Pádreg Ó Tuama is a master at the Pantoum poetry form. In his newsletter last week, he offered sentence stems and a 1-8 line prompt. He suggested “Don’t stress over it: bring yourself generously to yourself.” The whole prompt can be found here. If you haven’t tried a Pantoum before, you should give it a try. This time I was pleased enough with the results to share my poem with you.
Time
Today, my mind wants peace and I watch the white cat; although yesterday I sang of grace. As I write, I cling to memory
and watch the white cat. When I was younger, I thought tears were weak. As I write and cling to memory, I couldn’t have known, terrible things would happen.
When I was younger and thought tears were weak, I wish I’d known grief is a bitch. I couldn’t have known how terrible things happen. I had a dream I was a cloud.
Grief is a bitch anyway; although yesterday I sang of grace. I dream of clouds. Today my mind offers peace.
After months of drought, we’ve recently had an onslaught of rain. One of the most miraculous plants in the South is resurrection fern. It has a symbiotic relationship with live oaks. When the air is dry and no rain falls, it’s hardly noticeable, brown and dead looking. However, when we have days and days of humidity and rain, rain, rain, the fern pops up with its bright green fronds covering the branches and living in beauty. It seems to say, “Ah, yes!”
I took this photo of our grandmother oak near the bayou. She is 250+ years old. Her arms drape wide and hold a rope swing that many a child (and adult) have ridden on. She is featured on a live oak tree bike tour that our friend Jim leads every spring.
She’s also made mention of in many of my poems. I never tire of taking her photo or writing about her.
Turning to a random page in “Dictionary for a Better World” by Irene Latham and Charles Waters, I chose a cinquain form. (2, 4, 6, 8, 2)
Sometimes bravery looks like fern on an old oak coming to life only after hard rain. Margaret Simon, draft
Please write a small poem today and leave it in the comments. Respond to others with kind encouragement.
Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
Liz invited me to lunch. She is a poet. My husband and I have met her and her husband on the dance floor. I was “tickled pink”, as my southern mother would say, that she asked me to lunch. We talked for hours. While the restaurant got quieter and quieter, we got louder. When she told me she was an Enneagram four, I jumped up and squealed! No wonder we have a connection.
Liz asked me a question, author to author, “What do you most identify yourself as?”
For a long time, I was a teacher. In retirement, I’ve become a teaching artist. In March, I released my first baby board book. But my answer to her question was “Poet!”
And it felt good to say it out loud.
Identity is a tricky thing. Of course, our vocation dictates our identity. I will never not be a teacher. Now that I have 5 grandchildren, I will forever be Mamére.
Claiming the title poet feels vulnerable. Am I worthy of this title?
What do you claim as your identity?
In church on Sunday, listening from the choir loft, I found a poem in the Psalm. May we all find the bravery to be who we are called to be.
A Poet Listens to the Psalm and Hears
You marched— skies poured gracious rain, refreshed goodness.
Last weekend I participated in the Open Write with Ethical ELA. Erica Johnson’s prompt “Talk about Trees” inspired me to praise the state tree of both of my home states, Mississippi and Louisiana.
My morning walk these days takes me through our local City Park that skirts the bayou and also nestles a pond where there are rumors of a lurking gator. This little guy, about 12 inches or so, had his nose in the air and was totally still, allowing me to come close for a photo.
I like turtles. I love to see them lined up on a log sunning themselves. I was researching a poetry book a few years ago and discovered that turtles often ramble up on the top of a gator without a care. Turtles can live a long time in the wild, unless the gator is hungry for turtle soup.
Today, be inspired by this little turtle to write a small poem in the comments. Support other writers with encouragement. Thanks for stopping by.
Bayou-side slider still as a stone statue red-ear beams on point Margaret Simon, draft
Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
On Saturday, I went to Moncus Park for the Lafayette Farmer’s Market to sell books. I definitely spent more money on food than I made in book sales, but the spring day was breezy and the park was full of people. A former neighbor stopped by, all grown up and married, hoping for a baby someday, so he bought a book.
Garrett and me in the UL Press booth.
A nearby booth had these exotic birds that were pets. They were bright and beautiful, but I don’t remember their breed. I was struck by how they perched and begged for petting.
On the way to my car which was parked a long way from the market, I noticed the new walking path my friend had told me about.
The developers of Moncus Park have been intentional about planting only native Louisiana plants. The reclaimed prairie was full of life.
Moncus Park Prairie, Lafayette, LA
On my walk I found a sign dedicated to a family that included a beautiful painting and poem by my friend, artist Melissa Bonin. I took a picture of it, then used the image and words in a found poem, prompted by Jessica Wiley and Erica Johnson on Ethical ELA.
Garden Amorphous by Melissa Bonin
Moncus Park Prairie after Melissa Bonin
sugar harvest sky lights speckles of goldenrod, cotton weed tucked inside a worn pocket. A dragonfly wraps its wispy-thin legs atop black-eyed Susan’s eye.
Your place is on the gravel path listening to red-winged blackbirds, catching buttercup pollen on the tip of your nose.
Stories smudged on rock gather for the retelling, soft laughter of prairie grass speaking to the wind.
I’ve been taking a class in watercolor painting, and I find it challenging. This morning I went to yoga at my friend’s house. She does a private session with a sound bath meditation at the end. During the meditation shavasana, I had a vision of billowing waves of an ocean. I wanted to capture the vision in a watercolor, but I’m not brave enough yet to paint without help. I used a YouTube video to produce the image for my poem today.
The ocean is interesting, but the sailboats…well…ew. I accidentally dribbled some blue, and one thing my instructor said about accidental spots really helped me. He said, “Make them into birds.”
My poem wanted to be a shadorma form. (3, 5, 3, 3, 7, 5)
Waves of sound surround in seaflow billow sails simply free Meditation comes to me— whispers of owl wings.
Margaret Simon, draft
For Mother’s Day, my daughter gave me a beautiful oracle deck. The card I picked today was the owl “Wisdom”.
The power at my house is off. We are getting some repairs done, and the guys showed up at 7 and shut off the power at 7:45 AM. I’ve escaped to my daughter’s house.
She left a Mother’s Day gift on her dining table. It’s an oracle deck. Ironically, the first card I pulled was the snake. I am afraid of snakes, and my grandchildren know it, so they love to scare me with any snake-like toy. It is a visceral fear, completely out of my control. My son-in-law has gotten into the joy of scaring Mamére on our family trips. How did I pull this card? The Universe is speaking to me in snakes!
The label reads “Healer” and the message is “Begin the process of repairing something that has been hurt, sick, or not functioning at its best. Healing can leave us changed, but the scars remind us of our strength, courage, and resilience.”
Asclepius, help me shed the skin of grief and put on the armor of hope.
What are you most afraid of? What in you needs healing? Join me today with a small poem in the comments and encourage other writers with your responses.
Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
Should an instructor touch a student’s work? As a teacher, this can be an “it depends on the situation” question.
Last week I was with my grandson who is nearing the end of kindergarten. For homework, he had to write a sentence about the story he was reading. He knew what he wanted to write, but the line given was short, and he didn’t think it would fit. I debated. Could I write the sentence he dictated to me?
I decided not to. Obviously, he was not only supposed to practice comprehension, he also needed practice in writing. The option I came up with was to write the sentence he dictated on a notepad and let him copy it on the back of the paper since the line wasn’t long enough. This is what he did, but he completely filled the back of the paper (with no lines) and creatively elongated the tail of the letter p and the top of the letter h.
I have never been a kindergarten teacher, so I was keeping my fingers crossed that I did the right thing.
Recently I have been taking a watercolor class. The instructor is an artist. His teaching method is demonstration. So on both the first and second lessons, he came to my side and painted on my painting to demonstrate a technique. I felt defeated. I had a taste of what Thomas might be feeling when his teacher writes on his paper. The art piece I left with was not mine to claim. Was the art teacher wrong?
I talked with my daughter about this, and she suggested that I ask him to demonstrate on a scratch paper. But still, yesterday he did it again. This time, he asked permission. What was I going to do? I did want to see how he would darken the tree and how he would draw a piece of grass, but again, I have a work of art that is not truly mine. I refuse to sign these pieces.
One of them I cut up into a collage. Another I’ve tucked away. It’s hard for me to totally throw them in the trash. Do I just need to relax and be a good student?
What do you think?
Here is the only painting from the class that I did all on my own. I decided to sign it.
My mom pretending to sleep with my (or my sister’s) Raggedy Ann.
Isaiah 43:18-19: “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?”
Chris Margos of Spiritual Thursday suggested this verse to write about this month. With Mother’s Day big and bright in every gift store, it’s hard not to think of my first Mother’s Day without a mother. The sadness I feel; however, is calmed by being surrounded by the best mothers I know, my daughters. All three of them are in the deep throes of motherhood, juggling it all, with professional lives and kids, and they are crushing it!
Yesterday I went shopping with my youngest daughter. The other women in the store and dressing room were charmed by her interest in finding me some cute new clothes. Martha was happily taking pictures of me and texting her sisters. It was a sweet scene, I admit. I am blessed they all want to spend time with me (and help me dress better!)
A page of my new book is dedicated to my mother, who my oldest daughter renamed as GiGi when she made her a great grandmother. My illustrator, Drew Beech, used a photo of my mother with my daughter as a child to create the illustration.
See, Mom! I am doing a new thing! I love that I can share my mother every time I read aloud my book. After all, it was in her lap that I became a reader.
For Poetry Friday, I am in with an Elegy for Mothers using the duplex form created by Jericho Brown. This poem is dedicated to all who have lost a mother, and every mother who has lost a child.
Elegy for Mothers (A Duplex)
after Jericho Brown
The rain sounds like a mother weeping, softly kissing away touches of pain.
Mother washes away pain with a kiss as her child nestles in her embrace.
The child will leave her embrace someday— Memory echoes in her lullaby.
When memory echoes her lullaby, hushing sounds of the storm calm outside.
Winds brush the chimes of time like the sound of a mother singing.
Mother rocks on the soles of her feet feeling the rhythm of life changing.
The rhythm of life is always changing when the rain sounds like a mother weeping.
Margaret Simon lives on the Bayou Teche in New Iberia, Louisiana. She is a retired elementary gifted teacher who writes poetry and children's books. Welcome to a space of peace, poetry, and personal reflection. Walk in kindness.
Reflections on the Teche 