Tag Archives: Daily Post

Approaching Seventy

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Approaching Seventy

Careful near the pool edge, careful down the stair.
“Hurry” is disaster’s brand new nom de guerre.
All the things that in the past you might easily dare
are potential dangers hanging in the air;
so don’t stand on a ladder, or even worse, a chair.
It’s different being single than when you were a pair,
for there is no one  with you to see how you might fare.
When coming from the pool, be sure the shoes you wear
do not slip upon the tile–this is your worst nightmare.
If your feet are wet and if they’re also bare,
when you plug in your curling rod, I hope that you take care.
Although I know you’ve always been nimble as a hare,
things all change with age. I say this ’cause I care.
Bones become more breakable and muscles tend to tear,
so please take proper care, dear, in your single lair.
At seventy those second chances tend to be more rare.

Today’s prompt word was “Careful.”

We Seem Meant to Argue

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Time for change?

We Seem Meant to Argue

We seem meant to argue, to disagree and fuss––
to call each other s.o.b.’s, to blather on and cuss.
Somehow the world needs movement––the hurricanes and tides.
In every situation, there must be clans or sides.
There is a natural movement toward the pack or cult or gang.
Each game needs an opponent, and every yin a yang.

It may be named a congregation, a party or a cause,
but still there will be discord. There always is, because
there is something within us that draws us towards division.
Every peace march draws its crowd screaming in derision.
Some force within the universe that knows the whole of it
has decreed that everything has its opposite.

So though we may crave unity and hope one day to coin
accord between the nations, and for hearts and minds to join,
the truth is that the universe is like a pendulum.
For every radical event, the opposite will come.
if we just wait long enough, it will be peace’s turn,
but in the meantime hate will pillage, conquer, rape and burn
.
We would have it otherwise, but hope won’t make it so.
We may unite in nations, but we’ll still go toe to toe:
nation versus nation, like street gangs in a rumble.
The most sincere peace accord eventually will crumble.
Mere wishing will not bring on peace, but we can make a start
simply by appealing to that attitude of heart

that chooses to forget and start that upward swing
that can pull the whole world with it as it takes to wing.
The answer to the hatred is to start out one-by-one
to try to make the choices to set discord on the run.
To choose the dark sides of ourself is an act of treason.
We must conquer our own petty hates and choose to live by reason.

Today’s prompt is “Argument.”

Borders

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Borders are what divide us, but are also where we meet.

 

The prompt word today was “Border.”

Below

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img_4451Tree roots usually grow to three times the diameter of the branch spread, only half of which lie underneath the trunk and canopy.   jdb photo

Below

Rising above, magnificent,
a tree is surely heaven sent.
Giving shelter, shade and beauty,
as though each function were its duty.
Squirrels on branches, falling leaves
caught up by the roofs and eaves.

With moss for hair and bark for sleeves,
and vast foundation that now heaves
the sidewalks up and breaks the earth
as roots grow in length and girth,
imagine it spread far below
what we see and what we know.

Under the driveway, house and street.
Under the car. Under your feet.
As branches spread, so grows the root.
And through its branches, far underfoot,
tunnel earthworms, spiders, voles,
shrews and woodchucks, ants and moles.

For gourmands, sights of trees evoke
thoughts of truffles on roots of oak.
All things have lives both seen and hidden
as they do what nature has bidden.
Cicadas burrowing and feeding,
all this wildlife living, breeding.

Our lives are richer whenever we
are shaded by a massive tree
or see its branches iced with snow,
but we do not see what lies below.
White oaks, walnuts, hickories—
all have creatures such as these

living their lives underground
in the solace they have found
curled up in their slumbering coils
or ventilating root-twined soils.
So, as you come and as you go,
surveying all you’ve come to know—

leaf shadows and the curl of moss,
the branches’ harmonies and  toss
of snowflakes as wind stirs their snow,
please also think of what’s below,
far beneath the branches of
every tree we’ve grown to love.

The prompt today is Tree.

Daring-do

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Daring-do

Once from our comfort we are torn—
from the first moment we are born—
we’re put into this world to do,
to suckle, gurgle, bill and coo,
then to stand and tie a shoe.
To participate, and not just view.

From a broomstick with horse’s head,
we go on to bust a bronc instead.
Playing drums or clarinets,
clicking heels or castinets,
from paper airplanes to flying jets,
doing’s as good as living gets.

We start out small and then get bigger.
Vine pod boats grow sails and rigger
to sail the world and tell the tales
of seas like glass, whirlpools and gales.
Each time you try out something new,
it brings more world inside of you.

Some things work out, others we rue,
but still it’s better to try and do
than put ourselves up on our shelves
and simply analyze ourselves.
Daring-do beats daring-don’t,
for life consists of “will,” not “won’t.”

 

The prompt word today was “Daring.”

Spending Time

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Spending Time

What do you value most, my friend? What carries you through life?
Have you friends and children? A husband or a wife?
If what we find of value in all the world contains
all we carry with us when youth and vigor wanes,
would you choose a portrait of all that you have had
that points your view toward happier times as the world turns sad,
or would you choose a camera that points you at the world––
all these younger lives than yours, about to come unfurled?
Whatever gives us life at first, then takes it all away
really only gives us what we have today
to value and make use of. So I want to be bolder,
looking straight ahead of me and not over my shoulder.
Though every hour has value, and every second in it,
the only time we have to spend is the coming minute.

The prompt word today is “value.”

A Passing Grace

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“Graceful” is today’s prompt word.

A Passing Grace

Where is the grace in our swift world?
Does it lie hidden, obscurely curled
In younger limb or nimbler spine,
in movement smooth and gesture fine?
As I pondered over this,
I started to feel hunger’s hiss,
so fed the dogs their morning meat,
then turned my mind to what I’d eat.

I piled my bowl with bran and berries
and when it came to choice of dairies?
Ice cream if I must be truthful.
(My eating habits, at least, are youthful.)
I headed for the dining room
and then—a crash and solid boom
as I went down with flail and swish,
having stepped in Frida’s dish.

I landed flat—leg, arm and head.
As for the bowl? The bowl is dead.
As it exploded in dust and shard,
berries, cream and bran hit hard
and efficiently dispersed themselves
o’er floor and cabinets and shelves
as I lay moaning on the floor
with swelling ankle and what’s more—

a skinned up arm and throbbing knee—
bemoaning what was wrong with me.
Where is the grace in our swift world?
Does it lie hidden, obscurely curled
In younger limb—or nimbler spine?
It’s clear it is not lodged in mine!
For whatever other talents I’ve got,
when it comes to “graceful,” I am not.

Here are the graceful creatures I had intended to write about:

 

 

Just Testing

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Bloggers know this, but today I’m just reminding us all that best friends need not always be close at hand or even living in the same country. I’m leaving in a few hours to fly back to Mexico. My bags are packed and for the first time, although they are stuffed to the zippers, I’m leaving the U.S. with the same number of bags with which I left Mexico. What I’m not taking back with me are all the close friends and relatives who have made the rigors of traveling worth it. Prime among them is someone you’ve gotten to know a bit during these last few weeks of my trip. A bit of an agoraphobe, he has nonetheless not only paid host to me in his home but has also driven me through six states to visit other loved ones. I release him now, back to his computer and the grass that I am sure he’ll be mowing tomorrow.  Oh, and to Little Duck, for whom he has sole custody, while I merely have visiting rights. Although he goes by the name of okcforgottenman on his blog, he is far from forgotten.


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Just Testing

If I were to choose from all the rest,
you are the one who’d ace the test.
You left your warm and comfy nest
to drive around at my behest.
I do not say it often, lest
you come to see me as a pest,
but though we tease and joke and jest,
you are the one I love the best.

 

The prompt word today was “test.”

Facebook Sourpuss

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Facebook Sourpuss

Most social network intercourse
has wholesale flattery at its source.
We put our data in their places—
our successes and our faces—
then have a moment of probation
waiting for the approbation
to come flooding back in force,
most of it as praise, of course.

Back and forth the discourse goes.
Pro or con, the talking  flows.
And in the main, the battery
of interchanges is flattery.
And the flaw in any compliment
is that it is only lent.
Whatever charm its giver may lack,
you’re expected  to give it back!

Disclaimer:

(The prompt today was “Disagree,”
and of course, this narrator isn’t me.
I just made up this ornery cuss
who sits alone and judges us!)

Curiosity

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Curiosity

As long as life remains unfinished,
my interest survives undiminished.

The prompt word today was “Unfinished.”

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