When 1,600 Asylum-Seekers Were Sent to This US Town, They Were Welcomed With Housing and Open Arms
This Article Helps to Restore Faith in the World
6 Replies
Monthly Archives: September 2019
Herded
Herded
If only we could rectify his brash and wicked pen
and go back to the saner world where we once had been,
where “sincere” was still a virtue yearned for by the masses
and a scrappy tweeting fool was not supported by the asses
who vended us their guns to turn against each other,
and make an enemy of one who could have been a brother.
Perhaps it’s true that we can win the vote and turn the tide,
but how can we affect the greater danger that’s inside?
All the hate within us that this monster has unfurled—
can we tuck it back inside to restore a saner world?
It is the way of nature, this violence and feeding
one thing upon the other, our wild hearts still beating
beneath our higher consciousness. Which part of us is winning?
All our better virtues counterbalanced with our sinning?
The problem is when things are skewed and evil is called good,
meanness and shortsightedness labelled brotherhood.
“Make America Great Again” a usurped slogan used
to herd together masses who then can be abused.
All the bleating, senseless lambs led into the slaughter.
Every fearful parent serving up their son or daughter
so the plastic rivers and the hurricane-fed winds
can circumvent their livelihoods and bring about their ends.
Like the mighty dinosaurs, wiped out from this earth
to see what newer species might grow up in their dearth.
Are my words hyperbole? Do I just rant and rave?
Is there no world redeemable left for us to save?
Should we give up and gaze at made-up worlds within our palms?
Using films on telephones to soothe our fearful qualms?
Whose great plan do we follow? Are we so so deluded now
that we no longer have an inkling left in us of how
to see a broader kinder world where we care for each other,
seeing humans far and near as sister and as brother?
In this world of selfies and facebooking and tweeting,
of foolish men herded like sheep, blindfolded and bleating,
can we return to sanity, our world to save and mend
or will we continue to be led, stampeding to our end?
Please comb your conscience and then vote for a saner world!
Prompt words today are scrap, rectify, wicked, sincere and pen.
Oxalis: FOTD Sep 2, 2019
I found this shy little bloom while inspecting a plot of ground where I want to extend the sidewalk to enable easier access to the pool water shut-off valves at night. I found a flower that looks very close to it that was labeled “Shamrock Hong Kong Clover,” so until someone proves me wrong, that’s what I am labeling it. For Bob’s sake, I am revealing the shocking state of my manicure just to show the flower to scale. So lovely. I’ll transplant it before letting the bricklayers do their job. Well, I myself have proven myself wrong. It turns out those were just tags and the actual name of the flower is Oxalis!
For Cee’s FOTD
Will It Do Us Any Good to Vote????
Now that financial giants in the U.S. have staged a coup of our government, what will it take to escape this stranglehold if we can’t even count on being able to vote them out? Please read THIS NEWSWEEK REPORT about Mitch McConnell blocking voting machine reform after receiving campaign contributions from several different voting machine lobbyists. And, the likelihood that Russia has plans to affect voting machines during the next election. First the powers of free speech taken away re/ scientists being able to report on the climate crisis and protesters being able to protest the pipelines, now our right to a fair election challenged? What is it going to take for the majority to act????
Kitchen Queen
Kitchen Queen
Her souffles are a marvel and her cakes a work of art.
Every single thing she cooks, a product of her heart.
Her kitchen full of luscious smells and openness and levity,
every disaster solvable and noted for its brevity.
She surmounts each problem, opens every stubborn jar,
locates each ingredient, no matter how bizarre.
When she puts on her apron and dons her cooking cap,
she conquers national cuisines from all over the map.
Marinara and béchamel, curries and doro wats—
sauces from every culture simmer in her pots.
From kreplach to pot stickers, she has mastered each cuisine.
When it comes to ruling kitchens, our Dolly is the queen!
Go check out Dolly’s blog at koolkosherkitchen. She is presently telling wonderful stories about her grandmother and sharing her recipes as well. One of my favorite blogs.
Prompt words for today are marvel, surmount, bizarre, levity and map.
Sunday Trees, Sept. 1, 2019
For the Sunday Trees prompt.
Wallflowers: FOTD, Sept 1, 2019
Swift Retribution
Swift Retribution
Out of all who came to court her, she had picked him as the winner.
It was later, after the wedding, that she discovered he was a sinner.
He had planned her initiation to the gambling and the grog—
her debauchment, his ego told him, easy as falling off a log.
But she had not shown an interest in the wild life he preferred,
so though he vowed that with his marriage, his earlier vices had been cured,
his sporadic bad behavior had her climbing up the wall.
His raw language and deportment weren’t acceptable at all.
Like she hadn’t known his weakness, he did not know her power.
She was not a wife to follow nor a girl to cringe and cower.
When they married he had few prospects—not a nickel nor a dollar,
so when he came home one night with lipstick on his necktie and his collar,
she chose not to be tearful, nor to scream or make a threat.
She just threw him into the driveway sans the keys to his Corvette.
And as he hoofed it toward the highway, perhaps he felt his first regrets
as he learned that one who gambles always has to pay his debts.
Prompt words for the day are sporadic, raw, winner, initiation and log.
Photo by Zach Rowlandson on Unsplash, used with permission.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 