Patchwork Prose and Verse
it occurred to me
in the shower
this morning that
the work shoes
I just bought
may be the last ones
I’ll need for my career ~
these last-hurrah celebration shoes:
Life Stride flats with
Velocity 2.0 footbeds
in navy and taupe
may get me through my
remaining years
taking me straight into
the retirement years of
my soul spirit
classic hippie Birkenstocks
for all the frayed denim
and fringed shawl
days ahead
just not today,
not yet.
Anna Roseboro of Michigan is our host today for our fifth and final day of the August Open Write. Anna encourages us to walk through poetry from #VerseLove 2024 and apply the TIME acronym to the elements of a poem and construct a verse about one of our choice. You can read her full prompt here. I chose Stacey Joy’s Our Old Kitchen Table to think about these elements in her poem and to write about each.
Time
Imagery
Music
Emotion
Tabletime Tempos
Through all these tender table times
In games, gatherings, cartoons, showers,
Meals, drumrolls of dice and laughter and tears against
the backdrop of time ticking
Emanating life tempos tintinnabulated and tolled, thus told
around the old kitchen table
sometimes when
I am alone
only the stars are visible
in the empty darkness
my mother’s laughter
twinkles from Heaven
and I feel the
narrowness
of my grief
It doesn’t matter what
the role in education,
whether teacher or coach
or media specialist or
administrator: one truth
holds true. I learned it
in the 1990s from my
partner teachers. The
back-to-school
nightmares hit hard
and on time. The world
of dreams mysteriously
knows that school for
students starts here
Monday, so last night
I was walking a class
down a hall of a
school I’d never seen
and lost them all
on the first day.
They were second
graders. I haven’t
taught a classroom
of second graders
since 2003, but
here I was in my
nightmare, losing
every one of them,
wandering the halls
and calling for them,
knowing I’d be fired
when their mothers
showed up, but
finally discovering they
had all gone to the
library. I stepped
into the murky
haze of the dream
to find they were
all reading books,
scattered all
across the floor
in their own quiet
spaces, not one
saying a word.
And I realized:
my nightmare
had become my
best back-to-school
dream ever.
I chose a book
and collapsed into
the library couch to
read, too
I learned this last night:
when you’re having
a night terror, look for
the library. It turns
nightmares into dreams.
that moment when you
see your book cover
for the first time with
your group of writing
friends and hold back tears
for all the waiting,
for all the writing,
for all the hours spent
anticipating
what you always but
never dreamed so real
and possible and
finally right here
here it is, set to
launch September 2
stay tuned for the link
to our stories, to
our wounds, to our hearts,
to our healing words
Cheers for Words That Mend!
she’s there
but I can’t
hear her
I can only see her
she comes to me
in dreams
we travel
climb stairs
sit at tables
drinking coffee
in B&Bs
holding presence
I see his figure
peeking around the sage chair
looking right at me
acting non-chalant
resting briefly to lick paws
he stretches out, yawns
as if he does not
have a burning agenda
playing me a fool
his ball rests nearby
then a thump of his black tail
and a sudden pounce
an invitation
to an early-morning game
that I can’t resist
Camping families
more than half of us have pets
(One official stat)
the day after Open Writes
when we go back to writing
without the company of
friends makes me miss them
This day of the month is my favorite – the day when all three of my online writing groups converge – The Slice of Life (www.twowritingteachers.org), The Open Write (www.ethicalela.com), and The Stafford Challenge (a group on Facebook, led by Brian Rohr and inspired by William Stafford). I look forward to seeing my fellow writers in person at NCTE in Boston in November and hereby volunteer to work with others to help set up meet and greet points where we can all eat and write together. There is something special about getting to know a person through writing and then meeting them face to face.
Today’s host at http://www.ethicalela.com for Day 4 of the July Open Write is Gayle Sands of Maryland. She inspires us to write Important Thing Poems based on the childhood classic Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown. You can read Gayle’s full prompt here, and I hope you will write a poem and share it!
I so love this prompt and its reach to everyone, everywhere. This prompt would work to inspire verse in grades Pre-K through 12 and beyond. Classic books have the power to change the world, I am convinced.
Sparking Hope
The important thing
about a flame
is that it sparks hope.
You can warm by it,
hold hands by it,
kiss by it, sleep by it.
You can see with it,
you can remember through it,
you can glow in it, pray over it,
refine gold in it,
say goodbye or goodnight with it.
But the important thing
about a flame
is that it sparks hope.
Special thanks to Two Writing Teachers at Slice of Life for inspiring teachers to share their writing and giving space to read the work of all and share the love of the writinghood.
Common Threads 