Driving down the road,
I stop to praise the wildflowers
guarding the gully
like yellow-billed soldiers.I praise your sensible size,
clustered in God’s bouquet,
open to the arrival of bees,
spreading the wings of spring.Your beauty is the first swamp color,
popping up in winter’s wake.
A glorious butterweed ribbon
unbounded, blowing in the fresh breeze.Even with your death, you feed us,
such is the circle of life,
from compost to crawfish,
trapped, boiled, and Cayenne-peppered,
just in time for Good Friday Feasts.–Margaret Simon
Archive for the ‘Poetry’ Category
Butterweed
Posted in Poetry, Slice of Life, tagged butterweed, Louisiana, poetry, spring, wildflowers on March 25, 2014| 5 Comments »
Full Ides (of March) Moon
Posted in Poetry, Slice of Life, Writing, tagged erasure poetry, found poem, full moon alert, Jim Foret on March 17, 2014| 9 Comments »
I have a tree-hugging naturalist friend who sends out an email every month around the time of the full moon. His email is called Full Moon Alert or FMA.
One of the methods of writing I enjoy is erasure poetry or found poetry. I often find a poem in Jim’s FMA.
Full Ides (of March) Moon
Full moon rises Sunday at sunset.
Spring officially starts Friday,
Buds swelling,
swamp red maples coming into bloom,
thangs were moving y’all.Sky reverberates
with the smudge of cranes.
I love you little.
I love you big.My ladies are working hard already.
European honey bees are an all-girl operation,
and these are happy dancing
their butter butts, like the warblers
catching Crane flies.A pair of raptors dive spectacularly,
two lovers celebrating newfound love
in this the season of love.Happy spring y’all!
Get out and enjoy the fine spring weather.
Get out and stand there with your mouth open
watching that moonrise and sunset with loved ones.
What a gift! And bring some little ones along.–Margaret Simon, found from Possum Foret’s FMA March 15, 2014
I want to stay
Posted in Poetry, Slice of Life, Writing, tagged meditation, relax, teaching, yoga on March 13, 2014| 9 Comments »
I want to stay here
in deep meditation
focusing on one word,
letting light dance in my eyes,
letting go of stress.
Let me stay a little longer.
I want to stay here
in this warm shower
with scents of fresh herbs, a hint of rose
rubbing my itching scalp.
Steam wraps me in comfort.
Let me stay a little longer.
I want to stay here
reading in my teacher chair
while kids are spotted all around
with noses in their books.
I stop to read a favorite line.
Can I stay here a little longer?
I want to stay here
in shavasana, toes pointing to heaven,
holding my color focal point
melting away the day,
bowing in namaste,
Please let me stay.
Ten Things Right Now
Posted in Books, Gratitude, Poetry, Slice of Life, Writing, tagged flowers, spring, ten things on March 11, 2014| 15 Comments »
Faced with another Slice, I turned to the Two Writing Teachers blog for inspiration. Never fails. On March 8th, they featured an idea used by blogger Mandy Robek “10 Things Right Now.”
1. My friend, James Edmunds (Poor Clio) posted on Facebook “loved today’s March watercolor sunshine.”
2. Reading poetry by Barbara Crooker.
each day, we climb
a few more inches
up the ladder of light,
and grackles and redwings
return, bringing postcards
of tropical sun.
3. Started A Snicker of Magic: Felicity Juniper Pickle collects words:
Popsicle
Paper star
Poppy-seed muffin
4. Tulips on the kitchen table.
5. Remembering my Uncle Stu. His funeral was yesterday in Georgia. I wasn’t there. My mother wasn’t there. I thought of my cousins all day long. My uncle always hated to say goodbye.
6. My husband has been cancer free for 8 years! Here’s a picture of his new running shoes. Aren’t they cool? St. Patrick’s Day green!
7. Meditating for two weeks. Here is a sample from my journal:
Meditation on the words from Emily Dickinson, “Love is the furniture.”
The chair holds me, all my thoughts I brush away with a word.
I sit again and again
in silence, waiting for angel’s wings,
symbols of love.
No words, no thought.
Just light
twisted, jeweled light
wrapping me up in love.–Margaret Simon
8. The return of my former student to Slice with us. I have missed her voice. This is a small sample of a poem she wrote about Mother Nature. Our class blog is here.
Her feelings come and go
As quickly as leaves fall
In the brisk autumn months.
Her heart will always be with the earth.
If you are quiet, you can hear her heart thumping, thumping,
Dancing to the beat of the cicada song,
9. Cooking with my daughter: The menu is shrimp tacos with mango salsa.
10. Supportive principals: School #1, I got permission to take my 5 gifted students to a local fast food restaurant to solicit donations for an upcoming community service project. School #2, One of my third graders wants to raise funds and food for the local Humane Society. She wrote out notes of her plan and presented it to the principal at recess. She got the go ahead.
Celebrating Love
Posted in Celebration Saturday, Poetry, tagged Betsy Snyder, haiku, love poetry, Valentine's Day on February 15, 2014| 6 Comments »
This was a week of feeling the love. and spreading love. Here’s how we did it.
1. Valentines for the elderly: I co-sponsor a leadership group at my base school, Paw Pride. These students decided last week that they wanted to make Valentines for the elderly, so we had two recess crafting sessions, created original Valentines, and delivered them after school on Thursday to a local subsidized housing facility for elderly. The students who came were filled with love and joy as they talked with the residents. A few of them expressed to me how surprised they were at the fun they had. They want to go back at Easter.
2. Writing Love Haiku: On Friday, I decided to forego a math lesson with my youngest group of students and teach them about haiku. (I guess you could argue that counting syllables is math.) I read to them Betsy Snyder’s precious book, I Haiku You. This was their first experience with haiku. In the 10 minute writing time, a few of them wrote up to 4 haiku poems. Then they illustrated them. The feeling of pride and joy in their writing was heartwarming.
3. Love Poetry Night: Not a huge crowd, less than 20, listened to love poetry Friday night. I read my own poem and a Jane Hirschfeld poem, For What Binds Us, and choked up at the end. “how the black cord makes of them a single fabric/ that nothing can tear or mend.”
Jim recited Rumi. Phanat sang us a French love song. Clare and Bonny both made us tear up with their touching poems. Love is just like that sometimes, touches the heart.
I hope you were touched by some love this week. Join the celebration over at Ruth’s blog, Discover.Play.Build.
Love Poetry
Posted in Poetry, Poetry Friday, Writing, tagged Bonny McDonald, Clare Martin, love poetry on February 14, 2014| 18 Comments »
It’s Poetry Friday and Love Poetry Night. Tonight at A&E Gallery in New Iberia, we will gather and love poets and poetry. The event begins at 6:00 PM with open mic. The featured poets are Clare Martin and Bonny McDonald.
I’ll be reading this poem during Open Mic, dedicated to my one true love.
The Kiss
I can remember where I put my keys,
How many eggs are left in the refrigerator.
I can remember the dance step
we practiced over and over.I cannot remember the line in the poem
The one after the knees in the desert.
I can’t remember what you said
before you went to sleep.I do remember the kiss,
not that particular kiss but every kiss,
gentle on my cheek,
telling me you are near. You are here,
We are here—remember.Margaret Simon
Nerdlution Week #3
Posted in Blogging, Poetry, Writing, tagged Chubby Carrier, journal, Laura Purdie Salas, nerdlution, Vermilionville, Zydeco on February 13, 2014| 1 Comment »
Michelle Haseltine is gathering the Nerdlution round-up at her site, One Grateful Teacher.
I am a total nerd and am embracing this nerdlution for 50 days. So how many days has it been? Eighteen, I think. I’ve had to cut my goal of exercise every day to exercise 5 days a week and I’m counting dancing as exercise. My husband and I invited some friends out for Zydeco dancing to Chubby Carrier on Sunday afternoon at Vermilionville. We love these Sunday afternoon gigs. One hour of jitterbug, waltz, and Whiskey River, and I checked off exercise for the weekend.
My second goal, writing every day, has gone OK, too, if I don’t worry about word counts. I have been journaling more and not really writing anything that anyone else will read, but practice is the important thing, right?
Staying Open, my One Little Word, is easier than I thought it would be. New things are available and happening all the time. On Saturday, I learned the art of Centering Prayer. I wrote about it on Tuesday for Slice of Life. I have kept up the practice every morning. The only downfall is that I resist the gotta-get-something-done mode. I get so calm and zoned-out that I want to stay in that moment. How many of you would love to live on a yoga mat? I know, it’s not very practical.
I got an appropriate fortune in my fortune cookie last night. “Don’t ask. Don’t say. Everything lies in silence.”
Laura Purdie Salas posts a 15 Words or Less poetry prompt every Thursday. This morning I wrote “Snow Cloud.” To see other poems in response to her picture prompt, visit her site.
Snow Cloud
Each time you
open yourself
to the world,
miracles happen
like snow from
boiling water.
Nerdlution Check-in
Posted in Poetry, Writing, tagged exercise, Illuminate, Laura Shovan, nerdlution, poetry, yoga, Zydeco on February 6, 2014| 4 Comments »
Another week into the nerdlution and I’m falling behind in one of my promises to myself. Exercise! Ugh! It’s always a challenge for me to fit. it. in. And the cold weather hasn’t helped. But this week has been better; I made it to Curves Monday and Wednesday mornings, Yoga class on Tuesday, and Zydeco dance lessons on Wednesday night. I’m even feeling a little sore. Learning to do the alligator walk does a job on your calves.
My attention to my OLW Open is working out pretty well. I try to attend the Acadiana Wordlab each week. On Saturday, the workshop leaders were two young actresses from an Improvisation Group, Silverbacks Improv Theatre. These girls were amazing actresses! We played the craziest games. In one of the games, we each added a line to a story; In another, we could only add one word. I participated even though I felt absolutely ridiculous and totally out of my comfort zone. As always in Wordlab, the writing was unique to the writer and wonderful.
And that leads me to my third nerdlution: writing every day. This has been easy with Laura Shovan’s daily color prompts. At her site, Author Amok, she is posting different color swatches from Pantone colors to prompt poetry. If we send her our poems, she posts them the next day. I have been feeling so famous all week as she daily posts one of my poems and tags me on Twitter and Facebook. Some other blog-friends are playing along, too. (Linda Baie and Diane Mayr) Please take a look at her post for today as it features one of my poems from my book Illuminate.
Let the nerdlution continue. Thanks to Michelle Haseltine for hosting the nerdlution round up every Thursday. Click here to read more.
























