Today, I've written a riddle-type poem (Haiku two lines short of a Haiku sonnet), open-ended, to invite readers to title this poem AND to add two seven-syllable lines to the end to make it a true Haiku sonnet if you wish. I'll add my title after the photo at the bottom so you can see what my initial title was. It's subject to change :).
never have I met
anyone who on first taste
liked its bitterness
sipping piping hot
aromatic wakefulness
swallowing its truth
ah, but sip by sip
its addiction is for real~
can’t live without it!
A lavender latte from my local coffee shop, where I’ll be reading poetry tonight – YAAAY!A book of poetry
The title I initially landed on was Coffee and Poetry – original, I know! Perhaps you can figure out a better title for this poem! Leave ideas in the comments, please.
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 daughterRose of Jericho ~ choosing to live, in my mother’s milk glass on the kitchen counterLeafy 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
Why Do You Write Poems When The World Is Asleep, (Even the Sun Has Not Risen), And There is Death All Around?
because over on the kitchen counter, a Jericho Flower has come back to life in my late mother’s pristine white milk glass, taking water into its dry, brittle brown fingers, slowly unfurling for the world and me to see that even in death, there is faith and hope and love - and life. Leave it to my daughter to send me a Resurrection Plant for Easter - it’s the most perfect Easter gift EVER, Mom, wait ‘til you see! - and when the plastic envelope with four baby tumbleweeds arrived in my mailbox, I wondered - WTH?? (yes, even wondered it with Easter and all), so I Googled and discovered it was a Resurrection plant ~
Thank you, dear, I can’t wait to plant it! A perfect Easter gift indeed! ~ to which she promptly replied: Mom. You don’t plant it. You put it in a bowl of water and sit back and before your very eyes it will come to life. No dirt….. ~
and so I packed these dead quadruplets in the camper thinking with the purple martin house assembly and this tumbleweed show, our picnic table by the lake would hold more fun than Disney World. I just had no idea how spectacular, how moving, how positively enchanting it would be to watch. I poured water on one in a clear plastic tub. Sat back in my camp chair, feet on the picnic table bench, Cherry Coke Zero in one hand, dry salted peanut shells in the other, waiting. This thing came to life, from a mail order twig to a beautiful green floof of a plant that now graces my kitchen. And I felt the nudge from Mom to put it in her milk glass bowl, the one I used to use for bananas that was sitting empty with no life and now holds the promise of her presence even in death, along with my daughter’s amazing tumbleweed thinking, in my kitchen, holding three generations of women who know a little bit about what it means to regenerate, to unfurl brown, brittle fingers into green again.
Because stories need to be told. That’s why I write poems when the world is asleep, the sun is not yet up, and there is death all around.
Saturday afternoon, 2:00 p.m.Saturday afternoon, 2:30 p.m. Saturday afternoon, 3:00 p.m.Husband napping through all the excitement Saturday afternoon, 5:00 p.m.Sunday morning, 7:00 a.m.This morning, 7:00 a.m.
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
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
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
Dave Wooley is our host today at http://www.ethicalela.com for Day 13 of #VerseLove. He inspires us to find poems on the pages of books or sheets of music or newspapers – anywhere there are words. Blackout poems are positively addictive. I could sit all day finding blackout poems and wish I could. I ripped a few pages out of a Steven King destined for a Little Free Library and found this from the pages of Blaze: a single soup-spoon ain’t what I call a thing for grim peculiar amusement
Try a Blackout poem and share yours in the comments! Warning: you can’t stop after one.
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
Wendy Everand of New York is our host today for Day 9 of the #VerseLove challenge this month as we celebrate National Poetry Month. She invites us to break all the rules or share of a time we broke a rule in her prompt, which you can read here. It’s Easter. I’m breaking every diet rule I can break today, so I’m just going to go ahead and turn myself in. I’m guilty, and the day has barely begun. Happy Easter, everyone!
Homemade lemon ice cream with grated lemon zest ~ like a glorious Easter sunrise! Zoom in!
living with grater purpose
optavia rules
say there’s no eating ice cream
(i sho’ ain’t liss’nin)
i might gain ten pounds
who cares? it’s easter sunday
it’s lemon. homemade.
special recipe
made with three ingredients ~
sugar, whipping cream
and meyer lemons
fran haley’s shared recipe
from a march blog post
today’s about life~
churn a zesty slice of life!
awaken senses!
glorious easter
calls for celebrating life
with grater purpose
If you’d like the recipe for the grate-est lemon ice cream ever, you can find it on Fran’s blog post here. Warning, though: you will not want store-bought ice cream ever again.
Today at http://www.ethicalela.com, Emily Yamasaki is our host for Day 8 of #VerseLove. She invites us to write Something You Should Know poems in the style of the great Clint Smith. You can read her full prompt and poem here.
Note to readers: try this one! I just rambled. Sometimes I use a Sarah Donovan strategy I learned several years ago: just write for 10 or 15 minutes and see what you get. Don't worry about editing or word choice or anything - just draft. That’s what I did today. Please come write with us!
Something You Should Know
is that I only moved my lips when Mrs. Flexer
played Living For Jesus all those Sundays
in the big group before small group
because I can’t sing except with
my heart
and that I just acquired the old oak secretariat that
has been in my parents’ home since I was
a baby in Kentucky along with the old red
milk can for my porch, but back to the
secretariat: I love that it shares
the name with the greatest horse
who had to win in Kentucky first
to win the Triple Crown
and that as a child I was mesmerized by Harold Monro’s
poem Overheard on a Salt Marsh
from Childcraft Volume 1 Poems and Rhymes
with the nymph in the green dress
and it’s framed by my bed today because
I’m still mesmerized by it
and that I savor Saturdays with morning coffee
and good conversation
and that I love plants but can’t grow them
because they all die except Leafy Jean and
Leon Russell, who are thriving on the front porch
and that I have four bluebird eggs in one birdhouse
and baby Carolina Wrens in my garage
up over the garage door apparatus
and Brown-Headed Nuthatch hatchlings in another birdhouse
and fledgling cardinals in my Yellow Jasmine vines
and a nest under the porch eave
and I saw an eagle a week ago
and that all three of my Schnoodles have literary names
Boo Radley for obvious reasons
Fitz because of, you know, the party animal F. Scott
and Ollie for my favorite poet Mary Oliver
and that I blog daily and call all my writing group
people my friends
including you.
Ollie, all tucked in while campingFitz, a true party animalBoo Radley, who recently lost his beard for running through the pasture and getting matted with field spurs
Common Threads 