there is almost always laughter and strength.
Two Ways To Enter And Win
Splashhall Poetry Boards Members Choice Challenge. Top poems are decided by anonymous Splashhall Members Choice open voting poll. Award Banners are given to First Place and Honorable Mention. To enter your blues poem in the SplashHall Poetry Members Choice post your 'Some Blues Of Summer' poem or prose Here at SplashHall Poetry.
Rollin Thunder Poetry Editors Choice Challenge. Top poems are decided by Rollin Thunder Poetry Editors, by a scoring method. Award Banners are given to First Place and Honorable Mention.
Rollin Thunder Poetry top poems are awarded blogging credits from our sponsors
To enter your blues poem in the Rollin Thunder Poetry's Editor's Choice post your 'Some Blues Of Summer' poem or prose Here at Rollin Thunder Poetry.
Top poems are also published on our syndicated blogs including Rollin Thunder Poetry, BlogOsphere ZoO and SplashHall Art & Poetry.
You can enter the same poem or different poems in either challenge or both. There is a limit of 1 poem per person per challenge. Poems that do not have a Blues tone to it will not be included in the voting or scoring.
Submit your Blues poem or prose today ..invite your friends to take the 'Some Blues of Summer' with you !
10 Bloggers have commented
Hi Rg. Am I posting in the right place?
This is more Jazzy than trad blues now I look, and I know I am going to want to edit it the very second that I can't any longer, but I had fun anyway:
Left Behind Blues
I wanna be out there
Not sittin’ on my own
I wanna be somewhere,
Meltin’ to the tone
Of a sweet
And sexy
Saxophone,
A sleazy serenade.
So lemme go wander,
Dancing to the beat
And lemme be under
A diff’rent kinda heat.
‘Cause I need
My man to
Come back home
And melt me in the shade,
Oh baby, please,
How do you manage to tease?
When you’re a
Hundred miles away from me,
Still I shut my eyes and I can see,
My lover boy so wild and free
Singin’ his soulful melodies.
why does blogger hate apostrophes? Dash darn & dang it!
Hi Cheryl ..yep this is the right place.
I think I fixed the character thing. I do wish though that blogger would let us edit comments, though - perhaps in time, eh?
In the meantime if you need to edit a comment just repost and let me know to delete the comment your replacing..
Without You
-----------
Sunrays raining down on me
Givin' sweat to hide my tears.
Hidden, muted melodies
Lost behind the years
That I had without you.
Heat risin' from the streets
No sweet breeze comes my way.
Summer won't be my friend
It's loneliness everyday
That I have without you.
And I don't care if the gardens grow,
For no seeds I will sow.
Like you, the flowers will only die in the end.
And I don't want to carry on,
But still I will move along.
And wait for my winter to take me to you, my friend.
And no drink will end these dreams
Still I have one with a cigarette.
No blue sky behind those clouds
Only disappointment and the regret
That I live without you.
And still I live without you.
Summertime
The Blues?
Hey I'm no expert
Speaking of shady dives
And midnight wailin' singers
The soulful notes
Of a lonely sax
Or broken dreams
Down in New Orleans
These I never knew
It's how you grew
And where
More than any lack of insight
Understanding lives within
What you know
And anguish plucks the same strings
In Manhattan
And Baton Rouge
But I do recall
In the land of my youth
A certain song that says it all
Musicians my age
White guys yeah
And what have they to do
With singing Summertime? And yet
And yet they did
And bent the knee of rock
Before the Blues
Electric sounds
Honed to the freight train whistle
They dragged it out
And laid it down
And all for her
As well they might
Though they could not know
How the years would bring her silence
They did their part
Big Brother
And his Holding Company
Mere backdrop
For her agonies
Oh Summertime
And the livin' is easy
The saw-edged voice
Impossible
In one so young
She holds the heartbreak note
Fish are jumpin'
And the cotton is high
She cannot know
The sun burning on a breaking back
And the dirt raw in the mouth
Of the daily round
How can this be?
She draws the longing through you
Wrings the tortured ecstasy
From souls of plenty
Hovering on the bounds
Of understanding
She takes them with her
Oh their daddy's rich
And they want for nothing
But she speaks the empty yearning
That brought them here
And draws them on
In silence
Only listening
Now the aching voice
Rises
Mounts to a crescendo
Loosing the pent up hunger
Tears the humid atmosphere
Cuts and stabs at innards
Rasps against the skin
Reaches in and wrenches
Guts and veins
And glory
Now pours out her anguish ragged
Empties out her desperate void
In sounds of anger
Pain and loss.
Sing it, Janis
Sing it.
Jelly Blue
How my garden grows
A thin disguise.
Your mama needs you
To fill my eyes.
See blue-
I'm missin' you
The blackbird wails such
A mournful tune
Sings to me
A heartbreak croon.
Oh Baby-
I'm missin' you.
Come on back Daddy
Your woman weeps.
Shake me down tonight
I'm dreamin' deep.
It's true-
I'm missin' you.
Oh I loves you Jelly
This ragged heat
Keeps meltin' me down.
I hear the beat of two-
Yeah…I'm a missin' you.
Awakening
This is the act of self-love. Certainly
As conscious as the tremulous flutter of
Butterfly wing upon the windowpane.
No less compelling than the lilting tinkle
Of wind chimes in a thunderstorm. It is
There, the slightest note in a symphony of
Dissonance; one we revisit upon the cooling
Of embers, when night sets in and takes
Us by the throats in a clammy, clenching grip.
I teach myself the art of loving, by inhaling
Each miniscule speck of daylight, warming
My insides to juicy compote, an exquisite
Swirling, soft mess. Drinking Jasmine tea, I
Unravel the yarn of my yesterdays with
Tiny tugging. Each pull, a moment lived.
And each tender skein, a second in a silence
That is rapidly becoming unfamiliar. Grant
Me a morning of covert whispers among the
Tall, willowy grasses, and a rowdy romp
Off into the thickets. I will gather river stones
To set on my mantel with bottles that sparkle
With sapphire, one for each day of the year.
I shall eat my fill of twilight and feast on
Metaphors when the moon is full. Caress
My skin, braid my hair, and let myself drown
Deep in shades of blue as the spiraling earth
Rejoices in my intoxication by halting in
Its tracks, and applauding the rising sun.
Cicada Blues
Whippoorwill sing to me
From yon willow tree
Singing lone summer song
Last all summer long
The heat seems so cruel
Now that I don’t have you
Don’t have you
Cicadas mock my tear
They are all that I can hear
Didn’t hear you say goodbye
When you left my side
You left me sitting lone
Your favorite blue dress on
Blue dress on
Thunderstorm soon to start
It’s raining in my heart
But rain brings no relief
To oppressive summer heat
The summer goes on and on
Now that you are gone
You are gone
The Blues Must Fall
Fiery Hot then Bright then Dark, the powdered blues must fall
Losing ground for nature’s sake, the mother of them all
Feeding all those things you knew but never meant to grow
Remember? You just sat there too, so many years ago
Remember too those rosy thorns we’ve often written of
So many lines of sentiment, growing now the act of love
Well that thorn my dear, pierced deeply, my veil of discontent
Leaving only whisperings of the messages you sent
And still the blue rain came to wash, in all it’s potent mud
Revealing all the crap you hid and exposing all that crud
I heard you glisten softly as you bathed naked in the sun
Ripening your skin for glory on the wars you never won
I watched that bead of sweat roll down the Dixie line
Pooling in that dreaded stench, cementing for all time
The sultry sound of southern grief that permeates the air
For the Yankee doodle dandelions waving now despair
As if the blues played in their homes for more than just one day
The powdered blue must fall on us to show the blind the way.
But the blues we’ve know are not just now, their rooted like the tree
Standing strong and glorious, our shame’s the pity we must flee
Great sacrifice we call no more, we’ve paid our dues in spade
for deafening is the modern life created just to fade
Reveling the horns to sound a mighty burst to cry
We’ve all but sung that final note that bid for us to die
Fiery spirits hot, bright and dark dance now among the dead
To breath our life anew among possessions forced we’ve shed
Our ghost will rise up in the shelters to sing the blues once more
Calling forth powdered blues to fall, losing ground for nature’s sake
while building for the poor.
The Wordicle
Thank you all for your submissions. The Winners will be announced within the week. For now as Summer, submission are closed.
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