It was my turn to post the challenge this past month in our Swaggers group. Talk about pressure! I felt a bit like Goldilocks looking for the perfect prompt–something not too hard, not too easy, but just right. After way too much deliberation, I finally opted to poach off a post I’d used in the past for photography. Here’s what I shared:
Challenge: I participated several years ago in a photo challenge from Kim Douillard to “find beauty in the ugly” (My post is here). This month, I invite you to reinvent the world around you (or one aspect of it) by shifting your lens to see the beauty in what at first seems to be ugly or unnoteworthy. Happy Writing!
Next, I had to figure out what to write about. My garden immediately came to mind. At this time of year, it’s a jumble of sad, dried stalks. Some people cut their dying plants back, and I’ve heard that can help prevent the spread of some plant diseases. But I’m not much for proactive “cleaning”, and I did read that leaving your garden intact, with all its rustling seed heads and stalks, protects plants, enriches the soils, and provides birds with food and shelter. That was convincing enough for me! I also love the architecture of all the angles and lines when the snow falls.
I thought I’d write one poem about my garden, but instead some smaller poems emerged. All of them are love songs to my bedraggled weed-filled winter garden.
finches ladder up
dessicated plant stalks
feast on tattered seed heads
©Molly Hogan, 2019
bee balm dons
her winter accessory
a fresh white bonnet
©Molly Hogan, 2019
sered garden husks
shiver in the breeze, whisper
summer memories
©Molly Hogan, 2019
Perhaps only
with winter’s advance
does our truest heart
reveal itself
amidst a slow,
steady crumbling
©Molly Hogan, 2019
And finally, stepping away from the garden to another time that I found heartfelt beauty somewhere unexpected.
after the hospital
your sleepy warmth beside me
oh, blessèd snore!
©Molly Hogan, 2019
Click on the links below to visit my fellow Swaggers and discover where they found beauty:
Margaret Simon: Reflections on the Teche
Catherine Flynn: Reading to the Core
Linda Mitchell: A Word Edgewise
Heidi Mordhorst: My Juicy Little Universe
This week’s Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by Tanita S. Davis at her blog [fiction, instead of lies]. She’s sharing a wonderful poem expressing gratitude for worms and an original sonnet acknowledging the many hands that make our lives run more smoothly.
Nix the comfort zone 
The photos and the poems are stunning. How fun to have an online poetry group.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Jone. I’m so thankful for my online poetry group. It’s a wonderful thing indeed!
LikeLike
Always, your poetry and photography is a gift, Molly. Fave lines/images for me; finches ladder up / – your whole crumbling to heart (poem and pic) and the comfort and warmth of that blessed snore. Beautiful!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Kat! I loved seeing all your American school photos and intend to pop back over and comment later. Glad you survived the journey home and hope to welcome you back again before too long!
LikeLike
A heartfelt thanks once again, Molly, for this challenge. It could work every week as a gratitude practice, couldn’t it. Your many garden beauties are lovely, but I particularly like the first one with its delicate balance of double-letter words–such a lovely mouthful! The longer one about the “slow, steady crumbling” made me cry for all sorts of “truest heart” reasons. I’m so grateful for you.
LikeLiked by 1 person
What a lovely comment, Heidi! Thank you and right back at ya’!! Looking for beauty is a wonderful way to face the world. Sometimes I need a nudge to remind me to do so! 🙂
LikeLike
Lovely! I especially love the “winter’s advance” poem and the photo right below it. Ruth, thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown.blogspot.com
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Ruth! I hope you have a wonderful, peaceful holiday season.
LikeLike
What a lovely bunch of images – and the last poem is very dear. I will keep the idea of hearts slowly evolving into their truest self – after a steady crumbling – that is profound. This is a great challenge!
LikeLiked by 1 person
It was such an interesting process to shift this prompt from a photo challenge to a poetry one.
LikeLike
Loved your collection of beauty in pictures and words! I loved that last image with the sun illuminating the leaves. Gorgeous!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Donna! A few rays of sun can make all the difference, right?
LikeLike
Your winter garden is so lovely, Molly. Hooray for all the good reasons to leave our gardens in tact. I clean out my hosta bed because shoveling our walkway is difficult if I don’t. I can’t choose a favorite poem, although I do love the bee balm’s “fresh white bonnet.” And everything Heid said about the “truest heart.”
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Catherine. Winter gardens are so interesting! I had to limit myself from taking a million photos. I have some cute ones of squirrels and birds sheltering and foraging. Such a happening place!
LikeLiked by 1 person
You helped me to see my garden anew, but then you took my breath away with the
“…slow,
steady crumbling.”
I’m feeling it. I’m living it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well, you’re not alone!
LikeLike
I love this prompt and have enjoyed the poems that grew from it. And I’m with you on the winter garden–I enjoy the tangled beauty of last year’s growth and wait until spring to clean it up. It also provides safety and shelter for a variety of pollinating insects as well. Your poems and photos capture that stark beauty.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s so nice when the right thing to do coincides with my natural inclination to procrastinate and let clutter accumulate! lol
LikeLike
Such a fertile collection of love poems today, Molly. I love them all, but my faves are probably “bee balm dons” and “after the hospital.” I also enjoyed reading your 2017 post. Had I known about it at the time, I would have shared your post as inspiration when Carol Hinz challenged us to write poems that find beauty in Nov 2017!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Michelle! I would have been thrilled to have had my post shared! Now I’m wondering when I first discovered TLD. I do know I was lurking for a while before I participated (read that as intimidated), but I must have missed Carol’s post. I’ll have to go back and check it out!
LikeLike
Love the relationship poems! Thanks.
after the hospital
your sleepy warmth beside me
oh, blessèd snore!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Dan!
LikeLike