Ruth Ayres invites us the celebrate each week. Click over to her site Discover. Play. Build. to read more celebrations.
In the month of April, the whole Kidlitosphere lights up for National Poetry Month. There are so many exciting projects going on.
The gatherer of all Kidlit poetry postings is Jama at Jama’s Alphabet Soup.
Today the Progressive poem is here with Joy.
Click the NaPoWriMo button for more about daily writing prompts and poem sharing.
I am writing a poem-a-day to images. You can join me by leaving a poem in the comments or a link to your blog. Use #imagepoems on Twitter. Today’s image is Spanish moss. It hangs all over the trees in my neighborhood.
Spanish Moss
Columbarium
Moss crawls like skeletons in the trees,
a lacy tent for playful squirrels.
Even my cat, usually lolling and lazy,
joins in the chase, paws at the waving ghosts.
The moss speaks to the heavens,
the heavens that opened up with wind
and a storm yesterday when we placed
your ashes in the dovecote
outside the church
where you can live forever
in the eyes of God, or, at least, I’ll
say hello when I pass by on Sunday.
We do not know what time
has prepared for us
to walk in or to walk out
with ashes on our foreheads,
and now you are ashes in the tomb.
What does this say about the squirrels?
Do they know something?
Who are they chasing?
–Margaret Simon
Process: When I wrote the poem to this image of moss, I had returned from a funeral for a church member. I did not know him well, but every funeral is a deeply spiritual experience. And I was moved by the sudden wind and heavy rain that fell immediately following the placement of his urn into the columbarium. I looked up columbarium on Wikipedia and found the word origin of “columba” refers to the compartments used for doves, dovecote. I somehow think Charles will like playing in the trees with cats and squirrels. And now that I have written it, I will say hello to him when I pass each Sunday.
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Reflections on the Teche 