Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
Wildflowers in a jar, Margaret Simon
If you read my post last week, you know I have a thing for flowers. After visiting Petite Anse Farms and cutting my own flowers, the wildflowers that line the Lafitte Greenway in New Orleans drew me in and begged to be clipped, collected, and given away.
The Festival of Words yearly fundraising event was once again virtual this year. In a way, this is great because more poets from Louisiana and beyond can participate. I volunteered again to write a commissioned poem for Words for You. How this worked was I volunteered, someone donated to have me write a poem, and we all celebrated with a reading event on Zoom. The reading was last night and it’s on Facebook Live.
For some reason, I felt drawn to the sonnet form. What a challenge I gave myself! My person, Sue, answered a question about her spirit animal being a leopard. I did some leopard research and puzzled it into a poem. The problem was it didn’t hold any meaning. So then I wrote a free verse poem. After that I continued to hack away at the sonnet. After more study of the form, a total rewrite was necessary. The process was challenging, at times frustrating, but in the spirit of the leopard, I did not give up.
It may help to know that Sue is a playwright who is tolerant of Louisiana, but she hates the weather.
(c) Margaret Simon, for Sue Schleifer “Words for You” 2021
Last week when my youngest daughter, Martha, set up her office on the back deck, she watched hummingbirds fighting at the feeder. It was one of those rare high pressure/ low humidity days with an actual breeze. She had to silence the wind chimes for her Zoom calls. Today, Martha’s office is back in New Orleans as power has returned.
Currently I am watching the rain bands of Hurricane Nicholas (now a tropical storm) fill up the bayou. The hummers are still coming. That’s a good sign.
My friend Molly Hogan in Maine has been watching these amazing birds, too, and taking amazing photos of them. She sent me this one.
For my students, since this is a virtual learning day due to the storm, I linked the photo to this Wonderopolis article and used one of the facts in my haiku.
photo by Molly Hogan
Peach-sweet zinnia fanned by wingbeats 200 times per second: Zest!
Haiku draft, Margaret Simon
Please write a small poem in the comments and reply to other writers with encouraging words. Thanks for being here.
Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
Ring of Fire Sunflowers, photo by Margaret Simon
My daughters packed their cars, their dogs, a toddler and returned to New Orleans on Saturday. The house was cavernous and quiet. I needed to do something for myself or I knew I would sink into the sofa and sulk.
Petite Anse Farm advertised a cut-your-own-bucket-of-flowers weekend. On Sunday morning, I grabbed my coffee and smoothie and hit the road. The farm of beautiful Jennifer and handsome Andrew Graycheck is about 8 miles south of town. I was greeted by Georgia, their Australian Shepherd and Lorelei, their 5 year old.
Lorelei helps me choose the best zinnias. Their stems need to be strong and not springy.
In the warming breeze, I set out with a bucket of water and clippers. I stopped to take photos. I took Lorelei’s picture, and she took mine. She also helped me choose the best stems to fill my bucket.
Photo by Jennifer Graycheck with my phone. She’s a fine art photographer and gave me some great pointers for using “portrait mode.”
When I checked out with Jennifer, I asked, “What am I going to do with all these flowers?”
“Give them to the people you love!”
At home I gathered jars and vases and cut the stems again to place in arrangements. After lunch, I set out to deliver flowers.
My friend (and my husband’s cousin) Annie has been called as a priest for our church. She is the first female priest in charge for the Episcopal Church of the Epiphany in its 165 year history. I wrote an article for our local newspaper about her. You can read it here. I stopped by to thank her for all the little things she is doing at our church to make it a stronger community of caring people.
Madre Annie Etheredge flashes her smile.
I made 4 more stops. It took me 2.5 hours because everyone was home and ready to visit. I caught up with friends and delivered a bit of joy in the process. Literally and figuratively filled up my bucket.
Laura Purdie Salas has been a writing mentor in my classroom for years now. Her books and poetry speak to children ( and to this adult). A few weeks ago she posted this poem on her blog. I used it with my students for a beginning-of-the-school-year writing prompt. I did not require the precise rhyme and rhythm pattern; they got the gist of making a list of favorite things.
I, however, took on the challenge of getting into the right meter and rhyme-scheme. I don’t think I’ve nailed it (I’m missing a verse and one of the rhymes is too slanted) but each revision gets closer to it. Rodgers and Hammerstein were musical geniuses. I played a video of this favorite scene from The Sound of Music, a classic that many children are unfamiliar with. They know this version better–the Lays commercial with Anna Kendrick. It’s fun to watch, too.
My middle daughter’s son, my middle grandchild, turned 2 yesterday. “Mamoo” (his version of Mamére) bought a set of bubbles and wands for his family birthday party. It’s fascinating when a child learns to blow bubbles. Often the blow is too fast for the bubble to form. The bubble set came with a variety of instruments for making bubbles. I hit the Walmart $5 Jackpot with this set. “Tuffy” (the nickname Thomas gave to himself) was able to blow more slowly through the pipe and watch the bubble form. This helped him blow with the wand. Bubble success! Then he was on to something else.
I, however, stayed focused on getting a photo of a bubble. I am posting the best of the bunch. I find the colors magical.
Photo by Margaret Simon
There is a rainbow of magic inside a bubble blown by a boy learning to blow.
Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
Another week of writing from The Quickwrite Handbook by Linda Rief. I have two pieces of writing I’d like to share today. The first was a prompt after Cynthia Rylant’s When I Was Young in the Mountains. Linda Rief wrote a mentor text “When I Was Young at the Ocean.” I wrote “When I Was Young at Purple Creek.”
When I was young at Purple Creek, I dangled my toes in the trickle of water and watched minnows dart around them, sending tickles and goose pimples all the way up my skinny white legs.
When I was young at Purple Creek, I buried my Barbies in the sand, played Treasure Island on the wrip-wrap shore, and let go of the leash so Loopy could wander and explore, bark at the squirrels.
When I was young at Purple Creek, my fear of snakes was on high alert. Brother shouted a warning just to see me jump. We gathered treasures in a tin bucket (rocks, broken glass, colored leaves, mimosa seed pods, a baby frog).
My flip-flop feet toughened on summer days when I was young at Purple Creek. The trickle was my ocean. The shoreline my cave. The pine trees my towers. I was queen of Purple Creek.
The next text we read and wrote from was an Excerpt from The Terrible Two by Mac Barnett and Jory John.
That Kind of Teacher
On the first day of school, you can decide what kind of teacher you want to be. You can be the smiley teacher, the one who greets everyone at the door with “How are you today?” You could be the fashionable teacher, the one who turns heads with her new outfit each day. You could be the kind of teacher who knows everything about the new reading curriculum guidelines. The teacher who decorates her classroom in rainbow colors and files everything in matching color-coded binders. You could be the teacher who stands at the board and takes roll, who finishes her report cards on time. Or you could be that teacher who works as hard as her students. The curious teacher. The open-minded teacher. The teacher with a lot of stickers on the chart. When the school year starts, you can choose what kind of teacher you will be, the kind of teacher you will be for the rest of your life.
Margaret Simon
And here’s 6th grader Chloe’s poem response for “I’m the Kind of Kid Who”
I’m the kind of kid who leaves at the end of class, new kids asking why. I say “Guess” to hear what they think.
I’m the kind of kid who always does their work or finishes their homework in class so they have nothing left to do.
I’m the kind of kid whose teacher lets them eat in class as long as she doesn’t see me.
I’m the kind of kid who writes every day. If you don’t know what I mean, I’m doing it right now.
I’m the kind of kid who is ready for the weekend and is actually ready to come back to school.
Chloe
Adelyn, 3rd grade, wrote about her sister and posted it here on FanSchool.
What was I thinking when I challenged my Inklings writing group to write a ghazal for this month’s challenge? Woah, who knew there were so many rules/ guidelines? I had attended the Poetry Foundation’s Summer Teachers Institute and watched a presentation about using repetition in poetry. The presenter talked about two poetry forms, the villanelle and the ghazal. So I said to myself that in order to teach these forms, I needed to write in these forms.
The ghazal is an ancient Arabic and Persian language poetic form. It has couplets (two-line stanzas) that end with repeated end words or phrases. You can also add that traditionally the author’s name appears in the last couplet.
Looks easy, right? Well, this definition was somewhat incomplete. At Poets.org, there is this more complete definition. And Molly directed us to this guidance on Tweetspeak. The most help, as always, came from the Inkling group’s dedication to the craft of poetry and to each other. Their critique was invaluable.
I wanted my poem to say something, to express my longing as a grandmother for the grandmother I never knew. This portrait of her was painted in the 1940’s when my mother was a young girl. It now hangs in my dining room, life-size.
Grandmother’s Song
She never held me in her arms long to sing. Death took her breath–she was not wrong to sing.
Within her eyes a lullaby still stares from a frame to invite me along to sing.
Her portrait-hands caress violin strings; Like the songbird’s voice, they echo strong to sing.
Now I wonder if an angel sings to me. I want to know whose song to sing.
I have her name–Margaret–a spelling tune, like a young child, I know I belong to sing.
Margaret Simon, ghazal, all rights reserved.
Click on the links to read more ghazals by our amazing poetry group.
Spiritual Journey First Thursday posts are being gathered by Karen.
Spiritual journeys, like life, have their ups and downs. I think I’ve been in a low for a while now, without realizing it. Nothing like a major disaster to come along as a wake up call. God whizzed by and said, “Hey, look what the force of nature can do. Blow off roofs. Shut down power systems. Upend trees. Disrupt our lives. But I’m still here if you need me.”
Karen Eastlund asked us to write about virtue. She sent us a long list of virtues. I have been thinking a lot about Grace. Grace kept us safe from the storm. Grace allows us to be a safe haven for our family. Grace is the virtue that gives freely without asking for anything in return.
My family is filling up my house. It’s usually just me and my husband, dog Charlie, and cats Fancy, Mimi, and Buzz. Today my home includes 4 more adults, 1 toddler, 3 dogs and a cat. My school secretary commented, “Simon Family Zoo.” But I prefer another friend’s comment. He said, “Like Christmas!”
In Grace and with Gratitude, I open my heart and my home to the ones I love. We will get through this and likely become better people.
God, grant me the grace to be the calm in the storm, love in times of trouble, and faith when things look bleak.
I almost forgot it was Wednesday. Yesterday was the first day of my work week because we had Monday off for Hurricane Ida, which thankfully did not impact us directly. When I walked Tuesday morning, this beautiful cloud led me. I held my phone up high to capture this photo. Clouds always draw my eye, especially ones with the sun within them.
Yesterday there were ten minutes of class left before the bell rang, so I challenged my student in a game of Metaphor Dice. We rolled 3 dice and wrote a poem in one minute (her idea). It was a great way to keep our brains active. I am using a revised version of mine as a small poem today.
Silver lining by Margaret Simon
Metaphor Minute
My birth is like a bright meadow– like stars on the path to a grand castle, like diamonds strung on a silver string, walking in clouds lined with sunbeam.
Margaret Simon, draft
Join me in praising the clouds and the spirit of all things. Leave a small poem in the comments. Support others with encouraging words. Thanks for being 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.
Reflections on the Teche 