Category Archives: poetry

National Poetry Month: Fortune Cookie Poetry 4, “Love Makes the World Shine”

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Lol. I’m starting to think these freaking fortune cookies are trying to tell me something. And unfortunately for them, I’m not in the mood to write love poetry.

Still, when I got this one, “Love makes the world shine”, I thought, well hell. Maybe I should try a villanelle. (Yes, I rhyme in my thoughts.)

Villanelles were originally meant to be love songs. The form definitely lends itself to that. So I gave it a try. My original thought was an astronaut floating in space looking down at the bright sparkling lights of the cities and towns with affection. However, my brain immediately asked me why he was out there? And this is what I got.

It’s been a while since I wrote a villanelle, and this one was literally finished about five minutes before I wrote this. Still, it’s not awful.

Enjoy!

Photo and poem copyright 2024 Michelle Garren-Flye
Love Lights Up the World
By Michelle Garren-Flye

Floating in space, feeling fine,
beauty below fills you with pride;
what makes the world shine?

Golden lights that’ll make you pine
for all you’ve ever been denied—
but you’re out in space, feeling fine.

Surely such beauty is benign
and should not be denied.
It’s what makes the world shine.

Mysterious glow sends a sign
that will not ever be denied
even out here in space, feeling fine.

The stars themselves must align
to serve as such a bright guide,
and that’s what makes the world shine.

Escape the tendrils meant to entwine—
be careful you do not collide!
Safe now, floating in space, feeling fine.

You just couldn’t be part of that design
no matter how much you have tried.
Love is what makes the world shine,
but you’re floating in space, feeling fine.

National Poetry Month: Fortune Cookie Poetry 3, “Love Conquers All”

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At first I thought I’d have a hard time with this one. And I did, a little. Do I really believe that love conquers all? At least, do I believe that now?

However, this is an appropriate day for me to get this one. Today is the birthday of my first child. He’s 24 today. I love him even more than I did the day he was born, and it’s like that with all my kids. I can have no regrets because I do not regret them.

My love for them has conquered the bitterness of everything else.

Photo and poem copyright 2024 Michelle Garren-Flye
Love Conquers All
By Michelle Garren-Flye

Let go the bitter;
it does you no good in life,
and love conquers all.

Your heart will wither
if you cling to what will die,
but love conquers all.

Turn to what’s better—
see what will help you to fly?
Love will conquer all.

National Poetry Month: Fortune Cookie Poem 2, “Life to you is a Dashing, Bold Adventure”

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I have no idea what form this poem is, but I have a feeling I’m not the first to create one like this. It feels a little like Emily Dickinson to me. I used the fortune for the title, but that may change if I ever publish it.

Photo and poem copyright 2024 Michelle Garren-Flye
Life to you is a dashing, bold adventure
By Michelle Garren-Flye

You’re too old for adventure everyday,
so why do you battle pirates in the bath
and sharks in the kitchen sink?
You’re just too old for this kind of play!
Add it up…do the math
then tell me what you think.

It might be too late for you, I guess.
Real love can’t match what’s in your mind—
so for me there is no chance…
But what if I join you on your quest?
Just maybe if I was one of your kind,
in your eyes, my person would enhance.

Who cares if we choose to escape the strife?
After all is said and done, it’s our life.

National Poetry Month: Fortune Cookie Poem 1, “Love is in the Air”

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Happy National Poetry Month to you! Welcome to April. My favorite month of the year.

Every April, I try to post a poem I write every single day. This year, I’m actually incredibly busy with my bookstore, my new editing business, and trying to get my first two novels republished by me instead of the traditional publisher that had them until recently. (See previous post.)

So, instead of trying to master a particular type of poetry (I’ve done haiku, sonnet, and villanelle in previous years), I’m opting for what I hope is a simpler route. I’m writing what I call fortune cookie poetry.

It’s pretty simple. Each day I’ll break open a fortune cookie, read the fortune, and write a poem based on it.

A little background about me and fortune cookies. A few years ago my life took a turn I had never anticipated. At the time it devastated me, and I became obsessed with wishing I could know what was coming at me before it actually hit me. Astrology, online Tarot and Magic 8 Balls (I recently got a real one for my birthday), hitting shuffle on my iPhone music after asking it a question…and fortune cookies.

Have any of these things helped? Probably not. Life is life and sometimes it smacks you around. Unpredictability is just what the world is, and no amount of crystal balls are going to help you see what’s around the bend…or, sometimes, right in front of you.

With that said, I still eat fortune cookies. And right now I have the sweet taste of one in my mouth and I got an even sweeter fortune. And I wrote a poem about it. It’s a sort of sonnet with a kind of cool rhyme scheme. 🙂 Hope you enjoy.

Photo and poem copyright 2024 Michelle Garren-Flye
Love is in the Air
By Michelle Garren-Flye

Love is in the air, you say?
Well, that explains it all.
I’m not looking up today
so I guess I missed its call.

Don’t bother looking out for me.
I don’t think I believe anyway.
Love has no real allure, you see,
and on my nerves, it will fray.

Seductive whispers just won’t work
now that I’ve been set free.
I don’t want to sound like a jerk
but I don’t think love is my key.

So go ahead and float about!
Someone else will hear you out.

Oh, another attempt at a ghazal on the anniversary of my Mother’s death

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Today I’m remembering my mother. She died one year ago. Throughout this year, I have had moments when I wanted to talk to her more than anything else in the world. And knew I couldn’t.

Maybe that’s where this poem came from.

At any rate, I’m sure it’s not just me. (Although some of you may not write ghazals about it. Or attempt to. I’m still struggling with this form!)

Hug someone you love today.

Oh. 
By Michelle Garren-Flye

I wait for the rhyme to come but, oh, pain?
The rhythm runs through my thumbs, oh pain!

Sometimes it all feels right—no strain—
and others it’s nothing but, oh, pain.

Some might seek comfort in cocaine
but that will not shelter me from…oh. Pain.

Your beauty I have come to know, fain
would I reject its attraction, oh Pain.

My last refrain is your domain;
rest, you’ll fly in my love, oh pain.
Photo and text copyright 2024 Michelle Garren-Flye

Self Portrait, a poem, And Nothing New update

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First of all, I cannot begin to tell you how much I love Rattle. If you want to know why, check them out. I’m a subscriber, and they send me a poem every day, and the poetry is so good, it makes you feel good about just living in a world where people can think that way, you know? Yes, it is my ambition to have some poetry accepted by them, and I do submit to them from time to time, but I also just get so much inspiration from them.

For instance, every month they have an ekphrastic poetry challenge. If you don’t know what ekphrastic poetry is, it is a poem written because it was inspired by a piece of artwork. Here’s this month’s: Ekphrastic Challenge. I have entered this challenge several times, and I’ve always missed the mark and then read the responding poem and figured out why. But it doesn’t even matter. I’ve written so many poems and I’m learning every time I do it. Anyway, as soon as I saw this challenge, I knew I would enter it. I wrote three poems. This is the one I submitted.

Self Portrait



I am scraps of lost mail

pulled close around a center axis;

a book snapped shut by an unfeeling hand;

a paper doll cut from yesterday’s news

and left to crumple underfoot.

I refuse to yield to cripple and age,

obtuse in clinging to antediluvian belief,

a vow given long ago

and held in my chest,

concealed, mostly, by wisps

of lost dreams and things

that I won’t let go.

And you can’t make me.



I am obstinate in the face of the wind,

making myself ridiculous,

clothed in scrapbooks and memories

that threaten to blow away;

an object of pity perhaps

with no objective in mind.

So pull out my heart, 

and crumpled bits of newsprint

I can’t share

will spill at your feet but

spell out only what was

because sometimes forever

and ever won’t go away.

I also just yesterday published Chapter Two of my new venture, “Nothing New Under the Sun”. You can read it here: “Nothing New“. Although the story is called “Nothing New Under the Sun”, it’s all new to me as I’m publishing it on Kindle Vella in episodes, and it’s a mystery. I have an idea for it that I think you’ll like. I like to think of it as literary upcycling. And that’s gotta be new.

Maybe there’ll be a tropical sunset in a future episode of “Nothing New”. What do you think? Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye Copyright 2024 Michelle Garren-Flye

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year! (Happy Winter Solstice)

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People think I’m crazy when I say this is my favorite day of the year. But it is. It’s the day I feel the most hope for the future.

Today. The darkest day of the year.

Want to know why?

Because every day after this one gets brighter.

In honor of the darkest, most hopeful day, I’m doing a “live poetry writing”. If you haven’t joined me for one of those, it’s sometimes interesting since I’m working at my bookstore and am often interrupted.

(At 11:16 a.m. I’m already interrupted by customers. How dare they? Just kidding!)

Winter Solstice

By Michelle Garren-Flye

(11:20 a.m. debating about form versus free verse…really should’ve thought about this ahead of time!)

What makes the darkest day of the year so bright?

When the sun leaves early, why do I still hope?

I refuse the fear the end of day, the coming of night

With the long darkness, I know I can cope.

(11:23 a.m. I’m thinking sonnet, then. I do love sonnets.)

Daylight may not last as long while the night grows

and flowers cannot emerge in the absence of sun

but even now, I sense the spread of nighttime slows

and the approach of dawn will soon come.

(11:29 a.m. I know. Sun and come don’t really rhyme…)

In my bed, I wait to hear the first bird’s sweet whistle

(11:38 a.m. Sorry, I was off trying to find a book for someone. Back now.)

in the dark and the cold, with my head on my pillow.

and then it comes, like a message of dismissal

to the cold of yesterday, a welcome to tomorrow.

(11:45 a.m. I did stop in the middle of those last few lines to check out a customer. Not doing badly on time, considering…)

I jump from my bed, ready again for employ.

This day and the next I feel will bring joy.

(11:49 a.m. I wrote this couplet to end the sonnet thinking I wanted to write about joy, but as I wrote the last line, I thought maybe I should concentrate on faith instead. So, I’m working on an alternate.)

I jump from my bed, but wonder about my haste,

I pause to think but I know: it’s all about faith.

11:54 a.m. I’m done. This was fun and I will most likely polish this one up some. No idea what I might use it for, but it’ll go into a folder on my computer, anyway. Thanks for joining me! Enjoy the darkest day of the year, but don’t forget to have faith. Tomorrow will be brighter!

Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye. Copyright 2023

Silence (a poem)

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Poetry continues to be my main objective in spite of a couple of ideas I’ve had about novels. If I hear about a new form of poetry, I have to try it out. And then I have to stretch it. Remember Stretch Armstrong? How you would stretch and stretch him to see how far you could stretch him and he’d still go back to his original form…until he didn’t.

I sort of feel like I did that with haibun. Haibun is the combination of a haiku and a prose poem. Matsuo Basho wrote them. I discovered them relatively recently and decided to give them a try. And stretched the form a bit. What do you think? Is it still a haibun at its heart?

Silence
By Michelle Garren-Flye

it’s awkward, silence,
because it wants treasuring
and I reject it

laying too heavy on my ears in the dark, begging to be broken, shattered against the brick wall, revealing the death of sound ringing in my ears, spilling out like the yolk of an egg until the utter madness is stunned by a brief click in the wall behind the thermostat as the furnace breathes life into our emptiness…

don’t rejoice too soon
complete silence verges on
total perfection

you will seek it again, want to crawl into it, feel it envelop you in velvety warmth as if it can never break because it always always bends and that’s why you can never make friends with silence, why you can’t love it even if you want it, you will always seek release from it, but…

the birds will ghost you
the wind and waves will give up
leaving you…awkward
November flower. Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye

Poem: One Minute

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There are so many things to wish for. What’s your wish?

One Minute
By Michelle Garren-Flye

It’s 11:11, what’s your wish?
Is it love…money—or a bit of peace?
Go ahead, speak it and be selfish!
You’ve spent your whole life trying to please.

Whisper it to the first sparkling star…
Watch it drift away on dandelion fluff.
Pray for relief from your past life’s scar…
Hope a simple wish will be enough.

But just one single wish may not suffice!
I tell you what I think we must do:
in order to fulfill your wish’s price,
I’ll pledge mine to benefit you.

Hurry before the minute hand turns!
Tell me the passion that in you burns.

Self Portrait in 30 Years (a poem)

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Self Portrait in 30 Years
By Michelle Garren-Flye

She sits on her porch as people go past,
taking notice of what they bring into her past.

Little bits of their lives that pepper the now…
a tired mother…a crying child…now it’s all past.

Her son mows the lawn now every two weeks.
She likes it best when one week has passed,

when the grasses breathe rustles and chirps
echoing in her heart like songs from the past.

Those days when everything hurt so much—
if only she’d grasped that one day they’d be past.

Her daughter brings groceries, unpacks them inside:
“mom, come in, the summer’s heat is long past.

You’ll catch cold out there in the autumn breeze.
What keeps you outside when supper time is past?”

She smiles and takes her daughter’s dear hand,
hopes she’ll never know this longing for what’s past.

She could have dreamed up a magic spell back then
and stopped precious time before it had passed:

when she was a happy, tired mother of three…
now a lonely woman thinking only of the past.

She searches the stars for Orion’s sword belt,
Longs to fly to their light, leave this ache in the past.

Congratulations, it’s a ghazal (pronounced “guzzle” not “gu-ZAHL”, much to my disappointment).

Ghazals are hard to write due to their rhyme scheme, which involves repeating the same rhyme over and over. It can sound monotonous or forced. I’m just getting started playing with ghazals, so if it sounds monotonous or forced, I apologize.

The inspiration for this poem actually comes from a house. I used to walk by this house and see a little, old lady sitting on the front porch. I often wondered what her story was. I waved at her a few times, but before I got the nerve to stop and speak to her, I saw an ambulance there in the middle of the night. And then the little, old lady was gone.

I have no idea what happened to her, but her house is going through a major renovation. The porch is still there, though. I like to think she was lucky enough to spend her last days sitting on her front porch, maybe thinking of her loving children and eventually slipping away into her memories of past glories and loves.

Maybe that will be me someday. Because even if it’s painful to remember past sweet memories, it’s definitely better than not having them.

Selfie portrait by Michelle Garren-Flye