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Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
A quick video of an egret in flight on Bayou Teche, Louisiana.

What do you do with a perfect day? The temperature was just right, 70 degrees. Not a cloud in the sky. Humidity low. Sunday is our day to catch up and get ready for the work week. We go to church and come home to our individual chores: cat litter, trash cans, lesson plans, laundry, grocery…and I had writing group. “You think we can squeeze in some paddle time?”

I decided that there were a few things I could put off like vacuuming, so I said a resounding, “Yes!” Perfect days are rare, so I feel we must embrace while we can. So we made a date for 4:00 PM. Jeff hosed out the canoe (ants), I grabbed the paddles, and off we went.

Heading directly into the sunset, the colors change. The old leaves on the oaks are a dark green while the new pollen fuzzies are a golden yellow. People complain about this popping of the pollen. It aggravates allergies and covers cars in a fine sprinkle of golden dust. All part of the healthy life cycle of a great live oak tree.

Pollen on the Grandmother Oak

Some, not all, of the cypress trees are showing new growth. These tiny needles are the brightest neons of green. The truest sign of spring.

cypress needles against blue sky

As we paddled home, Jeff noticed a plastic chair wedged in some tree roots across the bayou. He said, “I think that’s our lost chair.” A few storms ago, the water had risen and taken with it a plastic chair from our yard. Sure enough it was ours. Jeff managed to back the canoe next to it and grab it with his paddle. The chair was a little muddy but still in tact. I had to take a selfie to get a photo of it, so the angle and perspective are odd, but you get the idea.

Jeff rescued our long lost backyard chair.

We were home before the sun set and were treated to the appearance of a great white egret. Grace from God to praise this perfect day. Click on the video above to see this majestic bird in flight.

Great white egret

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Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.

I love to go for a walk in the morning. Getting out of the house is my problem. First, I have coffee. Then I check email and these days, write a Slice and read some Slices. Comment. I get sucked in. Even with this problem of getting out of the door, once I’m out, I’m never sorry. Most days when I get back home, there’s a mad rush to get ready for school. Somewhere in this morning routine, I try to get in some writing. Sometimes the writing happens while I am walking. Notes app, microphone on.

My grandson Leo visited this past weekend. He is highly creative. He draws with amazing design, unlike most scribblings of a 4-year old. Last week we ran into my cousin Andrew, the architect, during Mardi Gras. I showed Andrew Leo’s drawings. My daughter started a shared album about a year ago, so I have them on my phone.

Andrew told me a story about his second grade teacher. He loved to build things, and his mother, my aunt, would throw out things like paper towel tubes, boxes, and magazines, etc.. But not Andrew’s teacher. She had a box of trash just for him. An Andrew box full of scraps to build with. He has never forgotten this and may be the artist he is today because of it.

Being Mamere I collected toilet paper tubes, gumballs, and a box. Early on Saturday morning (Leo woke up at 5:30 AM), I showed him the stuff. “You can make whatever you want.” I gave him a plastic container with glue and a paintbrush and left him alone. He created something. When his mother saw it, she noticed that he had even found a wad of cat hair to add to the top of one of the towers. I placed the sculpture in my new butterfly garden to hopefully attract insects and caterpillars.

Leo’s sculpture
Happy Poetry Friday! Be sure to visit Tanita at {fiction, instead of lies} for Roundup.

For Poetry Friday, it is the first Friday, so the Inklings (my writing group) have a new challenge. And it came from me. I asked my friends to toy with the use of anaphora (repetition) in a poem using the mentor text from Jericho Brown, Crossing. I wrote one last week that I ended up putting in the trash, so I didn’t have anything to share. Remember the walk I took? I spoke a poem into my Notes app that is my poem offering today.

To see other Inklings poems:

Linda @A Word Edgewise
Heidi @my juicy little universe
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Catherine @Reading to the Core
Mary Lee Hahn @Another Year of Reading

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Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.

Some time ago a blogging friend suggested subscribing to The Isolation Journals with Suleika Jaouad. At the time I didn’t know who she was, how amazing, how she has written a book, married Jon Batiste, and that she battles leukemia every day. All I knew was her writing felt like a letter from a friend. Her prompts compelling.

Prompt 230 came from The Renunciations by Donika Kelly. I wrote from the line “Let this be a moment of remembering”

photo by Henry Cancienne

“Let this be a moment of remembering” Donika Kelly

Let us be bird and nest. Let
me curl my toes around this
threshold to flight. You’ll be
waiting with your net of comfort, a
reason or two why this moment
shouldn’t crush me. Eyes of
love, we’ve been here before–remembering.

Margaret Simon, Golden Shovel for Jeff, my nest for 40+ years

This post is also the first Thursday of the month Spiritual Thursday gathering. Today Karen Eastlund is hosting. She suggested we write about “words to fall back on.”

Over and over I fall back on Mary Oliver’s words. The line “You do not have to be good” from Wild Geese gives me the confidence I need to plow through. There will be days that I mess up, say the wrong thing, write something shitty. But we don’t have to “walk on (our) knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.” We can embrace our soft animal body and let it love what it loves.

This Lent I have started writing in my journal using a line from the Bible as a jumping off place. This morning the verse I turned the page to was “You were blameless in your ways from the day that you were created.” Ezekiel 28.15.

My response:

Guilt lives in my backpack.
I carry it with me wherever I go.
I’ve never done enough according to Guilt.
I’ve been selfish and without purpose.
Guilt is heavy and wants to break me.
Some will say, “You’ve done everything you could.”
I wish I believed them.
Where weeds grow, more will come
until you decide
their simple beauty
is within their blamelessness.

Free stock photo from Pixabay

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Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.

I have lived in South Louisiana for 40 years, but had never attended the authentic Courir de Mardi Gras. Courir is a French Cajun word meaning run. In the western parishes north of us, there are multiple small towns that have a chicken run. The basic idea is the krewes are going house to house to get all the ingredients for a gumbo. The final ingredient is a chicken. The chicken run is a crazy, wild drunken race to catch the chicken.

I introduced this cultural tradition to my students, and we did chicken art on the Thursday before our Mardi Gras break. We followed a video created by the Acadiana Center for the Arts linked here. The chickens were created using recycled materials. In Courir de Mardi Gras, the costumes are made with scraps of fabric and masks are made with screen. It is the total opposite of New Orleans Mardi Gras which is all about royalty and elaborate beautiful costumes. Courir de Mardi Gras has a captain rather than a king who leads the krewe.

My husband and I became interested in Courir from a performance we saw at the  Acadiana Center for the Arts. We decided to go to the parade in Eunice when all the krewes come in, some on horse back. My daughter, son-in-law, and grandkids joined us. We had made some costumes by adding fabric patches and fringe to old clothes. I used an old scarf, some sparkling jewel tape, and an old denim shirt. As the parade came through, Leo was poked (in jest) by a couple tricksters; one of them untied my shoelaces. Afterward there was a band we love to hear and dance to, Steve Riley and the Mamou Playboys.

I have to admit I was a bit creeped out by the chickens. I refrained from petting one. They walk close to the crowd to allow for petting. The chickens are surprisingly calm. I gasped when I saw a dead one on the ground. And to top it all off, a woman was wearing a taxidermic chicken on her head. While the band was playing, some of the tricksters got on the stage and threw a live chicken into the crowd. Luckily, I was not close by.

Learning more about the culture of my own state is fascinating and fun. I’m also trying to accept some of the craziness of it all. For the most part, it is harmless fun.

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Poetry Friday is hosted today by Tabatha at
The Opposite of Indifference.

I have been off this week and joyfully participating in two writing challenges. I truly wish I could do this every day. Writing to prompts makes my creative juices flow. If I write a poem each day, I feel a certain satisfaction that I’ve accomplished something.

This week the Poetry Sisters challenge was to write an ekphrastic poem, which is a poem written to art. Their theme this year is transformation. In the February Project with Laura Shovan, Molly Hogan used photographs of abandoned buildings to prompt us to think about their story. I went to a mysterious place with this image.

Photo by Molly Hogan

I’ve always enjoyed writing about a mystery. In high school, I had a short story published in the school’s literary journal about a portrait in an abandoned house that ended with a question, a mystery. Many in the Facebook group wanted to know more. Mystery is like that. We want to know. I recently heard on a podcast “surrender to the mystery.” I believe that we don’t know all the answers, and we are not supposed to. So let this poem sit with you in all its unknown.

Shattered

She left the curtains
hanging,
the window open,
the cat in the yard.
She left when the air
was warm and damp
fearing her shame
would shatter her dream. 

Margaret Simon, draft

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Poetry Friday is hosted today by Carol at Beyond Literacy Link

I feel like I chose the wrong One Little Word this year. I’ve grappled with it since I decided. What is the purpose of a One Little Word? Is it a guide or an affirmation? Should you pursue it or let it comfort you?

Every day I choose a quote-of-the-day to post on a Jamboard for my students to write a response to. Lately, I’ve allowed the students themselves to take over this routine. I have a few quote books that they use. We select a photo background and use the text box or sticky note feature to write in. One of the quotes this week was this one. Avalyn chose a background to this Mark Twain quote that was both day and night. It made me think about my OLW: Purpose.

I decided to play around with an acrostic form using Purpose. And this poem emerged:

Pray
Until you
Realize
Purpose is
One
Step at a time
Every day.

Voila! Poetry led me to the answer I had been searching for all along. Life is a journey. There is no destination. It’s a constant discovery day by day. I cannot choose a word like Purpose and magically feel satisfied with myself. It is a word that I will search for the rest of my life. Unlike Mark Twain’s idea that there is a day when you will discover why you were born, I’ve come to the realization that why you were born is a daily march. It’s what we do. And every once in a while, someone or something will knock you off the path and that’s when you need a different word: Grace.

These days I need Grace more than Purpose. I need to let myself feel what I feel, but not get attached to those feelings. Not let the feelings define me. I received this message from EnneaThought of the Day:

Remember that your cognitive error is to identify with your changing feelings and emotional states, especially negative ones. Since your feelings constantly change, your identity does as well, undermining many of your psychological needs. Notice this tendency in your thinking today.

EnneaThought of the Day,

I’m going to keep Purpose around for a little while longer. It’s only February, but I’m hoping to relax a little and let time do the telling. Maybe another more appropriate, more calming word will emerge.

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The Spiritual Journey First Thursday is gathering at Bob’s site.

For this month’s Spiritual Journey posts, Bob asked us to use the theme “Colors of My Life” Ever since my father died in April, the color that reminds me to think of him is yellow.

One day in early June as I recovered ever so slowly from Covid, a male prothonotary warbler came to my window. He flapped his wings, showing off or defending his territory from his reflected invader I’m not sure which, but I internalized it as a visit from my father’s spirit.

Recently I was in an antique shop with my daughters, wandering as they shopped and I found a little ceramic yellow bird with a sweet succulent in it. Now it sits on my kitchen table. Do we need these little things? Probably not, but in some small way, they give comfort and hope.

My cat Fancy overlooks a succulent plant.

Yellow Through My Days

In a terra-cotta pot, daffodil
bulbs sprout, ones my dear friend
nurtured and planted for someday.

Someday, a yellow blossom
will pop open like a sparkle
of light welcoming spring.

Someday, a yellow prothonotary warbler
will find a house perched
at water’s edge, ready for nesting.

Someday, the yellowed pages
of a scrapbook will break
my heart.

But today, yellow is hiding
inside a bulb, on a southern shore
and in a cardboard box

for someday…

Margaret Simon, draft

Daffodils sprouting

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Poetry Friday is with Jan at BookSeed Studio

This month’s #poetrypals challenge was a new form to me: the cascade poem. I was mesmerized by Molly Hogan’s Slice of Life post on Tuesday. She posted amazing photos of a beach in Maine at sunrise on a very cold morning. I borrowed some words from her post to create a cascade poem about this photo by Molly.

Photo by Molly Hogan

Cascade Golden Morning

Cold. Cold. Single digit cold.
Walking the rhythm of the morning,
Day breaks to molten gold.

Experience moves me. Bold
ripples through me, lifts me.
Cold. Cold. Single digit cold.

Still lost in glory dawning,
toes throb in rebuke,
Walking the rhythm of the morning.

Miniature forests of fairies hold
a treasure chest of sparkling jewels.
Day breaks to molten gold.

Margaret Simon, with words from Molly Hogan

Find more Cascade poems at these poetry blog sites: Molly, Heidi, Mary Lee, Laura, and Michelle.

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Poetry Friday is hosted today by my new poet-friend, Marcie. She is a master at haiku and sends me a beautiful photo with haiku card each month. Here is the latest one:

out of tree crumbs–
tiny mushrooms stake
their umbrellas
haiku and photo by Marcie Flinchum Atkins

Today is my day to be featured on wee words for wee ones for my contribution to Two Truths and a Fib Poetry Anthology: A Poetic Introduction to 30 Subjects with a Twist. Thanks to Bridget Magee for her work compiling this book. If you are not sure about which bio statement is the fib, I’ll give you a hint: I teach gifted kids in grades 1-6.

I was inspired to write about Bubbles because my grandkids love to play with bubbles. Aren’t they fascinating? Kim Douillard granted permission for this photo to be included in the book. She takes photos on the beaches of San Diego, California. There is a bubble person who creates amazing bubbles on the beach. I love how she captures the wonder of a huge bubble in her photos.

Photo by Kim Douillard

I want to share my Fib poem. The Fib poem form was created by Greg Pincus using the Fibonacci series for syllable count: 1. 1, 2, 3, 5, 8,…

Blow
Big
Sturdy
Flexible
Shape-shifting whispers
Large enough for you to ride on.

(c) Margaret Simon, 2023

Consider ordering a copy of this book full of fun poem forms and fibs: Click here.

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I can’t resist a good sunset photo. I don’t think I’m alone in this. A brightly colored sunset reminds us that things will be alright. I saw this wonderful photo on Mary Howard’s Facebook. She often posts sunsets from her new home in Hawaii, but this one is from Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. She happily granted permission for me to use it.

 “I was in Myrtle Beach SC for a SERRRA presentation. Each night I’d walked the beach to get sunset photos. On this day I noticed that I could actually walk under this and it made for a perfect photo. I’m learning to pay attention to my gut!” Mary Howard

Please post a small poem in the comments and support other writers with encouraging responses. I will be posting my own poem later today.

Sun reluctantly sets
in golden glow
sending us a message
of hope.

Margaret Simon, draft

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