On Saturday, I look forward to writing the next line in our progressive poem. I’ll share it Friday evening. My project for National Poetry Month is to write a poem daily with #Verselove. Here are the first few days of poems and prompts.
To America, 2025
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
O, let my land be a land where Liberty
flames as it has flamed.
I hear America singing–
Believing what we don’t believe,
Stealing my breath of life, I will confess
God mend thine every flaw.
In order of appearance: Emma Lazarus, Langston Hughes, William Carlos Williams, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Claude McKay, Katharine Lee Bates.
Mi amiga, my friend,
Gracias por tu ayuda again
My skills are slowly creeping
I think of Spanish while I’m sleeping
You challenge my brain,
Our sweet friendship remains.
I used to study solo alone;
No ripples from the tiny stone.
Your knowledge lights my lamp,
brings me hope. I won’t damp-
en el entusiasmo’s light
Gracias, mi amiga, día y night
(Rhyming words for my poem are from verses 1 and 2 of “The Sound of Silence” by Simon and Garfunkel.)
I wrote a psalm with a stanza each of protest, petition, and praise. I know there are millennia full of terrible history and brokenness in this world, so I want to quit thinking God is always just on my side. God is just and true, and I’m sure God is not a member of a political party. I am trying to practice petitioning that all mockers, scoffers, liars, and haters be exposed, especially when I find myself in those groups.
Peace to all this Lenten season.
Psalm for Today
The road is winding, steep, rough
too many pathways to choose
We cry, ‘We’ve had enough
of this exhaustive ruse!”
God, mockers rebuff.
The scoffer refuse.
Expose the liar’s bluff.
No haters excuse.
So many songs conjure up stories for me. I could come to Leigh Anne’s Music Festival many times, but I come today with these songs that reminded me of small stories of my childhood.
When I was in eighth grade, Ms. Andrews was my English teacher. We were reading the novel Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes. The story of Charlie Gordon pulled out feelings of empathy and sadness that I had never experienced before. At the same time we were reading the book, the song “Bye, Bye, Miss American Pie” by Don McLean came out. For no lyric or rational reason, but just a matter of the heart, when I heard the song, I thought of Charlie Gordon. I still do to this day; the song brings me back to eighth grade and this important novel we read.
I have never been much of a consumer of music, but when I was a freshman in high school, I received the album The Sounds of Silence for my birthday. It wasn’t a new album, but it was still popular, if I remember correctly. I had a record player in my room, and I listened to this album continually. Other the years, I did buy a few singles (45s) of other artists, but I never bought or received another album.
Every day in third grade, Mrs. Gaffney’s class said the pledge of allegiance and then we were all trained to break into singing the first stanza and chorus of “America, the Beautiful.” It’s a familiar song for people my age. I recently had an experience at a rally on President’s Day (Not My President Protest) in Palm Springs. One of the first things we did was sing “America the Beautiful.” I was touched and a little choked up singing that song with this unlikely group. Patriot protestors taking the flag back.
Patriotism
shines through warriors under
Mother’s spacious sky
This seems like a good time in our nation’s history to learn another verse from Bates’ prophetic poem:
America! America! God mend thine every flaw, Confirm thy soul in self-control, Thy liberty in law!
I found writing about a small slice of the day to be a rewarding and interesting exercise. I didn’t plan anything special during each day’s timeframe, but instead I enjoyed waiting for it; I just lived my day and paid attention when that time came up. It was easy for the most part and also the first time I’ve ever had a plan for the Slice of Life Story Challenge. In the past, I was on the lookout for slices anytime during the day, collected formats, watched what others wrote, and borrowed ideas. My notes were usually disorganized, but I always had more than enough ideas to make it through the month. This year many opportunity’s like Leigh Ann’s invitation to the Slicer Music Festival passed me by. I just paid attention to my upcoming 31-minute slice. I liked doing something new, but I don’t think I would do this time slicing again. I would consider trying a new plan for the SOLSC next year.
So as this evening’s slice of time draws to a close, I’m finishing up this last post of March with a brief synopsis of what one day in my life looked like this month in 2025. I’m glad I lived this “day” over the whole month instead of in 24 hours.
5:00-5:31 a.m. Read in bed Resistance: How Women Saved Democracy from Donald Trump by Jennifer Rubin.
5:32-6:03 Read more because I couldn’t sleep during the night due to the nonsense going on in Washington.
6:04-6:35 Slept through this slice because of a very busy day yesterday, and a poor night’s sleep the night before.
6:36-7:07 Drove to windy Palm Springs for car repairs.
8:28-8:59 Rerun evening slice, so instead I blogged about grasping from earlier in the day.
9:00-9:31 Summarized and reflected on this year’s Slice of Life Story Challenge.
*D-Backs beat the Cubs on Sunday, 10-6. I guess I’m enjoying this MLB app more than I thought I would.
Now, we continue our writing adventure. Tomorrow the Slice of Life community continues on Tuesdays. See you then. I also want to invite anyone who would like to join us at Ethical ELA’s VerseLove, with classroom-ready poetry prompts each day during National Poetry Month. I’ll be hosting on Thursday this week. (It was five years ago that Glenda invited us at the end of the SOLSC, and I’ve been enjoying being part of that community ever since. Do come and give it a try.)
Well, tonight it’s 8:30 p.m., and this evening looks a lot like last evening did. Person of Interest and earlier we watched another Diamondbacks game. They lost in the bottom of the 9th with the tying run getting tagged at third as he overran the base. So disappointing.
Since my evenings are on rerun this week, I decided to blog about something from earlier today during this slice of my day.
My hubby and I took a walk, and while we were out, I took a half dozen photos trying to illustrate GRASP, which is the photo-of-the-day prompt with @365PictureToday.
That’s my husband down below in the wash. I took a different route for part of our hike.I took a lot of pictures like this, with and without my shadow, grasping my hiking pole.This is the one I chose for Instagram today.
Since I haven’t written a poem yet today, I wrote a dictionary poem during this time too.
grasp /grăsp/ (v.)
To take hold of or seize firmly with the hand, the foot, another body part, or an instrument.
Grasp the handle of the hiking stick and breathe deeply. Let go of the other distractions. Grasp only what is needed for the moment. With your heart, seize firmly to love instead of stuff.
To hold with the arms; embrace.
I’ve grasped onto you for 42 years, and you are my reason. Grasping you in worry and fear brings solace and hope. Hold on to me.
To take hold of intellectually; comprehend.
Is it too late for all of us in the U.S. to grasp the history of this nation? To learn that our history runs deep and wide in white supremacy, greed, power, and nonsense.
Will there be hope that lie-addicted folks will someday grasp what they have lost? What we have all lost?
This time of the evening, we often watch two episodes of our latest show. That show is usually an old series we watch through before we choose another. We’ve watched all the episodes of Monk and S.W.A.T., and now we are watching Person of Interest.
Often I can relax and enjoy one-and-a-half hours of TV, but not in March. I find it difficult to only watch. I am usually busy reading and commenting on posts, writing my post for the next day, or, like tonight, studying Duolingo lessons for the day. Keith watches our show; I barely take notice of it. Here I am doing Spanish, while hubby was in the kitchen. (After he took the photo of me, I mean.)
Another common part of this slice of my day is to have a cup of herb tea.
I didn’t make any mistakes tonight in all four of the lessons I did in Duolingo. That is really unusual for me!
I’m hanging in in the Diamond Tournament this week.
By the way, the Diamondbacks beat the Cubs 8-1 tonight.
It’s Opening Day for Major League Baseball. Thanks to T-Mobile, we got a free subscription to watch MLB for this season. Tonight’s game, the Arizona Diamondbacks vs. Chicago Cubs, is bringing back lots of memories.
We haven’t lived near a ballpark for over 20 years. When my kids were young, we were all baseball fans. They still are, so when we go to Minneapolis and Seattle, we usually go with our kids to a game.
Baseball started for my girls with the 1998 Arizona Diamondback expansion team. We lived just down the freeway from Bank One Ballpark (now called Chase Stadium) and we were all delighted when Phoenix was chosen for the new NL team that year. My husband took my kids out of school for afternoon Opening Day games more than once those next six years.
Other memories around the Diamondbacks are fond. My kids were 7 and 9 when the team started, and the franchise was very family-friendly. We would bring a van full of us, plus the extra three seats were filled with neighbors or school friends. There were $1-seat sections in the ballpark back then, $5 parking, and home-packed dinners. It was a cheap family outing, and we did it dozens of times those first years.
To the 1999 AZ Diamondback team, you have all gone your way, retired now. When we watch tonight, I have memories of those strong years. Our family favorite was Luis “Gonzo” Gonzalez who entertained us with his hitting streaks. Then Randy Johnson’s no-hitter and record number of Ks, and Jay Bell’s grand slam that made a fan a million dollars. All-Stars, all of you. Thank you for the memories.
Tonight’s game started at 7:10 PT.
By 7:24, the Diamondbacks scored their first run: 1-0. They lost the lead in the second inning, though.
At 7:26, Keith said, “I’d be okay not watching the whole game.”
I said, “Well, I want to watch until at least 7:55. This is my Slice of the day.” We turned it off a little after 8:00. Then later, we watched the ninth inning.
My guess is we won’t be using the T-Mobile perk too much, but it’s nice to know it’s there when we want to watch a little baseball.
Tonight I came out as this sweet slice of my day began. The sun was just setting. The weather was perfect as I read and commented on some Slices of Life from my friends. This month is almost finished, and I will be relieved when it’s over. However, I have enjoyed every day in March, and I love getting to better know my writing friends through their writing.
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