JoAnn Early Macken

 

 

Nesting birds, tra-la!
Rabbits flip head over heels.
Hope is in the air.

 

Heidi Mordhorst has today's Poetry Friday Roundup at my juicy little universe. Enjoy!

 

rustling brushes twirl
street sweeper stockpiles debris
thunder on patrol

 

 

pulmonaria
blossoms bow down to welcome
hungry bumblebee

 

 

mesmerizing view
I could stay here all day long
watching spring unfold

 

 

brown creeper shadow
climbs sidewalk tree trunk shadow
my shadow watches

 

 

Waiting in the car:
portable machines, fabric,
supplies. Let's go sew!

Update: Volunteers at today's Bring Your Bag Shorewood Sewing Bee produced 26 handmade reusable shopping bags for the Shorewood Public Library and Hunger Task Force, Inc.--good for the planet and fun!

 

 

purple martin pairs
claim the best nest compartments
beneficial guests

 

We've just returned from a trip out of town, where I ran across gobs of lost things. Of course, I took pictures. Glad to be home. More to come!

 

Jone Rush MacCulloch has today's Poetry Friday Roundup. Enjoy!

 

binoculars raised
I focus on waterbirds
learning duck by duck

 

 

shiny plastic threads
dangle from oriole's nest
built to last and last

 

 

some days are too hard
tomorrow will be better
let's just try again

P.S. Rosy is fine. We had a long, lovely, tiring walk followed by a spectacular tick event. All will be well.

 

post-eclipse dinner
veggie-nut ravioli
pasta suns and moons

 

 

starling silhouette
perches, whistles, cackles at
starling silhouette

 

 

keeping one foot warm
goose guards rippling reflections
eyes us warily

 

Happy Poetry Friday! Irene Latham has today's Poetry Friday Roundup at Live Your Poem. Enjoy!

 

crashing waves reveal
sleek, polished inspiration
always free of charge

 

Note to Self

Purple notebook,
purple pen.
April is reason enough.
Write again.

 

chilly all-day rain
underneath the overhang
finch finds room to rest

 

Miss me? Miss you, too--
you and your icicle ears.
I'll wait here. Come back!

 

Happy National Poetry Month! This year's theme is Lost & Found. I'll try to post a new poem every day. Enjoy!

 

Happy Poem in Your Pocket Day! Have you found yours?

 

I've posted a new poem every day this month so far--read on to see more of them.

 

And Happy Poetry Friday! Jone Rush McCulloch has today's Roundup. Enjoy!

 

 

Dutchman's breeches!

With only a few days remaining in National Poetry Month, the Progressive Poem has landed in this spot. Twenty-six contributors have now added a line apiece, most of them quotes from other literary sources. This is my first time participating, and my line is the last one here.

 

I spent last weekend in Indiana at the Celebration of Life for my dear friend April Pulley Sayre. I've been immersed in her wonderful work, and I chose a line from her book Warber Wave.

 

After you read the poem, you can read on to discover the names of the other contributors and their sources. Enjoy!

 

--- --- --- --- --- --- --- 

 

Where they were going, there were no maps.

 

   Sorry! I don't want any adventures, thank you. Not today.

 

Take the adventure, heed the call, now ere the irrevocable moment passes!

 

   We have to go back. I forgot something.

 

But it's spring, and the world is puddle-wonderful,

so we'll whistle and dance and set off on our way.

 

Come with me, and you'll be in a land of pure imagination.

 

Wherever you go, take your hopes, pack your dreams, and never forget –

 it is on our journeys that discoveries are made.

 

And then it was time for singing.

 

Can you sing with all the voices of the mountain, paint with all the colors of the wind, freewheeling through an endless diamond sky?

 

Suddenly, they stopped and realized they weren't the only ones singing.

 

Listen, a chattering of monkeys! Let's smell the dawn 
and taste the moonlight, we'll watch it all spread out before us.

 

The moon is slicing through the sky. We whisper to the tree, 
tap on the trunk, imagine it feeling our sound.

 

Clouds of blue-winged swallows, rain from up the mountains,

 

Green growing all around, and the cool splash of the fountain.

 

If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden,

a bright, secret, quiet place, and rather sad; 

 and they stepped out into the middle of it.

 

Their minds' libraries and lightning bugs led them on.

 

The darkwood sings, the elderhist blooms, the sky lightens; listen and you will find your way home.

 

The night sky would soon be painted, stars gleaming overhead, a beautiful wild curtain closing on the day.

 

Mud and dusk, nettles and sky – time to cycle home in the dark. 

 

There are no wrong roads to anywhere

 

lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove.

 

Standing at the fence of the cottage, 
    I hear the new note in the voices of the birds.

 

I pray to the birds because I believe they will carry the message of my heart upward.

 

I make up a song that goes on singing all by itself

 

Surfing rivers of wind way up high . . . calling zeep, zeep, zeep in the sky.

 

--- --- --- --- --- --- ---

 

Contributors:

 

1 April 1 Irene at Live Your Poem (This post includes links to all the other contributors' sites.)
2 Donna Smith at Mainly Write
3 Catherine Flynn at Reading to the Core
4 Mary Lee at A(nother) Year of Reading
5 Buffy at Buffy Silverman
6 Molly at Nix the Comfort Zone
7 Kim Johnson at Common Threads
8 Rose Cappelli at Imagine the Possibilities
9 Carol Varsalona at Beyond Literacy Link
10 Linda Baie at Teacher Dance
11 Janet Fagel at Reflections on the Teche
12 Jone at Jone Rush MacCulloch
13 Karin Fisher-Golton at Still in Awe
14 Denise Krebs at Dare to Care
15 Carol Labuzzetta @ The Apples in my Orchard
16 Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe
17 Ruth at There is no such thing as a God-forsaken Town
18 Patricia at Reverie
19 Christie at Wondering and Wandering
20 Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge
21 Kevin at Dog Trax
22 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche
23 Leigh Anne at A Day in the Life
24 Marcie Atkins
25 Marilyn Garcia
26 JoAnn Early Macken

 
27 Janice at Salt City Verse
28 Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference
29 Karen Eastlund at Karen's Got a Blog
30 Michelle Kogan Painting, Illustration, & Writing

 

Sources:

 

1. The Imaginaries: Little Scraps of Larger Stories, by Emily Winfield Martin

2. The Hobbit, by J. R. R. Tolkien
3. The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame
4. Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech
5. inspired by "[in Just-]" by E. E. Cummings
6. "Pure Imagination" from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
7. Maybe by Kobi Yamada
8. Sarah, Plain, and Tall by Patricia MacLachlan
9. inspired by Disney songs "A Whole New World" from Aladdin and "Colors of the Wind" from Pocahontas
10. The Other Way to Listen by Byrd Baylor
11. adapted from Cinnamon by Neil Gaiman
12. adapted from The Magical Imperfect by Chris Baron
13. adapted from On the Same Day in March by Marilyn Singer
14. adapted from a line in Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
15. The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
16. Prince Caspian by CS Lewis
17. The Last Cuentista by Donna Barba Higuera
18. Kate DiCamillo's The Beatryce Prophecy
19. The Keeper of Wild Words by Brooke Smith
20. Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv
21. The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
22. "Dance Me to the End of Love" by Leonard Cohen
23. adapted from Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt

24. A quote from Terry Tempest Williams in Birdology by Sy Montgomery
25. adapted from "When I Was a Bird" by Katherine Mansfield

26. Warbler Wave by April Pulley Sayre with Jeff Sayre

 

 

White-throated sparrows have returned! (Thanks to my sister Judy, who gave them the name in the last line!)

 

Read more about the birds. 

 

I'm thinking about bees today. I just learned that the flowers on pulmonaria (an early spring bloomer and one of my favorite plants) change color from pink to blue as they age, and bees know to visit the younger, more nectar-rich blossoms. Happy Earth Day! Plant some pulmonaria for the bees!

 

 

Today's poem was inspired by What the Heart Knows: Chants, Charms, and Blessings by Joyce Sidman--one of my favorite poetry collections.