the prompt was OVERLOADED

OVERLOADED
My mind was overloaded

I’d jammed it to the hilt

No room was left for gladness

Only misery and guilt

My mind was overloaded

I couldn’t sleep a wink

I tossed and turned forever

There was no room to think

My mind was overloaded

My blankets made me sweat

My toes were cramped and twisted

I could only turn and fret

My mind was overloaded

I tried to say a prayer

Either God was on vacation

Or He simply wasn’t there

My mind was overloaded

My wife began to snore

It brought to mind my lover

Who always knew the score

I poked her in the rib cage

I asked her for advice

She answered me with kisses

No need to ask her twice.

Andy

SOMEONE ELSE

Someone else has sat in your seat. Someone else had had your idea. Someone else has led your life. Someone else has stood in the rain or snow and stared at a discarded bouquet of roses on the ground. Someone else has shed these tears before.

Yet for a moment, that first moment you felt it or experienced it, that hard flat surface beneath you or the bright shocking revelation that 2+2=4 or that indeed this girl is the one and only one for you, that moment is yours and yours alone. And then it’s gone, and you are left with that old proverb’s famous words, “There is nothing new under the sun.”

But I prefer to think to myself, “But what a sun!” and the thought that he and I and you and I and even she and I are looking at the same sun is a beautiful thing, and can threaten to overload my mind. There is nothing new it’s true. The world is very old, but it is also very beautiful. Especially if you try to see it for the first time everyday.

Scott

OVERLOADED

Overloaded

From my hair to my toes

Overloaded

From my guts to my nose

Overloaded

Like a ship about to sink

Overloaded

Like a drunk’s last drink

Overloaded

Like someone in trouble

Overloaded

Like bursting his bubble

Overloaded

By ice and snow

Overloaded

Like a burlesque show

Overloaded

Like an derelict’s yawn

Overloaded

Like a cop’s baton

Alex

STRANGERS AGAIN

The Nash, cut down into a truck of sorts and overloaded, rolled along on three tires and a rim that wailed a constant complaint.  Each expansion joint in the concrete punctuated the protestation with sharp metallic blows.  For all the noise there was not quite enough to fill the big quiet caused by a motor silenced by the lack of gas.  A hot breeze sanded over the sunburned faces of those passengers perched on the patched canvas covered remains of their lives.  Their dirty hands gripped the canvas tightly, their fate on the downgrade, brakes burning.

Al looked over at Floyd, but they were strangers again.  Their night on the Colorado River was a couple of hundred miles ago, and the Mojave had since sucked all the juiciness out of the memory.  Floyd looked resolutely ahead, knowing he was being watched.  The increasing wind whipped at his open shirt and the sunlight counted his ribs.  He was as dark as an Indian, except for his knuckles.

Daniel

ODE TO FACEBOOK

Too much talking

Too many words

You need to stop

You've already been heard

Too many messages

And notifications

Please give it rest

And go on vacation

I guess it's entitlement

I guess it's fear

That makes you think

You're all I want to hear

Please take your comments

Your updates and such

To your own bulging mind

We've all had enough

Emily


OVERLOADED
Weight Limit!
Feeling overloaded!? Some people have figured out how brains work.
Important names, dates, secrets, poems, criticisms, jokes, catchy phrases?
Where have we put these thoughts? In long term or short?
Can I recall or even remember to search out what matters most to my friends and family?
Overloaded equals a full life--or agony & sleepless nights.
I think I'll just watch another movie.
Writing helps.

Liz

OVERLOAD
Information overload
Is the frustration of the day.
Too many stings, and things
That attempt my mind to sway'

Gigas, megas,and other bytes
Filling up our brains
without something else to store them
I would simply go insane.

A simpler life is better
It brings me peace of mind.
And of course, my music,
Which helps me to unwind.

I don't think we're intended
To walk upon this road
The information highway
To systems overload!

Mike

Fort Bragg to Gold Beach Oregon: 271 miles

Monday, 24^th September

50 MPG

Fatigue the night before had misguided my assumption that the Oceanview Inn & Suites was merely shabby, not dirty.  In the morning light I discovered the detritus of past guests piled up all around the base of the bed.  As I checked Mother’s room for forgotten items, I found a Mini Oreo residing under the wall furnace.  For all I know it could have been years old---its preservatives protecting unknowing guests much like a mothball.

As I wrote and got ready for the day, my husband went for a walk---returning with a beautiful Brugmansia sanguinea blossom he found on a very large bush.  He promised to show me where he found it, but after we took an extensive motor tour of the side streets he could not relocate it.  I told him in ten more years he’ll call me from one of his wanderings, hoping I can find him.  The blossom resided all day on the dashboard, hardly showing any fatigue from the drive---amusing, since the plant itself is rather insistent on having cool, moist temperatures.

It was a pretty morning---misty sunlight playing over the fields and coves.  We stopped a couple of times to take in the view around Westport before turning inland and twisting our way up to US 101.  The mileage sign mentioned Rockport being ten miles away---and then another soon mentioned NO SERVICES IN ROCKPORT.  Upon arrival one finds nothing but trees, so it seems a case of CalTrans not keeping up with the times.

Shortly after the site of Rockport the back entrance to The Lost Coast appears.  Usal Road looks like somebody’s dirt driveway save for a plethora of warning signs that would alarm most suburban drivers.  It’s also the back entrance to Redwoods Monastery, a group of nuns related to the boys at New Clairvaux in Vina---some forty miles north northwest of Rancho Notorious.  We’ve toyed with the idea of visiting the nuns sometime, taking the more conventional route from Garberville towards Shelter Cove, and then south on Whitethorn Road, which is paved before eventually petering out into Usal Road.  Not that Patsy hasn’t forged over the Lost Coast’s dirt roads before---as recently as the 2^nd of January of this year.