Friday Shoot-Out: Sports

Today's shootout topic is sports suggested by Barry and Linda.  This week is going to be a quick post for me.  Time has run short lately! 

Here is my sweetheart, John, swimming at the Taj (in AC).

Here are some Belly Dancers.  They also did an amazing sword dance.

Sorry to be brief!  Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

One Single Impression: Fissures

The prompt from onesingleimpression this week is fissures.  Here is my poem.

Fissures

If we were a mountain
it wouldn't matter,
these fissures.

If we were a waterfall,
full, beautiful, rainbow drunk,
the cracks would be irrelevant.

If we were a rock
or a fossil,
the little divisions
would add character,
be magically artistic.

If we had accomplished something
somewhere along the way,
some formation of mending clay
like tenderness, like forgiveness,
these fissures would not have
opened into gaping holes,
chasms swallowing
earths, dreams, weights of hope.

HaikuBones: Night Rain

The prompt this week from haikubones is night rain.  Here is my attempt!

Your kisses fall on
my skin, sweet, quiet, loving,
like soft rain at night.

Happy Song Time

I just wanted to share a song that always makes me feel happy and energized.  I believe in the power of the creative arts to make life better.  Every time I hear this song, I want to get up and dance around the room.  And why not?  Life is too sort to NOT dance around the room every chance you get.

Six Word Saturday

I hope everyone enjoyed the weather!

(NJ had a beautiful, sunny, Spring day).

Friday Shoot-Out: Trees

In honor of Earth Day, gingerv has suggested "trees" as the subject of this week's shoot out (her blog is beautiful and I highly recommend checking it out).  What a great idea!  I love trees and I love taking pictures of trees.  I actually talked about it and shared more pictures of trees in a previous post: http://spiritsoflena.blogspot.com/2009/04/proud-to-be-jersey-girl.html

This picture I took on the way to work.  I loved how the tulips match the tree.  This was outside of a florist called "Bloomers".

This was taken in my town of Vineland this winter.

I just love the way the sky looks through the silhoettes of trees; mystical and magical.

This picture was taken in the town where I grew up.

Trees are truly majestic and beautiful.  It is one of the best parts of living in New Jersey.  A poet I once knew, Betty Spinner, said that in the Fall, the trees are sometimes so beautiful that it hurts.  I was a teenager at the time but I never forgot it.  For those of us who live in a place with trees that change in the Fall, we know how true this statement is.  The beauty of nature is a gift to all who have the senses to perceive it. Sometimes, we just need to remind ourselves to pay attention to all the beauty that surrounds us.  I hope you enjoyed!!

Haiku Bones: Hunt

This week's prompt from haikubones is hunt. 

My dream, like the moon,
hangs out of reach miles away.
I will hunt you down.


If you like my haikus, check out some more:
illogical
wrought iron heart
pregnant

Friday Shoot Out--Pictures that make me Smile

This week's topic was suggested by Kerry.  Good timing for this topic (day after tax day)! 

This picture makes me smile because it makes me appreciate the Spring with warm sun on my skin.  It wasn't too long ago when the sight above was almost a daily occurence!

My cats Winston and Magnum always make me smile. Winston likes to pose.  Magnum is harder to get with the camera.  Winston is quite a ham, sometimes.

It is amazing how cats will try to cram themselves into boxes way too small.

Oh, to be as relaxed as my cat!

I hope you enjoyed my pictures that make me smile!

I hope something made you smile today!

One Single Impression: Vicarious

The prompt from onesingleimpression is vicarious.

Vicarious

I will not be
vicarious,
like the starers
at the stars
sparkling in designers best
on a blood-red carpet.

Dreams of others
step outside what's real,
what's love.
the heart a peeling husk,
disintegrates at a touch
just for wish.

Some would step inside
for the sick possession
of the beautiful,
be gods to marionettes
staring in the mirror
at the stranger
their self has become.

An enemy, that wish of another ghost.
What of divine
what of light
what of compassion
for the god
that grows
slow
inside our aching
Earth.

Haiku Bones: Bamboo

The promp from haikubones this week is bamboo:

A bamboo heart
knows how to bend with the wind
is hollow and versatile.

Six Word Saturday

Starting on a new path today.

Friday Shoot-Out: Country Roads

This shoot-out is going to be short and hopefully sweet.  It's just been one of those days!!  Hope you enjoy my interpretation of the theme.  Thanks!

Hope your week is sunny!

Haiku Bones: Anthem

The prompt from haikubones this week is Anthem.

Oh say can you see
the dawns softly fading light,
an anthem's whisper.

Getting Personal With Poetry

I can't believe I forgot to do the poem a day the last few days!! Just got caught up with life!  But I still want to participate as much as I can.  Click on the above icon to read about the prompt. 

Poetry

What name can I give you;
Glinda--magical and good,
sparkly hope of home?

Charon, a dark mysterious
guide to a deeper realm?

My own name?
After all, my self is written
all over my words--
Jung would say
it shows it all
as if my soul
were naked.

Nothing satisfies,
so maybe Mick Jagger
or Shakespeare
or simply Joan.

I do not know.
I do know
I love you.

Poem two for NaPoWriMo: Regular White Paper

RWP

The note was on regular white paper
and I guess I was hoping for something
more fancy, maybe a scroll at the borders
or a tiny purple flower winding its way
through a vine...

Anything to reveal some secret message
beyond your words; all that's left,
your soul's skeleton in black ink.
I will keep this forever,
but you knew that, probably,
as you wrote, providing
me a souvenir or
your death knell.

I suppose I should forgive you
and this blank message on a carelessly ripped
page from a notebook.
I suppose I should.

Anger Management (Poem a Day for April)

Since I do not have an ipod or a cd shuffler, I put on "Music Choice" which is basically radio television.  I wrote the titles of the first five songs that played on the Adult Alternative channel.  The songs were:
"Is it any wonder," "Troubled Land," "The Bringdown," "Thank You", "Trash Day"

Anger Management

Is it any wonder
that my mind wanders
like a stranger in a troubled land,
when all that rage has gone unpronounced,
held inside to protect you
and myself
from the Bringdown

that launching anger brings.

I guess I'm supposed to thank you,
for teaching me more self-control,
better anger management,
forced on me by the need for survival.

Be careful, it's a dangerous game
you play, look out to the curb
on trash day.

RWP 120 Get Your Poem On

This poem was inspired by a picture by alicepopkorn:

Devour the Empty

Crows circle
like burnt paper
floating above the bonfire
dying in your heart.

Those were my poems
never written,
charred beyond
recognition
gone somewhere outside
of consciousness.

I'll eat this death;
let its carcass rot inside me,
a desert of the soul
with blue skies that never cry;
dried up, used up,
useless, wheels that won't roll.

Close your eyes, dear,
after all,
it doesn't really matter.
All hearts die
sometime.