a spider built her web in my camp
chair overnight, hoping to catch
something huge, and I can’t help
wondering if it was
my backside she spied
a world record
spider prize
trophy
win
Along Comes a Spider Nonet
Reality
every few days
I have the urge
to sell everything
we own and move
into the camper with
two plates, two forks,
and two spoons
and share a knife~
to retire, take to
the highways, see
the changing landscape
of America, pulling
our flatware and
plates from
site to site
no particular place to be
no pressing deadline to meet
then I come to my senses
trying to reckon with the
reality of the silverware
drawer and all those
cabinets.
A Saga in Six Days of Life When You Live on a Farm: Featuring Boo Radley and the Unexpected, Day 3
Day 3:
In farming communities
not a week goes by
that some animal
doesn’t try to make
a break for it and
has to be herded
back to the home pasture
every new day brings
a Facebook Post –
pigs loose on Reidsboro Road
donkey running down Highway 362
goat with a red collar on Hollonville Drive
my favorite was the baby camel
someone reported
running down Concord Road
(the Sheriff’s Department went to
investigate and found it was
Nellie LaBerge’s Lllama)
you never know what you’ll
see in the country
but last week,
Wayne’s entire herd
of cows was loose
in the woods
between our farms
two bulls
among the herd
I was thinking
of lovely handbags
my husband was
thinking of
perfectly rounded cow
patties (dried cow poop)
(this isn’t out of the ordinary ~
just a few weeks ago we’d
had donkeys trying to
move onto the Johnson
Funny Farm
and my sister in law and
I joined in the chase
with other neighbors
to wrangle these two
asses and lead them
back home)
when Boo Radley
saw the herd of cows
eating his grass
the next day
he protected me
and our blades of grass
the black and white
bull turned tail and
ran into the woods
the milk and dark chocolate bull
stood its ground
Boo charged it
that’s when the brown bull
dropped its head
ready to charge
I felt surely in my
soul I was about to
witness Boo
being trampled
and killed
because
though he is small
he is tenacious
ten times the size
of that monstrous bull
in his inflated mind
Two-Wheeled Wonderings
as we were driving
to our campsite
a teenage girl
crashed her bike
into a red clay hill
falling among the
rocks and it seemed
on purpose
…..that’s
one thing….but
when I took the
dogs for a walk
a preteen boy
crashed his bike
(jerked the handlebars!)
on the concrete
(on purpose!)
skidding flesh
of knees and palms
the very next day
leaving me to
ponder:
what does this say?
Feeding Turtles Marshmallows
I was mad since you
were late so I fed turtles
all your marshmallows
no roasting for you
our discussion was our campfire
spark, flame, sizzle, blaze
they smiled and thanked me
reminded me to tell you
to keep slowing down.
Invitation
Invitation
I was once
invited to a
wedding
but I saw
the truth
of that
invitation
and
declined
without hesitation
without gift
without regret
without excuse
Day 29 of #VerseLove with Fran Haley of North Carolina
Fran Haley of North Carolina is our host for Day 29 of #VerseLove, inspiring us to write Heart Map poems. You can read her full prompt here.
Fran explains that author Georgia Heard created Heart Maps to help younger students find their own meaningful stories. She encourages us to brainstorm “first times” in our own lives – or last times.
The Last Time
The last time I came home
before you died you
stood feebly
in the door
cold rushing in
against your
flannel pajamas
swallowing you
life leaving your body
escaping you
your voice
deep and low
sunk to the bottom
of your being
a soul cry of despair
saying my name
Kim
proving you knew me
there at the bitter end
unlike the times before
your trembling arms
reaching for me
I reeled at
the change in you
in only a few days
and held you up
while we cried
both knowing
this would be
our last
standing hug
our last
cry together
our final
goodbye
before you
slipped away
I watched you die
Day 9 of #VerseLove2024 with Denise Krebs: List Poems
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).
Day 4 of #VerseLove with Jennifer Jowett, inspiring us with Alphabeticals
Today, Jennifer Jowett of Michigan is our host at http://www.ethicalela.com for our fourth day of #VerseLove 2024. She offers a spectacular Alphabeticals prompt, using letters of the alphabet to create a poem. You can read her full prompt and the poems of others here.
My mind went straight to the farm as I looked at the letters on the keyboard. There’s a whole world of things to see if you let your eyes see what is held in each letter. Donkeys belonging to someone in our area keep getting loose, and my sister in law and I helped some other neighbors for two hours on Tuesday trying to trailer them, finally herding them into another neighbor’s fenced pasture. When they turned up in her yard again Wednesday, we decided to just make friends with them – they’re not halter trained, and we think they are lonely and seeking the companionship of humans.
They know they’ve found folks who are friendly. They’d rather live here on the Funny Farm, where things are amusingly quirky.
RELAXing on the Funny Farm
R hangs out in the
barn, his back against the wall
relaxing cowboy
E stalls two horses
or goats or donkeys or mules
safe from elements
L stands firm, holds reins
hitching post for keeping us
right where we belong
A swing for sweethearts
porch side sunset views, sweet tea
two-strawed Mason jar
X makes a manger
to feed all of God’s creatures
Chasing Sunrise – Stafford Challenge Day 70, Slice of Life Challenge Day 26
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.
How to Chase a Sunrise
I was late for work
watching the sun dance
she curtseys
through the countryside
a morning meringue
of slide-stepping
just over the next hill, to
do-si-do the meadows
pirouetting periwinkle pasture
just around the next bend
then
stopping to spin
like a
March Madness
basketball
on the courthouse
clock steeple
reminding me I'm late
that's how
you chase a
glorious
countryside
sun
e
s
i
r
Common Threads 