Edna St. Vincent Millay

No poem from me here today (I know. Strange, huh?), but if you must read one and you haven't yet, Monday's post, has my poem, Pulse, and a photo - I don't think it was too widely read.  Please bear with me if I haven't been to your site in a bit to comment.  Life is like a rushing wind around me.  When the wind settles to a breeze, I will have more time and energy.  But this week, I promise to reply to all who comment here or on Monday's post...even if I don't get dishes done!

This week we took a trip up to Camden, and drove up to the top of the "mountain".  Mountain is in quotes because we don't have mountains like other people have mountains.  Ours are considerably smaller for the most part.  But when you mostly see sea and forest for rest...well, we make mountains out of molehills.  But still, those molehills are pretty high up and beautiful.


Mt. Battie at Camden State Park has a stunning view of Camden's harbor.  If you are ever up in Maine it is worth a stop to either hike or drive to the top.

At the summit there is a tower, and a plaque honoring Edna St. Vincent Millay (more info here), who was born in Rockland, Maine and often came to nearby Camden. 

All I could see from where I stood

Was three long mountains and a wood;

I turned and looked another way,

And saw three islands in a bay.

So with my eyes I traced the line

Of the horizon, thin and fine,

Straight around till I was come

Back to where I'd started from;

And all I saw from where I stood

Was three long mountains and a wood.

by Edna St.Vincent Millay

The poem in its entirety may be read here.

For more poetry today, go to Carol at Carol's Corner and check out the links!

A Late Thought

I was thinking as I was lying in bed.  Now I can't even remember if it was before I fell asleep, or upon waking up too early.  But I guess it doesn't matter.  I got up and wrote down a couple of lines.  I did not do what I usually do, which is think to myself that I will certainly remember THAT thought.   When I finally got up for the day, I remembered I had written something, but had no idea what it was.  So, good.  I would not have remembered my thought in the morning without writing it down.  And I had been smart to just get up and jot it down.  The next step in outsmarting myself will be to have a pad of paper, pencil and flashlight...or an iPad that is still turned on and set beside me.  I am beginning to know myself and my limitations - you would have thought that would have happened years ago.  I still have to remember that I am like that though, for I will argue with myself about how I will surely remember THIS latest and greatest thing.  Then I don't write that something down, but reassure myself that I have that nugget tucked away safely for remembering.  And I never do remember it.

But I wrote this one down - sometime when it was still dark this week.  I left these lines on a document page on my computer:


Waves of the ocean,
Strong pulses of life
Breathe over the sand

And I'm going to think about it now and write more... because I remembered to write it down, and it must mean something to me.

Okay, finished.

Pulse

Waves of the ocean,
Strong pulses of life
Breathe over the sand
Renewing, embuing
These small grains of land;
And I hum to myself
With a small roar inside,
A thrum that refuses,
To quell the great tide;
The salt of my tears
And dried whispers on breeze
Soon bring me to
Fall on my trembling knees.

Oh, there’s strength in
The falling,
There’s power in tears,
There’s hope in the
Squalling of gulls
Without fears,

And cormorants plummeting,
Seals sliding to depths

 All to be fed
Of oceans great wealths;

And I sit here still,
Shiftless, sifting with hand
Where the pulse of my life
Is renewed in its sand.

by Donna JT Smith, © June 25, 2018

Colorful

It is Poetry Friday, and though I am a little late posting, I'm very happy to be here!  There's nothing like a bit of poetry to liven up the day.  So after spending a little time here, pop on over to check out more links to poetry at Michelle Kogan's!  (Oh, my word... I forgot to link and here it is just after 4:30 pm... I got distracted in the middle of it!)

Here is a rosa rugosa (beach rose) from in front of our home (near the beach).  I am in love with this rose.  It is the best smelling rose around.  Every time we enter or exit the house - almost all summer - we are greeted by their sweetness.

I have taken many pictures of them, and painted them a few times.  I'm hoping to get better at it!  They are so delicate and fairly glow in the sun!  It is hard for me to capture their essence.  I ALWAYS overdo them!
See... it's not even close.

I'm going to do it right one of these days!

Today, I am sharing a photo I took, and a true thought story poem.  Did you ever have this "wonder", I wonder?

Colorful

I remember
wondering
about colors,
wishing
I could
spy a new color.
Fluorescents
came into fashion,
and new crayon
names appeared…
I thought,
“Ah-ha!
I’ve never seen
these colors!”
But now I know
they have always
been there;
just waiting for me
to look more
closely.

by Donna JT Smith ©2018

Unbroken

Kiesha Shepard at Whispers from the Ridge has our Poetry Friday links today.
Have a beautiful summer day sometime this week!  Looks like rain instead of sun here today! (Whoops!  Sun just peeked through the leaves in the back yard!  Maybe it's a bike day after all!)

Unbroken

"I’m broke,” she said,
And laid in bed.
"I’m sick,” she lied,
And then she cried.

“I can’t do that!

I won’t do this!

Just go away,
And bring back bliss!”

Then as she tumbled
To the floor
And crawled along
To find the door,

She noticed she
Was on her knees,
And knew that someone
Heard her pleas,

Where all along
She should have been
To see her world
Brought right again.

Her smallness, frailties
Magnified,
Her being so
Undignified

Reminded her that
There’s a force,
A power of
Unending source.

And tapping that
She rose to see
That all was as
It’s meant to be.

No more broken,
No more sick,
No more lies
There is no trick.

“You’re right, you cannot
Do it all
But neither do you
Need to fall.
For there’s a light
And there’s a hand
To help you fight
To help you stand.”

“I’m broke,” she whispered,
“Help me mend.”
“I’m sick,” she murmured,
“But I’ll attend.”

She grasped the light
And saw much more;
She held the hand
To cross the floor,

And all her worries,
All she feared
Dissolved at once
And disappeared.

Once again
The sky was bright
And even stars
Came out at night.

by Donna JT Smith, June 8, 2018

Two more of my poems at GetSparked "Up on the Roof" and "Full Cold Moon".

Thanks, Tabatha!  After reading your comment, I went surfing and found this one, too...enjoy!

First Spiritual Thursday

This is the first Thursday in June, so the Spiritual Journey Thursday gang meets to think about a variety of topics and how it affects their spiritual life.  This month's topic is Summer.  I tried thinking about this a few times over the past week and a half and nothing really came together in my brain well.  I didn't seem to get a lot of minutes all in one sitting to really meditate upon the theme.  Then I looked up Bible verses with summer in them.  And that is when I began to be able to focus better.

Summer is a promise from God.
Genesis 8:22  While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.

This constancy is promised.  We can count on the cycles of seasons and day and night and that summer will return in an orderly fashion.  We don’t get tricked into spring turning to winter, and then autumn leading into summer.  There are not days without a night between (though at the poles they might be a bit shorter or longer than on other places on Earth…).  God gave us the promise of summer as part of a cycle for as long as the earth keeps spinning and rotating around the sun.

Of the four seasons, summer seems to me to be the one that most resembles Heaven....perpetual summer...though without the humidity, of course.  As beautiful looking as winter can be, it is not “heavenly” or “heaven-sent” to me.  It’s a dormant, cold time, when most things at least appear to be dead... unless you like skiing or other winter sports...
Spring is new birth, and autumn is the harvest before the cold, dormant dead of winter sets in.  Summer is the realized potential of all living things -  which seems heaven-like.  Everything is awake, grown or growing, green or greening, and flourishing.

Summer is our promise,
and our warning to harvest and prepare for the promised winter.

Summer

When the butterflies

fly home,
And moths
no longer roam,
Snowflakes spritely 

take their place

upon my face.
Memories of warm

sun spun

as lace
I hold dear today.

For soon I fear

the silvered sands
of beach

between my toes

will slip away
And ocean’s white-capped
waves

will be replaced 

with towering drifts -

the rift between
Summer’s reason
and
Winter’s treason.
As waves sift footprints
from the sand,
So may the sun

release iced land.

And someday I will

come to know

The endlessness of

 summer's glow.

by Donna JT Smith, 2018

Check out the links at Margaret Simon's Reflections on the Teche for more Summer postings. 

It is Friday...It is June...It is a Blessing

A bit of respite in May

Over the past month... and a bit more... we have had one crisis after another to fill our plates.  They have not sunk us.  They have not taken our joy.  But they have taken great amounts of time, energy,  and prayer.  And I have joked that I need a big platter instead of a plate to hold my portion.  But then I set my plate down, opting not to hold onto it.

I think May deserves a poem to celebrate its ending, its tenacity and its victories.

May Be June

We were clearly tempest tossed
well before May had begun

But as patterns crissed and crossed 
there were signs of more to come.

We smiled despite the cost
as we set our course to run.

Till races nearly lost,
instead turned races won.

Now June arrives all glossed
and we're ready for the sun.

Can May's near-holocaust
be traded for some fun?


by Donna JT Smith - June 1, 2018


Reason to Celebrate

Celebrate!
May was great -
Great with trials
and tribulations.

Celebrate!
Cannot wait -
Wait for hints
of revelations.

Celebrate!
Why that day?
Day requires 
deep inhalations.

Celebrate!
In the end,
End rewards
all faithful patience.

by Donna JT Smith, 2018


Not a masterpiece...
but a poem that sums up May for me.

No, two poems for May.  It deserved at least two.

I am not going into the details of all the piles of garbage - but suffice it to say our daughter walked away with only minor injuries after her car struck a tree head-on, totaling it.  And that was a total blessing, setting the perspective straight on all of the rest.

I have not written a posted since May 5th.  I have written a little since then... poems, but for other stuff...it's been hard to focus on writing, though it certainly was a full month for thoughts, just no time to write them.
GetSparked 37 is underway, and I submitted two inspiration pieces - one poem and one art piece to my exchange partner.  Since May 23 I have worked on 2 pieces: one a watercolor and one a poem as responses to my partner's inspiration pieces I received.
I actually completed two poems for her image.  The first one I completed, then decided to keep it instead of publishing it online.  So I had to create another one.  My second one was a bit fanciful and literal, and I decided to go with that one.  Today is the day for completing the response pieces - which I have done - and we now have the week to submit our work to the website.  I'll let you know when mine gets up there later today - probably tonight.

And now I'm working on Tabatha Yeatt's summer poetry exchanges.  I have 5 poems to write in the next couple of months, so I am beginning the thinking and drafting of my first now.

Poetry Friday is being hosted by Buffy at Buffy's Blog.  Enjoy the twirling seeds of the beginning of summer!