Welcome to my weekly photo writing prompt. Take a peaceful moment to lose yourself in words. Write a poem of 16 words or so and place it in the comments. Write encouraging words to others by commenting on their poems. This week we are writing with the hashtag poeticdiversion that Molly Hogan started on Twitter.
This week’s image comes from my friend and neighbor James Edmunds. James does a lot of creative work including photography. I once took a class from him about iPhone photography and learned some cool tricks. I don’t know if he took this picture with his phone, but I doubt it. James, if you stop by, let us know.
Way down south here we’ve been getting a great deal of rain lately. The resurrection fern loves rain, and it pops up in beautiful green carpets on our trees. In nature, there are small miracles like this every day.
Inside the depths
Margaret Simon, draft
of fronds and rhizomes
fairies twinkle
&
dance.
Reflections on the Teche 
Mmm… I really like how fairies mix with science in your poem – the close observation of nature leads to an appreciation of the magic. Also, “rhizomes” is a great word in general.
Thank you for this gorgeous picture. I love how each week you choose completely different and evocative images. It really gets my juices flowing. Today, I found a poem in your words of introduction and I wrote a second one. And it’s only 8:30! When I’m done here, I’m of to explore Molly’s hashtag, too. What an auspicious start for the day!
Found poem from Margaret’s introduction
Way down South
after a great deal of rain
the resurrection fern carpets our trees;
In nature, small miracles every day.
I toyed a bit with that last line – do I include “there are”? Do I add a different verb? Leaving it as it is for now. And… here’s my second. Playing with repetition – not sure how well it works & I might need some punctuation, but this is what I’ve got before i get moving today. 🙂
Reaching for the sun
green and green and green
and all the different greens between
Resurrection. Life finds a way.
Thanks again, Margaret, for the images and the place to post.
It’s high praise when you can find a poem in my prose. I love your second poem for the repetition of green. That is exactly how it feels, green gets greener. The conclusion is moving, “Life finds a way.” Thanks for playing along this morning. I like how you also wrote about your process and wrestling with word choice. That’s the fun part for me.
This is so cool. I love finding poetry. One of my favorite forms of play! Yes to miracles every day.
Love both your poems, Amanda – the small miracles of nature every day in the first and the rhythmic repetition of “green” as inner rhyme with “between” in the second – hey, an end-line found poem!
In nature, small miracles every day.
Resurrection. Life finds a way.
❤
Oh my goodness, Fran! I love this. An endline found poem that starts from a found poem.
I wish I could show all my students how playful writing is – how we connect & weave ourselves together with nothing but words & love. How putting our half-formed thoughts into the world leads to other and others and others until – beauty, love, connection. How this is not about being perfect but about being alive.
Oh, thank you for the gift of your words with mine with Margaret’s with the photographers with the fern with God. Thank you.
I was super stuck for writing this morning…and I now know to write my way out of that. I love that rhizomes and fairies know each other in your small poem.
Fern Speaks
Green
this way and that
in shadow
Pray
when you can
for sky
and sun
rain too
I love the slip in of the word “pray” and “when you can.” I think of nature, in its own way, is a prayer.
Yes. My understanding of the sacred has expanded with age.
The way “Pray” pivots the poem, catches my attention, anchors things. “Pray/ when you can” made a catch in my chest. Yes, and “rain, too.”
Linda – “pray” seemed to be playing in my mind, too, as I thought about the fern and its amazing capacity to live until rain comes (even for a hundred years, sometimes). I especially love the metaphor of being in the shadow praying to see the sky and the sun, as well as for restoring rain. A reminder to us all, no? So lovely.
Art Gallery on the Forest Floor
Green is
the new black
Yours is beautiful, Margaret! I tried writing a couple, but everything came out so general: platitudes on how anything is lovely if you shine the right light on it. That led to me picturing this as an art gallery, but all the hipsters are wearing green instead of black:>)
That’s where the rest of my writing has gone today….just blah. I’m running to my craft table now. I really do like Green is the new black, though. It’s funny and smart and true!
How DO you do this, Laura, in so few words! A master artist you are. I can take this in so many interpretive directions, like, y’all, listen: it’s hip to be hopeful … try it on for a change …
There was such joy in viewing the photograph, and a lightness of spirit too. I wanted to write instantly but had a meeting to tend to. So glad I was able to come back to this photographic prompt. Reading about the name of the plant guided my words, thinking the gleaming fern was reaching towards the heavens after the resurrecting rains.
And then the whimsy of the fairies In your poem added to the ephemeral feel and completed the scene! Thank you. My poem below:
Translucent fronds
radiating beauty
Resurrecting from
dark, shadowy earth
Stretching towards
Heavenly light
Your poem paints a beautiful picture that evokes a sense of peace. Thanks for coming back.
lovely….reaching for heaven.
Christine – I hadn’t read your poem when I wrote mine but I see a shared theme of reaching toward heaven. Your poem radiates with beauty itself!
Beutiful offering, Margaret. Few things are more compelling to me than a resurrection fern … somehow a tanka seems called for. Here goes:
withering, drying,
fronds curled heavenward, dying,
resurrection fern’s
thermoluminescence burns
until rain regenerates.
Yes, a tanka is perfect as is the word regenerates.
[…] Margaret Simon features a weekly writing invitation on her blog, Reflections on the Teche, in response to a photo. Today’s offering is a resurrection fern photographed by her neighbor […]