Author: lillian

Cowboys and Me and Junie Z

lillian39 Comments

Junie Z and I,
we had a lot of fun
watchin’ Winky Dink and Me
eatin’ PB and J sandwiches
in front of her black and white tv.

But she liked Gene Autry
that singin’ cowboy,
and Roy Rogers and Dale
croonin’ Happy Trails to You,
like it was just for her.

Me? I was the silent type.
Who would guess it now.
The Lone Ranger was my guy.
No sissy singin’ – just that masked man
ridin’ into those far off hills.

So imagine my surprise
hearin’ good ole Gene
on the radio today
preachin’ at me in song,
There’s no back door to heaven.

And I guess he’d know,
at least in the eyes of Junie Z
after all these years,
but not for tone-deaf me.

Couldn’t resist putting up a more light hearted one for the prompt. Take a listen — ah the childhood memories of me and Junie Z!  Posted for Dverse Tuesday Poetics, a poem somehow related to “doors.”

Passage

lillian52 Comments

You carried me
over the threshold…
alice found crazy hats
and a tea party…
stalactites dripped slowly
until they began to fall…
fissures…
apertures…
this time
you cannot be
with me…
door to something
somewhere…
and I must
pass
alone.

chairTending the bar today at dVerse’s virtual Pub for Poets. It’s Tuesday Poetics and I’ve asked folks to write a poem relating to the word “door.” Although I provided a number of photos for possible use, writers can also use one of their own. This one was taken at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts a few days ago – a space you enter wtih three walls, ceiling and floor covered in mirror or mirror-like materials with beads and jewels hanging from various areas. Looking back at the photo – it seems a passage to another world — perhaps an afterlife?  Who knows? You’re invited to visit dVerse and pop through some doors with a group of wonderful writers!

Maine

lillian47 Comments

I’d read Blueberries for Sal as a young girl. Robert McCloskey’s 1949 Caldecott winner, set in rugged Maine. And so I recalled that book many years later, spending three glorious days in Acadia National Park.

We spent our indoor time within the cozy confines of a knotty pine cabin. Mornings of hot steaming coffee mugs, looking out windows that opened to the northern woods. Bedtime, covered in faded down quilts, noses chilled as our fire turned to softly glowing embers.

Afternoon walks took us along the coastline, climbing over rock strewn paths with views of crashing waves. Trail number three turned inward, passed ruins of a wall, crumbled stones scattered in wild tall grasses. We walked through a dense birch tree stand. And in one magical moment, the wind whipped up and the canopy of branches swayed. Sunlight streamed in, creating a shimmering lacework overhead.

Our last evening, in denim shirts and hiking boots, we made our way at dusk to the top of Cadillac Mountain. We lie back and watched the sky turn glittering black. Specks of incandescence gleamed light years away. The only sound was our intake of surprised breath as a shooting star streaked from left to right, to another place in time.

sun light dances
through birch tree leaves and disappears
as stars skitter into view

acadia_national_park acadia_national_park_maine_landscape

Written for Haibun Monday at dVerse Poets’ Pub with Bjorn tending the virtual bar, asking us to write a haibun about a walk we’ve taken.  Photos from Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor Maine.

Ferlinghetti 21.25

lillian48 Comments

Casting her eyes to heaven
she meandered through what was.
If only
she’d sensed his other half,
those gentle hands fisted as
love pummeled, possessed too far.
She lie now, crumpled to the floor, that
human mass he abandoned in the night.

a-girl-eerily-exhausted-1537602

Sometimes poetry can be written to call attention to an endemic problem. This is dedicated to all those who face domestic abuse. Written for dVerse in a unique format that takes one or two lines from another poem and uses these words, in order, as the end words of the new poem. Photo credit: Linda Lucerne

Ferlinghetti’s poem titled 21 is from the 60th Anniversary Edition, City Lights Pocket Poets Anthology, edited by Lawrence Ferlinghetti:

Heaven
was only half as far that night
at the poetry recital
listening to the burnt phrases
when I heard the poet have
a rhyming erection
then look away with a
lost look
‘Every animal’ he said at last
‘After intercourse is sad’
But the back-row lovers
looked oblivious
and glad

Party Lines

lillian21 Comments

Telephone chatter,
chirps heard round the neighborhood.

Eunice knows
what clara knows
what maybeth knows
what celia knows.

Biddies gathered round the wire
in times gone by.

grey-day-with-pigeons-roger-bultot

Word Count: 27.  Written for Rochelle Wiseoff-Fields’ Friday Fictioneers (photo prompt appears on Wednesdays)  Photo credit: Roger Bultot.  Apologies to those expecting fiction here….saw this photo and could not resist! When we were first married (early 1970s) we lived in Marengo, Iowa — the last place in the USA to have 4 digit phone numbers (think about that!) and of course, we also had party lines. For those of you too young to understand, those were the days of rotary dial phones where 5 or 6 or sometimes more families all shared the same “line.”  We always picked up our telephone receiver (the piece you listened to and spoke into) carefully, and didn’t start dialing until we knew it was “free.” OR, chuckle deviously here, you could listen in to what was going on in the neighborhood!

 

 

Festival

lillian59 Comments

The sky is aglow this morn.
Floating quilt of primary colors
myriad shapes and sizes
blankets the bright blue overhead.

Row by row, baskets peopled
by those akin with adventure
fires stoked, ropes cut, they rise
to gas gusting sounds and cheers.

And we are left behind
we who stood the ground
arid browns and taupes,
dry earth and tumble weeds.

Thermos empty, dusty mouth
a vague sense of wish-I-was-there
mind dulled with lack of sleep
I crane my neck again

and wonder,
why am I here
and they are out there
soaring with their dreams.

2001-Albuquerque-International-Balloon-Fiesta-02

Written for Tuesday Poetics at dVerse, hosted by Mish. She asks us to write a poem related to the Southwest — and she has strong ties to New Mexico. A number of years ago I was in Albuquerque, New Mexico for the hot air balloon festival. I went out before dawn and helped folks with their balloons, readying them for flight. Watched as wave after wave of balloons fired up and lifted into the sky. An amazing sight indeed.

Memoir

lillian55 Comments

i remember
skip-to-my-lou
kukla, fran and ollie
days of the week underpants
and uncle howie’s store
the wisconsin dells’ wooden indian
my lone ranger lunch box
howdy doody’s freckles
miss tews’ ballet school
and kindergarten with junie z

any one out there
remember me?

A man dressed as the Lone Ranger rides his horse along the pier as the aircraft carrier USS RANGER (CV-61) ties up behind him. The RANGER has returned to North Island following its deployment to the Persian Gulf region for Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm.

A quadrille (44 words) written for dVerse using the word “skip.” Skip to My Lou is a popular children’s song – begun in 1826 as a lyrical game in Abraham Lincoln’s youth in southern Indiana and Kentucky, it became a partner-stealing dance in the 1840s. In my childhood, we literally skipped along the sidewalk singing this song. Photos: The Lone Ranger; Kukla, Fran and Ollie; and Howdy Doody – tv shows popular in the 1950s. Me playing dress-up with Junie Z, on a Wisconsin Dells vacation, and ready for a Miss Tews dancing recital.

Artist in Waiting

lillian8 Comments

Obsessed with her oils
and the patina of still life,
she spent her later years
living in a shadow world,
feasting on edibles
from her studio walls.

pear-fingers

Image credit: AnnMarie at anntogether.com. Artist with words and brush. Creative woman extraordinaire. Thank you AnnMarie for allowing me to put my words to your amazing pear-fingers. Meander over to her site and see beautiful portraits, amazing creatures, and poetry that unites her images to words.