Poetry Friday

Simply in a hurry.  Very busy yesterday.  Want to see Ginger today...
But a poem for her.

Ginger

A simply silly Labrador
With eyes all sparklehappy
Retrieves without a second thought
And plops upon my lap she
Isn't small enough for that
But how can I deny her
She loves without a second thought
I wish her nose were drier.

by Donna JT Smith, Feb 8, 2019

Ha!  There you go - a poem out of it at last. Gotta run.  I'll let you know what "treat" she found to almost kill herself on.

Well, it was a small pop gun ball.  She evidently ate TWO of them.  One she threw up along with a cotton rope knot and bread tie... then they found the other during surgery yesterday.  She is healing, along with our bank account.

Here it is...almost usable still...unlike my credit card.  This is a Hog Wild Popper ball. Great fun, until they aren't!


Find a Poem, read it up, all the day you'll happy up....(wait - that's a double up rhyme)
with Laura today at Writing the World for Kids February 8, 2019!!

Home is Where the Heart Is

I am going to set this page up today, but don't know where it will lead me.  I have been up all night...a few nod-offs watching tv and babysitting Ginger, our yellow lab, who has taken ill.  Lots of vomiting yesterday.  And this morning we had more when she got rid of the water I'd given her.  She is not eating now.  I have made her some rice broth, but she only took about two tablespoons before saying she'd had enough.
So I'm tired and worried and heartsick.  My FB post explains more.  I don't feel like going into it all again.

That said, I'm going to try to pull myself together and get the First Spiritual Journey Thursday link up ready at the very least.  Then I hope to take a nap while my husband figures out if he is heading to the vet with Ginger, or we are riding it out a bit longer.

This was to be a "heartwarming" post today.  And I am going to try to remember what I had in mind and get my focus back there.

Essentially, I was thinking of how no matter where you are, being with family and with those people that you hold dear in your heart constitutes being "home".
I have had many homes in my lifetime, both as a child and when married.  We are yet again embarking on making a new place a home.  We have a good start.  We are with our daughter and two grandchildren.  But then we left our old home where our son lived.  So part of my heart still lies there.  My brothers and sisters are spread out over the United States now, as well as their children.  My heart has had to stretch to encompass lots of places.  I've come to realize that home is not where the heart is in this sense.  It can't be.  I have too many places to call home.  My heart is getting stretched too thin.  I get sad thinking just thinking about it.

I've discovered that it has to mean, and that I have to focus on the "other" meaning of home and heart.

Matthew 6: 20-21
20 But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:
21 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

I am laying up treasures in heaven.  And that is where my home is.  And if that is where my home is...that is also where my heart must be.  It's a home I have not yet moved into perhaps, but it is there and real nonetheless.

For now, my verse that I must keep in mind as I am growing a new, on Earth home and repotting my heart in its new location is:

Philippians 4:11
11 Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.

This is just another stepping stone.  And it is ALL good.

Home is Where the Heart Is

Treasures in heaven
Are waiting for me
Treasures in store
That I cannot see
But someday my home
Will be in the clouds
I don't know just how
But I'll join the crowds
Of family and friends
Who've gone on before
And that is the home
That my heart will adore.
Until then I'll wait
With feet firmly set
For it isn't my time
To be with them yet.

by Donna JT Smith, Feb. 6, 2019 (I had a bit of a poem in my after all.)

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Been up well over 24 hours now.  I have to go check on Ginger, and see if she will take a bit more rice broth.  And I should probably wake up my husband, who went to bed at 5 am, and take my turn at getting some rest.  I'll post somewhere later to update Ginger's state* **.

* Update - Ginger went to the vet.  Had an ultrasound, and they didn't find any obstructions.  She is home again, with NO surgery - yay!  But she doesn't seem any different.  Won't eat her rice.  Just wants water.  I am only giving her a little at a time.  So far it seems that she just stores it to get rid of in HUGE amounts all at once.  I've been fairly successful at limiting the vomiting to the kitchen vinyl floor, but not always able to keep it from going under the refrigerator...  We will cook her some chicken tonight and see what she does with that.  Good news is ultrasound was $300.  Surgery would have been $3000+.  We could still end up there, but I don't think so.

** Second Update - Ginger went to the vet again this morning (Thurs.) as she was still doing very poorly, and got a free second ultrasound.  It was definitive this time.  There is an obstruction that requires surgery for removal. She is having today.
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A Slug's Bio

Rebecca Herzog made up this poem game to get the juices flowing, and I always love a challenge... even when I'm cloggy nosed and coughy.  So I tried it again today.  I left one in the comments yesterday from my 5, 2, 1 combo... Dribble, Dying, Botanist....

Here's the game:
Write the numbers 1-6 on strips of paper and draw them out of a bowl or use dice to generate three numbers.  Use the prompts below to compose a poem:

POETRY FORM
1. Cherita
2. Haiku
3. Bio Poem
4. Acrostic
5. Dribble
6. Limerick

TOPIC
1. Winning
2. Dying
3. Travel
4. Season
5. Alone
6. Haunted

CHARACTER
1. A botanist
2. A door
3. A cafeteria
4. a toy
5. A slug
6. A geologist

I picked three numbers.  I got a 3, 2, 5 combination (there are three of each number so you could get a 1, 1, 1).   The result was I had to write a "Bio Poem",  with the topic of "Dying" and the Character being "a slug".  Here's a Bio Poem format, in case you are unfamiliar with it:

  1. Your first name only
  2. Four traits that describe you
  3. Sibling/son/daughter of
  4. Lover of ... (list three people, ideas, events)
  5. Who feels ... (list three items)
  6. Who needs ... (list three items)
  7. Who gives ... (list three items)
  8. Who fears ... (list three items)
  9. Who would like to see ... (list three items)
10. Resident of ... (City, street or physical location)
11. Your last name only

The Bio Poem about a slug and dying, too.....

Gastopoda
I’m slow, slimy, shell free, and slippery
I am a son-daughter born of my mother-fathers and have snails in my tree
Moisture, the dark, fungi and plants please my tentacles and fringed foot
If I thought about it much I might feel preyed upon, vulnerable - yet I'm slick
My needs are simple and common: water, food and a quiet hiding place
I provide a cleaner Earth, a path of mucus for others to follow, and sustenance for hungry creatures
Perhaps I should fear everything, but really I fear nothing but dryness
I’ve heard of inhospitable places, but someday I'd like to see them: the desert, the ocean and stars
I live in a close up world of lichen, strawberries and daisy petals, and will die for want of a drop of water
Snail

by Donna JT Smith, Feb. 3, 2019

I'm still sneezing... lack of mucus doesn't seem to be my problem anyway...

Better Late Than Never

* Oh, dear.  I apologize in advance.  This post is too long.  Pick ONE part of it.  Don't let it overwhelm you, as overwhelms me now looking at it....for someone who has nothing to write, it is certainly full of words!  I am sick today, but am slowly making my way through all the poem offerings.  I'm hoping doses of poetry will get me feeling better! *

Life has just been taking priority over writing...and when the writing DOES occur, Facebook posting has taken precedence over blog posting.  So here's a recap and I apologize to those who have already read these on Facebook. 
I am sharing my two poems that I sent to Erin Mauger for Tabatha Yeatts' Winter Exchange.
I am posting the poem I wrote for Jone Rush MacCulloch's New Year Postcard Exchange (see FB for why you didn't get a postcard from me...but might someday. Surprise!).
And this first poem is one written in response to a painting I found recently at a thrift store.  I reminds me of "home" in winter.

Oil painting I purchased at a thrift store last week

Winter Harbor

Blotchy the clouds
Frozen the sky
Ice bedecked traps
Yet gulls still fly
No thought for winter
All wind's the same
It's only the snow
That changes the game
Where beaches are empty
No harboring seal
But look to the ocean
Where lobster boats reel
Slicing through waves
Reflecting the gale
Riding out winter
The breaker of frail.

by Donna JT Smith, Jan. 26, 2019
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Postcard Exchange Bookmark for Erin Mauger

 Journal

If ever you
  wander,
  wander dreamily;
If ever you
  wonder,
  wonder mightily;
If ever you
  dream,
  dream fantastically;
If ever you
  wish,
  wish majestically;
If ever you
  wander,
  wonder,
  dream or wish
     take me,
Together you
   and I
   will write
   what we
      can see.

by Donna JT Smith

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New Year Postcard Exchange poem - not sent

Moonlight

dappled
dimpled
light of night
shine on us
in purest white
light the dark
in shades of gray
till the glow
of dawning day
stippled
rippled
seemly bright
carry me
above my plight
reflective of
the light above
gliding wings
of Noah's dove
simple wimple
of a cloud
wrapping you
in whitish shroud
from behind you
shyly peer
foreshadowing
of morning clear

by Donna JT Smith, Jan. 2019
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Winter Exchange Poem for Erin Mauger

Journeys

Travel far and travel wide,

Journey to a place inside.

Pull the door and settle in,

Write a tale of ocean's spin.

Feel the waters sharp and cold

Turn into wide fields of gold,

Where the seaweed covered ledges

Dissipate and morph to hedges.

Starfish undulate their feet,

Float to heaven's stars to meet

Moon snails dancing on Bear's turf,

As snowy drifts engulf the surf.

You're unconfined in worlds sublime

And hold the key to transcend time;

Just write it all with open mind;

Naught restricts the paths you'll find.

Write it all with open heart;

Begin the end and start the start.

Instead of rocks and sand and snail,

Your story's grown another tale.

by Donna JT Smith, 12/1/2018

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Happy Groundhog Day on Saturday.  Have a beautiful Sunday, too.

Looking forward to feeling much better by the time you read this!

For more poetry, please check out the links at The Opposite of Indifferece where Tabatha is hosting Poetry Friday today.

*This was not "publishing" so I had to close Blogger and reopen.  Of course upon reopening, there was nothing here. Good thing I had done a "select" and "copy"  beforehand, just in case, and that "paste" worked or there would be no post, because I'm worn out.