From Scratch

 

“Happiness is having a scratch for every itch.”

– Ogden Nash

 

Leave
it(ch) alone you’ll only make
it(ch) worse.
It’s what you do.

You have
an itch.  You scratch
it(ch).  Then it(ch) bleeds.

Tear
it(ch) open.

Crawl
inside the wound.

Whiskey and Ancho liquor splashes
onto exposed
flesh.

Osprey screams.

The itch
won’t go
away.

 

* * *

 

Posted to dVerse Poets Pub, Quadrille Monday.  Happy Anniversary, dVersers!

62 thoughts on “From Scratch

  1. Fresh and edgy! Whiskey & Ancho; must give that a try. Do I have to bleed to throw back a shot? Or is it the other way around? Love ‘crawl inside the wound’ and that bird of prey who adds a sound track. Awesome writing my friend! ~Z

    Like

  2. I like it as a poem, very much, but you won’t get rid of that itch in the long term by drowning it in alcohol. It will come back worse than ever!

    I like the osprey thrown in there, sudden jolt of predatory/prey imagery.

    Liked by 1 person

  3. the problem is not the itch, it is that the itch is itchy. This is the problem eh? No great solutions, maybe to explore the original irritant or antigen – and either eradicate or make peace as the case may be? So easy to say, not easy to do. Love the poem Charley, it is how an itch on the soul feels. Thanks again for the Heller recommendation, all finished, Kirkus hated it, but to hell with Kirkus, I thought “Picture This” was a great weird contrapuntal piece. It was like Heller was standing there in front of that painting musing on all the weird avenues and connections in his neural net about that little piece of oil and canvas. The world looked back. Thanks again. Still liking Sound and Fury by the end?

    Like

    • Sorry I took so long to respond. It’s been too long since I’ve read Heller. I hoped it was as good as I remembered. Faulkner is proceeding nicely… along with several in-progress reads. Truth is I’ve bit off a lot this summer. But I’m enjoying the play of characters!

      The itch was more play than anything. I’m learning to follow the Talking Heads’ advice (Stop Making Sense).

      Liked by 1 person

      • I have been thinking a lot about making sense lately, and frankly I think it might be over-rated. I think I should tell you that you make an appearance in my dVerse response to Amaya’s prompt on 7 sins and 7 virtues. 😉 it was done in fun when I was in a strange mood, you are in there with Bjorn, Amaya, and Frank, it was fun and not serious, but anyway, thought you should know. It’s called “Broken Quadrille”. Your quadrille here was a lot of fun.

        Like

      • OMG! I howled! This is hysterical. You didn’t have to explain that it was done in fun. I just imagined you putting on a target bull’s eye and running past the dVersers… back and forth… pulling at the corners of your mouth, sticking out your tongue and going, “Nyah nyah nyah!” (or however that’s spelled.) Wonderfully done. Best line: Bjorn again.

        Like

Leave a comment