live for today

Quit Complaining!

lillian56 Comments

Oh . . . let it go!
Quit complaining about growing old.
I’m half-way through my septuagenarian years,
big deal!
If you divide life into seasons,
I’m probably long past autumn,
well into winter.  
Things I have on my must-do list,
goals to achieve,
to make my “mark” on the world?
 
So what if some of them don’t get done.
I’m happy I can bend over to pull on my galoshes!
Carless in Boston,
I leave footprints in the snow
walking to the store or to the doctor’s office.
Shows me I’m still here,
above ground.
I’ll bet I can still make snow angels.
I know I can –
you’d just have to help me get up.

Think of life as a merry-go-round,
concentrate on the merry part.
So we can’t climb up
to sit on the tallest horse anymore.
Let’s just sit in the carriage
the one with benches on both sides.
It goes around just as fast as the horse.
It just doesn’t go up and down anymore.
That’s us you know . . .
leveled out to enjoy the ride.


I’m hosting Tuesday Poetics at dVerse today, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. I’ve provided a list of song titles about winter and cold weather. Writers must include at least two of the song titles from the list, within their poem, word for word. They can add punctuation between the words of the song title; or split the words over two lines (enjambment); but the titles must clearly be included in the body of the poem, word for word.

I’ve included three titles from the list in my poem: Let It Go, Winter Things, and Footprints in the Snow. Pub opens at 3 PM EST. Come join us!

Photo from Pixabay.com

A Little Ditty for a Gray November Day

lillian17 Comments

Did you know
the sun is always shining,
even if behind a cloud?
Frowns can be turned upside down
into a smile, just by remembering that.
There is no distance looking blue,
when we walk barefoot
in dew kissed grass that tickles our feet.

Call me Pollyanna, many do,
because I choose to believe
there is no top to any steeple
if I make up my mind to climb.
Be it with strong legs
or, at my age,
a little blusher, mascara,
a pen, and a plethora of words.


Written for Tuesday Poetics at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. Today Sarah hosts and asks us to consider the poem November by Thomas Hood. One option in today’s prompt is to use a line from his poem and include it in our poem. I’ve chosen two lines from his poem: “No distance looking blue” and “No top to any steeple”. Image from Pixabay.com

The Ride

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How many times around
life’s stationary wheel?
Eight times ten,
nine times ten?
Apex reached at twenty-five or fifty?
Maybe thirty and three-quarters?
Down cycle begins later, much later,
or maybe it did? Back then.
There should be a view from the top,
everything spread out in miniature
but recognizable.
Broken fulcrum invevitable,
timed entrance tickets do end.
Others clamor to get on, their turn.
What’s that saying?
We’re just along for the ride.

Photo taken in Warnemunde, Germany two days ago.

In the Midst of a Current . . .

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time ebbs and flows
like sand sifting through a sieve
like advancing waves crashing,
rushing furiously to shore.

Emotions ebb and flow
as we journey through later years,
stopping to dally at sweet spots,
speeding through dangerous curves.

Humanity ebbs and flows around us.
People progressing forward,
while others try desperately to stall
and others slip backward to the way it was.

Much as we’d like to take control,
place wooden rulers across our lives
draw straight lines from point A to point B,
we all remain in a fluid path
as our lives continue to ebb and flow.

Written for NAPOWRIMO, Day 22. Today we’re asked to write a poem that includes repetition.
Photo take some years ago when in Bermuda.

The Septuagenarian

lillian6 Comments

Society’s expectations?
She doesn’t give two hoots
about being who she’s not.

It’s taken her a while to get there,
seven decades to be exact.
Wrinkle creams and hair dye be damned.

She wears flat shoes on every occasion,
air-dries her hair in all its grey glory
and orders dessert, which is mandatory.

Happily sleeveless when it’s hot,
just stare if you dare at her crepe-like skin
and notice her knees with those very high hems.

Stereotypical sayings are bantered about,
she’s older and wiser and been round the block
but look at her now as she picks her own route.

Written for NAPOWRIMO, Day 15.
Today we’re asked to “write a poem about something you have absolutely no interest in.”
We’re invited “to investigate some of the ‘why’ behind resolutely not giving two hoots about something.”
Although my poem is written in third person, this is how I feel at seventy-five.

Haiku to ponder

lillian18 Comments

The second half of joy is shorter than the first.
Emily Dickinson

everyday a gift
wildflowers along the road –
snow falls silently

Written for the NAPOWRIMO prompt given the day before National Poetry Writing Month begins. We are to respond to one of Emily Dickinson’s lines of poetry. Several are provided or we may choose our own.

Also will appear at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. Today is OLN: Open Link Night. Ingrid is hosting and we may post any one poem of our choosing. Pub opens at 3 PM Boston time.

NAPOWRIMO begins officially tomorrow. April is National Poetry Writing Month and the challenge is to write a poem every day of the month.
Photo is from our trip to Ireland a number of years ago.

The Mysteries of Time

lillian1 Comment

Time slips away, disappears.
Those years of youth,
ours and theirs.

I had a firm grasp on reality.
Even so, the mundane simmered,
repetition melded, numbed time.

Infinitesimal changes crept in,
unnoticed until too late.
What was, was gone.

Those everyday moments . . .
in hindsight I know
were anything but mundane.

Sweet viscous memories
fragments, rarely continuous,
slip and slide in my mind.

I sit, smiling gently,
my head in the past
then force myself into the now.

Pen in hand,
I write as time moves on
faster than my script.

My gait slower, skin thinner
eye sight cloudier,
but joy nurtures me.

Each day is still a gift
for one constant reason.
You are still beside me.

Sing Me Some Jazz

lillian14 Comments

Time’s long shadow
scats and sings.
That ole pendulum
forever swings.

Doo-ya doo-ya
doo-ya bop.
Tickety tickety
tickety tock.

That grim reaper,
got no soul.
But shit my honey,
he’s got control.

Doo-ya doo-ya
doo-ya bop.
Tickety tickety
tickety tock

Now listen good
while I’m tellin’ you.
Doo-ya doo-ya
doo-ya boo.

Live it up baby
while we can.
Stompin’ and dancin’
that’s the plan.

Jazz it up baby,
come on now.
Do some lovin’
fore he takes his bow.

Snappin’ and poppin’
and rockin’ strong.

Singin’ doo-ya doo-ya
doo-ya bop.
Ain’t no way
we’re ready to stop.

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Sharing with dVerse, the virtual pub for poets, on Open Link Thursday.  Image by freepik.com

Ms. Ima Character

lillian15 Comments

She chose a lucky-charmed life,
chocolate chip tolls
in the gluten-free lane.

Driveway décor, night-time too,
rainbow arrow from street to door.
Somewhere-over-the  always nearby.

Merry she is, poppin’ about,
never in knots, no-sayer not.
Upside-up, never down-side down.

Lover of music, coda in place
3/4 time is far too slow.
Give her 6/8 and she rushes the gait.

Zingin’ along on her hubby’s zither
strummin’ those dum do-diddley-dos.
She rocks-a-hill billy rockin’ toon
never the deja-vu blues.

IMG_4519 (1)

Paul hosts dVerse today, the cyber pub for poets. He’s asking us to mix up our language a bit….forget the grammarian rules. So, read the title aloud. This poem is about Ms. Ima, as in I’m A. And her last name is Character 🙂  I really had fun with this one. How many of the allusions can you catch here? Toll-House chocolate chips, a cereal choice, a famous Julie Andrews movie and a famous Judy Garland song, a number of musical references RE music notation, and a country musical instrument. And yep, that’s me in the photo. A number of years ago goofing around with my grand kids. So I guess you could say, I’m a character too!