May 2019

Maia, Good Goddess:
garland the earth with bouquets–
unfold us shining

A circle grid for the new month.  The flowers have arrived!

Also linking to dVerse Open Link Night.

 

We are doing nothing,

and yet we
shout, we run through skies
like fire.  Where
do we live?
Our voices surround the trees,
our dances timeless.

We are deep,
endless, uncontained,
always and
everywhere.
We entwine with movements, with
stillness, with the air,

like leaves
that grow green and then
release themselves,
singing in
the wind.  We fall apart and
return completed.

We have no
surfaces, no years
to count or
give away.
We laugh like creatures with wings
scattering clear light.

Our form is
unmeasured.  We speak
in no know
tongue.  Alive,
we need no reason.  No one
can tell you our names.

NaPoWriMo has asked us to spread joy today.

 

April 2019

morning wakes
me at first light as
my mother
used to do,
but not with words—birdchoir sings
through me:  “rise and shine!”

My mother did not believe in sleeping in…when she decided it was time to get up, even on non-school days, she would waltz in, open the blinds, and announce, “Rise and Shine!”  One of the delights of spring for me is that my alarm is the light and the birds (I never close my blinds)–but I always hear my mother’s voice joining the chorus.

I worked on my monthly grid all week, waiting for the NaPoWriMo prompt to do the accompanying poem.  This is not really a recipe, but I think it’s close enough.  The grid was inspired by numerous photos of tulip festivals from all over the world…rows and rows of beautiful color.  April!

full earth

I consulted the Magnetic Oracle for a haiku to go with my May grid.

moon blossoms between
rain root and seed song—bird boughs
blanket the wild wind

 

 

Postcard for Nina

Dear Friend,

I got lost in another dream. I was on the edge, searching for a map.  I fell onto the blue river of time.  The flowers growing together inside the stars cast me home with song, just like you do.

Love, Me

I started with “dear friend”, and the Oracle sent me a lovely message for Nina.  This blog, and my art and writing, would not be here without her encouragement and support.  Thank you my friend!

For NaPoWriMo Day 28.  Almost there…

Collage inspired by Joan Mitchell’s painting “Ici”.

 

Sunflowers

Joan Mitchell painted sunflowers, over and over, which always makes me think of Van Gogh (as she did, too, although her colors are softer, her strokes open and layered lightly)—the intense yellows and burning oranges, the ground a mysterious combination of blue and green. My father’s Aunt Lil often talked about that undefinable intermixture of hues, which also glowed behind her favorite painting of almond blossoms.

Aunt Lil taught my brothers and me to play poker, ignoring my mother’s silent Protestant disapproval. She was a champion bridge player, a potter (I still have a vase), a judge’s secretary, a woman who became far larger that the life that had been mapped out for her in the early 20^th century.  She was the daughter who lived at home and took care of her mother until her mother died.  They watched the Saturday Night Fights every weekend on TV.

She called my father Chickie, and came to Sunday dinner often when we lived in Baltimore.

They say her fiancée died before they could marry.

Your laugh infectious,
opening like a flower–
I smile in return.

I’m not sure this answers the Day 10 NaPoWriMo prompt for multiple things happening at the same time…but certainly the mind rambles and holds many images and thoughts at the same time, even if we can only write it out in sequence afterwards.

Mother’s Day 2017

My mother loved roses.  The Oracle caught my mood.

magic flower laughs
opens remembering heals
like stars aborning

 sacred spirit shines
between memory and rose
flowering the soul

Hope/#PoetsForPeace

“Where flowers bloom, so does hope.”
–Lady Bird Johnson

“If you could
have three wishes, what?”
Number one–
always “peace.”
I’ve been repeating that word
since I was a child.

What is peace?
Easy to say what
it is not–
not guns, not
bombs, not hate or violence.
Not this destruction.

There are seeds
but they need sunlight–
fertile soil
to nourish
growth, to send roots; open space
to reach for the sky.

This is not
complicated.  This
happens if
we let it–
the Earth can teach us if we
can’t find our way home.

Despite the way we mistreat it, the Earth still shares with us its bounty.  As it does each summer, the Rose of Sharon tree is blooming, surrounded by concrete and the sorrows of our world.

Writer’s Quote Wednesday Writing Challenge Theme-“Hope” #WQWWC

Join in with your poem here.

Flowers

I first drew an impressionistic representation, and then I abstracted it.  Neocolor dipped in water.  Which version do you like?

May 2016: Opening Her Arms

“The peony was as big as this,”
says the little girl
opening her arms.
–Issa

Issa, one of the four classic haiku masters of Japan, wrote over 20,000 haiku, often illustrated with his own drawings.  His work is known for its simplicity and directness.

After posting art and poetry every day in April, I will be here irregularly for awhile.  Lots going on this month.  I may not see your posts everyday, either, but I will catch up as time allows.

A note on the grid:  I found some flower graphs I had done for sweaters and thought: “I could make a collage out of this.”  I was not really thinking about how many of those tiny squares there actually were.  The squares were cut from magazine photos I had of flowers.