Stefani, our host for the 29th day of VerseLove 2025,, is an Associate Professor of Education at Aquinas College in Michigan. You can read her full prompt here.
She writes, “Poem titles are not discussed, practiced, or modified as often as the art of crafting a poem. Therefore, I wanted to remind us again about the power of titles and how they have the potential to hold the hand of the poem and lead it to new interpretations.”
Today, Stefani invites us to create a title centered on identifying or twisting the content, theme, or purpose of a poem. She suggested letting other readers offer a title for our poems today, so here is mine, awaiting a title.
The windows should all be open, but Gemini didn’t listen.
A week ago, Lainie Levin posted an announcement that I wish could be reposted every day. Below, she states that engaging with others is the single most powerful thing that builds community during this challenge.
I emailed her immediately to ask if I could repost this announcement. She readily agreed.
Which brings me to a connection that stopped me in my tracks. I was having a conversation with the Poetry Fox as we were working out the details of his visit to Georgia from North Carolina. I asked him to describe what his events look like, and he told me that he sits at his typewriter and writes on-demand poetry for people who give him a word. He said, “And really, it’s not even about the poem. It’s about the connections I make and the people I get to meet. Those moments of connecting with someone are what it’s all about.”
I’ve thought about this again and again as I have returned to the conversation and the blog announcement and reflected on the power of connection. This community would be nothing without it. I realize that when I wake up during March and get to open the blogging windows and drink my coffee with an entire community and we’re all talking to each other about the slices of our lives and what is happening, there is power in these moments. We may all be tired and worn thin some days, but I know things about you – the people in my community – and I know many of your family members and how you spend time.
I know Paul likes to cook and actually likes Brussels sprouts (I thought I was the only one), Glenda likes to travel and has a voracious appetite for adventure (and will be having quite an adventure today – – I won’t spoil her surprise, but be on the lookout for something uniquely and colorfully …..uplifting)! Denise hikes in the desert and has a stargazer window in her house, Fran watches birds and is teaching her little granddaughters to love them too, Maureen also has two young granddaughters who love music and art and the outdoors, Peter is beginning to grieve the loss of a loved one and many of us are keeping his family close in our thoughts, Barb loves poetry slams and art exhibits and spending time outdoors, Sally checks in on her mom and has a granddaughter with new shoes, Margaret lives on the bayou and has the cutest ducks that jump into the water on jump day, and Joanne loves flowers and gardening. And I’m getting to know each of you, too!
Even though we all live in different places across the nation and beyond, I imagine a high rise brick apartment building where we’re all sitting in an open window chatting, waving, greeting each other at the start of the day, and smiling, rather like we might look from windows on the cover of the New Yorker if someone illustrated all of us in one drawing. We’d see floral window boxes for the green thumbs, cats and dogs with the animal lovers, and food cooking on the stoves of the culinary artists. We’d see children playing with grandmothers and, in a Paul Fleishman Seedfolks-ish kind of way, we’d all be connecting, contributing in beautiful ways to the community vegetable garden and sharing what we have to share, helping as we can, reaching out as we have needs that others can help meet.
Connection. Conversation. Sharing. Caring, Responding in kindness. Giving. Living.
Because that’s what community and connection are all about, and it’s also what writing is about – – reaching the next person. Not the word choice, not the capitalization of proper nouns, and not the run-on sentences (which, like Brussels sprouts, I love, by the way).
Thank you for these marathon days in March where we build our own neighborhood, and the Tuesdays throughout the year where we keep in touch! And to the owners of the Slice of Life apartment building for letting us move in for a month, rent-free, a huge debt of gratitude is owed for all of your hard work in keeping the lights on and the water running.
You each make a difference!
Slice of Life Challenge
Slice of Life Challenge community connections: open your windows!
pour a cup of tea share family recipes show trip photographs
compare hobby notes reveal hopes and dreams share fears and shed tears
open your windows! connect with fellow writers plant seeds. water them.
I started savoring Saturdays in January, making sure that weekends offer something relaxing and fun – coffee, books, short day trips, reading, writing, and creating. So when my husband and I were having coffee in Senoia, Georgia (filming location of The Walking Dead) and I walked by a charcuterie board artist hard at work on a catered board, a post came rushing back to mind. Earlier in the week, I’d seen this:
This is a story idea, I thought. I ambled over and asked the food artist a few questions – namely if she could give me some pointers about creating a charcuterie board and whether I could make some photos of her work.
The first charcuterie board I’d ever actually eaten had been a disposable one from an outdoor camping and survival store in downtown Blue Ridge, Georgia when my husband and I were staying at the top of a mountain that took a 4-wheel drive to navigate. It was too much effort to go back out for dinner, so we took home a simple board, pre-made, with some cheeses, meats, and crackers on it. Nothing fancy like chocolate, nothing colorful or fresh and sweet like fruit, nothing exciting like nuts and pickles. We were not impressed. But it had been good for binge-watching Virgin River and not starving at cloud-level elevation.
Charcuterie board artist at work in Senoia, Georgia
This particular food designer, though, showed me the art of charcuterie creation with her XO and heart cookie cutters that she was using for the cheeses, and offered me a rule of thumb or two:
“Use three meats and three cheeses – play with combinations of food, and be creative with savory and sweet foods ranging from pickles and olives to chocolates. Your board should offer a hard cheese and a soft cheese. Use cutouts on the soft cheese and pipe in some preserves. Be festive with the cookie cutters and food colors to customize your board for the occasion.”
I decided to create a board for the Super Bowl, so I found a tray and shopped for the foods. What I discovered is that you can make these boards in under an hour, and they can be as healthy or as unhealthy as you want to make them. I shopped at a Dollar General that has a fresh food section, and the cost was about $40-45 – the price of what it costs for the two of us to go out for a nice meal.
I rolled ham and cheese and secured the bites with toothpicks.
I put on an apron to try to look the part and began chopping meats and dicing cheese and arranging the foods on the tray in designated areas. I started feeling a little bit like a food artist myself!
I arranged fruits next to meats and cheeses and kept the pickles, olives, and chocolates in their own containers on the tray. Soon, my board had a look of completeness to it, and while I’m no good at making little roses out of hard salami slices like the expert, I’m confident enough to create a charcuterie board for the next social gathering where I have to sign up to bring food.
My finished charcuterie board
So I realized that the daily 1,000 story walk is true! I’d walked past a story idea, stopped to ask questions, and learned something new!
Ta-daaaaa!
Humbleswede inspired my post today when he shared First, if I know I’m in need of an idea, I spend the day with my antennae up. Thanks, my fellow writers, for all the sparks of ideas!
Common Threads 