Category: Creativity

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Autumn Walk

I had a meeting in our local coffee shop yesterday and treated myself to a Hex Latte while projecting next year’s budget and goals with a community partner. From inside, the vintage paned windows make the outside world look a little bit like a dripping realistic painting – the kind of windows that have candles and snowdrifts in the winter and don’t have 20/20 sharp focus. It’s like I’m in a world of my own in there.

I confess: I was.

I had a moment, looking across the town square, when a brilliant flash of fall colors caught my eye. “I’m walking this square when I leave here. I’m sharing these pictures with others – this Hallmark Movie charm this time of year is too beautiful to keep all to myself,” I decided, right then and there in the middle of a business meeting.

We finished. I walked along, thinking in Haiku, as I mostly do. Here is part of my walk that I’m sharing with you:

charming small town vibes

fall displays on courthouse square

spiced chills in crisp air

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Taking a Boon Canine for a Walk

Today’s host for our final day of the October Open Write is Anna Roseboro of Michigan, who inspires us to write Take a Word for a Walk poems. You can read her full prompt here, along with the poems of others and the responses to writers.

Anna writes: Take a word for a walk.  Students might choose a word from the class generated vocabulary list or from a list of concepts or abstract terms. Move this word through the poem so that it appears in each “X” position.  There can be six words in each line.  Use color, abstraction, or other poetic devices in your poem. Use this formation:

X – – – – –

– X- – – –

– -X- – –

– – – X – –

– – – – X –

– – – – – X

Master of the House, Doling Out the Charm, Ready with a Handshake and an Open Paw

Boon – blessing, benefit, favorable, friendly, chipper

Everybody’s boon companion – one convivial mister

Les Miserables boon lyrics loop de-loo

We have a boon canine: Boo,

who sleeps under the boon moon

awakening soon, our Boo boy boon

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Crossings

Erica Johnson, our host at http://www.ethicalela.com for the first day of our five-day October Open Write, wrote one of my favorite forms of poetry – found poetry – in an art museum using the artists’ statements about the works! You can read her poem here – it surely captures the essence of departure by someone, leaving us to feel the loneliness that comes, almost missing them before they get fully out of sight. I feel I have been on an art exhibit tour today. Erica invited us to find poems in artists’ statements about paintings as well. I have a framed print of a painting that my parents gave me for Christmas in 1984, after I fell in love with the landscapes of the English countryside painted by John Constable following a visit to the National Gallery in London. My favorite Constable work: The White Horse, kept at the Frick Collection in New York. Here is the art link: https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.1146.html

The White Horse

six-foot wide space
a new technique
spanning canvas
no longer overshadowed

The White Horse
crosses
the River Stour
to the other side
on a barge

full-size sketch
with broad brushstrokes
thus crossing a new
career threshold

The White Horse painting appears at 2:37 and at 2:49 in the video
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Goal Update for September

I usually post my goal update at the end of each month, but September’s is running late. October was sneaky and arrived before I knew it. I even forgot to say Rabbit, Rabbit.

At the end of each month, (or beginning), I review my yearly goals and spend some time reflecting on how I’m doing in living the life I want to live ~ a way of becoming my own accountability partner and having frequent check-ins to evaluate my progress. I’m still in the process of revising some of my goals as I encounter successes…..and setbacks. New goals have asterisks for the month of October, when I will report on them in a few weeks. For the month of September here’s my goal reflection:

CategoryGoalsMy Progress
LiteratureRead for Sarah Donovan’s Book Group








Send out Postcards


Blog Daily




Write a proposal for
writing group’s book		I participated in the September book discussion with Sarah’s reading group and look forward to reading October’s book – Reader, Come Home: The Reading Brain in a Digital World. I’ll participate in this book discussion this month. Fellow blogger Tammi Evans recommended a book by Elizabeth McCracken entitled The Souvenir Museum, and I hope to explore this collection of short stories as well this month. I need a spooky book, too, to bring on the chills of October.



I mailed 10 postcards this month from Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky.

I continue to blog daily, and the daily writing and reflecting is a wonderful habit for me. I don’t feel complete without some form of daily writing, and the blog is a way of continuing the habit.

My writing group is writing a series of new books, and I will spend time editing the chapters we have written. I will continue to add chapters as we receive feedback from our proposals. We are each sending our proposal out to some publishing companies.
Creativity

*Decorate the house for fall





*Create Shutterfly Route 66

I am working on decorating. It’s a slow process this year. I picked up an orange and a bronze mum today from Home Depot, and I’ve also made the instant hot spiced tea and put it in Mason jars for the fall. I have added a couple of new pillows and a throw for the living room. Our decorations are simple around here in the country – – we have a lot of natural foliage, and I like using it in some wine bottles I’ve wrapped with twine using double-sided tape as vases.

I have been trying to get to Shutterfly since July, so if I haven’t accomplished this goal by the end of October, I may give up on this one.
SpiritualityTune in to church



Pray!



Keep OLW priority		We have been tuning in to church. With Dad preaching every Sunday in October and a few Sundays ahead of that, it makes the church home hunt take a back seat until my childhood church gets a new preacher, since I have the opportunity to hear Dad.

My car is still my prayer chamber for daily prayer, and there’s so much to give thanks for. I continue my conversations with the good Lord each morning and afternoon.

I’m still keeping my OLW my priority: pray!
ReflectionWrite family stories

Spend time tracking goals each month		I have shared family stories through my blog this month and will continue this month to do the same.

I’m tracking goals, revising, and considering some new categories as I look at my goal table.
Self-Improvement*Reach top of weight rangeThis is a setback for me this month. I’ve hit major stress and gained weight, despite joining WW. I need to set a firm date and get the mental mindset that it takes to stay on track. I have work to do. Update: every day, the diet is starting “tomorrow.” I seriously need a good mindset to start back.
GratitudeDevote blog days to counting blessingsI begin the days this way and end them giving thanks as well. I enjoy tea on the porch, taking time to meditate on all that I have been given. And all that I have not been given, too. I’m grateful both ways.
ExperienceEmbrace Slow Travel




Focus on the Outdoors


I’ve taken a trip in September to Augusta for a work meeting and to Kentucky to visit family. We visited Mammoth Cave National Park and the Bell Witch Cave – two caves in two days.






I’m still focusing on the outdoors with birdwatching adventures and camping. It’s the best time of the day to sit outside on the porch (in the shade) and just listen and watch what is going on around me. I have also come to an interesting resolution: I like my own backyard for birdwatching. Over time, I begin to know where each bird lives, its hours of activity, and its preferred seeds and feeders – and there is a powerful science to the perch on a feeder. Take cardinals, for example. They will come to a hanging feeder, but they prefer platform feeders just like mourning doves do. I’m learning by slow birding.
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Princess and Hero Night on the Zebulon Square

As the District Literacy Specialist for Pike County Schools in Zebulon, Georgia, I get to be a part of some amazing events put on by businesses in this county by offering L4GA grant partnerships to provide books and other literacy materials to put into the hands of families who attend the events.

One such event is the Princess and Superhero Night on the Zebulon Square, which happens on a Saturday evening at the end of September. Our Chamber of Commerce organizes the event and gets permission from the City Council to block off the road directly in front of the courthouse to make a safe zone for families to visit the characters that are each sponsored by businesses and stationed all around the square. This brings people into our local businesses and provides opportunities for people to meet new friends and get new books! 2,000 books, to be exact.

This is where my passion and my career intersect for the most fun I could possibly ever have in my work! I meet with our local businesses in the spring of each year to design a Community Partner Literacy Plan. Instead of coming up with new ideas, I ask each business to share with me the events that are already happening as part of what they do – whether they are providing workshops, celebrating certain holidays, holding festivals or hosting events that bring people together. Once we have their events listed, we imagine all the ways that grant funding through L4GA can be used to bring books, reading clubs, writing workshops, poetry readings, or other literacy-related benefits to our community. Then we put the dream on paper and make it happen. The cherry on top is when we network between and amongst community partners themselves. This particular event showcases how all the dots connect to create a magical night!

I often think of my work as a year-round Hallmark Literacy Movie, because if I took any Hallmark Christmas movie and substituted the festival that always seems to be part of the plot for any of the events held in our county, with the constant smiles and joyful spirit of all the characters, that’s the setting where I live and work – – in a dozen or more Hallmark Literacy Movies, where people fall head over heels in love with books.

But please don’t tell anyone. I need everyone to think that no one would want this job (I have a few fake complaints stored up just in case anyone realizes I’m getting paid to do what I would, most days, do for free). The truth is that I work with amazing people every single day, from the state department of education and the broader network of schools throughout the state, to the local schools and businesses throughout my own county. The Princess and Hero Night is one of my favorite events, but it is only one of many that draws families and gives us opportunities to distribute books.

Just look at all these smiles! In the words of Judith Viorst and her adorable Alexander, these moments make this terrible, horrible, no good, very bad job the most rewarding work I do!

All photographs are used with permission of families!

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Gratitude: Ansley’s Birthday

Today is my youngest child’s 30th birthday, and I could not be prouder of her! Happy Birthday, Ansley! Here’s an acrostic poem to celebrate you on your special day, using the letters of your name vertically to begin each line!

Ansley Claire Meyer

Artistic gifts galore

Nonnie – your nickname

Soloist extraordinare

Lloyd writer the on bathroom wall??

Expressive and sincere

Youthful spirit

Cherished daughter

Lover of coffee and books

Aunt of 6

In inches – 59 – (4’11”)

Restorer of furniture

Eye for fashion

Musically talented

Ever the quietest baby girl

You, child: coolest urban kazoo player EVER

Enthusiasm for life

Rock solid believer in God

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September Poetry Marathon – Day 5 of 5

Today’s host for the final day of our September Open Write at http://www.ethicalela.com is Glenda Funk of Idaho, who inspires us to write Barbie poems. You can read Glenda’s full prompt and her poem here. I can’t wait to see all of the poems born into the world on this topic, so please hop over to the site and take a read. I chose a reverse nonet today, crafting nine lines with each numbered line’s syllable count on each in descending order as if going back in time, seeking Fountain of Youth Barbie.

Turning Back the Years Reverse Nonet

We’d line them up like kickball players

at recess, then pick one by one,

taking turns to get the best

looking Barbies. Next, we’d

choose accessories ~

whip worlds to life

narrating

stories

dreamed.

As part of this post today, I’m sharing the remaining poems from the poetry marathon last Friday, where a poem and hour was written either by someone in my family, a friend, or me. Here they are:

12 a.m. hour – Kim Johnson – Hashtag Haiku

#meanness

Fruit of the Spirit

my tree needs fertilizer

nothing much blooming…..

1 a.m. hour – Tanka – a five line poem with a syllable count of 5-7-5-7-7

Cinnamon apples

sliced, wax-sealed in Mason jars

cane sugar syrup

for Thanksgiving dessert pies

prepped-ahead ingredients!

2 a.m. hour – Naani – a poem consisting of four lines, with twenty to twenty-five syllables on any topic

Pumpkin Harvest!

Pumpkin Spice!

Pumpkin jack-o-lanterns ~

glowing face with the slice of a knife!

3 a.m. hour – Senryu – a three line unrhymed poem similar to Haiku, about nature

Midland water snake

basking in Gibbs Gardens grass

misunderstood

4 a.m. hour – Tricubes – three stanzas of three lines with 3 syllables per line 

Poetry

Wings to Fly

Words to heal

Poetry

Weatherproof

Warmth for cold

Poetry

What if prompts

Why not now?

5 a.m hour – Cinquain – a poem that has two syllables in the first line, four in the second, six in the third, eight in the fourth, and two in the fifth (it was early, and I was watching my Honey Nut Cheerios dance in my plain Greek yogurt)…..

mOrning

cOffee hOp!

cheeriO’ed yOgurt prOm

O’s d-Osi-dO  with pOetry

hOedOwn!

6 a.m. hour – Kim Johnson – Ode – a poem of praise, often written directly to a person or object 

Memories of Miriam 

Dear Mom,
you come to me
in the missing
with tingly spots that
turn warm
in the heart,
help me exhale~ my
fingers circling my temples
bringing back
all the whens

of this Bernina
your fingers guiding
mine under the
foot, stitch by stitch
learning to sew
a lime green terrycloth
bathcover, now
sewing quilts
for your great grands
on your fine
Swiss machine

of hawks,
talons clutching wires
checking that
my seatbelt
is fastened
as I drive past,
shaking your pointing finger
if I forgot,
knowing that
whatever I’m
thinking at
that moment,
you’re there
in it

of strawberry figs,
last summer wave
just picked, my own
weakening fingers twisting
tender fruits free ~
canned this very
week, Mason jars
sealed tight
with summer’s
sweetened warmth
for coming winter

of spiced Russian tea,
the Tangy orange
and lemonade mixed
with clove, sugar
cinnamon and tea ~
a medicinal brush
of your invisible fingers
through my hair
in sore throat season

of rippled milkglass
with resurrection fern
springing to life
unfurling its brown
dry fingers
into open arms

green again

7 a.m. hour – grand finale recap poem

A coffee stir stick

started a 24-hour 

poem marathon! 

we stirred up writing

gave wings to what if ideas

preserved memories

called love to action

resurrected ancestors

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September Poetry Marathon – Day 2 of 5

Today for the September Open Write, our host at http://www.ethicalela is Stacey Joy of California. You can read her prompt and her poem here and see the amazing Diamante form generator that will help you write your own Diamante poem. Today’s topic is food, but as I was reflecting on last night’s dinner, I chose Riesling as my topic.

Rhine grapes
light, refreshing
flavoring, fermenting, fulfilling
German white wine perfection
dinnering, relaxing, reading
citrusy, aromatic
Riesling

Continuing with Friday’s poetry marathon that I began sharing yesterday, here are some more poems from the 24 poems in 24 hours. I had other writers contributing as well. The first one was written by my stepson, who chose the word laughter to write an acrostic. I love his creativity and his random example of laughter right at the start!

1:00 pm hour – Andrew Johnson, Acrostic Poem – a poem in which the first letters of each line spell a word vertically, often defining or explaining the acrostic topic.

LAUGHTER

Little spontaneous

Alien pajamas

Universal expression

Good times had

Human experience

Topic of discussions

Emotion of healing

Right kind of feeling

2:00 pm hour – Shadorma – Kim Johnson – a Shadorma is a poem that has six lines with this syllable pattern: 3,5,3,3,7,5

Shaving Cream 

shaving cream!

not just for shaving

but also

for cleaning

when little fingers write words

into the lather 

3:00 pm hour – Abecedarian Poem by Boxer Moon – In an abecedarian poem, each line or stanza begins with the first letter of the alphabet and continues with letters in successive order, or the poet may take creative license and use the stitch-up feature that Boxer used, stitching the ends back to the beginning.  I think he created a whole new form – a Circular Abecedarian! He not only wrote it forward, but also back up from the bottom, starting with A and working back up to Z. The man shows his genius in this Halloween poem.

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

All alone, Zombie of Me

Before Dawn, Your life will be.

Crackling bones, Xanthic Demon!

Demonic Songs, Why have you Chosen Me- Dreaming?

Every Breath a stone, Vicious Song!

For Here my Creature roams, Ugly rightful wrongs!

Gleaming with blood, Tomorrow I’ll retrace.

His eyes yellow with crud, So fast-paced.

Inside no love, Retreating from my space.

Just as teeth chatter, Quietly, I leave my place.

Keynotes of feelings matter, Pathogen thoughts infected.

Leave, oh please leave,—- Rejected!

My heart punctured and deceived- Neglected!

Neglected- My punctured heart grieved- dejected!

Or rejected- Leave, oh please, leave in the latter

Pathogen thoughts, Keynotes of life do not matter.

Quietly, shhhhhh! Justify my chatter…

Running, Ruining, my face! Inside without love

So fast-paced, His eyes yellow stained with crud!

Tomorrow I’ll retrace, Gleaming with blood.

Ugly vicious wrong! For my creature roams

Vicious, ugly, song. Each breath a stone

Why must we repeat this Demonic song?

Xanthic Demon, Crackling bones!

Your life is mine, Be.

Zombie of me, A me of Zombie?

– Boxer Moon

4:00 pm hour – Kim Johnson – Limerick – – a humourous rhyming verse of three long lines, then two short lines, with a rhyme scheme of aabba.

Goofy Schnoodle

A schnoodle who sleeps upside down

Is a goofily-schnoozing nap hound

He contorts in my chair

Chasing rabbit dreams there

Ollie chases those hares ‘round and ‘round!

5:00 p.m. hour – – Kim Johnson – Decima- a ten line poem with 8 syllables in each line, having rhyme scheme of abbaaccddc

Monster and Robber Spray

we used to have a can of spray

when you were but a wee youngster

to rid bad robbers and monsters

to keep those things of fear at bay

and chase those horrid scares away

together we would fill the air

of Lysol-labeled love and care

you thought it did the magic trick

better than any billystick

come near us? No monster would dare!