Our first camping weekend of 2024, and we arrived in heavy rain on our favorite campground within an hour from home. It's pretty full - campers pepper the campground, and kids are out on brightly lit hoverboards, while others are riding bikes and playing frisbee. Folks are walking their dogs (and vice-versa), and one site had its smokeless fire ring going this morning after the drizzle stopped and there was a damp chill for the reckoning.
The dogs were nestled back in the crook of the teardrop on the bed, under blankets like little humans, their heads resting on the pillows in a deep schnoodle-snooze.
I was making the coffee for breakfast when the sweetest moment happened - one I shall never forget, connected to another moment that I shall also never forget.
The first one happened in May 2013, when I got my fingers slammed in the trunk of the honeymoon getaway car at my son's wedding as the happy couple were leaving. I assured everyone I was fine, fine, fine, but as we drove back to the hotel, I cried and carried on because I was afraid I would never be able to write again since I couldn't bend my fingers yet and they looked a lot like a package of Ballpark franks after being in a sandwich press. It sent my husband into such a panic that this moment of fear became forever etched into his scrapbook of memories he'd rather forget. But I was fine, am fine, nothing broken or chopped off.
Which makes this morning's moment all the more special.
I handed him the water bottle as I made coffee
more and more recently I've handed him tight lids
I apologized ~ my hands don't have the strength they used to have I explained again
it’s a scary feeling, this change of neediness
He smiled took the bottle uscrewed the lid handed it back
Rex Muston of Iowa is our host today for the 4th day of the March Open Write at http://www.ethicalela.com. He inspires us to use our kitchen junk drawer to inspire poetry. You can read his full prompt here.
A kitchen junk drawer is second only as frightening to me as forgetting a piece of clothing and showing up at work for everyone to see all truth. It’s downright scary except for the drawer I did clean out last weekend. I still have one to go, and it’s the worst one. An invitation to explore those quirky drawer corners is fantastic! I love that even in the oddities, the junk, there are revelations of life and memories.
Unbanded
One junk drawer is empty ~the middle one~ but the one on the edge is chock-full of random bits and pieces
a years’ supply of 9V batteries for the smoke alarms we change often because Boo Radley shivers at the smell of toaster heat and smoke alarm chirps
plus the goat ball banding tool and bright orange bands as if the whole horrid thing needed a screaming fluorescent proclamation across the farm
and a vintage unfiltered cigarette- sized box of Happy Family ceramic pigs from England
a mama and twin piglets but no daddy there was never even a space for his unbanded self
now from the Funny Farm kitchen windowsill Mama smiles with a sparkle-eye bats her eyelashes and thinks….
Our host today at http://www.ethicalela.com for the 4th day of the January Open Write is Larin Wade of Oklahoma, who inspires us to write free verse poems on the theme of reflection or discovery, following a reading of One of Us by Joyce Sidman as we explore a time when someone revealed something new about themselves or reflecting on a defining moment. You can read her prompt here.
I’m an Honorary Unicorn
I came in to work
on a cold Monday morning
to find her note
on my keyboard
Her children
have lost 4 grandparents
in the past 5 months
and all I did
was take pizza to her house
while she and her husband
disconnected life support
said goodbye to a father
And here, she thinks
I’m a magical unicorn
who is noble and brave
who shoots lighting bolts
from my eyes
who inspires others to sparkle
who carries a passport to Fairyland
who is kind and good
but not a goody-goody
who loves with my whole heart
She thanked me for the little
thing I did
taking pizza over
and always being there
but she got it wrong.
I’m none of that except maybe the Fairyland passport carrier
The host for September’s Open Write at http://www.ethicalela.com today is Barb Edler of Iowa. She inspires us to write poems about favorite childhood books or poems. You can read her full prompt here. I chose to write about my favorite childhood book – Childcraft Volume 1: Poems and Rhymes.
By The Light of the Moon
back in the 70s, the
World Book Encyclopedia
and Childcraft salesmen came
door to door
selling sets
ecru-colored hardbacks
gold-embossed lettering
the only one that
mattered to me
had a pink-banded
spine ~ Volume 1
Poems and Rhymes
that I read so much
I’m surprised I didn’t
read the ink clean off
the pages
I had a closet-and-flashlight
fixation with Volume 1
I’d crawl in and read for hours
staring at the illustrations,
memorizing the words
Overheard on a Salt Marsh
my favorite of all time
but Pirate Don Durk of Dowdee
and The Purple Cow
and The Raggedy Man
and every.other.page
were my best friends
so much that today,
I have a framed copy
of Harold Monro’s
masterpiece
by my bed, draped
with green glass beads
to remind me
I was steeped
in reading
by the light
of
the
moon
Last Friday, I had a poetry writing marathon, where I invited family and some friends to write poems that I would feature on the blog this week. Each hour, a new poem was born. I began sharing these on Saturday, and today is Day 3 of 5 days of our shared poems, continued below.
6 p.m. hour – Kim Johnson – List poem – – a poem that contains a list or inventory of things, people, places, or ideas
Signs Seen on a Drive Between Counties in Rural Georgia
Do not be lukewarm
Be the light!
Slower traffic keep right
Speed checked by detection devices
The compassion of the Lord never fails
Sad to see summer go. NOT.
Where will you spend eternity?
Don’t be the dealer…..be the difference!
Wrong Way
Don’t scroll. Stay in control.
Everything is hotter in the south!
Fall: When God displays his finest artistry.
7 p.m. hour – Kim Johnson – Etheree – A ten line poem in which each numbered line contains that number of syllables, written in ascending or descending order.
Norris’s Fine Foods
catfish, hush puppies, coleslaw and crawfish
green beans, cabbage, and corn on the cob
fried shrimp, baked cod, barbecue beans
shrimp scampi, rice and cornbread
peach and apple cobblers
Norris’s Fine Foods
chocolate cake
banana
pudding
…..full!
8 p.m. hour – my grandson Aidan – Concrete Poem – a poem in the shape of an object of the poem, or where the arrangement of words looks like the poem’s subject. These are also called shape poems.
My grandson writes about a covered bridge by the bridge
9 p.m. hour – Ken Haynes and Jennifer Butler – Renga Poem – a poem in which the first poet writes the first three lines in seventeen syllables, then the second poet writes two lines containing seven syllables.
Gracie and JoJo are mine
Kasa is his
We are one family
loving our dogs
please love yours!
10 p.m. hour – Kim Johnson – Nonet – poem with nine lines, with each numbered line containing that many syllables and can be written in ascending or descending order
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
Common Threads 