Kevin says, “Ada Limon’s amazing poem for NASA’s Europa Clipper mission – In Praise of Mystery: A Poem For Europa– often lingers in my mind, particularly as its launch into space is on the horizon in October. The sky is full of inspiration as is the mission of discovery. Her poem has me thinking of constellations, in particular, and how people across time, in different geographic places, have so often gazed up at the night sky and sought connections between the pinpoints of light, and told stories and created poems, and shared experiences.”
The Poetry Fox in 1828 Coffee Company in Zebulon, Georgia
Barb Edler of Iowa is our host today for the 13th day of #VerseLove2024, inspiring us to use a brain dump process to craft a poem. You can read her full prompt and the poems and comments of others here.
My role as the District Literacy Specialist for Pike County Schools in Georgia involves utilizing grant funds to create Literacy events to ignite reading and writing passion in our schools and throughout our community. When my soul sister Fran Haley of North Carolina posted about The Poetry Fox visiting her school years ago, I tucked that thought away as a dream to bring him from her school event in Zebulon, North Carolina to our coffee shop in Zebulon, Georgia to work his magic, sitting at his table in a fox suit, pounding out poems on his vintage typewriter for folks who stand in line to offer him their word.
He made that 7 hour trip this week from his home in Durham, NC and produced nearly 60 poems between 3:00 and 6:15, delighting people of all ages and from all walks of life – funeral directors who gave the words tears and gravestones, a pilot who offered the word sky, children who offered all sorts of words from monster truck to axolotl, teenagers who brought the words hooligan and baseball, and a librarian who brought the word library – and so many more! I’ve included the list of words in a photo at the bottom of this post. My words were royal fortress meadow since my name, Kimberly, means from the royal fortress meadow.
After three hours of writing poems, he packed up his fox suit and walked down to the barbecue restaurant on our town square and had a barbecue sandwich, baked beans, and banana pudding with me. When we returned at 7:00, he shared a delightful hour telling us about who he is, what he does, and how he came to do it. Beyond watching him work, there is as much amazement in the person of Chris Vitiello as there is the jaw-dropping magic of….
The Poetry Fox!
I. The Suit
there must have been
some magic in that old
fox suit they found
for when he placed it
on his head
keys began to dance around
to swirl up typewriter dust
conjuring the memories
reaching deep for connections
once forgotten, resurrected now
in the deep recesses of minds
and souls
the piercings of heartstrings by
moments of life
summoning past
awakening present
cultivating future
pounded out with two fingers
often superglued for
tenderness support
a suit ~
left behind, abandoned, forgotten
given as a gift by a
friend who knew the quirky depths
of brilliance in THE one who would
wear it best
II. The Roots
because as a kid
he read newspapers
enjoyed the flapping of paper
and the words they held, and
this future fox word volleyed
(forget board games – he played word games)
with friends
to build schema
set egg timers and each wrote 5 poems
all about one word
that had to be different from any other
with his knees against a heater
where his desk sat
the heat rising as the breath
of a boy who would someday
write to the tune of sweat
in a toasty fox costume
III. The Pursuit
and every day live out
his dream of writing
his love of meaning
his incessant hunger
for the exchange of words
for the gift of poetry
this soul-spark of wonder
when words touch places
long ignored
and breath catches
and tears well and spill
and loved ones lost return, smiling
between the lines
and children laugh
because the clever fox
explains in all logic
through poetry
that people don’t
make monster trucks ~
monsters do
and people aren’t the
only ones who write poems
foxes do, too
A group stands watching The Poetry Fox work his magic
I said, “Royal Fortress Meadow,” and this is my poem on the meaning of my nameA poem about monster trucksThe word list The Poetry Fox keeps – for all the words folks give him at his events
Denise Krebs of California is our host today for #VerseLove2024. She inspires us to write List Poems. You can read her full prompt here. I’ve added some pictures, just for fun – – a quick glimpse of our wedding weekend on St. Simons Island, Georgia, where my brother Ken and his bride Jennifer were wed on Saturday afternoon. Narrowing it down to the top ten – – that was a tough challenge!
I love a list poem because it doesn’t have to rhyme, it can be random, and it can be completely out of order or it can run in a countdown fashion to the top of the list. Mine is random, and it’s a photographic prose list poem, a blend of all my favorite kinds. I could not pick a single favorite moment.
Top 10 Wedding Weekend Moments
Straight-from-the-soul smiles on my brother and his bride’s faces, so full of happiness and love,
meeting my brother’s new family and feeling both sides merge into one big family,
getting a new sister-in-law,
placing flowers on the altar in memory of our mothers,
seeing the shoes of my son and husband and feeling them lift me up when I fell,
watching the dads dance – one with a cane, one with bionic knees, but believe it: these two can groove,
watching my brother watch the love of his life come down the aisle,
spending time with extended family and close family (5 of our 6 grandchildren),
figuring out how to win the dinner bill argument with my son since I own nearly one million shares of Shiba Inu (only worth about $25.00 total at .00002 a share, but hey – – it worked),
playing and having a picnic in the parks and hearing my 5 year old grandson’s response when I tried to tell him my ice cream was mashed potatoes and he took the folded arm stance and firmly stated, “that’s impossible!” (they all got ice cream).
I was three minutes late to work one day last week because I was chasing the sunrise. If you’ve ever been on the backside of nowhere in the rural Georgia countryside between 7:45 and 8:00 just after the time springs forward, you’ve seen it: the most gorgeous glowing coral red sunrise ever, so rich and fiery it could be an over-easy orange yolk of a just-laid Buff Orpington egg, the kind still warm upon cracking into the pan, the kind that mesmerizes folks who’ve never seen a yolk so unhormonally free-ranging fresh, that didn’t come from a carton in a store.
Sometimes that egg yolk sun’ll be right in front of you, as it is when it’s waiting for me like a dog who wants to play chase, right at the end of my eastside driveway first thing in the morning on my way to work. Then, it’s like I’ve tossed it a stick. It takes off to the left when I turn south, then stays left when I head back east, only a little lefter than before. At the stop sign, it’s still left, just not as behindish, and then when I turn back to the south right before I turn back east again, I’m approaching what I know is THE MOST beautiful sunrise ribbon of roadway in the entire county and maybe all of Georgia, maybe even all of the southeastern United States or the world or the universe.
And sometimes I slow waaaaaaay down just to take it all in, if there’s nobody behind me.
My friend Barb Edler and I both made spooky posts Saturday. Barb’s post was about the possibility of aliens returning after their suspected driveway visit when her oldest son was a baby. Mine was about loss of sleep because of messages in a sound machine (probably possessed by evil spirits, because its twin is working fine).
All of this gnawed on my brain last night when the whatifs* started spinning on the midnight merry-go-round of my mind…..what if a tree falls on the campsite and crushes us right here in the camper? What if somebody up the hill forgot to chock their tires and their camper slides down the hill in the middle of the night and lands on us? What if a rogue tornado pops up and slings us all the way to Alabama? What if aliens invade Pine Mountain?
Aliens.
And then that whatif gobbled and swallowed my whole frontal lobe with a poem.
What Do I Do?
what do I do if aliens land here and the whole campground nudges me forward to greet the spaceship, elects me their spokesperson like some Hunger Games tribute?
what do I do when the ramp door lowers to the ground smoke spilling out against the backlit silhouettes of aliens the expressionless kind with big heads huge eyes and knobby knees?
what do I do when they confront me and stop toe to toe face to face expecting a word or a welcome or a warning?
what do I do when I start wondering if this is what the Indian Removal Act felt like for those pushed off their own planet?
what do I do when it looks like they start speculating about the speed of all our little earth-anchored sewer-hosed spaceships with lights over the doors?
what do I do when I feel like the fly before the spider says step into my parlor?
what do I do?
I do what I do best
I invite them into my teardrop to read poetry and sip tea
*with a nod to Shel Silverstein for the whatifs in his ear
Special Thanks to Two Writing Teachers for inspiring writers, especially sleepless ones.
#messages in the madness
The melatonin was working fine, just fine, I thought, but I figured either we had a rogue sound machine with broken buttons or that one of the machines was possessed. I kept hearing things, but my husband didn’t. Just like when the car starts making a sound, only not a car but a tiny little white noise machine.
So finally, finally – – he in his melatoninlessness began hearing mysterious sounds, too. I didn’t know whether to cry, be scared, or celebrate.
If your children tell you they hear funny voices at night, believe them and check the sound machine. They’re in there.
Shelley of Oklahoma is our host today for the final day of the March Open Write, encouraging us to write poems to help us relax. You can read her full prompt here. I have one of those conferences today – the kind in a town with a gas station and a stop sign and maybe a hot dog in the gas station and nothing else, and I’m driving in with coworkers from an hour and seven minutes northeast, and I’m not overnighting so I have to leave early and get home late and I know the coffee’s gonna suck because it always does when they have those plastic canisters of powdered creamer and only pink-packet off-brand sweetener.
But I’m trying to relax.
Really.
Frumpy
Relax - no one cares whether your pants match your shirt or that they're wrinkled
Relax - no one cares that the tops of your feet are white as unbaked bread
Relax - no one sees you picking at your fingers of chipped nail polish
Relax - no one knows your Odor Eaters are now expired by three months
Relax - just because you forgot to tweeze your lip doesn't mean don't go
After all: you're the driver....others are counting on you to get there
Relax - your oil got changed, your gas tank's full and your car is vacuumed out
Relax - your riders might find your car is cleaner than theirs (not driven)
Relax - wait, is that .....is that a seam coming out? It's right on the butt
Nope, don't relax. Go change pants. Nothing clean? That's what long sweaters are for.
Heck, grab a blanket and wrap up like a student .....relax for a change!
I bought a set of Haikubes a few years ago for a middle school poetry group, and I still find I love to pull them out of the box and give them a roll to see what the universe brings. Today’s haiku had journey and travel, so I rerolled other dice, slowly adding to the poem until the one in the picture was born.
These dice come in a love set, too, which would be perfect for Valentine’s Day poems.
For today, the travel bug bites. The Aurora Borealis is calling to me even through the dice. I’ve always wanted to see the hems of angel’s gowns in emerald and amethyst dancing through the heavens at night.
It’s just like a dream you can’t remember Even though you always wish you could When it’s gone, it’s gone forever When it’s gone, it’s gone for G – o – o – o – o – D
Common Threads 