Quidnunc

QUIDNUNC

noun
A nosy or gossipy person.



The
Nonchalant quidnunc
Sniffing the garden

Asking
Really: Investigating
The world’s whereabouts

Is
Still puzzled
By our naivety.

Overstriking

OVERSTRIKING

Noun
1. Numismatics. The action of superimposing a new design over the original design on a coin; (also) a new design superimposed in this way.
2. The action of printing a diacritic or other modifying character over the top of another character; the action of typing two or more characters in the same space.






















Shyness
In a first meeting
Led to many overstriking
In our conversation:
After you.
No, you first.
And again.
Delicious blushing.


Lovely lady courtesy of lorivintage55stock @ DeviantArt.

Isthmus

ISTHMUS

noun
1.A narrow strip of land with water on each side, joining two larger land masses, for example, the Isthmus of Panama.
2.A narrow strip of tissue joining two large organs or cavities.



With a book for only isthmus
We cemented our friendship

Now, Nature has taken hold of it
Making a radiant garden of our first mutual smiles.

Malleable

MALLEABLE

adj
1 : capable of being extended or shaped by beating with a hammer or by the pressure of rollers
2
a : capable of being altered or controlled by outside forces or influences
b : having a capacity for adaptive change



Caresses would make him malleable
For a while
Before being startled
Into remembering
The wild beast within
By the littlest sparrow hopping by.

Edify

EDIFY

transitive verb
To instruct and improve, especially in moral and religious knowledge; to teach.






















He always performed the trick of edifying his audience
By pompously asserting the most ludicrous facts
With a deeply solemn mien.

Bollix

BOLLIX

verb (used with object) Informal.
1. to do (something) badly; bungle (often fol. by up): His interference bollixed up the whole deal.
noun
2. a confused bungle.























Translation of his sentiments into words
Had gone all bollixed
And derision was tossed in his direction;
Petals, torn by a storm, cast in the wild.

Bildungsroman

Bildungsroman

noun
A type of novel concerned with the education, development, and maturing of a young protagonist.



He looked at the older woman
Trying to find elements of a bildungsroman
In her guise.
He was more than willing to learn.
But could she be just teasing him?

Old letter courtesy of Autumn Goddess @ DeviantArt

Achipelago

ARCHIPELAGO

noun
A large group of islands.



Looking up the archipelago of stars
I wondered where my dreams might founder
(And sink)
As well as which creatures might inhabit those reefs
In the cold twinkling night,
Could I finally hear the astromaid sing?

(Stars courtesy of the European Space Agency)

Peruse

PERUSE

verb
1. To examine or consider with care.
2. To read completely.
3. (informal) To look over casually; to skim.




Perusing the lines on her face
Told me of her story and its minute dramas
Both unique and mundane
Of light defeating darkness.

Myriad

MYRIAD

Adj.
Constituting a very large, indefinite number; innumerable: "The myriad snowflakes in the winter."






















There must be
A myriad reasons
As to why autumn
Reaved me of my breath
I chose to only retain that
Of your smile
Golden and trembling.
A leaf soon departed.

Voracity

VORACITY

noun
The quality or state of being ravenous or insatiable






















Against voracity of the mind
Only one cure:
Sucumb.
Blissfully.

Pestiferous

PESTIFEROUS

Adj. or noun
1. Morally or socially harmful; pernicious.

2.a. Bringing or producing plague, esp. bubonic plague; injurious to health, noxious, deadly; pestilent, pestilential.
2.b. Originally: infected with a contagious disease, esp. bubonic plague. Also as noun (with the and pl. concord): such people as a class (obs.). Later: caused by or of the nature of bubonic plague.
2.c. Of an organism, esp. an insect: harmful, destructive.

3. In weakened sense: constituting a nuisance; irritating, annoying.



First a pestiferous caterpillar,
The budding ballerina turned to a butterfly
On her way to feast upon the stars.

Anna Pavlova appears courtesy of lorivintage55stock @ deviantart

Verbiage

VERBIAGE

noun
- overabundance of words
- the manner in which something is expressed in words (U.S. only)






















The
Musicality of its verbiage
Would really add to
The
Quality of its plumage,
Or so the fox believed.

The raven knew
That
Beauty was
ALL
In the eye of the beholder.
And that eye was feasting upon a lump of cheese.

Venerable

VENERABLE

Adj.
Commanding or worthy of respect to the point of reverence.



With the complicit wink of Time
He’d allowed himself to grow venerable.
For this unpardonable lapse in character
His rock-n-roll days were over.

Submersible

SUBMERSIBLE

Adj.
1. Capable of being immersed in water or functioning while submerged; "a submersible pump"; "a submersible electric frying pan".

Noun
1. An apparatus intended for use under water.
2. A warship designed to operate under water.



A submersible heart
Sunk in murky waters
- Green ponds of iniquity -
For the sake of a frisson

Calve

CALVE

verb
To set loose (a mass of ice).

Basking in new found warmth,
Smile a new venture,
I realised how much
FROST
Your kind words
Had calved off my heart
And that
DREAM
was permitted once more.

Unabashed

UNABASHED

adj
1.Not disconcerted or embarrassed.
2.Not concealed or disguised, or not eliciting shame.



Unabashed gusts
Wrinkled my mirror
Winds?
Or could it be just Time?

Hermeneutics

HERMENEUTICS

—n. (used with a sing. v.)
1. the science of interpretation, esp. of the Scriptures.
2. the branch of theology that deals with the principles of Biblical exegesis.



Hermeneutics did not serve:
The note - “Goodbye, cruel world” - was just as laconic.

Disengage

DISENGAGE

verb
To release from something that holds fast, connects, or entangles.




Let me disengage
Those clouds that clutter your smile
And set them on their course
Let them storm other minds
So you may breathe again

Realm

REALM

noun
1. A sphere of real or imaginary influence.
2. The domain of a certain abstraction.
3. (formal or law) A territory or state, as ruled by a specific power.



Unknown to us,
Our love’s realm had become vetust
Eaten away
By routine moths

Lovely lady courtesy of lorivintage55stock @ deviantart

Regale

REGALE

transitive verb:
1. To entertain with something that delights.
2. To entertain sumptuously with fine food and drink.
intransitive verb:
1. To feast.
noun:
1. A sumptuous feast.
2. A choice food; a delicacy.
3. Refreshment.


























You’d regale in
Wrapping my heart with your love
Until it couldn’t beat anymore.
Just an ornate empty shell
On your memory shelf.

Scruple

SCRUPLE

verb, noun
To restrain oneself for the sake of conscience; to have qualms or scruples about undertaking an action.



On a cold rainy day,
He might scrub his scruples away
And call in sick
To lounge by the fireside
With buttered crumpets and tea.

Usurp

USURP

verb
to seize and hold by force or without right



Slipping into my dreams at night
He’d usurp the burden of kissing me.
But drew the line at telling me bed-time stories.

Cavort

CAVORT

verb
1.To move about carelessly or boisterously.



Let's go cavorting in the leaves
Raising the ghosts of days past
Inhale deeply.
The earth will bring you back
To the child with autumn
in her hair.

Febrile

FEBRILE

—adj.
pertaining to or marked by fever; feverish.
























Love,
That febrile quest,
Robbing you of sleep
With tainted promises and smiles.

Wormhole

WORMHOLE

noun
1 : a hole or passage burrowed by a worm
2 : a hypothetical structure of space-time envisioned as a long thin tunnel connecting points that are separated in space and time





Jealousy had dug wormholes in his heart
Letting whole universe seep between them.
Turning off the stars in his eyes.

Immolate

IMMOLATE

transitive verb:
1. To sacrifice; to offer in sacrifice; to kill as a sacrificial victim.
2. To kill or destroy, often by fire.





Those forests I torched
To immolate – a precautionary measure -
The lying words that you might one day think
And write.

Glower

GLOWER

intransitive verb:
1. To look or stare angrily or with a scowl.
noun:
1. An angry or scowling look or stare.


























All through the museum,
Skeletons glower:
Natural history victims are many.
I fled.