poetry prompt

Ask the Moon

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 2 Comments

Last night as I fell asleep
I asked the moon–
like a child begging
for a bedtime story–
to tell me a marvelous dream.
I asked for a big cat,
like a lion or a cheetah.
An oak tree, or any tall tree.
A stone of power.
And Lake Victoria.
Suddenly an owl appeared,
so I said, You come too.

I didn’t ask for much.

What I got was a job
as an Administrative Secretary
at a desk in the lobby
of a grand publishing company.
Papers and messages
lay strewn about,
and I knew nothing
about dealing with them.

I sat for a while,
shoved papers around
like Sisyphus pushing that rock.
Tried to plug in the lamps
to get a little more light.
Looked as busy as I could.

When I awoke,
I was snuggled up
with a child
now comforted and warm
after a nosebleed and winter chill.

Some nights I wake up
in a panic, worried
that they will freeze in the night.

Drifting off again, I found myself
in someone’s cottage,
the same child a dream child,
next to me in bed.
I looked outside to see the moon
and a giant shadow passed
across the yard toward
the back door.

My legs were dream-leaden.
I could not rise to rescue
the other child asleep
alone in his dream-room.
Did this go on for hours?

When dawn came,
I awoke between the two,
the flesh-and-blood boys,
the dream child now
forever unrescued.

Next time I ask for a dream,
perhaps I’ll call for a restless job
and a relentless shadow,
and wish secretly
for a leopard in a tree.

 

Prompt for Tuesday

I was planning to do a found poem for tomorrow, trying to figure out how to come up with five or six totally random phrases to weave into a poem, but this evening before supper, Joss started singing, “Once I was a snake.  Once I was a weasel.”  I have also been wanting to trying creating something with a mythic tone.  So.  Found poem.  Myth poem.  Join me?  I am sure Joss wouldn’t mind sharing his song with you, too.  Or find your own.  Listen to someone speaking tomorrow morning and pull a couple phrases at random.

 

Gratitude List:

1.  Windshield wiper fluid
2.  Sentinel hawks along the highway
3.  My dental hygienist, who cares so well for my teeth
4.  The prayers and blessings that children give
5.  Ellis, who cut a piece of red paper into the shape of a Y:  “This is a Y, for you, because you are so important to me.”

henofthewoods

Begin the Revolution

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 2 Comments

A poem about the middle, about the anti-polarity.

We have danced so far
toward opposite poles
that we’ve become magnetic,

drawing each other closer
as we pull so frantically apart.
Our rhetoric and plans may seem

so utterly opposed, but
tones and tactics grow
so similar.  At times

they’re indistinguishable.
Today’s most radical,
most Revolutionary route

might be–perhaps–to take a step
towards the center, at least
in tone or tactic,

in the face of opposition
and defiance to throw up
a wall of joy, a flag of heart.

 

Prompt for Monday

I’ve been wanting to do a dream poem.  Since tonight is the Full Wolf Moon, I thought I might ask that wolf to send me a meaningful dream and use that for my poem tomorrow.  If I don’t retain a dream in the morning, I’ll make something up.  Heh.  Join me?

 

Gratitude List:

1.  Wolf Moon rising, caught in the branches of the locusts on the ridge
2.  Fiery orange sunset
3.  Sun dogs
4.  Women of the Faire, and roasted garlic, goat cheese, and hot pepper jam
5.  The village who raises our children: Be kind.  Be safe.

Much love.  May we walk in beauty.

Grandma making peanut butter cups:

Gma PB Cups

Breezes and Footprints

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 5 Comments

I

It was such a fine powder
that the shovel seemed like overkill
so I pulled out the leaf blower
and tethered myself to the garage
with the long orange extension cord.

In places it blew the fine particles away
from the tiny dimpled pads on a cat’s paw print
like an archaeologist’s brush,
leaving the faint foot print stubbornly intact
beside a stretch of black surface
where the heavily crushed tracks of the car
had flown away in my wind like flocks of white birds.

II

I can see clear pictures in my head
of things that happened long ago,
like catching crawcrabs in the creek
with my brother and his friends
the year I turned eight.

I can still smell the bullfrogs
that had grown from tadpoles
in my friend Jenelle’s aquarium
the summer I turned nine.

I can still taste the custard apples
we picked from the wild space
behind our house in Shirati when I was six.

I can still hear the hoot of a hyena
way off in the distance
on cool Tanzanian nights when I was five.

I cannot recall what I ate for supper last week,
nor what I told you about my journey
when I saw you at Christmas,
and I cannot remember why
I stood up just now and walked
into the other room.

What forces determine which pieces
will remain frozen to the surface,
and which will be blown away?

Why do some delicate paw prints
of the long-ago past continue
to tiptoe through my memories
while whole chunks
of yesterday’s heavy tire prints
whoosh away on the wind of time?

Yet others encounter opposing breezes
and drift back over time’s winds
to settle back in lacy veils
over the present moment.

III

What is the substance of memory?
I remember that I first met my grandmother
when I was three years old
just off the plane from Africa.
Is the image in my mind
my memory of that moment?
Or has it been blown there
by the breezes of story
told and retold in my family
of a child who ran into the arms
of a grandmother she had never met?
Perhaps it doesn’t matter.

And where now will it reside in my memory,
now that I have called it up into the present,
I who miss her so, who have a tender three-year-old
of my own, and tears in my eyes?

IV

These stories of memory are gifts
that we give to our children, saying,

You are who you are in this moment,
like this fresh landscape of new-fallen snow.
But also here in this moment you are who you were,
like the grass that stretches up through the powder.
And you are who you will be,
as the winds blow across,
constantly shifting the surface of things.

 

Prompt for Sunday

Thanks to Jodi Reinhart for the prompt today: Write a poem about the middle, about the anti-polarity.  Oooh!  You know you want to join me on this one.

 

Gratitude List:

1.  Reiki
2.  Angels everywhere
3.  The delight and focus of a 6-year-old who obsesses on a craft project
4.  Sun to melt the drive and roads to blackness
5. This:   2013 January

May we walk in beauty.

Sing You Gently Joy

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 2 Comments

A chant poem, inspired by some women I love.

Here in the house of exhaustion
Here in the place of retreat
We’ll sing you gently joy
and hold your heart in hope

Here when your way is weary
Here where your heart is uneasy
We’ll sing you gently joy
and hold your heart in hope

Here when the day closes over you
Here when your sighs bring tears
We’ll sing you gently joy
and hold your heart in hope

Here where the way seems hopeless
Here where the rage overflows
We’ll sing you gently joy
and hold your heart in hope

Here where the No overcomes you
Here where despair abounds
We’ll sing you gently joy
and hold your heart in hope

Here in the birthplace of the fear
Here in the abode of loneliness
We’ll sing you gently joy
and hold your heart in hope

 

Prompt for Saturday

Well, it’s got to be a snow poem.

 

Gratitude List:

1.  I know I write the word “Sunrise” a lot in these lists, but really.  This morning’s sunrise glowed magenta like burning coals through the snow-clouds covering the ridge.
2.  The beauty of the Susquehanna when it is iced over, with little channels of running water here and there, and the morning sun sparkling on the surface.
3.  Little birdy footprints in the snow, like cuneiform, like code, like augury.
4.  Joy and the friends who remind me to be joyful.
5.  Gratitude lists.  And Regina Martin’s observation that the spiritual discipline of the gratitude list makes you start to take notice immediately when you wake up–you start to look for what you will put on the list for the day.

May we walk in beauty.

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Rose hips in winter (photo taken in 2006)

Hold the Moment

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 4 Comments

I had intended today’s poem to be a children’s poem.  It’s coming out more like a poem for my children.

I want to snag your memories,
to hold your busy brains and say,
“This.  This is one to hold on to.
Here.  Don’t ever let this moment go.”

Remember that day
when you first sat
in the butterfly swing
up on the hill?
I pushed you
so high
you thought you were flying
above the house
into the clouds.

Remember when we went sledding
down the barn hill
on little plastic sleds
over a bare sprinkle of snow?
“Oh, yay for sledding day!”
you hollered
as you danced
back up the hill
through the powder.

Remember the day
we went to pick up the chicks
and I saw you suddenly change
from one who is cared for
to one who cares for others?
You held the soft down
up to your cheek
and your eyes shone
with the mystery of
sudden love
for the small ones.

Remember when
you first began to read?
How you said,
“You read this one,
please,” but
you couldn’t resist
reading aloud with me
at the good parts.

Our days are constant and comfortable.
The stream of life carries us
moment to moment,
and it would spoil it,
I suppose, to try to grasp it all,
to hold onto every shining treasure.

Oh, but I want to hook these few,
hold them to me like warm quilts
carefully crafted by the grandmothers,
and pass them on to you to treasure.

Prompt for Friday

I think tomorrow I will try a chant-style poem.  Join me?

Gratitude List:

1.  “Yay for sledding day!”–Joss said it and I agree with him.
2.  Making gnomes with Ellis today.  What a delight to watch him make something that he treasures.
3.  The breezeway is clean–thanks, Jon!
4.  Fidelity, loyalty, integrity, being true, garnets.
5.  This:  “Ten times a day something happens to me like this – some strengthening throb of amazement – some good sweet empathic ping and swell. This is the first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness.” ― Mary Oliver

May we walk in beauty!

2013 January 023

Ellis made the star gnome.

2013 January 018

Four new gnomes.

Ghazal

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 2 Comments

Listen for the blue note in the sparrow’s call: “Remember this!”
Notice where it flies when leaves begin to fall.  Remember this.

Yesterday I watched the morning awaken,
and in the shapes of clouds I could read the scrawl: Remember This.

Take hands and step forward with love in your heart
and do not worry about what might befall.  Remember this.

You remembered my question when you returned.
I had painted it, bright red, on the wall: Remember this.

When one who is known as the Weaver is gone,
What remains are these words in the sand–that is all: Remember this.

 

Thursday’s Prompt

Tomorrow’s poem will be a poem for children.  Join me?

 

Gratitude List:

1.  Clear questions, with thoughtful and earnest answers.
2.  Great blue heron
3.  Finding ways to warm up
4.  Discovering the new JK Rowling book in the library
5.  Vision.  Sight.  Eyes.

May we walk in beauty.

2013 January 014

Morning frost on the inside of the window.

Press One for Prosperity

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

Phone prompts poem. . .  Thanks to Nicole LaRue for the goats.

Greetings!  This is Auntie Beth’s Happy Place.
We hope you are having a pleasant day.
Please listen carefully to all of the following items
as our options are apt to change daily.

Press one for prosperity,
two for love,
three for vitality.
For luck, fortune or destiny,
press four, five, or six.
Press seven if your goat’s been gotten,
eight if you just can’t get it down the stairs.
Press nine for a whole new menu
of delightful options,
and zero for the operator.

To make an appointment
with one of our psychics,
visualize your appointment preference,
hang up the phone,
and wait for us to contact you.

Beep.

Wednesday’s Prompt

I want to try a ghazal.  I’ll be inside with the boys most of the day tomorrow except for a trip to the library, so hopefully I’ll have time to work on it.  Here’s a basic description of how to write a ghazal, if you care to join me.

Gratitude List:

1.  The smudges of snow-clouds drifting around the sky this morning
2.  That indigo-violet cloud with the magenta underbelly this evening
3.  The skitter and whoosh of the flicker as it flies out of the barn every morning when I pass on my way to the chickens
4.  The amazing learning capacity of children
5.  A real cold snap.  Really.  It will kill some bugs.

May we walk in beauty.

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Where Do I Draw the Line?

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 3 Comments

I had intended to make this playful and fun, but a heaviness overtook me as I began to reflect.  Perhaps I’ll try the silly side of this another day.

That lying line,
that lion,
that roars and rumbles rudely.

Color inside it or outside,
where shall we draw it?

When does the sweet secret
turn sourly to self-deception,
the slow slide of truth
across that watery line to lie?

This, says the heart, is mine,
this private line,
this inner realm I rule.
It is my right.

Indeed.  And yet,
integrity bleeds outward
from secret worlds,
the safest closets
and deep-down caves.

When does my secret cease
to protect us in its quiet case?
When does it enter that twisted space,
the reflection that belies reality?

Oh, give the heart its privacy
within indigo shadows,
but don’t mistake reflection
for the truth.

 

Prompt

Tomorrow’s poem, courtesy of my friend Brad Lehman, is to write a poem of phone prompts.  (I think he originally suggested that I translate them into or out of Spanish.  Um.  No.)  Something about the experience (frustration?) of finding your way through phone recordings.  Join me?  Press one for the poem of the day.  Beep.

 

Gratitude List:

1.  Getting the white shower curtain white again
2.  Cantaloupe smoothies
3.  Folk tales
4.  Hands to hold in the darkness
5.  Beeswax crayons

May we walk in beauty.

2013 January 005

 

Blessing

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 1 Comment

May the bright breeze of morning rouse your heart to singing,
May the fire of the noonday warm your heart to hopefulness,
May the cooling rains of evening wash your heart to freshness,
May the enclosing arms of the earth hold you through the midnight.

Walk in paths of the winds that awaken,
Walk through the fires that burn off the scars,
Walk in the waters that cool and renew,
Stand with your feet firmly planted on earth

Until you hear the voice of the wind,
Until you breathe the essence of the fire,
Until you smell the message of the waters,
Until you feel the heartbeat of the earth,
Until you see the sun rise
within you,
within you.

Prompt for Monday:

Write a poem about a secret or a lie.  I might tell a lie about myself, or make up a secret, or tell a REAL secret, perhaps.  But you’ll never know, really, what the truth is, eh?  Care to join me?

Gratitude List:

1.  A gripping historical account of the assassination of President Lincoln told by my 12-year-old nephew.  And the way my brother explains the patterns of ancient human history.
2.  The brightness of the half-moon, and the stars, tonight.
3.  Reading Mara’s poetry–awash in the language, in the imagery, in the mystery.
4.  A cloud above the Susquehanna, shaped like an eagle with a fish in its talons.
5.  Noticing.

May we walk in Beauty!

Passel of kids

Pantoum, Revisited

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / 3 Comments

Last night I  posted a fragment of a pantoum that I hoped to finish today.  Instead, when my head hit the pillow, a new idea began to form, and now I have other ideas.  I think it’s not too thunky for a first pantoum.  I want to work on more of them just for the fun of it, though this one is thematically perhaps not so fun.

There are so many things to write.
There is more than a chicken egg, speckled blue,
more than the way the flash of sun momentarily overcomes sight,
more than way I am always seeking a path to you.

There is more to write than an egg, speckled blue.
There is apathy, for instance, and betrayal, and war,
there is always the way that I am seeking that path to you,
but there are drones that spill death on a distant valley floor.

There is the way that apathy and betrayal lead to war,
there is the fact that we use religion to excuse our hate,
and those drones keep spilling death on a distant valley floor,
while we ignore our role in it, while we hesitate.

Religion is a poor excuse for permission to hate.
And sunny dogmas often obscure our sight.
Take responsibility for each other, don’t hesitate.
There is so much more to write.
Prompt for Saturday

Okay, Sandra Collin, here goes.  Write a poem about sticky words.  I love this and am nervous that I won’t be able to do it any justice.  Thanks for the prompt!
Gratitude List:

1.  Dancing in fairy dust at the shop
2.  Unpacking a box of incense.  I smell so good!
3.  Kitty cuddles
4.  Rose Quartz
5.  Chicken Soup with Rice–the food and the book.

May we walk in beauty.