days spinning faster
now toward twilight it seems
hours before dawn
years ago hours
lived, died, born again screaming
before twilight’s edge
watch the dawn hours
spin, dizzy and drunk with years,
into twilight’s grave
Twilight Days
Tag: Nature
Plantings
I tire of seeing memes about having a positive attitude and choosing one’s feelings plastered
social media. It is no surprise our young people are in the midst of a mental health crisis when constantly bombarded with messages telling them, in essence, “The only reason you are sad is because you are making the choice to be sad,” or, (one of my favorites for sabotaging anyone’s self esteem) “You have a choice to make your day wonderful or not.” While such simplistic messages are well meaning, I believe they are sometimes extremely toxic. After all, what if your parent died on that day? Did you make the choice to have a horrible day? What if you go home to a toxic abusive environment? How can you choose to make your day wonderful? So before reposting those wonderful positive messages on social media, let’s all take a step back and think about what we are really saying to someone who may be going through something or in an environment where there is no choice in the matter but to feel what he or she feels. Let’s send messages that say it’s okay to feel what you feel and acknowledge it and to take time to feel it all,so something can be gained from it—a lesson, a positive action taken, whatever it may be, so we know our suffering was not for naught. Hence, this piece.
I gathered my despair,
my tears, my losses, all my grief.
Sat with each,
held them close,
let them dry,
waiting for spring.
When the ground warms,
softening, ready for tilling,
I will plant my despair,
sow my tears,
plough rows for my losses,
dig a hole deep enough to hold all my grief.
In the turning of time,
from the shrubs of my despair,
I will snip flowers and herbs
for healing others.
From the vines of my tears,
I will pluck the fruits and vegetables
to pile upon the table for all who need.
From the fields of my losses,
I will reap the harvest grain
to store for when a time of need arrives.
Finally, from the tree of all I grieve.
I will pick the sweetest fruit
of memory.
Hardened Earth
dry, drought ridden earth
riddled with cracks inches wide
forms chasms decades deep
layered in dry dust
rising as rain pelts away,
determined to flood
chasms, erasing all cracks
but this earth is too hardened
unyielding to any rain,
seeking to soften hard soil
Return
Weekend Writing Prompt #267: This weekend your challenge is to write a poem or a piece of prose in exactly 31 words using the word “Return”.
https://sammiscribbles.wordpress.com/category/weekend-writing-prompt/
I envy the monarch’s, the hummingbird’s arc of return,
infinite, eternal.
My jealousy consumes as I have
no return, no cycle—
Only the damnation of this linear thing,
finite, directionless.
Endlessness
https://godoggocafe.com/2022/06/21/tuesday-writing-prompt-challenge-june-21-2022/
Todays prompt: Begin a poem with “endless”
Endless winds rustling
Through leaves baked a thin crisp green
By summer’s noon sun.
Endless wilting flowers
Reaping words of empty dust
Sands away meaning.
Endless hope sprouts blooms
In the dry cracked refuge of earth
A survival scented thing.
Spring Melting
Spring threatens to melt into us. Summer follows soon enough. Birds will return, seeking seeds and worms, Building nests for the young to come. Will the birds remember the songs they sing? Songs of summer, songs to mate? Flowers will emerge, warming their petals And leaves under a brilliant sun. Will they remember how to open Their blossoms? Will they remember how to dress themselves In glorious color? How can the birds or flowers remember When the world walks a tightrope Over the abyss And sunflowers may never grow again Tall enough to bow their heavy heads to God?
The Willow Trees
https://onewomansquest.org/2021/05g/24/vjs-weekly-challene-trees/
In the stillness of days between,
The willows long to reach across the stream,
Breaching distance impossible.
Without the breeze,
Their branches hang in solitude,
Their leaves nearly tears,
Longing drips with want heavy in the air
Until finally—thunder—
Lightning— A breeze teases,
Limbs reaching,
Almost, nearly touching—
And then the wind begins,
Whipping one direction,
Then another, almost swirling,
Limbs, leaves touch
Across the stream
Solitude breached.
Guarded Trail
Thursday photo prompt: Guarded #writephoto | Sue Vincent’s Daily Echo (scvincent.com)
Give me a minute.
Let me have another cup of coffee,
Will you?
Before I slosh on after,
Down the trail–
Again– maybe.
You say, a guard now stands there,
Of the newer variety,
Who advises of the locust thorns,
The kind that pierces the shoe
And can go straight into your foot?
Could have used that advice–
Once or twice
Maybe thrice
In life.
But now I’ve rubbed my thumbs
Over the sharp tipped thorns of regret
Until callouses formed.
Then I moved on to other
Fingertips until bloody, raw,
Proving to myself the sharpness of thorns.
So now, you say this stony guardian warns
Of all the thorns
Along the paths and trails?
Might this guardian advise of a thornless trail?
I really wouldn’t care, but the soles of my feet
Are without callous, and I’d like to keep them so.
Send me down a muddy, sloshy trail where
I might just fall and break my neck.
That would be simply fine,
If the soles of my feet
Remain as soft and unmarred
as a baby’s behind.
The Friction of Salt
Image from Shutterstock
Pieces of her broke in the waves,
Searching for wildness
In this place she always went to be alone.
She walked along this shore a thousand times
In the dawn and the dusk
As if they were quantities unknown,
And thus, in them, she could discover some truth,
Some faith, some charity, some hope for herself.
Who knew? It had worked before.
She’d walk toward the town with something—
Some small bit piece replenished.
Besides–
She’d always heard salt was healing,
So she figured she’d rub it in her wounds.
But bloody red and raw
She walks still wounded, broken,
Along the wildness,
Yet not touching it.
Freedom elusive.
She can not find what she lost.
Her wounds chains,
Binding her still
To things she knew illusions.
She waits for the friction of salt
To rub away the chains.
She walks toward the seals in the surf
And on toward the whales in the deep,
Searching for truth or faith or charity
In the wildness of the sea.
The White Ones
I wanted to run among the wild ones.
Live with them among the mountains.
Rub muzzle against muzzle.
Eat sweet grasses.
Enjoy golden warmth upon my back.
Let my soul and spirit rest
Among the trees with the wild ones.
But it was not to be.
My heart could not slow enough
To contain their peace.
And so, I sought the white ones at the sea.
They crashed about restlessly.
Truly wild they were, as they raced continually.
Their cacophonous pacing furious, relentless.
Yes, these wild white stormy ones were in keeping
With my heart, a raging irregular and brutal pace.
Hearing The Mermaids Sing 