October

Poetry Friday...

Go enjoy some great poetry by clicking links on Poetry Friday's host Matt Forrest Esenwine's page:

My poem for October was plunked down into FB this morning...or late last night:

October

October teases leaves
to begin their tinge twinges of
green to orange, yellow, red:

It begins the crisper nights;
it does a flash freeze on blades of grass;
it turns trees into bouquets,
and groves into giant mounds of mums;

It takes the sweetness of the summer breeze
and gives it a cinnamon kick
that swirls around your head
and tickles your nose.

And it ends with barely a leaf on a tree.
A coating thick on the ground
swishes and crackles
in your wake

as you scuffle-shuffle
toward the brown and gray
of November.

by Donna JT Smith ©2023

A Quarantine Remembrance in Canva and More

 

I did this movie in Canva after I wrote the poem.  It was fun to play in, and most is free online.  You can buy the version with more features/options, but the basic free online version is pretty great.

I know I have been pretty on and off here, and everyone's been very understanding and supportive.  I appreciate that.  

Recently, in the last week and a half, there have been some quieter times, and I've been able to write a bit more, sleep a bit more, get a few things taken care of and just concentrated on my own health.  

I'm wearing a Garmin watch my son gave me for Mother's Day to track my heart rate, number of steps, stress levels and sleep patterns.  I've listened to relaxing music, sat in the sun...one day, after getting up for breakfast at 8:30 I returned to bed and napped until 3:15 while hub watched tv in the same room.  That day my Garmin said my "Body Battery" was only 33% charged, but that's the highest I've managed so far and better than the 5% it has mostly been!  Needless to say, I am wearing myself out!

But I promise, I am staying in the game!

My blood pressure is coming down on its own, I have a washer and dryer now so I don't have to drive an hour to do laundry (though I have to cut into the wall to hook up the dryer hose so I can use it), and I'm walking one mailbox farther than I had been before my back seizes up!  Months off from the fall downstairs with it's surgery recovery, plus a year off for nerve spasms in my back from the Covid vaccine, plus the stress of almost losing our son to myocarditis/valve replacement/recovery complications have added stress weight and cost me some muscle.

BUT!! But, things are improving.  I WILL survive!  And my son is fine now.  He has a great new job, and his heart is working beautifully.  Can't ask for more!

Seriously, though...you should see the inside of our house....no, you shouldn't.
Not the vision I had when we started 11 years ago, to renovate this to our little retirement home.  We are still living in a storage unit/hoarder's home environment.  When I have the energy, I am going to make this what I envisioned, and I want that to happen BEFORE I'm here aloner than I am now!  He deserves to see it and live in it completed.  So we are chipping away at it as I can.  That too WILL happen!

More poetry goodness is to be found scattered across the fields of the Internet today...go to the links you will find on Tricia's page The Miss Rumphius Effect where she is hosting Poetry Friday!

This Picture Wants to Be a Poem

Margaret Simon has an image on her site, Reflections on the Teche, a photo taken by Taylor Saxena in Madeira, Portugal (this is not that photo, this is mine). As I wrote today, I listened to “Weightless”, finishing in about 4 min. 

away

i see your Near
i sense your Far
a leaf a branch
a shooting star
and all the while
you meditate
in Unknown Space
and can’t relate
the places that
your Mind has gone
but still i watch
for any Dawn 

By Donna JT Smith ©2023 

There are days when I hear his laugh, fleeting and rare, and I remember I was loved.

Sesquipedalianism

It's time for Madness!Poetry!  

I'm in!  The first word to use in a poem will be delivered to me by 7 pm on Sunday!  Register to be a poetic voter so you can vote on your favorites!  Go to Ed DeCaria's Madness!Poetry to begin the adventure!  So many poems, so little time!  So many words, so many rhymes! I hope I didn't just take on more than I can handle right now...but that's what's good about poetry challenges,  they can take your mind off all the rest of the stuff you SHOULD be doing!  It's a procrastinator's (14 letters) dream task!

To be chosen for consideration as an authlete in Madness!Poetry 2023, each contestant had to submit a poem of 13 lines or fewer, with at least one 14 letter word in it.   I chose to go overboard of course...There are a number of legit 14 letter words...and one not so legit...

Says the Sesquipedalian*

The daffadowndilly and jonquil are consanguineous races;
A Great white shark and goldfish have common ichthyological bases.

The abovementioned words in the first verse are not adventitiously placed
But all chosen with care and with purpose, each advantageously spaced

To show I can be sesquipedalian and can use words quite handily!
I’d like to write more, I’m a poet, but my eyes blink quite sandily.

Curse the sleeplessnesses of the writer as words flow in the night
When thoughts of fish and flowers outlast yesterevening’s light!

Yet when jostling jargonizations coalesce to a well rhymed and timed creation;
When eked and edited verses bloom jauntily with jollification...

Even if though the sun should rise…if we’ve inked through the hours it sinks…
We put down and charge our tablet and for sure takefortywinks -
  Before somatopsychics kick in and we lose our rithem and the riting stincks.

Donna JT Smith©2023

*Sesquipedalian: having many syllables, given to or characterized by the use of long words. a sesquipedalian television commentator.
Sesquipedalian can also be used to describe someone or something that overuses big words, like a philosophy professor or a chemistry textbook. If someone gives a sesquipedalian speech, people often assume it was smart, even if they don't really know what it was about because they can't understand the words.

Progressive Poem 2023

 

Ohhhhh!!!!  So sorry!  With the excitement of woodwork and a handicap shower going in, I forgot my poetic duties!  Sorry, sorry, sorry, my poem-minded friends and friends-to-be! 

This amazing project was begun by Irene Latham in 2012, and Margaret Simon took over in 2020.

The rules:
Each poet-blogger adds a line, creating a poem for children by copying the previous lines exactly as written (unless permission from the previous poet is obtained). Commentary on the process is welcome but optional.

So far we have grown five lines - mine will be the sixth today.  Can I just say (of course I can) that I love the way "like raindrops hitting the soil and sinking in" fits with "suddenly everything fell into place"?

Here's the start:

Suddenly everything fell into place
like raindrops hitting soil and sinking in.

When morning first poked me, I’d wished it away
my mind in the mist, muddled, confused.

Was this a dream, or reality, rousing my response?

I think I chose reality in putting the sun urging...continuing the morning's poke - with both the sun and the "being" rising.  No more wishing it away.

My line: 

The sun surged, urging me to join in its rising

 

So here it is all together:

Suddenly everything fell into place
like raindrops hitting soil and sinking in.

When morning first poked me, I’d wished it away
my mind in the mist, muddled, confused.

Was this a dream, or reality, rousing my response?
The sun surged, urging me to join in its rising  (pick your own punctuation to fit the next line)

 

Here is the list of participants and their blogs so you can follow along:

April 1 Mary Lee Hahn, Another Year of Reading
April 2 Heidi Mordhorst, My Juicy Little Universe
April 3 Tabatha, The Opposite of Indifference
April 4 Buffy’s Blog
April 5 Rose Cappelli, Imagine the Possibilities
April 6 Donna Smith, Mainely Write
April 7 Margaret Simon, Reflections on the Teche
April 8 Leigh Anne, A Day in the Life
April 9 Linda Mitchell, A Word Edgewise
April 10 Denise Krebs, Dare to Care
April 11 Emma Roller, Penguins and Poems
April 12 Dave Roller, Leap Of Dave
April 13 Irene Latham Live You Poem
April 14 Janice Scully, Salt City Verse
April 15 Jone Rush MacCulloch
April 16 Linda Baie, TeacherDance
April 17 Carol Varsalona, Beyond Literacy Link
April 18 Marcie Atkins
April 19 Carol Labuzzetta at The Apples in My Orchard 
April 20 Cathy Hutter, Poeturescapes
April 21 Sarah Grace Tuttle,  Sarah Grace Tuttle’s Blog,
April 22 Marilyn Garcia
April 23 Catherine,  Reading to the Core
April 24 Janet Fagal, hosted by Tabatha, The Opposite of Indifference
April 25 Ruth, There is no Such Thing as a God-Forsaken Town
April 26 Patricia J. Franz, Reverie
April 27 Theresa Gaughan, Theresa’s Teaching Tidbits
April 28 Karin Fisher-Golton, Still in Awe Blog
April 29 Karen Eastlund, Karen’s Got a Blog
April 30 Michelle Kogan Illustration, Painting, and Writing