It’s February break and we headed south in search of a little warmth…
It hasn’t turned out exactly as we’d hoped.
Unfortunately, we brought Maine temperatures with us, along with a gusty wind. Brrrrrrr!!!! You’d think we’d be used to it! Regardless of the cold (thank goodness for layers!!!), we’re having a lovely time. And luckily, after thick clouds and misty rain on Wednesday, yesterday was sunny, so we had that going for us!
With the temperatures so low, it’s been odd to see green leaves and blooms. The majestic oaks, with their twisted limbs and long winter shadows, dazzle me. I have been feeling a little bad for the magnolias though. They look so cold!
grey clouds scud in a winter-frosted breeze blossoms tremble
This week’s Poetry Friday is hosted by Laura Purdie Salas, and she’s sharing all sorts of exciting book news. I’m still traveling, but hope to get around to read and comment over the next few days.
PS A highlight of the trip–hanging out with Margaret and Jeff Simon and parade watching!
If you’re looking for a laugh or a light post, this isn’t the place to find that. If you’re trying to avoid politics, you might want to skip this post. But I’m tired of watching what I say. The time for that is past. The reality is that it’s impossible to tear my mind away from the news, even when I try not to follow it. Even when I try to create, the darkness creeps in. So, this post may be disjointed, and it may be somewhat incoherent. But it feels like it reflects my reality right now, and even though I am hesitant to press publish…well, if you’re reading this, I guess I just went ahead and did it.
This morning I read Brad Montague’s post entitled “Empathy is Dangerous“. I thought it must be sarcastic, and I guess, in a sense, it was. But it was also deeply disturbing. Apparently, the latest trend is to suggest that there is danger in being empathetic. That empathy is being weaponized. What?!? When I looked into this a bit further, I saw quite a few 3-4 year old articles supporting the view that empathy is problematic. That it’s somehow dangerous to try to relate to how others experience the world. I really can’t wrap my head around this.
This reminded me of the Rodgers and Hammerstein song, “You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught.” One of the verses goes like this: “You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late, Before you are six or seven or eight, To hate all the people your relatives hate— You’ve got to be carefully taught!”
Apparently some things haven’t changed much since this song was published in 1949.
In my Facebook feed today, there was a picture of Ruby Bridges. You know the name, right? She’s the woman who as a child was the first black to integrate a southern all-white school. She’s only 70 years old. How can that be? It feels like that should be ancient history. Clearly, oh so clearly, it isn’t.
I’m participating in a Facebook group poetry challenge this month. The theme is space and today’s prompt invited us to tell about “a thing or things you have, or know of, that used to be in a different space/place.” For some reason, I thought about a place where I once saw a fox, and wrote this poem:
A Waiting Space
Each time I pass the bend in the road where once I saw a fox and the fox saw me, I slow down to look
I’ve never seen it there again but I’m now tuned to its frequency so if I keep looking perhaps someday I will
A friend commented “This is what hope looks like.”
If you think of it in a different way, I suspect this is what despair looks like as well–the continual search for something that is no longer there.
These days, I’m looking at a dark space in our country’s history, where things have changed rapidly in a terrifying fashion. Or perhaps they haven’t changed so much as have been made more visible. I’m not sure which is more disturbing. The mandates and orders coming from the current government are ill-conceived and often illegal and unconstitutional. There is no empathy there. There is hatred. And so much greed.
I keep looking into the abyss of a space that once was, or at least seemed to be, a place where there was at lease some respect for the rule of law, for our constitution and for its careful balance of power.
This morning it struck me that I’m always hurrying. At least during the work week. This, no doubt, is not news to those around me. In fact, I can anticipate almost hearing the sound of my husband’s eyebrows shooting upward in shock when he reads this. Then, I expect to hear something along the lines of, “Wait! You’re kidding right? You really just realized this?!” (In fact, if you live within bordering towns, you might also hear him when he says this.)
At any rate, many years ago I started getting up very early before work so that I didn’t have to rush. It was quiet. I could write. I could get myself oriented to the coming day. I loved it!
But somehow this morning, it struck me that I’ve somehow managed to fill that part of my day up. It’s like a tetris screen full of blocks with no space for anything else to drop in.
I get up at 4:45 am, start the coffee and do the morning chores (feed the cats, stoke the wood stove, etc). Within 10-15 minutes of rolling out of bed, I’m sitting at my desk. I always start my day by writing in my notebook for 20-30 minutes or so. I’m often noodling around with writing challenges or prompts, too. Then, I try to read and comment on others’ writing. I respond to comments on my blog. I check my e-mails. Then there are a few beloved word games (Wordle, Connections and Spelling Bee) that suck up a few minutes. (I count that as time dedicated to slowing down mental decay.) I shower and get dressed. Then, while I’m eating breakfast, I read a chapter of whatever book I’ve designated as a morning book. (Right now it’s Margaret Renkl’s The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year which is fabulous!) Finally, I’m out the door by about 6:15 or 6:30 am, typically filling the bird feeders on my way to the car, and zipping off to work.
I cherish my morning time, and love all that I do during that time, but it really has become one big long rush. I’m stunned that I honestly hadn’t realized that until today.
So now I’m left with a lot questions: Is there any point in getting up at 4:45 am if it just means I’ll be rushing around for the next 11-12 hours? Do I want to change things? If so, what am I willing to change? I know I can’t get up any earlier, so how can I regain that feeling of morning spaciousness? That freedom of uncluttered time? What can shift or move?
I have a few thoughts, but for now, I’m still processing my realization and pondering…
Have you heard of the Public Domain Image Archive ? Well, if you haven’t, carve out some time and go visit. It’s amazing! Mary Lee introduced us to the site for our challenge and invited us to type a color into the search bar and write about one of the images that popped up. After a bit of playing around (and a lot of time passing!), I entered peach and was regaled with this image of a water tower in Gaffney, South Carolina.
Oh, my.
That’s what I thought, too.
So, while looking up synonyms for butts, I discovered the new-to-me word “callipygian”.
And that’s how this limerick came to be.
Down in Gaffney they sing a proud paean to this tower that’s oddly protean. They exclaim, “It’s a peach!” Tourists claim that’s a reach– it’s decidedly callipygian!
I can’t imagine living year long in a temperate climate. I love all the seasons, and they connect me to life and nature in a deep and meaningful way. Or at least they do when I pay attention. I’ve often thought that seasons heighten my awareness of time passing, which is bittersweet, but also valuable. In a weirdly related way, it’s why I’ve never colored my hair (okay, other than a temporary glaze a few times).
I love winter for so many reasons. One simple one is that, to my eyes at least, it’s simply stunning. I’m drawn to the stark contrasts of light and dark. To the beauty of snow and ice and to the grace of bare tree branches. Winter is filled with subtle mysteries. It offers up the bones of the world, and exposes things in new ways.
Still, sometimes I find myself wishing for a little color. Recently, on a freezing, not-much-snow-around-this-January day, an image popped up in my Facebook feed :
It was a painting by artist, Jane Dahmen, entitled “River Landscape.” Viewing this landscape with its vibrant colors felt like a detonation. They fed something in me that I hadn’t even realized was hungry.
On Viewing “River Landscape” in Winter
I yearn to lick vermilion patches like lollipops, feel their red and orange scratch and splash on my tongue, absorb the bold bursts of amber and pine into the stream of my cold, sluggish blood.
Oh! to grab dripping handfuls of effervescent blue raise them to my nose and inhale the coursing river, let it ripple down my throat anointing all lying dormant within.
Surrounded by a landscape swathed in grays and whites, I feast.
Until spring arrives with its shy greening and tentative bursts of color, I’ll continue to drink from winter’s chilly brew. It remains delicious.
This week’s Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by the effervescent Jan at her blog bookseedstudio. Be sure to stop by and warm up with the poetry goodness on offer!
People often wonder how my husband and I ever got together. How we ever lasted over 35 years. Sometimes, it’s a mystery to me as well, but I’m always thankful. He is a man who defies description, but describes himself as a “hippie, red-neck philosopher.” He would be the first to admit that he has some rough edges, but he is a man to admire–someone who works hard at being his best self. He makes me a better person, too. He turned 60 recently and I wrote this poem for him.
I know you’ll laugh when you read this, hold up your knobby hands, rippled with callouses and scars of unknown origins, thick-fingered with nails bitten into deformity These hands? you’ll ask.
Yes, those hands, your hands I find them beautiful. Achingly so. How they cradled our children How they dance across my skin How I know they will be there when I reach out with mine.
And how those quick-bitten nails record the unceasing effort, the struggle you put into living your best life every single day.
It’s interesting how different things can come together in your brain and percolate. I’m not sure exactly how all the pieces came together in my head, but I was thinking about Dick Van Dyke (maybe due to trailers of the Coldplay video?) and about laughter (definitely from one of Heidi’s Yuletide prompts). This combination prompted me to watch a video of “I Love to Laugh” from Mary Poppins. We always loved that movie in our family, but I hadn’t watched it in years and years. Here it is, in case you’re interested in refreshing your memory or checking it out for the first time:
Aren’t Julie Andrews and Ed Wynn wonderful, too? I found myself grinning the whole way through. In this day and age, it felt like a breath of fresh air. (And yes, I know that probably makes me sound very old and a bit persnickety, but it’s just such silly fun! And those campy special effects are perfectly charming!)
After watching the video a few times, the song developed into an ear worm that lasted several days. Not quite as much fun. I kept finding myself singing bits and pieces of it at unexpected, and sometimes awkward, times. I also kept turning the name “Dick Van Dyke” over and over in my head, again and again. It suddenly struck me that it might work in a double dactyl poem. So, I settled down to write.
Rewatching Mary Poppins
Jiggledy, giggledy Iconic Dick Van Dyke guffawed and chortled up into the air Proving that laughter is better than medicine Hyperhysterically beyond compare
Also, if you haven’t had a chance to watch the Coldplay video, here it is.
It took me a while to get around to it, but I finally watched the whole thing, and it was definitely worth it. It was moving and delightful! Enjoy!
This week’s Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by Tricia at her blog The Miss Rumphius Effect. You’re sure to find more moving and delightful things there, so hurry on over!
“Should I drive south and look for snowy owls?” I wondered.
It was tempting. The forecast was for cold and clear weather, and the possibility of seeing snowy owls is a time-limited opportunity here. There was no guarantee that I’d see one if I went out, but on the other hand, I definitely wouldn’t if I didn’t go looking.
I glanced around me at my desk, my notebook and pen. I heard the coffee pot burbling and felt the warmth of the wood stove gently pulsing against my back. In a little while, the sun would rise and the birds would be visiting. The idea of a lazy, lingering Sunday morning at home tugged at me. I love the quiet of the house when I’m the only one awake and when all deadlines are distant enough to ignore for at least a little while.
Still, I was torn.
I had a little time before I had to decide, so I opted to write for a bit before making up my mind. I opened up the most recent prompt from the New Year’s Poetry Challenge from MOST (the Modesto Stanislaus Poetry Center). Much to my surprise, it was entitled “A Chance Encounter.”
I put down my pen. “Well, that’s that,” I said aloud. It was a definitive sign, or at least I interpreted it as one: I needed to get out there and look for a snowy owl! I didn’t even read any further. I took another sip of coffee, shut my notebook, and packed up my things. Within about 10 minutes, I was on the road and on the hunt for snowy owls.
Here’s how the morning unfolded:
I did not see a snowy owl, nor did I return to write anything in response to the prompt, but I enjoyed a thoroughly gorgeous morning on the beach and at the marsh.
I woke at 1:15 am on Thursday morning, feeling flutters of panic. My mind was going a mile a minute, pinballing from raging wildfires to taking over the Panama Canal to an ongoing family medical crisis, and all points in between. Then it got fully sucked into the political/cultural maelstrom of Donald Trump, his cronies and the collective insanity: Greenland, the Panama Canal, renaming the Gulf of Mexico, revoking vaccines, etc. We’re taking this too calmly, I thought. We laugh at Trump’s insane utterings, or roll our eyes. Where is our outrage? How do we show it? Why aren’t we taking to the streets? What do I need to do to stand up NOW?
On this early morning when I can’t bury my head in daily life, I’m scared about what might come next. My thoughts skitter away from a book I’m reading about small town Germany during Hitler’s rise. How initially so much seemed slightly ridiculous–the pomp, the posturing, etc. And then later, it wasn’t. And by then, it was too late.
I’m scared that we’ll keep letting things slide until it’s too late. That we are relying on our democracy to hold fast. But our democratic system feels battered and bruised and severely undermined. Will it hold strong? If we ignore these small initial mad sparks, and don’t feed them oxygen, will they burn out? Or are we ignoring early sparks that could lead to out-of-control wildfires? It feels like the latter. It feels like we’re on the precipice of disaster. Especially at 1:15 am on a Thursday morning.
After spiraling for a while, I finally decide (in desperation) to change my neural channels by reading (not the historical fiction book I mentioned). I grab my Kindle, pull the covers up and over my head, and read. And read. And read. Until about 4:15 am. Then I sleep for about 15 more minutes before getting up for the day.
My notebook entries from that morning are dreamy and disjointed. And dark. I jotted down my Wordle guesses, as usual, to use as a word pool. When I write what I call a Wordle poem, I typically try to use all the words and keep them in order. This time I omitted one word (water) and shifted the order of the first two words.
My Wordle guesses: weary, wreak, waver, water, wafer
January 2025
Each day wreaks more havoc I am bone weary on the brink of this morning I waver watch the sun stutter then tip up and over the horizon a thin wafer of hope melting away into a bleak day
This month’s Inkling challenge was posed by Heidi Mordhorst. She invited us to revisit her multi-prompt Yuletide challenge from last year. After some waffling and general indecisiveness, I returned to the prompt “Appreciate a taken-for-granted part of your body.” As always, I wish I had more time to tinker, especially with the pacing (and the title…sigh! lol), but here it is in its current iteration:
My Skin
Back when it was young and taut and no hairs grew where they ought not, I wish I’d known to note skin’s glow its suppleness, its easy flow how it encompassed all of me, was neither creped nor wiggly.
Once long ago it held so firm, protecting me from sun and germ. Yet now it’s wrinkled on my hands a relief map of life’s demands, with rough terrain and darkened patches, gullies, gulches, deep crevasses. It waterfalls above my knees and dimples up beneath my sleeves. My skin, long unappreciated, evolved from smooth to corrugated.
Still finally I’ve seen the worth of this companion, mine since birth. This skin, a silent troubadour, with tales to tell of times before. Blue-hued scar above my knee reminds of past catastrophe. Age spots whisper sunny tales and eyes are framed by laughter’s gales. For fast as youth faded away skin journalled every passing day.
