King of Torrey Pines, Western Fence Lizard
Your deep sunny pushups warm your cold blood
Darting and dashing safely, young Wizard
Horny tight scales keep you dry in flashfloods
Your deep sunny pushups warm your cold blood
Those climbing toes! Longer than your femurs!
Horny tight scales keep you dry in flashfloods
Look at your stunning view, O, Daydreamer
Those climbing toes! Longer than your femurs!
Your dark shadow shows two tails and two heads
Look at your stunning view, O, Daydreamer
If your tail is caught it can safely shed
Your dark shadow shows two tails and two heads
No worries for you where you build your home
If your tail is caught it can safely shed
As human houses tumble into the foam
No worries for you where you build your home
Darting and dashing safely, young Wizard
As human houses tumble into the foam
King of Torrey Pines, Western Fence Lizard
Forty-seven years ago my husband took me on a date to Quail Gardens. Today, for the first time, we returned. Now it’s called the San Diego Botanic Garden. So often today we were reminded of something from our first time here. Just a few of the dozens of photos I took:
The bird-of-paradise (lower left hand flower) was one of the first plants we saw. I told my husband just this morning I had read a Bird-of-Paradise poem, and he asked me to tell him about it. So I looked it up and read it to him! (Written by our own slicer Joanne Emery.) Speaking of birds, today was the first time I confirmed my email on Merlin and used the app to listen to the birds in the garden. Thanks to Fran and Kim, my bird lover friends and fellow slicers. There were a lot of song sparrows, but the most interesting time was when I record this Red-Shouldered Hawk and Yellow-rumped Warbler who seemed to be carrying on a conversation.
After this we ate (a sandwich) and ate (a chocolate oatmeal bar) and ate (ice cream) and ate (a made-to-order donut).
Then we went to the beach to walk a couple more miles.
Years later and even more I belong to you
One of our first dates was to Quail Garden
It took seven years for you to break through
For you to convince my heart not to harden
One of our first dates was to Quail Garden
You say I had on white shorts and a red tee
For you to convince my heart not to harden
You had to be patient, and you were with me
You say I had on white shorts and a red tee
Don’t know how you remembered what I wore
You had to be patient, and you were with me
Though it took me time, it is you I adore
Don’t know how you remembered what I wore
There’s magic in the moments you give
Though it took me time, it is you I adore
Red roses and quail on a day to relive
There’s magic in the moments you give
It took seven years for you to break through
Red roses and quail on a day to relive
Years later and even more I belong to you
Today is Poetry Friday. Tanita Davis is rounding up the posts for this Ides of March at {fiction, instead of lies}.
This week has been a week of poetry reading (as well as writing regular shitty first drafts of poems for the Stafford Challenge).
First and most importantly, I read poetry by my daughter Maria. She took an advanced poetry class as a senior in college and made this beautiful book of poems:
My favorite poems of this collection are Maria’s Sonnets i and ii, written about her spring break trip 14 years ago. She experienced a vastly different spring break than is typical for a college junior.
i
I’d never seen my Grandma grey and worn.
This shrunken woman in the hospice bed
cannot be my grandma. My grandma lives alone
in Yucca Valley, hiking on the dirt
roads with muddy furrows that sink like
the laugh lines on her cheeks. She conceals
wispy hair under immaculate wigs. Despite
sore hammer toes she works her sky-high heels.
That day I hiked the furrowed roads alone,
adrift amidst waxy creosote.
Stringy jackrabbits, baby quail gambol,
flitting through dry gulches like rowboats.
Somehow I didn’t want to be inside
Spring Break two thousand ten, when Grandma died.
ii
Spring Break two thousand ten, when Grandma died,
I arrived in time for bon voyage,
the convalescent odors scattered by
tamales, Spanish rice, tortillas, guac,
and Grandma, a bit tipsy on boxed wine.
One last boisterous fiesta while the Reeds
were still a family, whole and feeling fine.
The jalapeño sweat displaced the needs
that lay beneath the cornered hospice sheets.
The jalapeños were what got to me,
the smiles against those hospice whites.
The laugh of one you love is therapy
with nebulizer and glass of sweet rosé.
I’d never seen my Grandma grey and worn.
~By Maria C. Krebs, reprinted with permission by the poet
Another book I’ve read this week is Counting Descent by Clint Smith. Last year I won a Barnes & Noble gift card from Carol Labuzzetta from a promotion on her site The Apples in My Orchard. I “lost” it for several months, and when I found it recently, I added Barnes & Noble on my to-do list when we were in Temecuela last week. For more than one reason, I wanted to buy a book of poems, but I also got this package of beautiful origami paper.
Another book I read was this 40-year-old verse novel. The Donner Party by George Keithley is the evidence I’ll bring to the next meeting of our Friends of the Library. It is convincing evidence, I believe, for the request to be less picky about the books we place in our book shop. I was volunteering on Saturday, and I found this book in the box to be recycled (not to sell in the bookshop):
It is beautifully-written and full of detail of the horrors of the cross-country trip to California that the Donners, Reeds, and others made in 1846. There are some offensive and archaic references, which were revised in a 2012 reprinting of this book, but it’s a worthwhile find for 50 cents or $1–the price we charge for books at our Friends bookshop.
Another opportunity on Ethical ELA: Verselove is coming in April. If you are looking for community and 30 days of writing prompts for April’s National Poetry Month, you will be coming to the right place. You’re welcome to join us. Sign up for Verselove here.
Finally, for those who are still here. If you’ll be writing a #poetrypals animal pantoum, have you seen the Pantoum Tool here? I find it very helpful.
a poem cannot save a life
cannot Luke Cage your skin
fend off a dark alley attack
cannot make you less woman
or less poor
or less Black
and
thus
treated equally
Thursday was the wedding day, a perfectly warm-not-hot afternoon and evening. Today’s Poetry Friday round up is being gathered over at Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme by Matt Forrest Esenwine. He is celebrating the one-year anniversary of Friends & Anemones: Ocean Poems for Children, a beautiful anthology. Thank you, Matt, for hosting.
This week I’ve been struck by all the small images, memories, and moments that inspire poetry for me and others. In “Supple Cord,” Naomi Shihab Nye remembered and shared this sweet childhood ritual linking her with her brother.
Supple Cord
My brother, in his small white bed,
held one end.
I tugged the other
to signal I was still awake. continued
Margaret Simon is hosting the Poetry Friday Roundup today. I have been inspired to write beside Margaret many times over the past year. Inspired here by “Zen Tree” and here by “Peep Eye”, and so many times at Ethical ELA, like here and here for two. I will be going back to her “Today’s Poem” again for inspiration, the poem that “gazes beyond the trees imagining…”
Margaret‘s “This Photo Wants to Be a Poem” has been a fun challenge and further inspiration for me lately. On Wednesdays, Margaret posts a photo, and others write a small collection of poems about one image–each always unique, with rich imagery that goes deep into the photo. Each person interprets and sees something beautiful. This week the image was of a bird’s nest in the garden at Margaret’s school. I was impressed with her student, Kaia, who wrote a letter to the superintendent to get improvements made in the garden for next year. Thank you, Margaret, for encouraging Kaia’s voice! I don’t think there is much more important work teachers do than making space for children to recognize, develop, and use their voice. (Of course, I do acknowledge that teaching history, civics, reading and critical thinking skills to know how to use that voice is vital, as well.) Here’s the poem I wrote copy-pasted here. It wasn’t about the bird nest photo, but about Kaia and Ms. Simon who assessed the garden after a long dormant Covid season.
Kaia’s voice
A voice can be
a power displayer
a truth conveyer
a path lighter
a garden inviter
a hardship remover
a world improver
Your voice can be
In addition, I wrote a sestina this week inspired by Liz’s post last Friday. Afterwards, I was searching for different poetry form generators. This one is the best I found for the sestina; it’s by Rena Mosteirin, which comes compete with the code. Here are two more good poetry form generators for Pantoum and Villanelle.
Speaking of generators: I ran across this interesting Poem Generator, so I gave it a try. It’s like writing a Mad Lib poem. The first time I wrote silly things with answers that came to me as soon as I saw the prompt, as they suggested. The second time I tried it with words that made me think of peace. I actually thought the second one sounded like a bit poetic.
Rorschach Poem
creep home
know Houlihan’s to try sunny late afternoon
ceiling fan getting dark
an owl is deep wide
I would go home if I am without gasoline
somebody a cowboy
stalking you.
Peace in Knowing
whisper home
live for wide sky to sip sweet dawn
heavens shining
a dove is slow and deep
Bring peace if I need a hand
somebody helper
reaching you.
Here is an invitation for you to write poetry with the Ethical ELA community. On June 13 there will be an introductory meeting for anyone who wants to learn more, and an open mic/writing hour afterwards. Click on the images below for more information. June’s Ethical ELA Open Write will be June 19-23 this month.