Endangered List Update

lindastudley2 Comments
(imagine the ‘Hinterland Who’s Who’ theme music in the background – Canadian reference, sorry)

I    Independence
Once a common attribute, Independence has suffered from loss of natural habitat due to the encroachment of Convenience. Although a weaker attribute, Convenience has increased its numbers by interbreeding with Independence resulting in a subspecies of Convenience with an insatiable appetite for novelty. Sightings of Independence are rare and population estimates are low and restricted to rural and northern areas. It is generally accepted that unless Independence develops a thicker skin and a more aggressive attitude this attribute may soon move to the extinction list.

II    Privacy
Although every year several sightings of privacy are reported, none have yet been substantiated by the teams of trained observers who converge upon them for verification. Only these sporadic sightings keep Privacy from the extinction list and it is entirely possible that Privacy never really existed at all and should be relegated to the realm of mythology.

III    Initiative
A tenacious characteristic, capable of thriving in the harshest of environments, Initiative has suffered great losses due to pollution. Every day many are snared in loops and coils of red tape. The pathetic sight of dying initiative, red tape tightening around its neck, has sadly become commonplace and although the losses would seem to be preventable, creating regulations to deal with this problem only generate more red tape.

This Endangered List Update has been brought to you by the Frustration Program of the Jaded Expectations Society.

#100

Yes, I know, it’s more prose than poem, but that’s what I wrote this morning so oh well… 🙂

How to Twist Wire

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Now take the wire in your left hand, the pliers in your right
and make a ninety degree bend not quite halfway along
rather like that bend in the road that I took
when I met your father.

Now, put down the regular pliers and pick up
the round nosed ones and twist a loop into the wire,
somewhat like the loop your arrival twisted
into our lives, perfect, symetrical,
the first full twist on a DNA strand.

Now grasp that loop with the regular pliers, hold firm,
sort of like we did when you rebelled, although you were
a decidedly reasonable child.

Now take a few wraps
around the wire, tight and close,
much like the way we’ve always been.

Now snip off the left over wire, the part left over
that needs to find another purpose, another role,
a bit like your journey into independence.

Now string your gems and pearls.

Repeat.

 

#99

My Mistake

lindastudley2 Comments

I don’t dwell on my mistakes but they do live quite close by
and we get together often though we don’t see eye to eye.
And I tell them how they should be and they laugh at me and claim
I should go look in the mirror if I want someone to blame.

And they always come to visit at an inconvenient time
my pennance and my poison and my sentence for my crime
of trying something different and stumbling and falling
of trying to discover my vocation, my true calling.

And I’ve tried to move away but they follow me. I guess
they have a built in radar for a forwarding address.
I suppose I’ll have to learn to get along with them some day
They’re my oldest, closest friends and they just won’t go away.

 

#98

Commentary on Spam – Seriously?

lindastudley3 Comments

I moderate comments to my blog and even though the filter informs me it’s deterred over a thousand spam messages, I still have a few to look at each day in the spam file. I have just one question…who in their right mind would allow a spam message, like the one I’ve included below, onto their page?

“Greatest fighter toasts ought to entertain on your couples.”

Thank you, my couples do not need anyone to entertain on them, certainly not fighters, great or otherwise.

I have pondered this for a long time and I can only conclude that these spam comments are the detritus generated by the proverbial ‘infinite number of monkeys sitting at an infinite number of typewriters’ before they managed to type out the complete works of Shakespeare.

Greatest fighter toasts? Seriously?

 

Nickel for Your Thoughts?

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Budget day has come and gone, the news has turned to olds
but for one staunch Canadian it knelled a cruel death toll.

For many years he suffered from a deficiency of copper.
He alternately was the friend and bane of every shopper,

who, after lugging pounds (or kilos) of them in their pants
empty them on dressers or into piggy banks,

then find that when the register rings something fifty nine
their purse and pockets are bereft, no pennies can they find.

Devout friend to small children living close to railroad tracks,
we passed him off a million times but he always came right back.

Today we bid a fond farewell to our pseudo-copper friend.
The brave Canadian penny has met a cents-less end.

#97

The Single Original Thought

lindastudley2 Comments

They say “pride goes before a fall”
I say “I don’t agree.
Pride is what makes us excel,
our downfall’s vanity.”

They say “the truth will set you free”
I say “I must demure.
Whose truth are you speaking of?
I assume it must be yours.”

Clouds have silver linings and
it’s darkest before dawn
and early birds all get their worms
and ugly ducks are swans.

We’ve thrown up clichéd fences
of homily and adage
with lies for all occasions
to carry ‘round like baggage.

There are many memorable mottos
that would better be forgot.
For there are no glib pronouncements
worth a single original thought.

 

#96

We Take Our Place in the World

lindastudley5 Comments

We take our place in the world and carry on
for even being nothing has its place
like silences that punctuate a song.

All things, and their lack, live where they  belong.
Positive pictures have negative space.
We take our place in the world and carry on.

I once believed that only strength was strong
till petals lit upon my upturned face
like silences that punctuate a song

The fragance haunts my memory all night long
although the fragile bodies left no trace.
We take our place in the world and carry on.

I used to think that things were really gone
just because they’d left an empty space
like silences that punctuate a song.

Our lives are like a pencil sketch we’ve drawn
Our shadows linger on like lines erased.
We take our place in the world and carry on
like silences that punctuate a song.

# 95

Challenge accepted Tony! Here’s the villanelle!

Geography Lesson

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Still waters may run deep
with rippling refractment.
Still waters may run deep
But often become stagnant.

No man is an island
all aloof and insular.
No man is an island
but some men are peninsular.

Faith may move a mountain,
shift it stone by stone.
Faith may move a mountain
but trust leaves it alone.

#94

Three Presents for Creativity- (Not a Poem)

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Occasionally I post something here that is NOT a poem! I am taking a creative writing course at our local college and was recently asked to give a presentation on some aspect of writing. I titled it “Three Presents”. Some of my fellow students asked me to post it somewhere so they could read it again, so I thought perhaps some of my blog readers might also be interested in it.

Three Presents for Creativity
I don’t have a lot of experience writing short stories or anything much longer than an occasional epic poem. But there are similar challenges and techniques in all forms of creative writing and since most of my success has been with songs and poetry, I’ll be drawing on that experience for this presentation. I call it a presentation because I will be giving you presents. My middle name is Jean. So this evening I’ll be a Jeannie and give you three presents.

One.
I used to wonder where the next inspiration would come from for a song or a poem and for a while it seemed that the harder I chased it, the faster it ran away. Then I realized that inspiration is very much like a skittish cat – chase it and it will dash up a tree and stay there untill you give up and walk away. Ignore it and soon it is in your lap, purring to be petted.

The first present I would like to give you is this –

The song/poem/story is already written – all you have to do is remember it. 

This may sound simplistic, but if you truly believe that the piece is already written it takes a huge burden from your shoulders. You are not faced with the overwhelming, God-like task of creating something from nothing. All you have to do is remember. Will you need to edit? Yes, of course. You’ll probably need to do some rewrites before you’ve ‘remembered’ it clearly.

Two.
The classic stereotype of a writer is one who struggles and strains to capture something and put it down on paper, who closets himself or herself away from the world and “Writes”, with a capital W. The struggle is self imposed, the isolation unnecessary.

The second present is this-

Keep your creative well topped up and you will never lack for inspiration.

You are a spiritual being on a human journey. Your creativity knows no bounds but the ones you impose upon it. Inspiration and ideas dangle around you like ripe fruit on the vine. It is the creative water that fills your well. The well that you draw upon when you take pen in hand or sit at your keyboard. Allow yourself the luxury of observing, enjoying, and participating in new and different experiences and your senses will soak up creative water like a sponge.

Three.
Some writers are accused of treating their work like it was their child – and by this it is meant that they are oversensitive and protective – as though anything but praise is a personal affront. Instead of considering a critique, they immediately jump to the defense of their baby. Is it wrong to be so connected to your writing?

Present number three –

Yes, you are the parent of your work, and good parents know when to let go.

When a child is young, parents are protective and that is the proper way to be. But as a child matures, a parent must stand back and allow the child to stand alone, to become her own entity. It’s the same with writing. If you are still overprotective of your writing then your writing must still be as a small child. Take it home and nurture it, train it in the way it should go, and when it is ready to stand alone you will find the critiques that stung before are now just interesting perspectives and helpful suggestions that you and your writing can use to grow and become strong. 

If you want to write then the most important thing to do is to actually write. Don’t plan to write, don’t schedule your writing, don’t wait untill the perfect plot lands in your lap. Write now. Write about anything and everything. Write everyday.

Write On!

I would also like to give credit where credit is due. I found Julia Cameron’s book “The Artist’s Way” to be pivotal in my development as a writer. I recommend it to anyone who wants to discover and nurture their creative soul. Her website is at http://juliacameronlive.com/

Spring Ambush

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Faint goose honk at edge of hearing,
soft chinook arch crowns the sky.
Wobbly fawn at edge of clearing,
baby coyotes croon and cry.

Redwing blackbird’s liquid chuckle,
rushing water’s roiling ring.
Crow returns with cocky ruckle,
peeper frogs begin to sing.

Pussywillows, silver glowing,
green haze limns the poplar trees.
Hush, child, listen, grass is growing,
Spring is ambushing the Peace.

#93

note: (I live in northern British Columbia, in an area called the Peace. Spring is a trickster here, sometimes you’re not sure if it’s really here until summer!)