Word Raccoon is out of the hammock and coming for the to-do list.

🎵 Now Playing: “Unwritten” by Natasha Bedingfield

(It’s Word Raccoon’s Tuesday morning mood. And don’t give me any shizz about this feel-good song.)

Yes, it’s Tuesday. But don’t tell Word Raccoon that; it’s her Monday, and she’s got pages to devour. Poems to massage. A novel that’s giving her side-eye and she’s giving it right back. And oh, she is ready.

The long weekend was relaxing (with a pinch of Word Raccoon mischief). I cover it all below.

Barry practiced his keyboard set for subbing in at this coming Friday night’s The Strays gig in our lil’ ol’ town square. (I’ll be in the crowd promptly at 6:30 with my folding chair and fizzy drink, promise.) Locals, come join the fun oldies. And by that I mean the songs are oldies, not the guys.

While he practiced (and in days in between), I got down to some poetic meddling. I kept to my modest goal of five poems, and wrote a few more because who follows their own rules? I tried to stop, I really did.

Weekend stats:

• 📝 Wrote five (plus a few bonus) poems
• 🎤 Karaoke & a G&T
• 🔥 Grilled, toasted exactly one marshmallow
• 🎬 Walked out of a movie with an hour to go because Word Raccoon was bored (Word Raccoon has opinions. Ask her, she’ll tell you.)
• 📚 Finished Rick’s excellent short story collection. Review incoming
• 🎸 Watched a fab video on famous stolen guitars (some returned like prodigal sons! I love these musical works of art even if I can’t memorize model numbers to save my life. Anywho, watch it. You’ll enjoy it.)
• 🍫 Made the brownies
• 📺 Rewatched 6/10 episodes of Platonic. Before you judge, that’s only 3 hours.
• 📖 Raided the library and walked out with a book tower. I may have giggled. Out loud.

Library Book Theory (You heard it here first):

Library books go stale if you wait too long to read them. I read and drop ’em in the return box as soon as I’ve finished one. Today’s haul! I felt giddy over my choices — I had to sit down and relish my precious ones.

🍎 The Apple Poem Nobody Asked For

Because I had feelings about apples today. Of all things. Also, I own nothing Hello Kitty. But apparently my poem does. This poem is wonky; I own that. But I am also not going to do anything with it but share it here, because I know it’s a petty poem, so that’s fine.

To Eat an Apple While Brownies Bake?!
—after Robert Frost. Sort of.

Whose red undelicious apples these are
I think I know.
He didn’t eat his lunch, though.

He will not catch me standing here
Beside the stove with brownie cheer.

My Hello Kitty potholder
Gives a shake
To ask if there is some mistake:
To eat an inferior apple while brownies bake?

The oven hums, the batter sets.
(The goddamned gas station wine of apples, really?)
I bake regrets.

Red Delicious, my ass.

Poem Themes, Catalog in Progress

Listing themes with my poems really will help in answering calls for poems and deciding what the best homes are for them (please find homes, my little soul flares), though it is time consuming. It’s gonna take a minute, but I’ve got this.

In the meantime, here’s the current mood board of themes across my poems:

• Love & Desire
• Grief & Loss
• Family & Inheritance
• Aging & Time
• Illness & Decline
• Pop Culture & Media
• Gender & Sexuality
• Religion & Faith
• Power & Control
• Nature & Animals
• Domestic Life
• Identity & Selfhood
• Memory & Nostalgia
• Class & Labor
• Technology & Modernity
• Art & Creativity
• Humor & Satire
• Freedom & Confinement
• Loneliness & Connection
• Justice & Injustice
• Body & Embodiment
• Myth & Archetype

It’s going to be a big poem week. Word Raccoon is caffeinated and coming for her legacy. (Maybe just one more brownie first.)

But first, she’s only about a third of the way through that serial killer novel she found at the library today.

What, you didn’t know that would be the one she would start in on?

Oh, my dear reader…you’ve got a lot of catching up on Dremaness to do.

And that’s okay.

All in good time.