Category: Literature

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For I Will Consider My Schnoodle Ollie – The Stafford Challenge Day 47, Slice of Life Challenge Day 3

Special thanks to Two Writing Teachers for inspiring writers to write each day!

Several years ago, I led a poetry workshop for teachers in my district using Mary Oliver’s Dogsongs as our text, inviting participants to write mirror poems inspired by the late great poet. One of my favorite poems in this collection is For I Will Consider My Dog Percy, which she wrote about her own dog following the form of Christopher Smart in the 1700s in his poem Jubilate Agno, or For I will Consider My Cat Jeoffry.

L-R: Fitz, Ollie, and Boo Radley in February 2024

Over the years, we have adopted several rescues, and they appear frequently in my writing. They’re all named after favorite Literary figures. We have Boo Radley from To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, because he was abandoned and found behind a door, an outcast of his original people. His rescue organization named him Einstein for his matted and untamed hair when he was found. I wrote a For I Will Consider poem about my Schnoodle, Boo Radley.

We also adopted a badly-abused (mostly Schnauzer, but some poodle) Schnoodle named Henry at the time, who had road rash and a broken leg that required surgery to save and eight weeks of intense physical therapy with his foster mom. We followed his journey back to health online, and prayed they would place him with us. When the news came, we eagerly met the foster mom and welcomed Henry into the fold, renaming him Fitz for F. Scott Fitzgerald, the party animal author. Turns out, he’d been correctly named as transcendental Henry David Thoreau, because he doesn’t party. Here is a poem I wrote about my Schnoodle, Fitz.

Which brings me to King. He was a young stray found on the streets of north Georgia, and he was supposed to be our girl. I’d put in a request with the rescue about a year prior to welcoming King, but the rescue called one day to let me know that they had a Schnoodle who met all the matching criteria as a good adoptee for us….except gender. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to meet this boy who needed a home but who had been turned down by two other families. It only took seconds. King was renamed Ollie for my favorite poet, Mary Oliver, and rode home with us that very day we’d hopped in the car for the 3 hour drive to meet him.

I’ve never written a For I Will Consider poem about Ollie, so today is the day especially set aside for my trophy dog we call the baby..

For I Will Consider My Schnoodle Ollie

For I will consider my schnoodle Ollie.

For he was a young stray running the streets, a real canine gangsta.

For he was named King like royalty, taken to a foster castle.

For he was rescued, brought to our Funny Farm with his one true love: a ball.

For he was renamed Ollie after Mary, who loved dogs through and through.

For he needs no bells and whistles when simple will do.

For he realized all too soon he had brothers vying for position. 

For he rejected all possibility of being low dog.

For he rose like a king to the throne.

For we call him the baby.

For he eats sheets.

For he listens for empty K-cup boxes to hit the floor....(for he eats those too).

For he bites ankles and eats Ada Limon poetry books.

For he places one paw on the head of his brothers (sibling annoyance tactic? or knighting?).

For there is no such thing as a quick pee when there are things to see.

For he "kicks" the ball with his nose like a gauntlet at our feet.  Throw, he commands.

For he catches popcorn mid-air.

For he fully belongs in our tribe.

For we whisper to him:  you're the best dog we've got.  

For he returns our love with royal full-face kisses.

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Awakenings Elfchen – The Stafford Challenge Day 46, Slice of Life Challenge Day 2

February Poetry Night at the Coffee Shop

We had a local poet come to our town square coffee shop to talk about his collection of poetry in his book Dust. Ethan Jacobs, a graduate of our high schools and Auburn University, shared his inspirations and writing processes, and he held an audience spellbound for a half hour with his poetry. What a gift! Ethan majored in Education but chose to follow his passion of woodworking as his career path. We are so proud of Ethan.

I’m especially proud of him because one year prior to his reading, I sat in this very room with him to record several YouTube shorts of him reading his poems when his book was still a dream coming together. It was a glorious moment to see him holding his published book in his hands as he shared with his audience of 16 people ranging in age from teenagers to attendees in their 80s. I’m sharing a couple of those clips at the end of today’s post (we made QR codes of the videos and placed them in small frames around our county so that people in restaurants or places of business could scan them and discover a poem; and a few were even hidden in plastic Easter eggs!).

We’ve decided on our town theme for National Poetry Month this year.

Awakenings.

It goes with our coffee shop, the hub of our sharing, and the rural spring buds and blooms and greening of the world waking from winter.

And, perhaps, it calls to the inner poet.

Ethan reads from his book Dust

We gave attendees a time to write at the end of the evening. Here is my elfchen:

Awakening

awakening
sunshine streams
coffee brews ~ I
leap into life......caffeinated,
ready
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Georgia Poet Sidney Lanier – The Stafford Challenge Day 44 – LEAP Day!

I was there for a concert with my husband – to see Atlanta Rhythm Section at The Capitol Theatre in downtown Macon, Georgia, when I saw the landmark plaque on the historic bricks back in January. From Guale, the Marshes of Glynn to Lake Lanier and beyond, so much of Georgia History is steeped in the words of Sidney Lanier. I took a picture and turned to William Carlos Williams for the inspiration today in a borrowed line poem.

Saluting Sidney Lanier

so much in Georgia depends
upon

a Macon-born poet illuminating
waterways

glazed with flute music
lyrics

from the bricks of downtown

birth-town

to the marshes of

Glynn

to Lake

Lanier

and

beyond

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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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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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Da Pup Een Da Snow Storm (Day 2 of February’s Open Write, Day 33 of The Stafford Challenge)

Photo by Julius Weidenauer on Pexels.com

Today, our host at http://www.ethicalela.com for Day 2 of February’s Open Write is Linda Mitchell of Virginia. She inspires us today to make a mash-up poem. You can read her prompt here, along with the poems of others. Here is the basic process she describes:

Read two works, perhaps poems you have loved for a long time. Find lines that speak to each other. Take a line from one poem and mash it up against one from the other. See how many lines complement each other as a new work. Write these lines, or copy and paste these lines, into a new work.

My all-time favorite poet is Mary Oliver, and my favorite poem is The Storm, from her collection Dog Songs. My father gave me a book of poetry entitled Poetry’s Plea for Animals by Frances E. Clarke, and in it there is a poem by T. A. Daly entitled Da Pup Een Da Snow, which may have actually inspired Mary Oliver’s poem The Storm. Oliver’s lines are in bold, and Daly’s are not.

Here is my Mash-Up:

                                                                          Da Pup Een Da Snow Storm

Eef you jus' coulda seen -

                                running here running there, excited

gona wild weeth delight

                                now through the white orchard my little dog

ees first play een da snow

                               with wild feet

all around' da whole place

                                hardly able to stop, he leaps, he spins

an' fall down on hees face

teel hees cover' weeth white

                                until the white show is written upon
                        
                                in large, exuberant letters

w'en he see da flakes sail

how he chasa hees tail

                               the pleasures of the body in this world

deed you evra see joy

gona wild weeth delight
 
                               with wild feet

mak's heem crazy excite'

you would know w'at I mean

Eef you jus' coulda seen -
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Deer-ssert! – Day 1 of the February Open Write, Day 32 of The Stafford Challenge

Today at http://www.ethicalela.com, Margaret Gibson Simon of Louisiana is our host for Day 1 of the February Open Write. She challenges us to write an elfchen, a form she has written almost each day of 2024. You can read her prompt along with (is it elveschen or elfchens that is plural?) here.

She gives us the basic rules:

Elfchen Guidelines:
Line 1: One word
Line 2: Two words about what the word does.
Line 3: Location or place-based description in 3 words.
Line 4: Metaphor or deeper meaning in 4 words.
Line 5: A new word that somehow summarizes or transforms from the original word.

Here on the farm, we are getting ready for a prescribed burn to prevent wildfires and nourish the soil. After the firebreak was cut and the dogs discovered all the wildlife tracks in the soft red clay earth, I could hardly get them back into the house – – it was like a dessert buffet for them! These walks inspired today’s elfchen. 

Deer-ssert!

firebreak
illuminates tracks
schnoodle noses enflamed
decadence of wildlife sweets
deer-ssert
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Birdwatching Abecedarian – Stafford Challenge Day 28

Special thanks to Two Writing Teachers for giving writers space and voice

As the birds make their way back from their winter vacations, I find great peace in sitting on the front porch and counting the species using Merlin ID and recording my results in eBird. This information-gathering is not only fun, but it also helps scientists at the Cornell University Lab of Ornithology track birds across the world when birdwatchers report their sightings. On Saturday morning, the weather was significantly warmer and the skies were overcast. It was the perfect morning for counting 28 species that appeared on the farm in a 90-minute observation. I was inspired to report the species in an Abecedarian list poem today, where each line beings with an ordered letter of the alphabet. 

Tufted Titmouse 
Birdwatching Abecedarian

American Robin
Brown-Headed and White-Breasted Nuthatch
Carolina Chickadee
Downy Woodpecker
Eastern Bluebird
Flittering American Goldfinch
Goose (Canadian)
House Finch
Invasive Brown-Headed Cowbird
Jay, Blue
Kinglet, Golden-Crowned and Ruby-Crowned
Loud-mouthed Carolina Wren
Mourning Dove
Northern Cardinal
Obnoxious American Crow
Phoebe, Eastern
Quarreling Pine Warbler
Red-Winged Blackbird
Sparrow, Savannah
Tufted Titmouse
Up-too-late Dark-Eyed Junco
Very Hungry Chipping Sparrow
Woodpecker, Red-Bellied
Xenial Gray Catbird
Yellow-Rumped Warbler, "Butterbutt"
Zippy White-Throated Sparrow