Mainely Write

It was a sad day yesterday.  My Mac has been shutting down randomly for the past few weeks.  I've tried figuring out what I had open when it would happen.  Finally, reading the crash reports and watching my usage, I determined it had something to do with my graphics card perhaps, as iPhoto and websites seemed to aggravate it. I took it in to a Genius at Apple (where my husband and I worked for a couple of years), told him my computer's symptoms, and he said it was probably the video card.  To confirm it, he plugged it in and ran a test on it.  Suddenly, the screen flashed a huge FAILED from one side of the screen to the other. There was nothing that could be done, short of a video card transplant.  So it has been sent in to the Apple Hospital to receive a new internal organ.  It will be back home in a few days.  Today I am working on my husband's old Mac.  I was going to just go without and maybe do laundry and clean the bedroom...but then I decided, nah!  Starbucks, a

For Poetry Jam today... Was going to write a light verse about something broken, but that was not to be. Broken Vessel For many years I did not know You were broken, Though there were signs I did not see - Small vague tokens. Some days I poured and you filled up - No drop was spilled; But other times hot liquid flowed And flesh was killed. Still I went on not knowing why, But being gloved In case of scalding steamy spew; Yet you were loved. One day I felt the growing crack, No slight fissure; Invisible until the break From the pressure. With broken pieces in my hands I’ll still hold you, But there is nothing I can do - I have no glue. ©Donna JT Smith, 2014, all rights reserved My poetry book..."have to put up" my link or preview each day this week...then you will not "have to put up" with it except on the side bar!   Available through Blurb and Amazon, soft cover, hard cover, pdf and an iBook!  Here's a small preview:

Haven't written a slice in a long time it seems.  The slices of my life are just piling up like firewood stacked for winter.  Let's take a log off and toss it in the fire.  See how it catches fire... Sunday was my birthday.  yea. But, the good thing was, I determined to have a book in print before my birthday, and I did.  Two days before my birthday, I uploaded my book of fall poems to Blurb (and a version to Amazon). Yea! You can find "The Fall of the Leaves of Fall" here.   My previous post has a preview if you go back to Saturday.... Then, today (it is Monday night as I write this), my husband took me out for an early breakfast and a photography date with our digital SLR's...anywhere I wanted to go...anywhere I wanted to stop!  I had a blast!  I think he did, too...but it was all about ME. I got some pretty good shots of ocean, trees, red berries, grasses and such.  I'm hoping it will be seed for new poems and writings.  Haven't "develop

I finally did it!  I set my mind to it this week to complete one project and push the submit button - and I DID it!!  It is an independent...but I think it is still a pretty awesome thing to have a book that people can actually own that I wrote!  It has 14 poems of fall and photos that I have taken in Maine...mostly around my coastal home (though there is no ocean in this one...some other day I'll compile that one).  Some of the poems have been on this blog, some have been on the blog in a little different form since I revised many, and some are new for this book. Here are a few pages from my new - and first - poetry book, "The Fall of the Leaves of Fall", offered in full color on Blurb.  My iBook is available currently, but I am trying to get a formating issue sorted out - something that happened on their end and didn't show up in any previews.  So I'll post that when it gets settled! The Fall of the Leaves of Fall by Donna

At Poetry Jam the prompt is to write about a favorite game or something you played as a child.  Well, here it is: My bike was my horse, Old Daisy her name, A blue Schwinn with bell With manners quite tame, I rode her up hill And then rode her down, All over the country, Almost into town. She didn’t eat oats, She didn’t like hay; And when offered them She’d always say “Nay!” Daisy liked to be brushed Until her coat glistened And when I would whisper My steed always listened. I yearned for a horse But my parents were set; A blue Schwinn named Daisy Was all I could get. So Old Daisy and I Rode off in the sun, With me pedaling fast To get her to run. Old Daisy's at rest now Where old bike-horses sleep, Her rusty, bent horse shoes In some scrap metal heap. ©Donna JT Smith, all rights reserved

My emaze experiment in poetry is up to share  for Poetry Friday , hosted this week at "Today's Little Ditty" by Michelle Barnes.  Taking inspiration from Margaret Simon at "Reflections on the Teche" , where she posted students' zenos on an emaze, I decided to try out emaze, too.   (Writing some zenos will probably be the next challenge...) I have been working this week on writing kind of spontaneously about fall and leaves as I take pictures and use the emaze site.  I used some of their sample titles on the templates, sometimes as they wrote it and sometimes adapted, as a starter to a poem about fall.  The titles really didn't refer literally to fall on the presentation, but they lent themselves to inspiration quite well.  I think I've left time enough for reading before it goes automatically to the next slide.  If it's too much time, just click on the arrow to go at your own speed. The text is kind of small reading it on the page, though, s

At Poetry Jam today the prompt is to write about a graveyard.  Like many other people, I've always loved looking at headstones.  I enjoy finding members of my family, but I also like looking at other old headstones and reading their stories.  The older ones were so much more interesting than the "name and number" on the newer ones.  Anyway...I don't have much time today.  Stuff to do.  So, here's what I came up with this morning.  Looking forward to reading others  tomorrow! R.I.P Lying next to Hester There is Reverend Brown With their youngest daughter Who was sadly drowned. Neath the maple, John Dean and his wives, all eight, In the shade are resting Dates on every slate. Mary Jo and Edmund married early on; Sixty years together, Ninety they've been gone. Sickness took the Maynards; Ocean swallowed ten, All of them a’fishing, Never seen again. Bodies in the dust bin Back to soil from soil But now comes the question Where will each sou

Today is Poetry Friday hosted by Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect !  And for the event I have A Little Something I Just Had to Try... Laura Purdie Salas has a 15 Word Thursday to write to a picture in 15 words or less.  There were some really awesome lines in the offerings, and they got me excited about writing a "found poem" using lines from those poems - excluding my own, which is here: old spruce draws close her counterpane in autumn’s wane she knows the cold to come (The image looked to me as if the spruce was gathering leaves to cover herself from the coming winter…) I took lines from the poets posting Thursday on Laura's page.  Go there to see the original posts/poems.  See if you can match up the lines to the poets! a maple leaf sky this morning in Maine... Two Worlds Squirrels, splashing energy - Bits of gold and green -
 Kicking leaves
; Amid the clutter
 Crackling under feet
, The cold is snapping! 
Orange-gold leaf kites


Today at Poetry Jam , the challenge is to "write a 'If I were' poem. Feel free to be whoever or whatever you’d like to be. What would you do? How would you feel?" Did You Ever Feel Like Dirt?  i am the salt the dust brought back the ashes returned deep i am giving life accepting death hands sift roots permeate rocks tumble and crumble becoming grower and salter and duster ashes of all the world i am ©Donna JT Smith

It’s never really magic. Magic? Someday the Magic will be revealed When all the volumes become unsealed And we will then know the reasons why And know the height and the breadth of sky Someday the Magic will be revealed The everlasting then unconcealed My eyes beholding, I’ll gasp for breath But in that Magic there is no death Someday the Magic will be revealed My guilt, the sentence are all repealed The day will dawn and atop the mount I’ll drink from Heaven’s eternal Fount. Someday the Magic will be revealed - Our praise to Whom we have long appealed. ©Donna JT Smith, all rights reserved For more poetic interpretations of magic this week, visit Poetry Jam .