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A SAWING sound, and the flash of a tiny handsaw, come from the interior of a ripe PUMPKIN. With a PLUNK! sound the PUMPKIN’s SAWED-OUT RIGHT EYE hits the TABLE. More SAWING and PLUNK!s come as the PUMPKIN’s LEFT EYE, NOSE and MOUTH are carved. Lastly the PUMPKIN’s NOTCHED TOP is carved and pushed out.

A HARPY, modified from myth to fit inside the PUMPKIN and wied the SAW, jumps out of the PUMPKIN, strikes a LOUNGING POSE, and declaims the PUNCHLINE, which is “Harpy Halloween!”

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Happy Halloween to all my READER FRIENDS, be they from CHINA, THE UNITED STATES, FINLAND, TRINIDAD and TOBAGO, AUSTRALIA, CANADA, ISRAEL*, SINGAPORE, or any other location OUTWARD.

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*Make Peace! Free Palestine! Heal the wounds of War! Please!!

grace notes of domestic love

her sleep is fitful owing some to a creaky knee

her man rises and exits the bedroom without sound

and then in the kitchen adds the gentle noises

of the early-morning chores of kitchen-bag disposal

(crinkly pulling up of bag

unlocking and opening back door

quite faint sound of deposit in big lidded bin outside

closing/locking door then swish out of new bag

closing little lidded bin with authoritative whmph)

and coffee-making

(lid-lifting/reservoir-filling/filter-snugging

store-brand coffeebag-opening/spoon-dipping

lid-shutting/pressing I/O switch

with a startyourengines click

and then the burble of the coffee brewing

and dish-doing

with the mild clatter of the roasting pan

and the rainfall-effervescence of a sink filling

with soapy water with the faucet nozzle

set on Sprinkle/Highpressure

and the clink and scrubsqueak of ceramic bowls

washed and rinsed and set in the dish drainer

..

the man is hopeful that the sounds

of little tasks being taken care of

will ease his sweetheart’s sleep

and she does look peaceful

as she opens her eyes and smiles and they kiss

..

“want some coffee?”

Photo by Donna Atkins

Here is my latest drawing. It is not finished, but the unfinished nature of the drawing may make this stage of completion superior to what would follow. I’ve dated it “October 2026” just in case I work on it some more; but after October 31st, nothing further.

Here’s about 40% of a drawing I’ve been working on for weeks. A little of the top and about half the bottom is cropped away. This is analogous to a Preview of Coming Attractions. 🙂

Some polishing and cleanup remain, but the main drawing is finished.

I was doodle-sketching a man looking vaguely like a bald Vincent Price. He looked like he needed a friend, so I added a waifish-looking woman, scaled differently so she would fit, and that enabled me to put her right arm around his head, rather protectively.

Then came consideration of a double-acrostic poem to go with the drawing, and “Scale Model” came quickly to mind: a Model built to Scale, punnish but (I hope) not too punishing.

I have done four acrosticizations of “Scale Model” and they all miss the mark but all have merit. If I did a dozen more I’d undoubtedly be nearer the mark, but there would go another few hours. I have a few other projects trying to be done, so the ghost of Robert Frost whispers

“Oh, I marked the first for another day!/But knowing how way leads on to way,/I doubted If I should be coming back.”

Scale Model

She and he have made a team

Cast and crew are oyster-steamed–O

At the wrap they’re all redeemed

Latent talent makes the theme

Ending well means what that hell

..

Scale Model

Sally 4th 4 new gigs loom

Comes the dawn we worry so

Angst is up til we feel doom’d

Lava flows and ice ergs floe

Every set’s a grassy knoll

..

Scale Model

She is small & he’s her gem

Cowardice has made him moo

And she haws as he has hemm’d

Lady’s skein’s a villanelle

Egomaniac doth swell

..

Scale Model

Sarcasm

Cameo

Adenoid

Lagniappe

Enamel

Moving Ground

May plowed Earth goodness bring

Or probe with metal finger

Vivacity–trade too

In circulation you

Need stagnate ne’er again

Go Under now & wend

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n.e.s. #181 of 480

the lady flings her arms persuasively. her left word balloon says “stablize” (not “stabilize”) and her right word balloon says “Zing!”

I love the look of land shifting beasts, and when one of them parked in front of the house I took a picture of it, and have started a sketch of it, and now I have the spine of an acrostic poem about it. The sketch and the poem will come around in due time, but when they do these early stages, fresh with undeveloped DNA, will be gone. I thought the balanced simplicity of them was worth preserving, just as photos are taken of a construction sote’s groundbreaking ceremony.