Category: Poems

poems

“The Peace of Wild Things”

Poems: May 4, 2022

“The Peace of Wild Things”

It is a rainy day.

That’s ok. I needed a rainy day.

Rainy days often cause for some reflection—and this day is one of those.

A friend sent me this Wendell Barry’s poem the other day—and today seems a good day to read and think about it. I had not read it in quite a few years.

The Peace of Wild Things 

When despair for the world grows in me

and I wake in the night at the least sound

in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,

I go and lie down where the wood drake

rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.

I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with forethought

of grief. I come into the presence of still water.

And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting with their light. For a time

I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

—Wendell Berry

RBG: A Life Lived Fully

Turkey Tracks: September 28, 2020

RBG: A Life Lived Fully

I grew up and married in the days before Ruth Bader Ginsberg began to change the American culture with regard to discrimination of all kinds. I could give you lots of examples of where I was not only “lesser than” the men who formed relationships in my life, but under their thumbs, which meant I was considerably less free than these men were.

Now I’m 75, and I am having a really hard time believing that we have returned to a time where much of what was changed can be made to revert. And, that a solitary white woman who thinks she has the right “truth” might be the fulcrum that makes this reversion possible.

We are all now faced with the power of a minority of white male politicians to change our lives in ways many of us cannot imagine. In the end, I do not think they will be successful, but the burning question is how far away “the end” lies.

Here’s a screenshot of a poem that might have been read at RBG’s funeral service and that holds something different: the power of love to change a culture in ways that are healthy for all human beings.

RBG will be powerfully missed and is powerfully loved by so many people in this country—precisely because she understood the power of love.

Turkey Tracks: Celebrating Spring Snow Drops

Turkey Tracks:   March 9, 2020

Celebrating Spring Snow Drops

The Snow Drops are here—at least in some warm, sunny places.

I have not seem mine yet up here on the hill, but Lion Jerry Stone has some, which gives us all joy.

He celebrated with this message and picture.

Thanks Jerry!

****

February 29, 2020

Fine friends & friendly foe,

Nothing more excites me as March crawls closer to introduce Maine to spring than the precious, plucky snowdrops along the front cellar wall at Bette’s & my modest Camden home. Few things in life attempt “gilding the lily”, for they are themselves already perfect. And so, annually, snowdrops revive my restless soul & poetic pursuit. Enjoy my early spring welcome with picture & poetry.

This Leap Year spring arrives on March 19th.

Blessings to all who hope & dream!

Jerry Stone

 

 

Oh, Brave Snowdrops Now Here!

by Jerry Stone, 2.29.20

 

Oh, gentle & glad surprise!

Oh, now-exposed, perennial plant pals.

Oh, slender & slim, at-risk snowdrops.

Oh, cute cotton swabs just before green flap & flower.

Oh, feeble friends, sneaking up this hardest early hour

In February’s frosty earth this Leap Year Day.

Among snow & stone & lazy tannic leaf you lay.

Oh, surprising bloom, Heaven-sent & hope-filled!

You signal mild winter’s end & salute spring’s slow start.

Oh, modest firstborn, oh, feeble firstling, “lily gild”,

By example, I’m also here, vulnerable but humble in heart.

 

Poems: Walking Haiku 19 and 20

Poems:  February 7, 2018

Walking Haiku 19 and 20

It’s often warm in Maine this winter.  And it’s often really cold.  We have yo-yo weather these days.

As I write, we are expecting a major snow storm, but here on the coast the snow may turn to rain later today.

No No Penny and I had a lovely walk on Monday, the first in some time.

 

19.

February 5, 2018

Hard rain all night long
In February, in Maine
Global warming comes

20.

February 5, 2018

February thaw
Sunshine brims from blue sky and
Sparks fire on the lake

Poems: Haiku 11 and Learning Herringbone Pattern

Poem:  November 27, 2017

Haiku 11 and Learning Herringbone Pattern

11.

November 26, 2017

White birches in the
Winter woods seem like ice spikes
Piercing the sky bowl.

 

Here’s my first attempt at making Victoria Findlay Wolfe’s herringbone pattern—from her new book MODERN QUILT MAGIC.  It uses 2 by 8-inch strips.  This SAMPLE  has been trimmed to make a pillow.  For right now I’m just putting this sample into the Parts Department box.  Lord knows I do NOT need any more pillows in my house!!!

And I learned what I need to know.

I do think that I will use this pattern to make a Cotton+Steel low volume lap quilt—a project I have longed to make for some months now.