Young girl with broad grin
face turned upward, felt the tug.
Kite string unwinding
colors dancing, zig zagging
dreams tossed to the wind come true.
Photo from Bermuda’s kite flying tradition on Good Friday.
Happy weekend to all — may your dreams fly high!
NaPoWriMo day 9.
Train moved round the bend, civilized now,
not then. Those days, she chose life
off the beaten track. No lookin’ back.
Twenty-six claims staked and panned.
Never hit it rich the way we define it.
Kantishna, home to caribou, moose
and Fannie Quigley. One tough broad.
Slung back whiskey and cussed with ‘em all.
Calloused hands skinned her kill
then rolled flaky pie crust,
bear lard, the secret.
Legendary in her day and beyond,
she took no train but her own.
Written for NaPoWriMo 2016 Day 5 and dVerse Pub for Poets where Bjorn suggests we use the idea of railroad/trains for a poem today. Photo Credits: from our Alaska trip last year. We visited the remote cabin of Fannie Quigley.
Innocent child stands
kite in hand.
Optimism lives.
A lune written for NaPoWriMo Day 1. April is National Poetry Writing Month. A lune is a three line poem with either a 5-3-5 syllabic count or a 5-3-5 word count. Photo is this past Good Friday, a national holiday in Bermuda, celebrated with kite flying. It was a joy to see!
Gaggle me group think
wisps of snipers
brooding, hence their evil
festers in murmuration.
Starlings not, cowards yes,
they prey on innocence
maim, murder,
crow hatred as they kill.
Life and exhaltation, a lark to them,
bombs strapped on chests
with heaven their goal,
wing straight to hell.
Let us become congregations
like plovers in flight with doves.
For they are small as one
but pure of heart,
powerful as they soar
symbols, nay beings
of peace and love.
Written for dVerse. De asks us to write a poem using the names given to gatherings of birds. She thoughtfully provided a wonderful list from which I’ve chosen the following: flight of doves, brood of hens, congregation of plovers, exhaltation of larks, gaggle of geese, murmuration of starlings, murder of crows, and wisp of snipe. Photo credit: Nevit Dilmen.
I choose life with mystery. Space.
Question marks, exclamations, ellipses
not brackets or parentheses.
Certainty directs,
connects dots by numbers
like choreographed dance steps.
Give me ad lib, jazz scat
one man band with knees that bang.
Meander, run, or tra-la-la.
Tap shoes. Not silly silk slippers.
Too much between Point A and B
to follow a tutu pink linear path.
Photo Credit: Shirley B. Posted to Poetry Pantry on Poets United.
Thanks, Bjorn, for the introduction!
Somewhere, light years away,
what was held in trust
shall revive.
The first one thousand miles
between earth’s implosion
and moons’ forever paths,
churns debris, seeds of possibility,
until a shooting star ignites
and a new land births itself.
Small roots find their way
and those that flower understand,
heritage matters.
The Universe remembers
those who strove but could not save
scorched earth, her favorite son.
And so at Latitude 38
she creates a divine place,
reconfigured in her galaxy.
A quiet place of timbers
where midst aquamarine waters,
her children shall try again.
Found Poetry: following titles taken from the bookshelf in our Bermuda rental: Held in Trust by The Bermuda National Trust; First One Thousand Miles by Gordon Phillips; The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard; Heritage Matters by Dr. Edward Harris; and Latitude 38 (a magazine). Photo: from a walk along Bermuda’s Old Rail Way Trail. Poem is inspired by Global Warming, something that too many seem to deny.
Paiutes called them Legend People turned to stone by Coyote. I call them mystical.
Silhouettes evolved from ancient seaway. Columns of ochre and orange-pink. Water, ice and gravity had their way with you. Slot canyons so narrow the head strains up for blue. Shadowed red when sun slants in. Thin rims so high there is nothing but everything beside. We tread in awe among these hoodoo pillars. This place of craggy, sharp-edged, smooth, fantastical shapes.
Rocks eroded tall
time escaped in canyons deep
we like specks of dust.
It was Haibun Monday at dVerse, the Pub for Poets. Rajani is tending bar and asked us to write about a travel experience. Haibun is “richly woven prose amplified by simple yet profound haiku. In its traditional sense, it connects to nature and travel. Photos from trip to Bryce many years ago.
Fireflies held aloft, cupped softly
between two hands. Flicker on…
off…on…off…under darkening skies.
On…off…dim…dimmer…
flutter palms’ release.
Dance free, bright within the night.
Could it be that easy,
as simply letting go?
Photo Credit: Tracy Stansel
A merry heart does good like a medicine
the yellowed brittle fortune
rest where he’d last touched it.
Beside the faded red envelope,
embroidered stitches now soft to touch.
She sipped her green tea, waiting.
The sun had set long ago
and now the rains were here.
Soon the streets would be a cacophony
drums, shouts, tourists and parades.
And from her window, she would see
the dragon dancing down the street,
her sign ever present, every new year
even in this approaching time,
the Year of the Monkey.
Closing her eyes, she saw again
mother, father, the land, and river
heavy rains bringing fish to the fields.
Images swam in and out in waves,
and memories filled her heart.
She sat, and sipped her tea,
waiting patiently.
Written for Toni’s Chinese New Year’s prompt at dVerse, a Poet’s Pub. Toni provided several fortune cookie slips and we were to choose one, and use it as the first line in our poem.
Photo credit: Yenhoon
Six minute eternity,
seventy-two hours ago.
A cardiac arrest.
Doctors talked incessantly,
you may return or not.
And if yes . . .
Then a voiceless lull
filled that sterile beeping room
and angels’ wings were heard,
as they carried you back to me.
Dylan Thomas, in Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog [first published by Dent on 4 April 1940] provided a whimsical explanation of the word “lull” – A host of angels must be passing by. What a silence there is!
Angels Along the Way is a quadrille (44 word poem) using the word “lull” — the prompt given by Bjorn at dVerse, a Poet’s Pub. Do visit this fabulous site!
Photo credit: Benjamin Earwicker.
Thankful for every day!
lillian the home poet 