Happy November to All and Welcome to Poetics! Lisa here as your pub host, offerer/server of liquid refreshment and tasty snacks from the magic cupboard as well as provider of today’s Poetics prompt.

In conversations on blogmates’ music blogs, a term I’ve started using when it comes to iconic concerts of the past that I would have loved to see live is, “I’m adding it to my Time Machine Bucket List © (TMBL.)” If our species survives long enough there is no doubt that the secret of time travel will be unveiled. [Some already believe it is mathematically possible.] If I’m still around, I shall stand as a teenager in the Cavern Club and watch The Beatles night after night and certainly catch George’s eye. I’ll have Thanksgiving dinner at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco before watching The Band’s Last Waltz. I’ll have front row seats at Hollywood’s Pantages Theater to see David Byrne in his big suit as he twitches while he and crew “Stop Making Sense.”

Live musical performances are what fills my list, but it could be to any time, any place.  Real or fantasy.

And who is to say that once we have time machines installed in our homes, appliances as commonplace as a stove or refrigerator, we won’t have repeat settings for our favorites. Imagine visiting your own wedding day every anniversary. Holding your newborn and experiencing them seeing you for the first time on their birthday.

A movie comes to mind that puts its time machine to humanitarian use, where they send teams back to a place where they can stop a deadly virus from being released and wiping out most of humanity.

Imagine going back as far as you need to to get at the root of a conflict that has been going on for millennia and finding a way to neutralize the original harm.

It’s easy to fall into the mindset of using a time machine to go back and visit pleasant people, places, and things, or to head unpleasant people, places, and things off in the past. The “back dial” is well-used and worn. But this handy dandy machine can be cranked to a forward setting as well.

From wiki:

The Time Machine is a post-apocalyptic science fiction novella by H.G. Wells, published in 1895. The work is generally credited with the popularization of the concept of time travel by using a vehicle or device to travel purposely and selectively forward or backward through time. The term “time machine,” coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle or device. Utilizing a frame story set in then-present Victorian England, Wells’ text focuses on a recount of the otherwise anonymous Time Traveller’s journey into the far future.

 

Now, Dear Poets, we have come to the prompt part of the program. Your challenge, if you choose to accept it, is to choose one of the following options and tmbl.

Option 1: Take a few minutes to create your own Time Machine Bucket List. Try to come up with ten or so of them. Once your list has been completed, go through it one by one and let the one that speaks to you be your choice, and write a poem about it. Alternately, go through the list one by one and the choose the one you are most resistant to write about. Being challenged helps us grow as humans and as poets.

OR

Option 2: Choose your favorite Time Traveler and write a poem about them, one of their adventures, or possibly riding along with them on a new adventure.

OR

Option 3: Go within yourself and write about a metaphorical journey you’ve taken or would like to take.

There are no form, length, or other restrictions beyond choosing one of the three options above. The biggest thing to remember here is to have fun with it. Tap into the energy of all-that-is, past, present, and future, and weave your journey.

New to dVerse? Here’s how to join in:
• Write a poem in response to the challenge.
• Enter a link directly to your poem and your name by clicking Mr. Linky below and remember to check the little box to accept the use/privacy policy.
• You will find links to other poets and more will join so please do check back later in order to read their poems.
• Read and comment on other poets’ work– we all come here to have our poems read.
• Please link back to dVerse from your site/blog.

Sources:
time machine image link
Elves poem image link
peace be on my heart image link