Tag: W3

family · Life · poetry

Coat of Many Colors

Sally5 Comments

Middle son put three batteries
Down bathroom sink drain (C size fit)
Then squeezed toothpaste, added water —
A disaster! I laughed at it

Then there was the time when some sons
Dammed the creek, flooded the backyard
Learning experience, thought I
As I squished through lawn water-scarred

Mud-smeared faces, markered-up arms
Colored on walls even have their charms
We moms take many things in stride
Rather than sound childhood alarms

One daughter cut her bangs real short
Before a family wedding
I shook my head, bemoaned a bit
Not seeing where this was heading

Scissors wielded by this girl
Led me to rethink and relook
’cause next she cut her dresses up
After reading one picture book

Dolly’s Coat of Many Colors
A lovely heart-warming story
Of a patchwork coat made with love
Became more than allegory

My child wanted to experience
To become one with that sweet tale
Seeing all those cut-up dresses
Is the one time I wanted to wail

This is my response to this week W3 prompt. PoW Nancy challenged us to “think about a moment in your life when something truly mattered. Perhaps it was a great success, a hard-earned accomplishment, or a memorable disaster that taught you something important. Maybe you organized a major event, won a competition, survived a family vacation gone wrong, or confidently attempted a home-improvement project that ended in chaos.“

Write about an occasion when you soared, stumbled, or did a little of both.

Guidelines:

  • Use one or more 4-line stanzas;
  • Keep each line to 8 syllables;
  • Maximum length: 20 lines; (Sorry!)
  • Humor, reflection, triumph, embarrassment, and self-deprecation are all welcome.

As always, have fun and make the memory come alive for your readers.

The joys of being a mother

poetry

Imagine

Sally8 Comments

what is it that music is trying to say
amid all the nonsense that’s happening today
amid words in all-caps, cage-fights, and tarps
imagine instead the sound of one harp

loudspeakers blare drumbeat and rage
fighters flex and spit before entering the cage
mercenary warriors with no noble cause
imagine instead one long silent pause

earsplitting raucous deafening noise
trash-talking nonsense like schoolyard boys
primal grunts, explosive, while delivering a strike
imagine instead gentle music, birdlike

music can stir us, music can calm
make us laugh, make us cry, act as a balm
instead of a claw, instaed of a fight
imagine sweet music to help us unite

This is my response to this week’s W3 prompt. Poet of the Week Artie Camenzind challenged us to use Mary Oliver’s poem Drifting as inspiration. He specified two lines we could use as a starting point.

  • “my delicious walk in the rain”
  • “what it is that music is trying to say”

The news this week has been a cacophony. More than once I’ve intentionally put on happy music to shift my thinking.

aging · poetry

Hickory Dickory

Sally16 Comments

Hickory dickory dock
Time is a melting clock
The hourglass sand
Slips through my hand
Hickory dickory dock

Hickory dickory dock
The windows need new caulk
Body falling apart!
When did this start?!
Hickory dickory dock

Hickory dickory dock
It’s getting harder to walk
No pep in these steps
Need some vodka and Schweppes
Hickory dickory dock

Hickory dickory dock
Did somebody just knock?
Dark spectre with sickle
Well, this is a pickle!
Hickory

dickory

dock


This is my response to this week’s W3 Prompt: write a poem inspired by a nursery rhyme.

I had so many ideas — Georgy-Porgy being taken down by the Me-Too movement. Mary being served a delicious lamb dinner and later finding out why her lamb had stopped following her to school. Three blind mice — what kind of mischief could they blindly cause? I settled, however, on Hickory dickory dock.

The picture was created by moi using ChatGPT

Life

Growing Up Rural

Sally9 Comments
Cows — my nieghbors growing up

Overwhelming smell
And noise [MOO!] — but gentle eyes
Smooth snouted Holsteins

My father
Bought an old farm (no bother)
In whose fields I played– a wild
Child

Farm neighbor
Dairy barn, outdoor labor
Always something more to do
[moo!]

Time changes
Local scene rearranges
I look for cows, but I’m told,
“Sold.”

Hay mowing
Then baled — where is it going?
Farms are gone. Fodder ought not
Rot

Field of purple weeds
Ragged Robin volunteers —
Bemoan? No — embrace

What was once a hayfield is now Ragged Robin.

This is my response to this week’s W3 Challenge which was to combine two poetry forms. I think of my response as a sushi roll — the Haikus (bookends) are like the nori that wraps the sushi roll. The filling is made up of Deibide Baise Fri Toin, an Irish poetic form.

A Haiku is three line moment of insight. Suggested syllable count 5-7-5. A Haiku also has clear images and a turning point.

The Deilbide Baise Fri Toin is an Irish poetic form made up of quatrains, aabb rhyme scheme, syllable count 3-7-7-1.

Life · poetry

Overwhelmed

Sally2 Comments

I have been stressed with too much to do
The grass grew tall in the lawn
Mow? Me? Ugh, I thought
My get up and go was gone
I went to the barn, John Deere tire was flat
My hope fell — [boing, boing, boing]
I drove to town to do a few things
Came home, and found a friend mowing

This is a true story. Who knew that someone mowing my lawn could be a beautiful moment?

I’m challenging myself to find a beautiful moment each day for a week. This happened on Friday. Did someone do something nice for you this week? Was it a beautiful moment?

This also follows the W3 Challenge criteria for the week — all one syllable words except the last one, 5- 8 lines.

poetry

Inspired by a Card

Sally6 Comments

Hop hop hop
[CHOP CHOP CHOP]
Paws pause

Hark!
Ears prick up!
[Sniff sniff sniff]

Hmmm…
What is this?
What do I hear?

Hop hop hop
[CHOP CHOP CHOP]
“TIM-BER”!

This is my submission to this week’s W3 Challenge. Poet of the Week, Ange, challenged us to capture a dramatic moment in just a handful of lines — a storm breaking, a glass shattering, a door slamming, a sudden realization, or any instant where something changes sharply or unexpectedly.

You may write in any poetic form, with the following restrictions:

Your poem must be between 5 and 8 lines long. (or maybe 12, if they’re really short!)

Every single word in the poem must be one syllable long.

You are allowed one multi-syllable word — but it must appear as the very last word of the poem.

I was literally staring off into space — or, more precisely, absently staring at the box of paper recycling beside me. This card was on top — a Santa carrying a Christmas tree. I love rabbits; I’ve been observing lots of wildlife in my yard this week– and the poem was born.

poetry

Beach Souvenir

Sally8 Comments

My mica flakes sparkle
In contrast to my blackness
I think that’s why you noticed me
In the water
At the provincial park
In Nova Scotia

You picked me up
And caressed my smoothness
Water is so patient
At smoothing away edges

Well, water and jostling
Jostling against other rocks
The daily tides make us all a little smoother
All a little less edgy

But at my very core
I always sparkle

This is my attempt at a Dinggedicht: a poem that enters so deeply into a thing that the thing seems to speak for itself through image, texture, movement, and sensation alone. That’s the W3 Challenge this week.

poetry

Shucking Peas

Sally11 Comments

Pods
In hand
Peas removed
Bowl slowly fills
Mom’s garden harvest
In her lap as she works
Orange-red sunset outside
Head falls forward [snore] then snaps up
“I’m not sleeping — just resting my eyes!”
Pods in hand, peas removed, bowl slowly fills

The W3 challenge this week was to write a Dectina Refrain in honor of Mother’s Day and be sure to include the word “mother” (or a variation of it).

The Dectina Refrain is a 10-line, unrhymed, syllabic poem with a precise structure:

  • Line 1: 1 syllable
  • Line 2: 2 syllables
  • Line 3: 3 syllables
  • Line 4: 4 syllables
  • Line 5: 5 syllables
  • Line 6: 6 syllables
  • Line 7: 7 syllables
  • Line 8: 8 syllables
  • Line 9: 9 syllables
  • Line 10 (Refrain): Combine the exact text of lines 1–4, in order, as a single closing line
fiction · poetry

The Age of Open Doors

Sally13 Comments

I reached the age of open doors
It was the time to choose
After years of thoughtful mentors
Whose advice should I use?

Door one revealed a scene sublime
Flowery, peaceful, green
The sun had just begun its climb
O’er this idyllic scene

Enticing sunrise pink and blue
The dawn of a brand new day
I stopped myself from stepping through
And looked the other way

A smell came from the second door
Putrid, foul, rank
I looked and saw things I abhor
My heart within me shrank

I knew at once where I must go —
Stepped past the lintel post
And entered not where flowers grow
But where I was needed most.

This is my response to this week’s W3 challenge where Poet of the Week Yvette M. Calleiro prompts us to create a poem that explores a fictional world—utopian or dystopian, your choice. This world must be wholly imagined and not reflect the current reality we live in. Let your imagination run freely.

  • Use 20 lines or fewer.
  • Write about a fictional utopian or dystopian world.
  • Do not portray the current state of our world in your poem.
Life · poetry

Rhyming Recipe for Ikigai

Sally13 Comments

Think of what you love to do
Jot those things down, one or two

Think of skills where you excel
Not half-bad, but really well

Think of things for which you’re paid
Perhaps in money or in trade

Now think of what the world needs most —
Is something there of which you boast?

Where those things meet is ikigai*
Find that thing; your soul will fly

*ee-kee-guy

This is my response to this week’s W3 prompt, which is to:

Write a poem in rhyming couplets (two lines that rhyme) that gives instructions for making something.

Requirements:

  • Use rhyming couplets throughout
  • Give clear steps or instructions
  • Be creative with what the“recipe” is for

Think of it as turning instructions into something memorable and playful through rhyme.

I’ve been thinking a lot about Ikigai this week. I have a version of that graphic posted in my office.

Too often, I feel that we, as a society, shove people into a job that meets only one or two of those criteria. Find something that meets all four and you’ll find fulfillment and happiness.