Spark! | Reflections on the Teche

Posts Tagged ‘Spark!’

Poetry Friday: Folktale Week Poems

Posted in Poetry Friday, Writing, tagged #folktaleweek, Inklings challenge, Jone MacCulloch, Spark! on November 3, 2022| 16 Comments »

Poetry Friday is hosted by Heidi at my juicy little universe

Happy November! Wow, did that ever sneak up on me. The month of gratitude. The month of NCTE! (Yes, in California and I am presenting) The month before Christmas. Ah, 2022 is quickly slipping away.

Here we are with another Inkling challenge, and I, once again, put it off. Linda Mitchell challenged us to write a poem to one of the prompt words for Folktale Week. I didn’t even know there was such a thing. You can find it on Instagram: #folktaleweek, #folktaleweek2022.

I selected the word star.

Have you found the star in you?

The one that shines brightest in the dark.
Your star may feel far away
yet even dandelions have hidden wings.
Open your wings to the wind.

Believe you can fly.

Margaret Simon, draft

I signed up for a postcard exchange through Spark: art from writing, writing from art. I received a card from our own Jone MacCulloch. It’s an illustration that wants to be a poem. Perhaps a Folktale poem? Will you take the challenge?

“Pumpkin Moon” by Jone
Moon: copy of great grandfather’s Civil War letter
Pumpkin inspired by Yayoi Kusama

Check out what the other Inklings have written for this challenge:

Linda Mitchell
Molly Hogan
Catherine Flynn
Mary Lee Hahn
Heidi Mordhorst

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Poetry Friday: Spark Art!

Posted in Poetry Friday, Slice of Life, Writing, tagged art collage, Linda Mitchell, Spark! on March 11, 2022| 16 Comments »

Poetry Friday is with Sylvia at Poetry for Children

I signed up to do an exchange for Spark Art #50 with my friend Inkling Linda Mitchell. Linda creates wonderful collages, so I asked her to do the exchange with me. She sent me a collage and I sent her a poem. She was charged with creating a collage from my poem and me with creating a poem from her collage. Fun, right? It is fun when you are playing with a friend you know will be respectful of your work and who does good work herself.

The links to our exchange on the Spark website are here and here.

I am sharing my poem process that responded to this collage.

The first thing I noticed was the moon. I wrote the title first, “Moonlight Sonata” and played Beethovan’s Sonata for inspiration. I noticed the foreign words. I asked Linda about the flowers, but she didn’t know what they were. I decided they were edelweiss. I got stuck, though, and decided to use a poem I had written for Laura Shovan’s February project and combine it with the work I was doing on responding to the collage. I don’t usually do this, and it created a level of mystery to the poem. And I’m OK with that.

Moonlight Sonata

Moon, wild orb nightly shining
high above the oak trees.
Your pull breaks waves
and concrete where oak roots
rise like bread, yeast pressing
our foreign earth.

How can you feel sadness
if you’ve not known joy?

When the edelweiss blooms,
we breathe in sweet scent,
welcome Spring
and sing praise for your goodness, Moon.

We push on and on
until, like you, the flower, the oak
we find our light
and shine.

There are only a few dates left for the Kidlit Progressive poem. Claim your day here.

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Poetry Friday: Zentangle Poems

Posted in Poetry Friday, Writing, tagged Beth Saxena, Spark!, Zentangle, Zentangle Buddha Poems on July 23, 2021| 12 Comments »

Poetry Friday round-up is with Kat Apel down under with snails and cats and #petpicpoems

I have a new creative ~~obsession~~ outlet: zentangle poems. I signed up for art card exchange with Amy Souza at Spark . I have a pocket Buddha reader. The pages are small (2″ x 3″) and full of wonderful Zen words in which to create small poems. Here are the art cards I sent out.

The winds, coming and going
free
See beyond reality,
illusion, vision, dream
beyond the realm of words.
(Zentangle Buddha Poem #1)

Disentangling truth
can free you.
Understand sweetness.
Trust the self.
Nothing exists forever.
(Zentangle Buddha Poem #2)

Find truth
in a tangle–
hopelessly question
Understand the tangle-truth.
(Zentangle Buddha Poem #3)

How brightly you will shine!
You are yourself.
You, wherever you are.
(Zentangle Buddha Poem #4)

You will know
the scent of sandalwood
against the weed.

My sister is an artist. (You can find her on Instagram at bethsaxena_art.) Beth sent me this folded book with the message “This book wants to be a poem.” I’ve had it for a while. She painted in blank spaces just the right size for Zentangle Buddha Poems.

The womb is pure and free.
Wonder indeed
entered
is calm insight
and truth.

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Poetry Friday Roundup: Spark and Swagger Challenges

Posted in Poetry Friday, Writing, tagged Jone MacCulloch, Molly Hogan, Spark!, Sunday Poetry Swaggers on June 3, 2021| 35 Comments »

Poetry Friday round-up is here! Scroll to the bottom to add your link.

Last month I participated in two challenges: Spark and Sunday Swaggers. Spark is an exchange between writer and artist led by Amy Souza. I partnered with Jone MacCulloch. I sent her a poem. She sent me this amazing photograph.

Lady Bird Johnson Grove by Jone Rush MacCulloch

How Do We Stand?

I go to Lady Bird Johnson Grove
to be among these giant trees.
Fenced forest of ten thousand branches
diffuses blue sky radiation
illuminating tunnels in the midst
of roots ungrounded–a path
to the great unknown.
Moved by stillness,
we pass ancient ruins,
an army of roots intertwined.
I’ll lock arms with you
through dark spaces
where rays of light
are swallowed
and breathe in blue forever.
Margaret Simon, all rights reserved

Molly Hogan challenged our Sunday Swagger poetry group to write after Cheryl Dumesnil’s Today’s Sermon. I created a collage. Sometimes doing this helps me focus and inspires creative juices. After playing with collage and word collecting, I pulled together a poem using the anaphora of Today’s Poem.

Link up your post here:

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#SOL21 Poetry Friday: Spark Art & Poetry

Posted in Creativity, Poetry Friday, Slice of Life, Writing, tagged Betty Nichols art, Spark!, torn paper collage art on March 19, 2021| 16 Comments »

Poetry Friday is with Linda at Teacher Dance

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

I challenged myself to try Spark, a creative exchange between artists and poets. Artist Betty Nichols sent me an image of her art.

A process I’ve been playing with lately is paper collage. To get my head around this abstract painting, I decided to recreate it in collage. The paper I selected informed words I collected to write from. Here is my response collage.

Notebook collage in response to art by Betty Nichols

While searching for things to cut out, I found an article that included advice from Maria Shriver on how to make a difference. The first bullet point, “Sit with yourself” became the title. I cut out radicchio to get the red color. Doing research I found that radicchio is the “crunch VIP of salads.” The black flame came from a bee print paper. I let the list and collage sit for a few days. The process worked for me.

Sit with Yourself
The chicory radicchio is said
to be the ultimate crunch in your daily salad,
rich in vitamin K.
This red dagger isn’t dangerous.
The flame that is the yellow body of a bee
harmlessly flying from tree to tree
pollinates, perpetuating life.
This red dagger isn’t dangerous.
When you are faced with the sharp points
of a knife you use every day,
look closely. The stain of death
may be the blood of birth,
the path of its blade leading to light.
This red dagger isn’t dangerous.
A snow-filled valley will green in spring.
Sit with yourself.
Give it time.

Margaret Simon, all rights reserved.

Posted at Spark here.

I sent Betty a blues poem, and she responded with tissue paper art. See our collaboration here.

At first I was completely intimidated by the idea of writing a poem to someone else’s art. By making it my own through my own art, I was able to find a way in to the original painting. The idea of sitting with yourself to make space for creativity comes up for me a lot these days. Creativity requires space as well as time for incubation. I hope you can find time and space to incubate and create. The process is its own reward.

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This Photo Wants to be a Poem

Posted in Photography, Poetry, Writing, tagged Kidblog, Paula Bourque, photo prompt, Spark! on January 6, 2021| 1 Comment »

Last weekend we toasted in the new year with some friends around our fire pit. I had taken down the tree ornaments earlier in the day, and my husband usually carries the dry fir tree out to the curb, but this year, it seemed appropriate somehow to burn it.

A new year also brings about changes in my teaching routine. For whatever reason, I hadn’t used photo prompts with my students yet this year. So this week I posted my photo on our Kidblog and directed them to respond. In Paula Bourque’s book Spark, she encourages teachers to use their own photos because it helps kids get to know you a little better. It was fun to hear my students’ questions and connections to this photo. I think I’ll do this with them every week. Click on the Kidblog link above to read their responses.