Diversity I inhabit:
None is my nation;
Let inspiration
Challenge your lyrical habit.

Now, as Kwan-yin, to change my tune—
For sheer delight,
In eastern light,
I’ll bring you the fruits of the moon.

Then plunder all the New World’s land.
A Spanish specter,
Mine is the scepter.
With regal bearing, I command.

In beaded buckskin, tawny, fair
Young maid I appear.
But I’m the seer,
And offer you a gift from there.

Latin porn star/Coyolxauhqui
Though cut in pieces
My gift increases:
Pure honey to the honeybee

My true self you may never see.
Your soul will dangle
From my bangle
Pure flame enshrouded: death to thee. 

I’m of no nation, in the end.
That, you cannot choose.
I reign as your muse…
You’re warned: take care lest I descend.

PROMPT #25:
An aisling, a poetic form that developed in Ireland, recounts a dream or vision featuring a woman who represents the land or country on/in which the poet lives, and who speaks to the poet about it. Today, I’d like to challenge you to write a poem that recounts a dream or vision, and in which a woman appears
who represents or reflects the area in which you live.

Now that virtue-signals are hopelessly confused,
And all the new TikToks silicone-filtered
And bots refuse to algorithmically read my verse
I will refuse to update my TwitFace banner.

I will stop exteriorizing the Luciferian hierarchy
From my pint-glass of unsalted gluten-free tears
Before petitioning my representative
For unlimited free abortion.

I will cease to sing the brilliance of blackness
And call light itself racist and homophobic.
Plainly, if you have one of those
You must be a woman. Excuse Us.

Painting: Mati Klarwein 

PROMPT #24: write a poem and describe something with a hard-boiled simile.
Use just one, or try to go for broke and stuff your poem with similes till it’s . . .
as beautiful as a chance encounter on a dissecting table of a sewing-machine and an umbrella.

  PROMPT 23: write a short and snappy poem – with a lot of rhyme and soundplay.

Your trite observations are word-crafted dullness
A poem half-empty mistaken for fullness . . .
You really think people pay money to read this?

The MFA chapbook as strong soporific;
For use as a sedative: truly terrific—
Do poetry-lovers pay money to read this?

Your online credentials are surely impressive . . .
Your verses, however, are drab and regressive.
Do muses think people pay money to read this?

This tepid admixture of phrases concocted;
A tottering temple of yawn you’ve constructed,
(Though readers might even pay money to read this.)

PROMPT #22: write a poem that uses repetition.
You can repeat a sound, a word, a phrase, or an image, or any combination of things.