I showed the central part of this hibiscus yesterday and took this photo as well. Today it has already fallen. There will be a new one tomorrow.
For Cee’s FOTD
Curl Up and Die: FOTD Apr 15, 2022
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Author Archives: lifelessons
The Changeling
The Changeling
At heart I am a changeling, born of fairy stuff.
Reality and daily life simply are not enough.
I yearn for the forest, the valley or the ness.
The only place where I’m content is the wilderness.
And though siblings are rosy and love to laugh and shout,
frolicking like puppies as they roll about,
my skin is wan and pallid and I do not care to play,
keeping mortal company constantly at bay.
Faux parents can’t facilitate my raging appetite,
nor my predilection for the deepest night.
I was born of different stock, unsatisfied and mean,
preferring solitary life, untouched and pristine.
And though I petition that I be let alone,
those who come upon me, alas, are often prone
to try to draw me out, an act that I rebuff,
for I find myself to be company enough.
Somewhere in the forest, in a cavern or a tree,
I know that there resides the opposite of me,
living far away from the place where they were born,
dreaming of the family that they miss and mourn.
Two unhappy doppelgangers, always just off-mark.
One languishes in daylight, the other in the dark.
We stand before a funhouse mirror and without a doubt,
One is looking into it, the other looking out.
While somewhere in the vast lost world, parental arms are aching
for the child that long ago was of their dual making.
What evil force declared that both sets of parents should pine
for the natural-born child each yearns to claim as “mine?”
Those who seek disruption wander through our life,
seeking to take action that cuts us like a knife.
War and rape and pestilence, disorder and melee,
substituting one child and taking one away.
What more brutal action than this cruel deflection
that subverts two tiny lives, causing lifelong dejection?
The human-born and changeling, forced into different lives.
A honeybee and hornet forced into warring hives.
The changeling and the one replaced, both of them misplaced,
yearning from the life from which they’ve been displaced.
Who can blame their solitude, their yearning to be other?
Wanting to take one life and trade it for another?
Prompts for today are changeling, pristine, petition, facilitate and wilderness.
Note: A Changeling is a fairy that has been substituted for a human baby. While changelings can look like anyone, they do have a true form. Their natural look can be scary to some due to their lack of detail and distinctive features. Their skin tone is always pale, either white or light gray, and they tend to have slender bodies with limbs slightly longer in proportion to other humanoids.The surest way to tell if you have a Changeling on your hands is by observing the temperament of the human in question. Changelings are constantly unhappy, unfriendly, and mean. They may be very cold and aloof, and may even recoil from human touch. Changeling babies’ appetites are never satiated. They may develop nocturnal habits and are abnormally aware of paranormal activity. The mortal child is taken back to the realm of the fairies to be raised and put to work, while the creature left behind usually sickens and dies.
My Favorite Busker!!!
I didn’t think to ask this young woman’s name, but I very much enjoyed her performance at the Jardin Restaurant in the Ajijic (Mexico) Plaza. I pronounce her to be the Mexican Janis Joplin. See what you think. Click on the link below:
Altered Hibiscus: FOTD Apr 14, 2022
Hibiscus altered by LunaPic Art Filters plus “Original Color” and Mac Photos App. Looks a bit Van Gogh-ish now, I think.
For Cee’s FOTD
Nativity Diary for NaPoWriMo 2022, Day 14
Nativity Diary
I’m curled inside, so soft and warm,
protected in my creator’s corm.
Within, without, the pulse and throb
of leg on stomach, thrusting knob
of head against that source of light
down a channel smothering tight.
I will I must continue toward
that severance of birthing cord.
A final push, a hearty cry,
one eye open, a glimpse of sky.
Helping hands receiving me,
head and shoulder, thigh and knee.
The miracle of freedom from
such tight compression. My questing thumb.
Curled into that outer nest
that has been my nine-month quest.
Swathed in warmth, bright lights above,
I take great drafts of mother love.
She wills and I agree I will
drink until I’ve had my fill.
Pursing lips and searching tongue,
and then a healthy burst of lung.
I declare my presence here
to the whole world’s atmosphere.
The prompt for day 14 of NaPoWriMo was to write the opening scene of the movie of our life.
Image by Christine Bowen on Unsplash.
Moon Pie: NaPoWriMo 2022, Apr 13
Moon Pie
When the moon is full
and everything ripe on the vine
I must have pie
juicy running from the crisp crust
vanilla ice cream clouding its surface like clouds over the moon.
I bite into the piece like a slice of the moon..
like swiss cheese on apple pie.
slice of the moon.
moon pie.
The prompt for NaPoWriMo today is to write a poem that, like the example poem here, joyfully states that “Everything is Going to Be Amazing.” Sometimes, good fortune can seem impossibly distant, but even if you can’t drum up the enthusiasm to write yourself a riotous pep-talk, perhaps you can muse on the possibility of good things coming down the track. As they say, “the sun will come up tomorrow,” and if nothing else, this world offers us the persistent possibility of surprise. What cheers one up like a slice of moon pie?
Image by Deborah Rainford on Unsplash.
Feed the Birds (Art Challenge #6)
This art print of Antonio Lopez Vega inspired the piece above. She is feeding the birds and in turn they bring her a message in the beak of the bird to the left. Wheat from my father’s last harvest spills from the hand formed copper bowl from Santa Clara del Cobre. A copper plate holds a loaf of bread and a halved avocado. Copper leaf in the background surrounds the woman and completes the theme.
This is one of a number of my retablos still on view at the studio of Jesus Lopez Vega, at the junction of Rio Zula/Rio Brava and Ocampo, a half block south of Casa Linda Restaurant in Ajijic. Open M-F until April 30.
Zoe Meets Cousin Kirk
Please click on photos to enlarge.
Tummy rubs mean instant friendship.
I was sleeping so well when Mom woke me up at 3 a.m. to put me outside so she could go pick her cousin Kirk up at the airport in Guad. She put me outside in my “safe” zone and finally got home around 5 or 6 a.m. She introduced us and of course he became “mine” immediately. He tastes pretty good! She fed him (but not me.) She and Kirk were still pretty peppy even after 24 hours with no sleep, but not as peppy as I was. The first ten minutes Kirk was here, I made off with one of his heavy sneakers and made it to Mom’s room with it in record time. Here I am resting easily with Ollie at 11 this morning. I’m still sleeping at 1:30. I think Mom got two hours sleep if she was lucky. She’s lying in bed writing this post, but chances are she’ll be having a catnap in the hammock later today.
Deirdre of the Sorrows
Misnomer
Why so taciturn, my friend? Are there things that displease you?
If you’re amenable to chat, perhaps I could appease you.
When they named you Deirdre, what could have been the reason?
To give a child a moniker like this is surely treason.
They put it on the record the day that you were born
that you were predetermined with propensity to mourn.
What sort of security is this to give a child
otherwise unblemished—beautiful and mild?
Such a tragic future and so many doleful morrows
must greet a child named after Deirdre of the Sorrows.
Prompts today are security, amenable, taciturn, moniker and record.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 