Author Archives: lifelessons

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About lifelessons

My blog, which started out to be about overcoming grief, quickly grew into a blog about celebrating life. I post daily: poems, photographs, essays or stories. I've lived in countries all around the globe but have finally come to rest in Mexico, where I've lived since 2001. My books may be found on Amazon in Kindle and print format, my art in local Ajijic galleries. Hope to see you at my blog.

Looking Out, Looking In

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Version 2(Click on first photo and arrows to view enlarged gallery.)

Looking Out, Looking In

Folks look in my window every hour every day
when they view my photographs or what I have to say.
It isn’t that I have a need to publicize or flout.
They are just a way to let a part of myself out.

When I’m outside the room of me, looking here and there,
it’s like I am a voyeur. I pry and prod and stare.
The window might steam over, obscuring what I see.
Then I wipe it clear again to see what I might be.

I really just write what I see as I’m peering in.
Each failure and each triumph, each kindness and each sin.
Each interior arrangement has some ugliness, some beauties.
I hold inside life’s pleasures, her sadness and her duties.

Each poem that I’ve written—be it whisper, be it shout––
is a way for me to let a part of myself out.
And if you choose to view them and see where I have been,
You’re standing at my window with permission to look in.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/window/

Primavera in Bloom: A Flower a Day 3-20-16

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Today, the park along the Ajijic malecon  was  full of activity, people, birds, Micheladas and these beautiful Primavera trees in bloom. More about the people later. It is 4:15 a.m. and the LOUD Music half a block away above me has finally stopped.  Yes, it kept me awake but it sounded like a huge family party.  Everyone was singing along with the music and having a wonderful time.  During Semana Santa, the week leading up to Easter, we can expect more and more people to flood into town and more and more loud celebrations.

Happy Spring!!!

(Click on first photo and then arrows to enlarge and display all photos.)

 

http://ceenphotography.com/2016/03/19/flower-of-the-day-march-20-2016-color-your-world-challenge-purple-pizzazz/

Carrot Attack

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It is 1:15 in the morning and somewhere down the block there is a very loud party going on––lots of singing along with loud sound systems and girls screaming. Dan’s watching Bill Maher on his notebook in the sala, Maggie’s gone to bed upstairs, Rhonda’s gone to bed downstairs and I’m cracking the crop over these photos I took earlier tonight that you will soon see below.

For months, I’ve been wanting to try out one of Leland’s scratch recipes that he posts weekly on his blog. Unfortunately, I always lack at least two of the ingredients; but the fact that I have an excellent baker visiting just now caused me to get organized enough to have butter, eggs, baking powder, flour, oranges, carrots and powdered sugar all in my house at the same time. The result is that Rhonda baked Leland’s carrot cookies and then taste-tested them with the help of Dan, Maggie and me. Here are the results:

(Click on first picture to enlarge all photos, then on arrows to view gallery.)

The Neighborhood–A Flower a Day, Mar 19, 2016

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The most wonderful thing about bougainvilleas is often their surroundings.  They can obscure faults, serve as security and also as home to many creatures: possums, lizards, iguanas and my own cat.  Here are some beautiful places that bougainvilleas exist in La Manzanilla:

(Click on first photo, then on arrows to enlarge and view photos.)

http://ceenphotography.com/2016/03/18/flower-of-the-day-march-19-2016-magnolia-tree/

Found Poetry I

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Now that I’m hooked again on “found art” I decided to fantasize about finding shards of poetry along with the objects I find along the way.  This one is silly, and came, somehow, from the WordPress daily prompt “dirt.”

(Click on first picture and arrow to enlarge both photos.)

 

Thirst

(This poem found fastened to a pail
by a spigot on a desert trail.)

When he retired, he bought a yacht
to go and see the things he’d not
seen those years when he’d been caught
behind a desk, perusing naught.

Sailing for years under the mast,
his fishing line he cast and cast––
happier than in the past,
roving over oceans vast.

But when he’d perused all that he
could see of oceans and of sea,
he yearned to visit family
to see once more dirt, hill and tree.

He visited his daughter Sue
to try to see what they could do
their former closeness to renew
while walking out to see the view.

As the day got hot and hotter,
this roving nomad and his daughter
began to reel, began to totter
as they searched for signs of water.

And when they saw the faintest traces,
they quickly livened up their paces,
and falling flat upon their faces,
they drank and drank at the oasis.

The moral of this little tale?
If you choose to furl your sail
to wander over hill and dale,
carry some water in a pail.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/dirty/

Purple Percussion

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IMG_2312

 

http://jennifernicholewells.com/2016/03/18/color-your-world-purple-mountains-majesty/

Cornered

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Cornered

When on some strange and lonely night
the choice is whether to take flight
or stand and face off for a fight,
I hope your soul turns still and white
and that you gather strength and might

to try to find that inner light
and conquer elements of fright.
Muster all your inner sight
and draw you to your furthest height.
All your inner truths recite.

Feel the solution’s tender bite,
your inner armies to incite.
Cast off the threat that holds you tight,
and lift off, soaring like a kite––
free once more for life’s delight.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/fight/

Beach Combing

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IMG_3577“Beach Sunset” bone, shell, wood, coral, sponge, beach scrub and acrylic paint, 3.5 x 11 inches, Mixed media assemblage by Judy Dykstra-Brown, March, 2016

Beach Combing

I gave nothing to the sea, so she gave nothing back.
It was as though she looked and thought, “There’s nothing that you lack.”
It’s true that I have all I need of food and friends and fun,
and yet I still lack something that’s waiting to be won.

It isn’t gained by medals, by prizes or by fame,
for it is some other thing, bereft of rank or name.
There is some magic in the world that I go looking for
that has no set place where it lives, no windowpanes or door.

I’ve found it once or twice before, in places far afield
by accident, for if you try to force it, it won’t yield.
It isn’t found at parties, a fiesta nor a fete.
If you go looking for it, the magic will abate.

It’s found in how you do things, in what manner, at what pace.
If you reach too quickly, it will vanish with no trace.
I can’t tell you how to gain it, for I fear that I don’t know.
I just know that when I found it was when I was going slow.

Bougainvillea Shadows: A Flower a Day, March 17, 2015

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Carried away by its more flashy parts, sometimes we overlook the subtleties of nature.  I found these shadow shots of bougainvilleas to be as intriguing as the flowers themselves.

(CLICK on first picture, then on arrows to increase size and view entire gallery.)

 

SELF ON A SHELF

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SELF ON A SHELF

P3310265 - Version 2

 

On my soul like a shelf
sits my own self
small as an elf
all by itself.

These four lines have popped up in my mind at various times in my life, but they are unpinned to any further memory.  Where did I read them?  Perhaps in a poetry anthology used when I last taught poetry 35 years ago, or perhaps in college. Google fails me and I can’t find its author.  I try various portions of the poem, but still, no cigar.  Google takes the poem apart and shows me dozens of posts that contain all these words,but none where they are stuck together in order.

Finally, in an article from Southern Review, I find a piece by John Montague that references his last communication from Theodore Roethke, but it seems that once again my memory has failed me, for his version is:

In a hand like a bowl
Danced my own soul,
Small as an elf,
All by itself.

Since my favorite college writing professor was a student of Roethke’s, it makes sense that this is why I remember these lines and that it was Roethke who wrote them; but since Montague describes the lines as “Blakesian,” I have to make sure that Roethke wasn’t just quoting William Blake.  I feed the correct lines into Google and finally, win success.  They are the opening lines of the poem “Restored” written by Theodore Roethke!

So, the first two lines are my own, the second two Roethke’s–a sort of nonofficial collaboration that actually makes me think more than the original.  Could “the soul” actually be our real authentic self and the rest of us just experimentation?  If there is a ruling hand in the universe, is it playing games with us–sending us out lifetime after lifetime to see how we’ll do in various situations? Like cans of Campbell’s soup lined up on a shelf, our present life is merely the flavor of the day.  Another reincarnation, another flavor.

As I grow older,  I increasingly think of life as a game–the entire universe the amusement park of a colossal mind keeping itself entertained. If we call that mind God and profess that he sees even the smallest sparrow fall, it is a testament to both the intricacy and the incredible efficiency of that mind and the interconnectedness of nature as the organizational structure by which he keeps it all straight.

 
https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/shelf/