Author: lillian

Opus Us

lillian31 Comments

When
life
gets
all
staccato,
insert
a
rest    

and slow yourself down.
Don’t beat yourself up.
Think key largo
and slip into three-quarter time.

Note:
I’ll dance with you
to any music, any time,
any place, any where.
Except the polka.
I hate dots and oompah bands.

Note_lines_horizontal

Victoria is hosting dVerse today, a virtual pub for poets. She asks us to write a poem that incorporates music. Bar opens at 3 PM Boston time….stop by and add your own musical voice, scat with us, or just enjoy some of the other folks jammin’.  For those non-musicians among my readers, opus, staccato, rest, beat, key (as in key signature), largo (as in slowly), 3/4 time, note and of course polka all refer to music. Photo/graphic credit to freepik.com

Recipe Card for Rejuvenatement

lillian25 Comments

Feeds: TBD
Baking Time: 65 to 70 years.
Time may vary, depending on your power source

Ingredients:
One ripe chick or rooster
Zest of lemon pepper (sometimes called life)
1 cup of sunny disposition, firmly packed
1 Peter Pan attitude [the flying kind; not the collar]
Dash of bitters, tempered by condensed joy

Step lively – do not beat.
To achieve needed volume,
may use lower speed or additional appliance.
Texture may be wrinkled – this is normal.

Choose icing to your liking.
Tutti fruiti is, by far, the most popular.
Add cinnamon red hots for extra kick.
Tinsel may be used for effect during the Christmas season.

Best served with a glass of cold chardonnay,
although a virgin bloody mary may also make merry.

Enjoy!

img_2646For today’s Poetics prompt at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets, Mish asks us to write a recipe poem! She includes a list of suggestions such as a recipe for peace, merriment, etc and “rejuvenation” was among the suggestions. Well! That’s my word! See my About 🙂  Never say “retirement.” I’m in rejuvenatement! 🙂  So here you go, Mish! I accepted the challenge. Photo is of my Christmas tree when I was a little girl — drenched in tinsel!  Hence the line in the poem.

Original Sin

lillian54 Comments

Proud anthems hide painful histories.
Call them Scar Face, the original mobs.

Maori treaties disemboweled.
Aborigine beliefs purged, land seized,
lives stolen by small pox scourge.
Wounded Knee cut beyond the pale.

Revisionist history.
Frayed band-aids cover festering wounds.
Moans for restitution reverberate.

A Quadrille (poem of 44 words) using the word “scar” for dVerse where De is tending bar at this virtual pub for poets today. Photos are from our recent trip to Australia and New Zealand. In New Zealand, Europeans came to settle and discovered the Maori people — they were of Polynesian descent. Treaties were signed that ultimately displaced the Maori. However, in recent years New Zealand has done much to rectify the situation including a formal apology, declaring English and Maori as the two official languages of NZ, giving back some key lands, having both languages taught in the first years of school. There are Maori television stations. The video is of a beautiful Maori dance on the land, given back to the Maori’s, where the original treaties were signed. A beautiful museum just opened there this year.

Second set of pictures are from an Aboriginal tour we took of the Botanical Gardens in Sydney. This man is Aboriginal (mixed marriage) and showed us many of the plants and trees used by the Aboriginee for food and shelter, and explained their difficult history. Because Aboriginees no longer have easy access to their natural foods of years ago, they now eat “normal” food and their bodies have never adjusted…the average age of an Aboriginal male is just 65. Kidney disease and diabetes are rampant in the population. The artwork is some from the garden and one bark drawing from a beautiful display at the New South Wales Art Gallery. The Aboriginees have not fared as well as the Maori in New Zealand.

And of course, the wonded knee reference is to the Massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890 when US federal troops killed 150+ native American Indians. In the U.S., the plight of the American Indian, on reservations, high alcoholism, education access etc.  In all three countries, we sing our national anthems proudly, but our countries are established on the “original sin” of taking the land away from those who were our countrie’s first inhabitants. It is a fact of our histories. This recent trip gave me much food for thought concerning history and indigenous peoples.

Mother Nature

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Earth’s breath,
whisper wind
hissing gushing geysers
howling gusts
quiet sighs.
She breathes as her children live.

Inspired by recent dVerse prompt to write about breath. Photos: Tauranga NZ on the farm used for Hobbiton in Lord of the Rings; Rotorua, NZ — geysers on land of the Maori people; untitled painting by Louise Hearman, Australian artist, exhibited at the Art Museum of New South Wales — all her paintings are untitled; and Lake Wakatipu near Queenstown, NZ.  All taken on our recent 40 day journey to Singapore, Bali, Australia and New Zealand. I have now returned and shall be posting regularly again. Hope you’ll join me often — I enjoy the feedback of readers!

Australasian Little Penguins

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Europeans settle rugged land,
in truth, unsettled. Balance disturbed.
Predators introduced to cure a plight
became the plight.
Land and species suffered
well-meaning mistakes.

One man saw and understood,
wed himself to land and a special mate.
Rejuvenated forest. Fought for,
and won, two marine sanctuaries.
Nesting birds depleted,
retreated to his cove.

Aptly named, Helps worked.
Natural burrows plundered,
extinction threatened,
he transformed bits of wood and rock
into havens above the ground.
Feathered flipper friends prospered.

Mrs. Helps built predator traps,
nourished wounded birds to health.
Children count and document.
Pale blue chicks hatch and grow,
march each year into sea,
return to breed again.

We are privileged visitors,
two among sixteen this day.
Ride rugged roads cross mountain tops,
marvel at miniature ships below.
Hills and seas, aquamarine and greens,
panoramic challenge to peripheral skills.

Sheep scamper as we descend,
his valley tall with forests proud.
We peek into nesting havens,
met by quiet, watched by trusting eyes.
Some sit upon their eggs,
others sit, little ones wedged beside.

And we witness this miracle of life.

Because one man and his wife,
dared to say enough.
Sacrificed wealth as many know it.
live a simple life upon and with the land
guardians to an eco system.
Their love given to generations.

Come take their tour and see their work
and you shall leave with wonder in your heart.
One extended family
in New Zealand’s awesome land.
Protectorates for nature
as it used to be.

On our amazing journey; now in New Zealand. We had the privilege of spending an afternoon at the Pohatu Penguin Sanctuary, located in Flea Bay near Akaroa, NZ. Mr Francis Helps and his wife (and children now; and eventually his grandchildren) do amazing work to protect the land and insure the Australasian Little Blue Penguins continue to survive. They also have 1,000 sheep on their land – have planted and are guardians of native forest. Such an amazing day. Such a dedicated family and a truly meaningful mission. This narrative poem is their story and dedicated to them. These small creatures are now thriving rather than disappearing.

Sydney Haibun

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Last night we sailed beneath the promise of a full moon. Standing on our deck above the ship’s wake, black diamond water glistened in lunar sheen. We awakened to a new day, hearts filled with gratitude and love, in Australia. We stand now, feet firmly on the ground, spirits soaring as we gaze together upon Sydney’s iconic bridge and opera house. The journey continues.

full moon graces sea
waves alit with wondrous glow
lunar toast to love

Shared with DVerse. Apologies again to my readers as we continue on this amazing journey: Oct 25 to December 2. Two cruises back-to-back with very little time or ability to connect to the Internet. Thus I cannot read from my dVerse poet friends’ posts. Once back to Boston, shall be in my normal writing AND reading pattern. Hoping you will excuse me.

She Lives

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And her spirit shall live within the sea
immortality within its ebb and flow.

Ashes tossed from sandy shore catch wind,
float quietly ‘neath shifting clouds
sink, adhere to anemones
and sail on dolphin fins.
Her smile illuminates in lunar path,
glistens under golden sun.

And generations shall feel her touch
toes stepping, leaping within her waves.

img_0937

Bali Haibun

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There is a place where one man has made all the difference.

The people’s Bali lies far from glamorized honeymoon Bali. In Banjar Guliang Kangin, three hundred+ villagers survive. Men toil in hot humidity tending rice paddies. Trek barefoot in muck, guiding bovine through shin-high waters as they pull hand-carved rakes, furrowing mud. Others stand in water, backs bent, sticking rice plants in wet soil. Women rise daily at five AM. Walk to village market and buy day’s fresh food supplies as mangy dogs and cocking roosters run underfoot on dirt road. They use firewood to boil rice, cook fresh chicken and vegetables in clay pots. Weave flowers and seed as offerings to Hindi gods three times per day. Balance bundled lunch on heads, walking into fields toward hungry men. Children, who can afford books and uniforms attend free school through tenth grade. Farmers make $7 per week, Their children work in fields and family gardens.

We are among the privileged few taking a cooking class from Chef on this hot Balinese day. He meets us at market and humbly explains vegetable names and uses. Takes us to his village, walks us though rice paddy fields to open air school he built with bamboo poles and thatched roof. Teaches us Balinese cooking and at class end, smiling broadly, serves us foods we’ve prepared. “This is not my school. It is my community’s.” Chef left this village as a young man. Traveled to Australia to learn English and culinary arts. Worked in kitchens, ultimately a Hyatt, saving monies. Two years ago at age fifty, he returned. Built this school.  Established relationships with cruise ship lines and hotels. He buys food and teaches multiple cooking classes every day. His work has literally built a bridge, improved homes, and insures that each village child attends school. As women toil at home and men plant fields, he is feeding a village, dish by dish.

Pale female cardinal
daily builds nest, stick by stick
winds of change blow by

Wonderful day in Bali. So very glad we did this excursion, experiencing Balinese culture and helping this village by working with Chef. Such a humble, giving man.

Singaporean Haibun

lillian33 Comments

There is a point in our emotional being when one crosses over to another place, even if for only a moment in time. Such was my experience last week. We happened to visit a Buddhist temple at their time of worship. Golds and deep reds dazzled my eyes as carved wooden panels, candles, supplicants and monks came into my sight line. Peripheral vision seemed to disappear. Chanting and soft rhythmic bells calmed in this mystical place. I found myself kneeling, head bowed, hands folded, sensing an other-worldness of supreme thanksgiving for life. For those few moments, I was in an inward place, so deep inside myself. Very hard to explain in words. . . and then it was time to leave. I walked out into sunlight, to talk and live, in the now and here again world I normally occupy. 

mountains disappear
clouds bridge to earth as fine mist
then lift in sun’s light

image

Posted from Singapore for dVerse where Grace asks us to write a haibun incorporating the word “bridge.” JUST A WARNING to dVerse readers: I am traveling for 40 days. We board our ship Monday and will be at sea for two days (no internet) and then in Bali – internet questionable. This means although I may be able to write and have someone at dVerse link in for a prompt, many times I will not be able to reply to comments or read and reply to others’ poems. It is not at all because I am  ignoring your poems. So–do take that into consideration on any of my future posts — except for the last five days in Sydney. I will totally understand if folks choose not to read my posts during this time. I also am operating with an iPad instead of my computer and can’t figure out how to highlight a word and link it to a URL or to make it italics – excuse the all caps. PS: Singapore has been glorious!