Month: August 2021

Slice of Life – Whoa, Summer!

Denise Krebs10 Comments
Today’s Slice of Life at TwoWritingTeachers.org, 31 August 2021

Wow, here we are and another summer gone. School started for teachers this week, and I am officially just a volunteer for four more months, when we will leave the country. Though I have spent a few hours at school this week for some meetings, helping with curriculum questions, and searching for books, I am no longer employed. It has been a long and weird transition of leadership due to the pandemic and a whole year of mostly-online learning. Now we are transitioning to mostly in-person learning (knock on wood), and there were some things the new coordinator never saw or needed to do last year. I am glad I was still around to help her sort those out.

Anyway, summer is gone. I looked back at a July post where I wrote many of my goals for the weeks of summer, a summer spent here in Bahrain in the thickness of heat and humidity. Looking back, I can say it was a productive and happy summer. I definitely accomplished a lot on my list, with a few items left to carry over for the fall. However, knowing I didn’t have to return to the full-time grind allowed me to have both a relaxed and fruitful summer.

A poem attempt today, trying a form by Joyce Sidman, used in her book Winter Bees and Other Poems of the Cold, and described here in this post by Michelle Heidenrich Barnes.

Summer

What does summer know?
Time to bud and blossoms showing
Merrily, merrily, life a-rowing
Calm and meditative glowing

What does summer know?
Wide-eyed wonder, newness flowing
Memory-building ripe for stowing
Almost over — attempt at whoa-ing

After reading the comment by Carol (below), I added this poem to an image I took this summer. In this photo of a common beach scene, fishing boats are anchored, for people are resting safely during the heat of the day. If you look off to the right of this photo, across the Arabian Gulf lies Iran, beyond that…Afghanistan, where many people are not resting safely and peacefully right now. I couldn’t help but read my poem again, noticing the privileged tone and all the missing summer pain of pandemics, hurricanes, and displacement. Praying for those in Afghanistan, Louisiana, and all others who are hurting.

Poetry Friday – This is What the Jasmine Flower Knows

Denise Krebs22 Comments

Today is Poetry Friday, hosted by Elisabeth at Unexpected Intersections. Elisabeth wrote a poem about what the marmot knows. Check out the other posts on her blog and see what other Poetry Friday poets are up to. Many are following the prompt inspired by Jane Yolen’s “What the Bear Knows.” Read more here on Mary Lee Hahn’s blog post.

This week I helped plan a surprise Zoom party for my dear friend and ministry partner. One stop I made was for her favorite flowers. I went to a little shop just outside the Hindu temple and purchased a string of jasmine flowers. The shop keeper, Raj, gave me a snip for my hair. (In my thin hair, it didn’t stay very long, but I do keep it nearby enjoying the scent as a work.)

Today we had the surprise Zoom party with friends and her family members, some in India and some here in Bahrain. I wrote my poem for my friend.

Ode to My Friend Vinolia,
Who Has Learned to Live Life Well
From What the Jasmine Flower Knows
To light up the room with love
And spread gentle perfume of
This gift of God, beautiful and pure,
Strong and full, savoring to cure
This is what the jasmine knows
Comfort of sopping up your tears of prayer
Later the warm caress of hugging your hair
as you hold the gaze of your mum and dad,
adult sons on life’s launching pad,
husband and daughter by your side–
The shepherding Way as your forever guide.
This is what Jasmine knows this year,
as your milestone birthday appears.

 

 

Slice of Life – Making a Yo-Yo Quilt

Denise Krebs10 Comments

Yo-Yos

Today’s Slice of Life at TwoWritingTeachers.org, 24 August 2021

Remnants of history
(that blouse for the Sadie Hawkins dance,
the dress that I wore when I interviewed for my first job,
a scrap from the bridesmaids’ dresses my mom made for my wedding,
and hundreds more forgotten memories)
I’ve carried around for forty years,
cut into perfect circles,
each stitched lovingly around the edges
by Aunt Thelma, and now by me,
to make what she called a yo-yo,
now find new purpose.

Image by Mahmood Ali from Pixabay

This whole project is a scrap craft from things I have on hand. My inspiration is this landmark building in Manama–the Bahrain World Trade Center. It always leads people to Manama, the capital city. My Aunt Thelma was the quintessential crafter. She cut hundreds of circles and stitched them into yo-yos. Now, as I near retirement, I have finally got serious about using them to make something. It’s far from finished, but I’m having fun.

Tammi Belko was the host today for Ethical ELA’s Open Write. Her prompt was to create a One Sentence Poem. That’s the poem that opened this post. Since I’ve had this quilt on my mind lately, that became my topic for my poem. (I have no idea if it’s really only one sentence!)

Yesterday’s prompt came from Tammi too. She introduced a new-to-me Sevenling poem. She has students use it to share about a book they have read–as a hook or a character sketch. I thought it has great potential for that. Check out the link for many other examples of poems written in this form. Here is my sevenling about E.B. White’s The Trumpet of the Swan.

Sevenling (He Works Hard)
He works hard to restore his honor,
Paying off his father’s debts, and
Waiting for his true love to respond.

He goes to school and takes on odd jobs—
Camp counselor where he learns to play, night club performer,
And Boston Public Garden entertainer.

Louis the swan became a trumpeter

 

Home

Denise Krebs

Today’s Ethical ELA Quick Write was shared by Jennifer Jowett, called Sunday Drive Tone Poem. I learned so much about tone poems and listened to a lot of great music. Do check out her post and read other poems written inspired by Sunday drive music. For my poem, I listened to some of the Lord of the Rings soundtrack and watched images of the Shire:

The peaceful scenes and tone poem of that soundtrack had my mind going in two opposite directions. Frodo said about leaving the Shire: “I shall know that somewhere there is a firm foothold, even if my feet cannot stand there again.” I used this quote to write a golden shovel.

Home

I am emptied by the news because Fred, Grace, and Henri
shall not stop their onslaught, and I
know they have siblings waiting
that will continue to ravage people and land.
Somewhere in Mexico,
there are families weeping, imploring,
“Is that grace?” And now Henri is storming New England, and
A cry arises from Afghanistan and Haiti and—God help! Is there a
Firm thatched roof, blue skies, and cirrus clouds, a
Foothold for a symphony of flowers, a launch for delicate butterflies?
Even old trees and honeybees find a place to be.
If there isn’t an expanse big enough for all, can we at least make
my prayer and yours to grow sweet-hope homes? Maybe our
feet can walk with the refugees and the broken until we
cannot help but find restful room for all to be, to
stand and share the waving hills and tender streams.
There–to create a home to return to
again and again.

California Quail

Denise Krebs2 Comments
Image by PublicDomainImages from Pixabay

Ethical ELA is starting their monthly Quick Write with a challenge to use kennings in our poem. Jennifer Jowett is the host today.

California Quail

California’s bird — wild,
But gentle as a child
Black-beard-styled
Belly white-tiled

Moisture gatherer
Ka-kah-ko chatterer
Attentive father
Scratches for fodder

Gregarious guy
Handsome and spry
Flies from a hawk
But prefers to walk
Comma Topknot
Audubon bigshot

Riddle Poems for Poetry Friday

Denise Krebs14 Comments

Thank you, Carol, for hosting Poetry Friday today with this lovely post at her site, The Apples in My Orchard.

I almost didn’t get anything written, but then I saw Margaret’s LaMiPoFri post. I hadn’t heard the term “Last Minute Poetry Friday” before–coined by Kat Apel in this sweet post. Now, here I am, Friday evening, needing just such a concept. I had nothing except a conversation with my husband this morning over tea/coffee. So, in honor of LaMiPoFri, I decided to write a poem about that conversation.

Yesterday in an email from Dictionary.com, the subject line read: What 3-Letter Word Has Over 600 Senses? It led to an interesting article for language lovers that identified “thirteen weird and wondrous facts about English.” My husband and I brainstormed some of the uses of the said word. I remembered the following poem I wrote in April where the title was important to the poem, but I saved it for the end of the poem to read afterwards. Try it…

Put it on the table
A staging of a fable

Donkey deity in the desert
Matching pants and shirt

Pieces in a collection
Go in that direction

Arrange the type for print
Vinegar will keep the tint

Pick it up and make it right
A string of LED lights

Hunting dog points
Relocate bones and joints

Concrete gets hard
Groups that score in cards

Earth’s star sleeps
That camera pose keep

Part of a tennis match
A whole cohesive batch

Start a campfire
A car’s new tires

Get ready and into the blocks
All the tools in your box

Your heart yearns for that
A suit with a matching hat

Pieces played in the band
Moving the clock’s hands

Direction of the wind
Rows of teeth above your chin

Choose a wedding date
Fix the value at a rate

We could go on for days and days
There are four-hundred, thirty ways

To use my little title word
Three letters–how absurd!

Double click or highlight the title after the colon: Set

Here is another riddle poem.  The title is at the end…

What Word Am I?

To the right and left,
Around and through,
To and from, in and out,
Up and down, forward and back,
How many ways to unpack
Just three little letters?

  • Depleted supply
  • Will surely pass by
  • Working mousetrap
  • Water at the tap
  • Do, re, mi, fa, so, la, tees
  • A prisoner flees
  • Crash into a pole
  • Health in the hole
  • Gallop and lope
  • A candidate’s hope
  • Duration of a show
  • Lies of a beau
  • Sequence of cards
  • A narrow dog yard
  • Blood veins flowing
  • Rich to poor going
  • Do a quick task
  • Tip over the flask
  • Cheap shirt’s dye weeps
  • The friends you keep
  • Manage a shop
  • Reboot the laptop
  • Drip from your nose
  • Ruined panty hose
  • Unraveling sock
  • Faster than a walk

They say there are 600 ways–
But I’m running out of plays.
What is my poem about?
Just a little word that shouts!
But 600 ways? I doubt!

Double click or highlight the title after the colon: Run

Here is the interesting article I read. I saved it for down here, so you could try my riddle before looking at the article: “Say What? 13 Weird, Wondrous Facts About English”

Another World

Denise Krebs7 Comments
Today’s Slice of Life at TwoWritingTeachers.org, 17 August 2021

Another World

Would you believe it, little one?
There is more in your future.
More to enjoy, to embrace, to learn.
A whole world awaits — vast and immeasurable.

For now, you are warm and cozy.
You feel this is all there is–
rocking, swaying with the rhythm
nestled in the glow of her heart.

But you will be disrupted soon.
You will come out kicking,
demanding attention,
attempting to make sense of the chaos.
It will take you a lifetime

To realize you can’t make sense
of the chaos.
You weren’t made for…
disappointments
hurts
brokenness
wars
lies
abandonment
abrupt withdrawal
poverty
earthquakes
pandemics
death
protesting for freedoms never promised,
distractions from the pain.

But would you believe it, little one?
There is more in your future.
More to enjoy, to embrace, to learn.
A whole other world awaits
Uncluttered thoughts, unfettered hearts,
As inconceivable as this one once was to you
A world being prepared for your full humanity —
vast and immeasurable.

Poetry Friday – Mary Oliver

Denise Krebs20 Comments

Today is Poetry Friday. Thank you to Christie Wyman for hosting us today at her Wondering and Wandering blog. Be sure to read the community poem she compiled called “Poetry Is…”

This week I’ve been reading Mary Oliver.

I’m finding that poets are among those I want to keep company with. You, Poetry Friday friends, “who say, ‘Look!’ and laugh in astonishment and bow your heads.” Thank you for helping me see the wonder.

I love that poem, “Mysteries, Yes” by Mary Oliver in her book Evidence (2009). This week, I read her collection, Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver.

I’m not two weeks late for the #theSealyChallenge to read a poetry book a day in August. I didn’t even try to do the challenge. However, Margaret Simon has been inspiring me this month, so I thought I would read at least a couple of poetry books in August. I have 3-4 that idly and open-heartedly wait for me on my Kindle. This week it was Mary Oliver. Her collection is filled with beautiful hope, faith, love and nature. What could be better?

I went through my notes and wrote out some of the highlighted lines in my favorite poems. (I didn’t get very far into my favorite lines because of the sheer volume of them). I chose about twenty, cut them apart, and then arranged them in order until I was pleased. The results are a cento poem exclusively made with Mary Oliver’s words.

A Cento of Gratitude for Mary Oliver

Joy is not made to be a crumb.
Love yourself. Then forget it. Then love the world.
It’s giving until the giving feels like receiving

Is this the place?
What would do for you?
And have you changed your life?

You have a life–just imagine that.
That the gift has been given–
Yes, yes, we are the lucky ones

to dance for the world,
all that glorious, temporary stuff
of this gritty earth gift.

You don’t hear such voices in an hour a day
Sometimes I want to sum up and give thanks,
and so, no doubt, can you, and you.

Sources for each line (in order)

      1. Don’t Hesitate
      2. To Begin With, the Sweet Grass
      3. To Begin With, the Sweet Grass
      4. I Wake Close to Morning
      5. Evidence
      6. Swan
      7. To Begin With, the Sweet Grass
      8. The Gift (from Felicity, 2014)
      9. I Know Someone
      10. Prayer
      11. On Meditating, Sort Of
      12. To Begin With, the Sweet Grass
      13. At the River Clarion
      14. That Little Beast
      15. The Poet Compares Human Nature to the Ocean From Which We Came

Oliver, Mary. Devotions. Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.