Prompts on A Geek's Life

Beauty

Tue, 24 Aug 2021 13:33:20 +0000

The empty glass catches the fading light, its pale blandness turned in an instant into a merry band of colours wending their way around its rim.

In the still moments of yielding to the night we see, through heavy eyes that in the brilliance of the radiant light, and the shadows too there is beauty, everywhere

Water

Tue, 28 Jul 2020 15:19:34 +0000

For The Sunday Muse prompt #118:

** In the chaos of water meeting water and breaking free, each splash

a hop of joy freed to twirl and twist and kick and be, a body bent

fluidly flowing like a shout of delirious joy, life echoes.

How To Taste Wine

Thu, 09 Jul 2020 17:24:50 +0000

For The Sunday Muse prompt #115:

** Let the first sniff hit you, let the faint hint of the juice pressed and aged be like incense wafting up, a prayer to Dionysius for a blessing on this rich red liquid, chilled, swirled and sipped.

Let the low heat linger, let its essence slowly spread, warming the insides of your mouth let its heft spread like a warm embrace across your tongue. Let it rise Let it rise.

A Prayer for Lost Loves

Mon, 29 Jun 2020 12:36:10 +0000

For The Sunday Muse prompt #114:

\\\* May the pains of today’s desires lose themselves in the fragrance of a love reborn, the pained passion of unrequited love find itself returned in time like a blossom that speaks, a sacred whisper to the soul colouring everything in the light of a rose, beautiful in its bleeding yet whole, because the Lover and the Loved like thorn and rose find themselves entwined, from past pain and tortured paths, delirious joy arising.

Ignition...

Mon, 15 Jun 2020 09:58:00 +0000

For the Sunday Muse prompt # 112: \\\* Sometimes I carry the weight of the world upon my head, its heft held between the twin peaks of forgotten and accepted things, a history curated not by those who waver at the threat of war but those who embrace its vagaries, who daily pour out a libation to destruction.

What seems like the stillness of a boat in quiet waters only hides the furious paddling of a mind being torn apart as it wrestles with the tension between conforming and desire.

Half Remembered

Thu, 11 Jun 2020 09:13:24 +0000

For The Sunday Muse prompt #111:

\\\* what we remember of the past are the things the mind allows, the harshness of being hacked into a thousand tiny pieces assuaged by the desire to forget, to not let the horror of the past hold the present hostage, to find a path that winds through the remains of pillage to a coherent whole.

what we learn in the end is that skirting the hole where our kin should be is akin to yielding to the pressure of a hand pressed against our throat, to feed the pleasure of the ghouls hovering over our history.

Quest

Mon, 01 Jun 2020 14:12:31 +0000

For The Sunday Muse Prompt #110,

\\\* The heart ponders what lies beyond the realm of sight, what hides in the place where dreams come from, where the beauty of a still night twinkles in the soft light. From afar it tugs at the strings of the curious heart, in its distance, a promise of salvation from the fires below.

When A Deed Returns

Mon, 25 May 2020 11:21:02 +0000

For The Sunday Muse Prompt #109, Image “Snow White & Rose Red” by Kerry Darlington

\\\* The kind hearts of the shy and the cheerful make space for the stranger, a traveller quivering in the winter wind, lost, for a moment.

What lies hidden in the dream is that sometimes a good deed travels the world for a season and then returns twice revived, the shy and the cheerful ones saved in return by the stranger who once wandered by.

Place

Mon, 18 May 2020 09:46:35 +0000

For The Sunday Muse prompt #108:

\\\* Bound up in its faux pillars and its dangling chandeliers are the memories of stolen things, the tears shed here by the lost ones reverberating in our ears. Time disappears here, subsumed by the delight of truly feeling and of seeing, the art of each act a tribute to the ones who’ve come before.

A Novem For Starlight

Sun, 23 Feb 2020 15:53:44 +0000

For the Poetic Aside Prompt #516 and the Novem poetic form. Not strictly interpreted though… \\\* Come bask beneath the starlight. Yield yourself to Time’s

gift of colour splashed across night’s canvas. Come here,

Hear the whisper of nature’s song. Ponder in awe.

Oasis

Wed, 29 Jan 2020 04:41:54 +0000

For The Sunday Muse Prompt #92 and Matthew 11:28-30.

\\\* Beyond the drying and the dying salvation calls; the distant shimmer of light cast by the morning sun a whisper to the weary; Come, draw nigh all ye who are heavy laden, who bear the burden of a common life around their neck. Hope and Haven is the promise, if we dare go through the door into the way.

After The Rain

Tue, 26 Nov 2019 17:06:22 +0000

For The Sunday Muse Prompt #83 . Image “After The Rain” by Cyril Rolando

\\\*
I tremble
at the echo of
the booming thunder,
the resounding
of its clap like
the roar of a lion
stirred, a brilliance
incandescent in its majesty
as it splits the night sky
like a warm knife
shears butter.

I have shivered
in the embrace
of a light rain
its fluid fingers,
by persistence finding
their way through
my garments till
they meet my
bare skin.

Dancing In The Dark

Wed, 13 Nov 2019 12:54:18 +0000

For The Sunday Muse Prompt #81 . Photography by Sarolta Ban (Website HERE )
\\\*
The lure of the lyre -
alive in its reverb - calls out,
inviting beauty and the beast
to dance, to yield to the rhythm
of the wind, as it rustles
in the leaves, swaying the trees.
We all - boar and deer-
of earth born and saved,
gather here, to dance
the gentle dance
of the dark.

Yellow Dream

Tue, 01 Oct 2019 19:38:55 +0000

For The Sunday Muse Prompt #75. Image Source .

\\\* A yellow orb,tethered to the earth by slender strings descends, its yellow light a hue cast over this dream in which I find myself looking at my selves; the past and the future holding the hands of the present, tiny figures scurrying up ladders which seem to reach for the sky, reinventing what is seen. Darkness lingers in the corners of this vista but stroke by stroke pixel by pixel, the dream and reality are slowly melding into one.

Stolen

Tue, 17 Sep 2019 11:52:38 +0000

For the Sunday Muse prompt #73.

\\\** Beneath the garb of Prudence and propriety deep delight can lurk.

Garden Spot

Thu, 16 May 2019 18:05:35 +0000

For The Sunday Wednesday Muse Prompt, Garden Spot. Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash. A nod to the still vivid memories I have of being dragged off to our family farm by my parents in those dire, dark SAP days.

** First comes the rain, and then the wakened worms which turn the hard, sun-baked soil into compliant mulch. Grain by grain, leaf by leaf the beauty of Symbiosis begins to rear its head, the cycle of death begetting life and sustenance for the things we must ingest, for which with backs bent beneath the blazing sun we labour; the reward of another day survived eked out from the hard, earth.

NaPoWriMo Day 2: Morning

Tue, 02 Apr 2019 19:51:45 +0000

For the Day 2 prompt, a poem about questions.

\\\* What is this which zips around my ears, its sound like the deep hum of an old man hunched down, stirring up the sand. It shimmers in the morning light its back a splash of gold splayed across the sky, against which stand the silhouettes of great metal tubes bending to its will. What is this but the wind, which goes wherever it wills.

#48. Rememory

Wed, 27 Mar 2019 18:06:48 +0000

Photo by Skitterphoto from Pexels, for The Sunday Muse Prompt #48.

\\\* Maybe it was the slant of the light streaming in, slicing through, as it were, the haze of yester-year’s detritus; the half-drawn blind like a mind stretched thin between leaving and returning, a face half-turned towards the memory of lost songs hovering just beyond the reach of a quivering tongue, and this present brooding. Maybe this is what the burden of life is. To carry, buried deep within one’s heart, the remains of the songs of one’s youth; until in a season of re-memory, they all come back.

Freedom

Tue, 05 Mar 2019 18:36:11 +0000

For Prompt #45 at The Sunday Muse. Image “Be Free” by Magic Love Crow.

\\\* Line by line the silhouette of an angel rises up, phoenix-like, in the space where the prophet’s finger parts the sand. This is what freedom is- the delirious joy of walking away from the baying crowd, the space between the lines as alive as the lines.

Call of the Wild

Tue, 22 Jan 2019 11:57:54 +0000

For The Sunday Muse #39 and Wordle 387 from The Sunday Whirl. Image Source.

\\\* Here in the shadow Of despair, loneliness Hangs in the air like A wet coat, the silence Like the weight of pebbles Beneath which which one sags, Broken at the knees.

Each step towards The distant light is a prayer Of repenting, for forgetting What love in the wild Feels like.

Step by step, walk after walk We are making this world Whole again, heeding the Inner call to become Wild and free again.

Horizons

Thu, 03 Jan 2019 11:27:48 +0000

For Sunday Muse #36 and The Sunday Whirl Wordle 384

\\\* The call of the future comes from across the border bringing hope to this poor, tired pilgrim- slouched beneath the weight of an open promise and the remains of failures past.

Tomorrow is uncertain, not promised but staying still wastes today so with intent I risk safety to seek the joy beyond the flood plains of seven rivers and the welcome of a home where hypocrisy is no more.

Wordle 382: About Town

Thu, 20 Dec 2018 09:33:38 +0000

Wordle 382:

\\\*

We brave the howl ing wind, wincing on the odd occasion when its icy fingers somehow reach within the folds of our coats to touch our necks. Along the snow covered streets, the children play, their shrieks of joy as they spin again and again piercing the air a hundred hundred times until they drop with exhaustion. From the coffee shop around the corner, different caramel drizzled drinks bring back their strength. This is the plan, to - with any luck - keep them so occupied that all they can do on the train home is sleep, so we get some peace and quiet.

3 Day Quote Challenge - 3

Sun, 20 May 2018 22:13:54 +0000

The greatest enemy of hunger for God is not poison but apple pie. It is not the banquet of the wicked that dulls our appetite for heaven, but endless nibbling at the table of the world. It is not the X-rated video, but the prime-time dribble of triviality we drink in every night. For all the ill that Satan can do, when God describes what keeps us from the banquet table of his love, it is a piece of land, a yoke of oxen, and a wife (Luke 4:18–20).

Wordpress Photo Challenge: Scale

Thu, 12 Oct 2017 11:26:31 +0000

Morning light, Man, Monument, Mansion. For the prompt scale.

Weekly Photo Challenge - Layered

Thu, 21 Sep 2017 18:01:24 +0000

One Friday this summer, S and I decided dolphin watching would be a good thing to do, which was how we hopped into the car, drove to the Aberdeen harbour and paid for a harbour cruise. The dolphins had other plans - 92% chance or not - and we ended up not seeing any. We did get the joy of about an hour of cruising round the harbour along with other equally disappointed would be dolphin watchers. Good bonding though, I guess?

Weekly Photo Challenge - Structure

Thu, 31 Aug 2017 17:00:15 +0000

Aberdeen’s Mercat Cross, which dates back to the 1600’s. A different sort of structure from the lines, freckles, and tiny hairs which were ostensibly the subject of this week’s photo challenge but a structure nonetheless; in that other concrete, physical constructed sense of the word.

– For the weekly photo challenge, Structure

Windows to The Sea

Thu, 24 Aug 2017 05:32:52 +0000

Although I am only three runs into my ParkRun ‘career’, the three blocks of granite on the grassy edge of the Beach Esplanade just before it turns West towards Kings Street have become a beacon of sorts. Situated around the 4.5k mark of the total 5k route they have very quickly come to represent the prospect of rest, relief and completion.

They also mark the halfway point of my morning runs, which again speaks to turning points and the call of home. Finding out they were donated to the city by a company I once worked for added a sense of serendipity to all of that.

Weekly Photo Challenge - Bridge

Thu, 06 Jul 2017 17:42:42 +0000

A reminder of transitioning from full time study to full time employment at the back end of 2009, the Forth Road Bridge a symbol of hope of sorts on the journey from Newcastle in the North East of England to Aberdeen in the North East of Scotland for interviews.

In the end there would be a fair few trips but in the end with December came the set of interviews that led to a permanent move up North. The rest as they say is history.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Delta

Thu, 29 Jun 2017 16:46:36 +0000

In the plains around Dunnotar Castle, lies an irony of sorts. The weathered rocks, worn by time’s incessant nibbling into cliffs which fall precipitously to the sea, are the very reason why the ruins of the castle we have come to see remain; a symbol of stubborn, dogged near permanence against the odds. But in the receding tide, and the quickly darkening skies, there is transience.

Ying & Yang. Life. Balance.

Weekly Photo Challenge - Evanescent

Fri, 26 May 2017 17:47:14 +0000

For the Wordpress Weekly Photo Challenge Prompt, Evanescent: ---

A curious combination of events - somehow in my early thirties becoming an insomniac and flexible start times at work - is how I manage to get the entire floor at work to myself for an hour on week days. Rather than stay awake in bed waiting for 8.00am, I figure it makes a lot more sense to use the morning hours up at work and free up my evenings.

Weekly Photo Challenge - Heritage

Thu, 18 May 2017 08:19:03 +0000

A few hundred years of Bini history on display a few thousand miles away in the National Museum of Scotland. #Heritage.

Weekly Photo Challenge - Reflecting

Thu, 11 May 2017 17:01:14 +0000

For the prompt, reflecting; which brings to mind the chill of a late (post Christmas) walk in Verulamium Park, a precursor to a splendid evening in St Albans spent with S. Of course, there were waffles and hot mugs of chocolate to warm us up afterwards. #Reflecting.

Weekly Photo Challenge - Danger

Wed, 03 May 2017 17:10:34 +0000

For the challenge, Danger. Rope Access inspections.. #Offshore

Weekly Photo Challenge - Wanderlust

Mon, 01 May 2017 17:07:22 +0000

For the Wordpress Photo Challenge, Wanderlust. St John’s, Newfoundland.

The Road Taken

Wed, 01 Mar 2017 21:02:53 +0000

Me, Benin City and an intense desire for fried chicken was how I ended up here; walking along Airport Road looking for a Chicken Republic. Having spotted it from the window of the speeding cab ferrying me from Ring Road to the neither-here-nor-there hotel I planned on sleeping over at on Ihama Road, I grossly underestimated the distance. That only became apparent once my cravings had gotten the better of me and I was back on the road, in the sweltering heat, plodding along whilst wondering what had gotten into my head.

Rhythmic

Wed, 22 Feb 2017 18:50:57 +0000

Image Credit Seb (Unsplash); for the prompt Rhythmic

– In the wake of the rising sun comes the call of dawn; a song drawn from the chirp of birds, the flutter of leaves, the creak of stirring bones and the lap of waves carried on the breath of the morning breeze.

Here on the edge of the morning in the quiescence of a lingering dream, the memory of the patter of your feet lives on. In the sumptuous symphony of nature’s call and response, the perfect fit of the lilt of your voice and the wind in the trees You return.

Against The Odds, A Haiku

Wed, 15 Feb 2017 20:02:48 +0000

For the Photo Challenge, Against The Odds

– Sometimes, between a Rock and a hard place, beauty Springs. Against the odds.

Shadow

Wed, 08 Feb 2017 21:56:41 +0000

Shadows at the Tate, for the prompt Shadow

Tremble

Tue, 07 Feb 2017 19:33:29 +0000

Image Source: Worthy of Elegance (Unsplash); for the Daily Prompt, Tremble

– Inhale the scent of Mint, wafting up. Tremble as The warmth soothes your bones

Walking Away, Lovingly

Mon, 06 Feb 2017 17:27:50 +0000

Source: Chobir Dokan

For the prompt: Lovingly

The glint in her eye Belies the set of her jaw Lovingly, she leaves

Clean

Sat, 04 Feb 2017 22:41:58 +0000

For the prompt, Clean

– With deep contrition I pour out a libation. I wish to be clean

One-Word Inspiration: Solitude

Fri, 03 Feb 2017 18:56:02 +0000

With a riot of Colour, the breaking dawn births Peaceful Solitude

For Day 3 of the Everyday Inspiration course, and the prompt Solitude

Loved Things, A Brain Dump of Sorts

Thu, 02 Feb 2017 06:31:43 +0000

Chilli flavoured plantain chips
Peri-peri chicken (having a cheeky Nandos is a thing, you know)
The scent of warm waffles
Friday nights (the prelude to the only truly quiet times I have)
Catch up TV (for how easy it makes indulging my fascination with Leroy Jethro Gibbs)
Postcards (sending and receiving them)
Running into old friends in the most unlikely of places.
When a shuffled playlist throws up a particularly apt song
Early morning runs by the beach
Scoring a late (winning) goal in Football Manager

Resist

Wed, 01 Feb 2017 22:31:14 +0000

Beach Boulevard, The ‘Deen; for the prompt, Resist

With fear in their wake, The crashing waves come ashore Shaken, I cower.

Pressure makes broken Things whole again, digging deep I resist in Hope

Wandering, Wondering, Pondering

Tue, 31 Jan 2017 08:09:58 +0000

A damp squib of a day is perhaps as good as any to wrap up January, given how off script the weather has been. It used to be that loads of snow and travel disruptions were par for the course for this time of the year; neither happened. Even the threat of thunder snow - cold air from Canada invading our own Northern skies - failed to materialise, a few inches of snow and gale force winds being the worst of the lot.

Joy, Three Things

Wed, 30 Nov 2016 19:06:49 +0000

For S, and the Discover Challenge One-Two-Three

– How easy it is To laugh, to bask in the glow Of infectious Joy;

How the patter of Your feet, like the sound of rain On a sun-baked day

Brings relief, and hope That tomorrow will come in Peace, and you’ll return

Outer Layers: On Dressing in Four Objects

Thu, 29 Sep 2016 17:44:03 +0000

Source [ Afolabi Sotunde]. For the WordPress Discover Prompt, Outer Layers

--- When asked to describe my look, I tend to go for scruffy chic, this being my attempt to rationalise away what is my laissez-faire approach to dressing up. Left to my devices I default to four objects: jeans, a t-shirt, super comfy shoes and a pair of glasses which I am increasingly dependent on. On the occasions on which I have deviated from these, they have tended to be to the relative safety of a shirt and a blazer over jeans; the full shebang - a suit and a tie - only coming out for weddings (the last of which I agonised over before buying a new suit) and black tie dinners, which I tend to avoid. I suspect I have managed to get away with this, particularly at work, because I work in the Engineering field and have largely worked for employers where a formal dress code has never really been enforced.

01 - Hike

Mon, 19 Sep 2016 20:14:47 +0000

For the prompt, Hike. Image Source

– Crisp air, fallen leaves- Crunched to dust by pounding feet, Delirious Joy. Hike

Here And Now...

Tue, 13 Sep 2016 17:54:46 +0000

For the Daily Post prompt Here and Now: \\\* Between Here and There One waits; Tomorrow’s Promise? Beginning again.

#24 - Dancing With (In) The Rain

Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:21:46 +0000

---

She whirls to the rhythm of the rain. Her dance, light-footed - A pirouette - in step with the beat The light, gentle splatter of rain - Drops stopped in full flight By the chipped stones makes. As the night light catches The fringe of her costume She is no longer there. What we have is the after glow Of stolen re-memory - Of Peace and of repose And the calming lightness Of the patter of the Rain.

A Pilgrim's Prayer

Tue, 12 May 2015 05:00:00 +0000

For Mag 269 --- Here beneath The glow of your halo, Mother of God, With clasped hands And humble spirit I bow in supplication, Bringing a prayer For redemption, for Absolution from this Weight, this burden Of deferred hope.

The crash of thunder, Flash of lightning, Fire and smoke, Echoed across seven hills Is etched in my memory A callus chafed raw By this journey, This unceasing battle Of Self and Spirit Of good ambushed by doubt

Transmogrification

Wed, 06 May 2015 20:54:45 +0000

For Mag 268: --- The dinginess within cannot hide the beauty that lurks here, hidden beneath the patina of age and wanton neglect.

Haste hinders the unveiling of poise, of grace carved out of ugly rock, of error transmogrified* by intense, pregnant intent, into a towering edifice of strained sinews and abs chiseled to perfection.

This is no drowning Narcissus sinking into a murky river of swirling self indulgence; this is David, bare and broken saved by the master’s hand.

#148 - Homeward

Mon, 17 Dec 2012 12:35:51 +0000

For prompt 148 at the Magpie Tales, a repost.


[![Andy Magee - homeward](/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/andy-magee-homeward.jpg)](/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/andy-magee-homeward.jpg)

Though tears like a river course down like rain, And your heart by cupid’s fiery barbs is rent. Although your cracked voice breaks out in wails, And hell with all its fury and fiends seem sent. Be still, Stay strong, you’ll make it home.

Though fear like a cloak your mind enshrouds, And rabid voices, your reasoning besiege. Though Night descends, your dreams to hound, And heart beats resonate to a symphony of rage. Be still, Stay strong, you’ll make it home.

Amnesia

Tue, 27 Nov 2012 12:55:25 +0000

For Prompt #145 at the Magpie Tales, and PawPaw, who left too soon.


His broken memory
no longer can relate
to her gentle touch-
Or the quiet reassurance
of her gnarled fingers
atop his wrinkled skin.
Or the long faded recollection
of the taste of smoked bush meat
chased down his thirsty throat
by frothy cups
of sweet palm wine.

He no longer can
remember the smell-
of moth balls – hanging
like a pall, around her clothes
a wispy cloud driven out
from before the eastward Sun
as it streaks across the sky.

But the dirty red chair
constant like the sun remains-
a signpost to a past
he can no longer reach
A place where once
Upon a Life there was a love
And a bond so strong
Though he barely remembers
He still can't quite forget

#130 - Osmosis

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 20:08:41 +0000

Delirium, for the We Write Poems prompt Osmosis;


You catch her eye
on the corner of King's
and Guild's, rush
of bright pink, blush.
Gaze, furtive.

A coy smile
works its way
across her face,
before she disappears.
A bird, startled as by
a twig snapped underneath
the lumbering feet
of her unwary hunter-
Half dream, half mirage,
half stolen, garbled-
fairy tale.

You feel the fever-
dry skin, throbbing head.
Unrequited memory like
the force of a hammer
against rock, a blunt axe,
Patagonian rosewood, a caged bird,
tethered to it's roost.

Your siren's sung-
her half song, half lure.
And like five bowstrings
plucked till worn-
all you have
is the unsated thirst
of your delirium.

Far far landing...

Mon, 13 Aug 2012 17:57:29 +0000

For the prompts Far far landing on We Write Poems and Mag 130 on the Magpie tales


the distance claimed you -
seven rivers, seven valleys
and seven mountains too.

fuzzy memories,shadows
wrapped around browned skin -
like a caul - hide you;
till like a distant
shimmering mirage
you fade into the space
where sky meets earth
and where like a pilgrim
I have been drawn
by the call of the muezzin.

the old women
by the river tell tales-
of muttered blessings
of redemption, and of rebirths
where like butterflies
shedding their cocoons
we may arise in peace
on that far flung,
far far landing.

A Dinner Table At Night

Mon, 06 Aug 2012 18:20:17 +0000

For the prompt at Magpie Tales. I couldn’t shake the impression of distance from my mind (he is looking in her direction, whilst she is looking into the distance)

A Dinner Table at Night, 1884, John Singer Sargent


There is silence here -
There is fear, and the dense
Stultifying pall of hurt-
and of memories unresolved.

I have been here before-
On the cusp of this uncharted
Sea, tottering on the edge
Of this yawning chasm, willing
Myself like a puppet on a string
To not tip over, to not
Be swallowed up in the flames
Of the Sango death ritual;
Like a mannequin sinks-
Weighed down by a necklace
Of milestones - into the depths
Of a cold calm sea.

Water drops glistening
In the subtle shade of red lamps,
Wine shimmering in the barely there light
Cannot fade the gloom;

And in her eyes as she looks away
For one last time
Is the cold detached lost-ness
Of a tomorrow that will never be.

Strange Bedfellows

Sun, 27 May 2012 19:35:15 +0000

For the prompt Strange Bedfellows at Sunday Scribblings:

Stuck in the middle, Between the Me I used to be, And the Me I want to be, Is the Me I am now. And like perfect strangers - Waking up in the same bed After a liquor doused night and debauchery to forget, They can’t relate To just how different They really are.