Category: Experience

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#VerseLove April 29

Our host today for Day 29 of #VerseLove at http://www.ethicalela.com is Scott McCloskey of Michigan, who inspires us to rewrite the script of a time we wish we’d given a different answer. You can read his prompt and the poems of others here. 

Kernels of Truth


ten months after

she died

four months after

he died

you asked me

what I thought

of y’all



and I told the truth



you’re nice

she’s nice

but y’all don’t fit



you thought

it was that woman thing

that I 

just didn't like her



you had it all wrong



there were those

I thought would be a

great fit for you



readers

travelers

lovers of wine

whose blood runneth blue



this one wasn’t for you



you’ve held my 

truth-telling 

against me all this time

made me the 

unaccepting one



and now after

seven years

of frustration

figuring out

discovering

you finally realize

all those reasons

y’all don’t fit



so next time I’ll

tell the only truth

you want to hear



marry her



then I’ll go 

make popcorn
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#VerseLove April 27

Today our host for #VerseLove is Chea of Texas, who inspires us to write poetry with regional dialect ~ to tell something as it really happened, in our home language. You can read her prompt and the poetry of others here. I’m sharing a phone conversation with my dad one early morning not too long ago and wrote it in prose during the Slice of Life Story Challenge. 

Hopin' Folks Out

my phone rings early 
Dad

I have a story I need to tell 
while it’s fresh on my mind
before I forget

I grab my pen

It was back in the old days in rural Georgia 
when I was preaching at Ohoopee
This was down around Highway 19
where you’d go through Wrightsville
meander over to Tennille
and then head on out to Sandersville
a sea of cotton fields  
roads all red clay

Ohoopee was a church of miracles
a cured drunk who loved the Lord led the singin'
“On Jordan’s Stormy Banks,” 
only he pronounced it Jurdan’s.
and he weren’t wrong.

a fellow named Noah in the church 
needed help finding 
where to dig his well
even with a name like Noah

back in those days
people were people 
folks’ existence was all about 
helpin' their neighbors out

now 
old Elvis heard about it
“I’m coming over to hope you out” 

I went over there too
to see Elvis hope his neighbor out

Elvis said he had a divinin'  rod – 
a hickory branch –  to find water 
Elvis walked  
it tremored
I saw it with my own eyes
they dug that well right there

they called this place Possum Scuffle
back over in Harrison by Raines Store 
over yonder by Deep Step and Goat Town
by Margaret Holmes's cannery ~
black eyed peas and collards. 

 in Acts 27
Luke is in a ship in a storm 
using stabilizing ropes 
~ also hawsers or helps
a help is a hope rope
on land or at sea
it's Biblical, Kim

now
you remember that

write it down
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#VerseLove April 22 – with Emily

Emily is our host today at http://www.ethicalela.com for Day 22 of #VerseLove.

Today is Earth Day, and Emily encourages us to write about an island of our choice. I grew up on two islands – one in Georgia, one in South Carolina. I love today’s topic, because I’m back on St. Simons today spiffing up our rental unit here, remembering my youth softball league playing in the ballpark across the street, walking the village where I crabbed on the pier with my mother. It’s a perfect day to enjoy the island vibe with three out of control schnoodles who can’t get enough of all the salty sea smells.

St. Simons Island, Georgia

Childhood
Memories splash
Time-faded photographs
Redigitized to present-day
Beach walks

sea smells
salty schnoodles
savoring Saturday
still snoozing, sunrise sand dune soon
spoiled sons
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#VerseLove April 18 – with Fran Haley

Fran Haley of North Carolina is our host today at http://www.ethicalela.com for Day 18 of #VerseLove, inspiring us to write a triolet. You can read her full prompt here and see the form for this 8-line short form with rhyme scheme. Fran is a fellow teacher, a bird enthusiast, poet extraordinaire, and she named one of my plants on my front porch: Leafy Jean (which led me to a name for the other plant – Leafy’s brother, Leon Russell – – children both buried in a cemetery Fran visited as a child). Today I am keeping yesterday’s blog writing topic with the Rose of Jericho and changing it to a poem – a triolet! 

Choose to Live!

Rose of Jericho ~ brittle, brown, dry
unfurl your fingers! choose to live!
mixed tears of grief and joy I cry
Rose of Jericho ~ brittle, brown, dry
my gaze drifts heavenward, eyes to the sky
reassurance of faith and hope you give
Resurrection plant ~ tears green you, oh my!
unfurl your fingers! choose to live!
Rose of Jericho ~ brittle, brown, dry – an Easter gift from my daughter
Rose of Jericho ~ choosing to live, in my mother’s milk glass on the kitchen counter
Leafy Jean at 7:25 a.m. on this day, thriving on the front porch here in Georgia
Leon Russell, her brother, at 7:25 a.m. on this day, thriving on the front porch
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#VerseLove April 16 – with Susan Ahlbrand

Susan Ahlbrand is our host today for Day 16 of #VerseLove. She inspires us to write poems about friendships that didn’t work out for whatever reason, whether there was a move or a disagreement or a divorce or another form of distancing. You can read her full prompt here. I wrote about a time I left a church because the views became too radical to accept. 

Blind Ewe

so you’re holier.
new pastor said NO WOMEN
his blind sheep believed

not one stood with me
not one challenged his iron fist
not one saw the wolf

wife who rarely spoke
children white as untanned lambs
always in the house

I took a firm stand
when I saw the truth. I left
that mutton pasture

one by one others 
did too, down to a dozen
“disciples” who stayed

brainwashed radicals
worshipping legalism
no grace, mercy, love

so you’re holier?
is that what you call yourself?
guess again, girlfriend.

Ewe blind
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#VerseLove April 15 – with Allison Berryhill

Allison Berryhill of Iowa is our host today for Day 15 of #VerseLove at http://www.ethicalela.com. She inspires us to write poems about what we missed, or what could have been. You can read her full prompt here. 

What You Missed

what you missed
you’d have never seen anyway

the way he looks like his mother
the way he casts his line
the way he asks with concern
the way he answers with passion
the way he doesn’t miss a beat
the way he marches to his own
the way he loves animals like Mimi did
the way he rescues turtles
the way he named his baby duck Steve
the way he knows departure
the way he feels betrayal
the way he talks all scholarly
the way he tells books start to finish
the way he hugs his cousins
the way he thinks in waves of blue
the way he ponders nothing new under the sun
the way he sees the world
the way he doesn’t see the world

five years from now 
he’ll carry fewer memories of you
because you were absent
    off praying for all the others
      at a ballpark
       again forgetting your own
that depth finder could see fish
   but will never show the depth of 
what you missed
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#VerseLove April 14 – with Margaret Simon

Today’s host for Day 14 of VerseLove at http://www.ethicalela.com is Margaret Simon of Louisiana, who invites us to write free verse poetry. I had a burst of brightness this week, so I’m capturing that moment this morning. 

Disco Fever

I opened my eyes
to a disco joint
missing the music 
clearly needing The Bee Gees
or Yvonne Elliman 
or the greatest ever: Abba

hundreds of tiny sunbeams
scattering light rays
in all directions
the kinds of rays
I could reach out and touch, 
measure with a ruler 
their armlengths’ reach
changing refractions

wondering how I would get home
in this overpowering light
too much, really
so much it hurt 

I squinted, tilted my face up 
propped my head on the backrest
closed my eyes
and sat silently
thinking, pondering

“Do you have sunglasses?” 
a voice asked

I do

“You’re gonna need ‘em,” she assured me. “I have some if you can’t find yours.” 

I reached in, fumbled blindly 
through my backpack
fingers searching feverishly

wallet
keys
chapstick
Aleve
Kleenex

Sunglasses! 

I put on these disco glasses,
ready to face the music

when I stepped out 
into the bright sunlight
from the darkness 
of the eye doctor’s office, 
eyes dilated from the exam, 
I had only two things on my mind:
John Travolta and a ride home
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#VerseLove April 12 – A Poet Like Me with Anna Roseboro

Anna Roseboro is our host at http://www.ethicalela.com today for Day 12 of #VerseLove, inspiring us to find our birth poets. I loved her nod to a line from Gorman in her own poem today – we must be the light. And I’m rather convinced that’s the only way to change the world. I found Angela Williams, who wrote the poem Almost Savages – born in northern Michigan – and born on the same day and same year as I. I chose to write a Golden Shovel with this striking line: small fish will scatter away from my steps.

Anna Shines the Light 

Here’s to you, Anna Small 
Roseboro! Words glimmer like tiny fish 
in your sunlight as each of us will 
put pen to paper, fingers to keys, scatter 
in all directions far and away 
searching, learning, writing from 
the heart of our birth poets- my 
same-day-and-year poet and I shared first steps

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Lines In My Prime – Day 11 of #VerseLove with Erica Johnson

I enjoy the structure of short syllabic forms of poetry, so I was thrilled with today’s VerseLove prompt using prime numbers from Erica Johnson at http://www.ethicalela.com on this 11th day of the writing challenge. I found a unique book in my mailbox yesterday from my writing sisterfriend Fran Haley from North Carolina, and it inspired today’s poem. We are both watching eggs ready to hatch any day now. I used a partial borrowed line from a poem in the book entitled Memory Garden (in bold) for today’s writing that includes prime numbers of syllables in ascending line order (2,3,5,7,9,11,13….) and I added an ending line of 3.

Feathered Friends

today’s 
poetry: 
Language of the Birds
cherished gift in my mailbox 
from a sisterly friend sharing peace and warmth 
grass withers, flowers fade, but books live on forever 
like friendship