Today is the first Friday of a new month, October, and time for an Inklings challenge. I asked my writing group friends to exchange photos for an image poem. I invite you to participate in image poetry every Wednesday right here with This Photo Wants to be a Poem.
My exchange partner was Heidi. She had the opportunity to visit fellow Inkling, Molly, in Maine this summer. I am quite jealous that they all made blueberry jam together. I could not resist the delicious collection of jars in Heidi’s photo.
Georgia Heard inspired my poem by sending her own recipe poem through her newsletter.
Click on each link below to see other image poem posts from Inklings.
I wrote the book of tanka and haibun poems to capture the miracle that my husband and I have witnessed each year by watching a Ring camera in our wood duck house.
Irene Latham wrote: “Readers of all ages will JUMP at the chance to celebrate the life of wood ducks in this inviting volume. Delightful verse, scientific facts, and striking photographs combine in this heartwarming tale of real-life animal adventure (and the humans that make it happen).”
The humans that made this book happen are my dear friends David Dahlquist and Mary Ubinas, through a donation to the TECHE Project. All proceeds will benefit the TECHE Project. One of the goals of the TECHE Project is to promote the well being of wood ducks along the 135 miles of the Bayou Teche through educational workshops and placement of wood duck houses.
My hope is this small book will inspire others to take the time to notice and wonder about nature and our environment. Wood ducks are beautiful birds that were once considered endangered. When we watch the dozen or more ducklings jump from the house a mere 24 hours after hatching, we do not know their fate. I don’t like to think about all the dangers lurking in the bayou waters, so I write poems about them. I’m sharing a few here. The book is available now on Amazon. I will receive my first shipment in a few weeks, so you can also order from me.
February 24
House Hunting (Haibun)
The hens are showing up! Now that the drake scouts have identified a safe nesting box and area, it is time for the hen’s approval as they begin to inspect the boxes for themselves.
Dawn, when sunbeams stream, an expectant glow invites a wood duck couple—
Female shimmies through the hole, Chatter-chipper to her mate.
la maison de chasse L’aube, quand les rayons du soleil coulent, une lueur d’attente invite
un couple de branchus— La femelle se trémousse dans le trou, Chatter-chipper à son compagnon.
Margaret Simon, from Wood Duck Diary
New Chicks
Gentle peeps echo. Jumping onto mother hen, New chicks jitterbug.
Like petals on a pinwheel fluffy down spins together.
Nouveaux poussins
Doux piaulements résonnent. Sautant sur maman canne, Nouveaux poussins font le jitterbug.
Comme des pétales sur un moulinet duvet moelleux tourne en rond.
I have been comforted by all of the sympathy notes and messages from this Poetry Friday community over the death of my mother this summer. I appreciate more than ever how this community supports and cares for each other.
In the summer poem swap, organized by Tabatha Yeatts, Denise Krebs sent me two poems, a raccontino and an acrostic of my one little word, Still. She also sent a beautiful crocheted twirly that I’ve hung in my kitchen window.
Still acrostic by Denise KrebsBy Denise KrebsCrochet Twirly from Denise Krebs
My response to Denise:
When a poem comes wrapped in swirls of gold and tied with a ribbon, I open, find, feel myself touching soft grass with my toes finding cool comfort there.
Thanks, Denise, for your comforting words and gift of swirly gold.
A new release from Laura Purdue Salas, Flurry, Float, and Fly!
On this hot, humid southern day when the temperature rises above 90 degrees, I received this cool to the touch advanced copy of Laura Purdie Salas’s next picture book all about the poetry and science of a snowstorm.
Without January, 2025, I’d have believed I would never see a snowstorm; however, we had one here along the gulf with enough snow to do all the fun things a good snow brings.
New Iberia, LA covered in snow, January 2025.
I look forward to sharing this book with my grandchildren who are just beginning to read. The text delights with rhyme: “From the north, a polar freeze…from the south, a humid breeze. All winds advance. They mix and dance.”
In addition to lively text, this book includes science that can be easily understood by our youngest readers. Did you know “each cloud’s type—how cold?—how wet? shapes each crystal’s silhouette.”?
Chiara Fedele’s illustrations show how white can be colorful and peaceful.
Illustrations by Chiara Fedele
Laura always has on her teacher hat when she creates a book. There is back matter including intricate photographs by Dr. Kenneth G. Libbrecht of the variations of a snowflake. Teachers can also find resources on Laura’s website here. If you click fast, you can enter a giveaway for a 30 minute classroom visit with Laura.
I highly recommend her for class visits. A few years ago, my students loved learning the back story of how Laura researches and plans her picture books. Author visits help students to see all the work that goes into creating a book as well as experience the passion the author feels about her topic.
Laura lives in Minnesota, so she probably sees snow every year, but her special book “Flurry, Float, and Fly!” took this southern girl back to a cool experience with a rare snowstorm. Relive your own snowstorm stories and share them with young readers. Publication date is November 11, 2025.
Today is the first Poetry Friday of September and time for an Inklings challenge from Molly Hogan: Write a love note to something or someone or some place. Go big or go small! You might be inspired by José A. Alcántara’s Love Note to Silence. You can read it here.
Dear Silence,
We’ve had a budding relationship, the kind that begins with a small bouquet of roses at just the right time.
You come to me in sacred spaces of air and breath and love.
Today, your hand feels heavy. What do you want to say to me?
Let’s just stay this way, cheek to cheek feeling the softness of the moment.
Some might call you expectant as the end of a grand symphony seconds before the applause.
I welcome you with disquietude, asking you to teach me to accept this breath of calm.
Will you stay a little longer?
Margaret Simon, draft
St. Margaret’s chapel at Edinburgh Castle
I’ve just spent a glorious week in Scotland. I found sacred silence in the countryside, the wild winds, and in the castles and cathedrals. I’m too tired now after 24 hours of travel to write, but I will after I’ve had time to process it all. For now, leave your link below.
Are you enjoying retirement? Isn’t retirement fun?
Questions I’ve heard nearly every day since retiring, but I haven’t settled into it quite like I thought I would. This morning my enneathought of the day said “Ignore your feelings.” Yeah, sure, you try!
In my notebook I wrote about this nagging anxiety, how every day I feel like there’s something I’ve forgotten to do. I had to buy a day planner. I’m making more lists than I ever did before. But I can’t shake the feeling.
A Box for my Anxiety
I’m putting anxiety away in a wooden box that latches with a key like the one for my childhood diary. Two matching tiny silver keys on a chain buried beneath bracelets where I can’t find them readily.
This feeling that belongs to me is useless, a hidden weed choking vibrant growth.
Be still, my sweet heart, you got this. You know what to do. Get busy.
Margaret Simon, draft
What feelings are you grappling with and need to put away?
The Roundup today is hosted by Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe. We switched dates, so I will round up on Friday, Sept. 5th.
My mother at the piano
After Packing my Suitcase for the Funeral
Then I turn to a portrait of you at the piano (Were you 12 or 13?), your smile the same one I saw in the last days when moving was hard. Your long fingers like a metronome holding rhythm on the bedding. At the funeral, we will cry. We will let you go, ashes to ashes and all. Sing you into heaven and praise the glow of the summer sky.
Margaret Simon, draft
Today I will be traveling to Mississippi where our family will gather and celebrate the life of my mother. I can’t seem to write a poem this summer that does not have her in it. Forgive me, but it seems necessary at this time.
Tabatha Yeatts of The Opposite of Indifference coordinates a poetry exchange. She sent me a poem she wrote based on a podcast she heard and thought of me. I love this Poetry Friday community and how we share poems as well as life events. Thanks, Tabatha for sharing your creativity with me.
Butterfly children
by Tabatha Yeatts
Jo Nagai, boy-scientist,
believed in love-memory,
thought his caterpillars greeted him
after becoming aeronauts, hovering
close as though he was
a dark-eyed flower.
Their memory not wing-scale thin,
but thick as honey.
He loved the before,
the tickle of their round bodies
held on his arm as he conducted his tests
so he shared their small pulse of discomfort.
He loved the after,
the wobbly wings,
the legs slim as a kite’s string.
Jo noted everything,
page after page,
as the butterflies responded
the same as their caterpillar child-selves.
No matter how great the metamorphosis
of being swaddled in the chrysalis
and rebuilt in the soup of creation,
even into the next generation,
young butterflies swooped into
the future’s flowers with messages
from their ancestors:
before you break open,
here’s what I know.
Inspired by Radiolab’s episode “Signal Hill: Caterpillar Roadshow” about a Japanese second-grader who scientifically studied what butterflies can remember.
One of my recent monarchs, “legs slim as a kite’s string.”
Spiritual Journey First Thursday is being gathered by Leigh Anne Eck at A Day in the Life.
Leigh Anne asked us to write about family this month. Family is my priority always, but since retiring, I find myself dedicating more time to my children and grandchildren.
This week as my husband and I celebrate 43 years of marriage, I am caring for my grandchildren in New Orleans. My colleagues are going back to school and while I admit to feeling a pang of “I should be there”, I am grateful I am not. My mind and body are more relaxed, and I am able to devote energy to my family. What a blessing!
Next weekend we will all gather in Jackson, MS to celebrate my mother’s long life of 89 years. My mother, Dorothy Liles Gibson, was dedicated to family. She taught me the value of being fully present. I have selected this poem to read at her service: “Let the Last Thing Be Song.” My mother was a musician all her life. She taught piano lessons and got her masters in piano. She was a founding member of the Jackson Music Forum. She was also an active choir member at St. James Episcopal Church. I look forward to being with all of my children and grandchildren, siblings and their families, as well as friends and cousins. We will raise our voices to praise her life.
I am taking a poetry workshop with Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer. This week she used a model poem by Alberto Rios, “When Giving is All We Have” to talk about paradox in a poem. She gave us a prompt with a variety of anaphoric phrases. I chose prayer. “We pray because…” I’m sharing the draft of my poem.
When Prayer is all We Have
After Alberto Rios “When Giving is All We Have”
We pray because we are lost. We pray because we are found.
We pray because prayer changes us. We pray because prayer changes nothing.
We hold hands to pray. We kneel alone in the sand.
Prayers have many ways to begin: Our Father Dear Lord Ah, me I am here
Silence can be a prayer.
Prayers connect us to the dead. We are helpless in prayer.
What I do not have, I offer to prayer—an empty voice, a sigh of desperation. Does it matter who is listening?
This first day of August is time for a new Inklings challenge. Catherine Flynn asked us to write a triptych poem using Irene Latham’s model poem here. I also looked at Summer Triptychby Linda Pastan.
This summer with my mother’s passing, I have been thinking about the three summers that stand out in my mind in the long process of losing my parents. The first summer I had to face the reality of their aging was 2019 when they decided to move to an independent living apartment. They left the house full, and my siblings and I had to clean it out.
In the summer of 2022, I was grieving the death of my father and searching for a sign of him. And this year, my mother…
Solace, peace, comes to me in this poem. I hope you find it there, too.
Summer Bird Triptych
July 2019
The hummingbird feeder, blown glass swirling primary colors, reflects the sun, attracts a ruby throat hovering while I sit alone on the porch,
Remembering.
July 2022
I hear a tap, tap at the window. A bright yellow prothonotary. Does he see his reflection? Does he want me to come out?
Is it you, Dad?
July 2025
The crows seem angry. The Merlin app identifies fish crows. They call with a fervor I feel deep in my belly, calling me back to nature
My mother died a few weeks ago. It was expected. She suffered for years with Alzheimer’s. My grief for her loss has happened over time. I feel relief now that she is no longer suffering. Nevertheless, we had to clean out her room at the memory care home where she’s been for two years. Many of her clothes were soiled and worn. Most of them were trashed. Some we gave away. I was grateful for my husband who was with me. He hauled the trash bags to the dumpster.
When I came upon a hanger of silk scarves, I couldn’t bear to give them away. I don’t even know why they were still there. So while Jeff was taking out the trash, I tucked them away in a box to bring home. I wore one to a funeral last weekend and felt comforted.
My mother’s silk scarves
Silk Scarves
I saved her silk scarves, each one a bright replica of art. I couldn’t bear to place such brightness into a black trash bag.
We worked quickly making choices to give away or throw away. Why? I asked myself did these scarves call to me?
I remember when appearances were important to my mother. She never left the house without coordinating clothes, make-up, jewelry. The end erased who she had been.
Lord knows I don’t need any more scarves. Tiffany stained glass (butterflies) will soften my neck above the black dress.
Margaret Simon, draft
This poem was written in response to an Ethical ELA Open Write prompt found here.
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.
