Author: kimhaynesjohnson

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For What it’s Worth – The Stafford Challenge Day 43

Forget finery.

Could we value family?

Prioritize worth.

Because in the end

~when life’s regrets take firm hold~

possessions don’t care.

OLW = Pray. Diopter Word = Release. Today I’m praying for things to always take a back seat to the people in my life. The worth or value of possessions can demand more of our investment of time and energy, and I’m praying that this never takes root in my own life. The stories many of my friends share in their challenges with their aging parents who struggle to let go of the past and move forward shines an unwelcome spotlight on priorities – and the degree to which they are a priority. Enough is plenty and preferable, as Robin Wall Kimmerer in Braiding Sweetgrass explains, and I pray I never amass an anchor of belongings that gets in the way of what is most important.

Today, I begin a season of release and pre-spring cleaning. Starting in my own attic. 

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The Quarreling Songbirds – Stafford Challenge Day 40

Today’s poem is a Haiku, inspired by the footage on my Netvue bird camera. We always seems to find such joy in watching birds, but the truth is that they argue and antagonize each other as much as people. Perhaps we laugh because they help us see the humor in human nature and how ridiculous we look.

The Quarreling Songbirds

quarreling sparrows
bicker, spar over birdseed
like squabbling siblings
Chipping Sparrows spar for the Johnson Funny Farm Birdcam
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Redbird Greeting Haiku – Stafford Challenge Day 39

As our birds return in greater abundance making their way back from their winter in the south, I again find the deep peace of birdwatching on my front porch in the early hours of the day. It really should be called birdlistening, I’m convinced, as the sound leads the way to the sights. The breaking sunrise that shows up for work each day, combined with the gratefulness of birds singing praises, brings joy! 

Redbird Song

redbird song greeting

farm morning praise at sunrise

my mother is near

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Sweet Potato Kitty Cat – Stafford Challenge Day 37

I went to lunch with some colleagues last week, and we ordered our food in the produce section of a local farm to table restaurant. Imagine our sheer delight when we encountered this cat napping in the sweet potato bin. This is no red potato, friends. Here is the couch potato of cats, right here in rural Georgia.

Actual sweet potato kitty napping in the produce bin

I Yam What I Yam

I yam what I yam

cat at the farmer’s market

napping in the yams

I’m a lazy and fat

sweet potato kitty cat

….and me?aw, I’m good with that.

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Day 5 of February’s Open Write with Amber Harrison of Oklahoma, Day 36 of The Stafford Challenge

Ollie, tugging a stolen sock

Today’s host at http://www.ethicalela.com for Day 5 of the February Open Write is Amber Harrison of Oklahoma, who inspires writers to write a borrowed form poem using a fill-in-the-blank approach. You can read her prompt and the poems of others here.

Amber writes:

Today, I invite you to fill in the blanks in these lines by Whitman, or create and refill blanks of a stanza by another poet of your choice (this could be a time when you fill in the blanks expressively or reflectively in zine form):

I celebrate ________,

And what I _____ you ______, 

For every ____________________ me as good

___________________ you.

Original lines by Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself”

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

And what I assume you shall assume,

For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

Boo Radley, Stolen Sock World Champion, taunting with those eyes
Stolen Socks

I celebrate stolen socks
And what I tug, you wrangle
For every muscle moved by me as good
as hackles you.
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Slice of Life, Day 4 of The February Open Write, and Day 35 of The Stafford Challenge – Epistolary Poem/Letter to My Younger Self

Special thanks to Two Writing Teachers

Today at http://www.ethicalela.com, Britt Decker of Houston, Texas is our host for this fourth day of the February Open Write. You can read her full prompt and the poems of others here as she challenges us to write letters (epistolary poems) to our younger selves.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

When anyone with human flesh

gives you advice

look them straight in the eyes

and say ~firmly~

I’ll take it into consideration.

Do not take it as gospel.

Guard yourself.

Do your own research.

They aren’t experts.

Live your own life

not the one they choose for you.

Notice more,

especially the

hands

in photos (it’s the unseen key

that will slap you

~hard in the face~

like a wet whaletail

when you finally see).

Don’t believe a single promise.

Above all,

practice your mother’s discernment.

She knew.

She knew.

Photo by Andre Estevez on Pexels.com

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Remembering Miriam on Her Heavenly Birthday – Stafford Challenge Day 34

Today’s host at http://www.ethicalela.com for the third day of February’s Open Write is Dr. Sarah Donovan, who inspires us to write poems that experiment with broken lines. You can read her prompt here, along with the poems of others.

I took the ghazal form today of 5 couplets with AA BA CA DA EA rhyme scheme and measured meter, reframed the whole form, relaxed the rules and broke the lines as I thought of my mother’s 81st birthday and the moments I’m so glad my camera captured before she left us in December 2015 with Parkinson’s disease. Above, she reads to her great grandson from The Sneetches by Dr. Seuss. 

Shaping Future Tense

when nothing else
made any sense

when family strangers
made you tense

your lap unfolded
picture books

that tore down 
every guarded fence

great grandson's 
heart and mind you shaped
each page
a moment so immense

your fingers curled
his eyes unfurled
his focus on you
so intense

when nothing else
made any sense
picture books
wrote future tense