Monthly Archives: February 2023

Centering: FOTD. 02, 23, 2023

 

This Gerbera Daisy was just one of an incredible bouquet of flowers brought to me by new friends. You’ll see the rest later.

For Cee’s FOTD

Musical Intercession

Musical Intercession

If I delete the news from home and flip all my attention
to aspects of the world escaping major media’s mention—
consign my concentration to birdsong and the tide
that washes out world sorrows that I bear inside
and fills me with the opposite of what the news exports—
that awareness of perfection that is what nature reports—
my life becomes more peaceful as my mind is set at ease
by nature’s lullaby sung to the music of the bees.

 

Prompts today are delete, home, flip, consign, opposite, birdsong.

More Prairie Verbena: FOTD Feb 22, 2023

I love this subtle little flower that likes to grow where it is hardest to do so. Thanks, Sam, for identifying it for me.

For Cee’s FOTD.  See her pretty blue daisy HERE.

Kiss and Tell

IMG_3601

                   “How quick come the reasons for approving what we like.” – Jane Austen

Kiss and Tell

How did you make your way into my heart?
Quick, tell the answer before we next part.
Come into my comfort, then comfort me back.
The way of the pair beats the way of the pack.
Reasons are given for all that we do—
For the ways that we love and the ways that we woo.
Approving my actions in loving you is
What wins you my love and wins you this kiss.
We swear to each other that we will be true
Like all the lovers in storybooks do.

Like brides and their bridegrooms and lieges and kings,
We shall swear our obeisance and seal it with rings.
What others have done is what we will do.
Approving tradition will make one of two.
For the rest of our lives, if they revile and chide us,
Reason’s just one of the things that will guide us.
The love we keep strong will keep us together.
Come be my steed, and I’ll be thy tether.
Quick, take my hand and give me thy pledge.
How we’ll kiss in the meadow and roll in the sedge.

For dVerse Poets
This is actually a poem I wrote 8 years ago, inspired by a line of Jane Austen’s. Read the first word in each of my lines to see her line, first forward and then backwards.

and HERE is the prompt, if you’d like to kiss and tell yourself.

Fat Tuesday, San Juan Cosala, Mexico, Feb. 21, 2023

Men and Boys dressed up as women and girls, bushels of flour flung through the air. Must be Fat Tuesday! I’d brushed myself off before these photos were taken. More surprises awaited when I disrobed to shower, however!  I could have baked a loaf of bread!!!

Pull Up A Chair, Feb 21, 2023

For the Pull up a Seat Challenge.

Click on photos to enlarge.

A Cautionary Tale

A Cautionary Tale

I’m held spellbound by your plan. It is ingenious for sure.
You might be a benefactor and your motives may be pure,
but still you are a diplomat and know your way around
all of the maneuverings that daily may be found

in politics and daily life and so I wonder why
the minute that I said I’d sell, you made an offer to buy.
Is it, as you say, because you know I need the cash,
or are your motives otherwise and have I been too rash

in leaping at your offer? Perhaps I’ll look around
and see if there’s a better deal waiting to be found.
Conspiracies are floating ’round. I hear there is an air full.
In politics and real estate, you cannot be too careful.

 

Prompt words today are spellbound, why, benefactor, ingenious, diplomatic. Image by Maria Lin Kim Luhn on Unsplash

Kalanchoe: FOTD Feb 21, 2023

These look a bit like wallpaper or an image from an oilcloth tablecloth, but the photo was taken in my front yard.

For Cee’s FOTD

Sculptress

Sculptress

The lady cuts a slab of stone
and in the twilight, works alone.
Attempts to carve and chip and sand
with a sure and steady hand
interpretations of her heart
as she tears the stone apart.

She gauges well, and when it’s split,
she finds that she’s well pleased with it.
One heart of stone broken in two
is what she gives the world to view.
The rock has done what she has bidden:
revealed the heartbreak she has hidden.

 

 

Prompt words today are twilight, attempt, gauge, interpret, slab and lady.

February Bouquet: FOTD Feb 20, 2023

For Cee’s FOTD