NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 13

Not sure what the prompt was today but my focus was mainly my trusty thermos. It’s not my first thermos. I’ve had several that have travelled to work and even to Wales with me because there’s nothing quite like being able to pause for a hot cuppa. I’ve learned the pleasure of making a thermos when I’m sick and being able to have a hot cup in bed without the tea-making activities. So my thermos is getting its moment of spotlight these days. Worth every penny. It’s not a damn travel mug. It’s a Thermos®. And it keeps things VERY hot. And it turns out you can actually pour without removing the stopper all the way (oh, the things you learn along the way!)

another day sick
another cup of hot tea
cooling

making myself
a thermos of hot tea
for the afternoon

boil up the kettle
thinking of the endless cups
at grandma’s table

And while outside righting and filling the feeders, I noticed some new developments in the front garden.

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 13

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 8 – The Eclipse

Got together with Mom, some of Mom’s neighbors and some of my cousins today in Rensselaer to watch the eclipse. We had eclipse glasses but we also had a great few hours and for most of it had a great view of a 97% eclipse despite the passing clouds.

Trying not to stare
we raised our eclipse glasses
again and again.

fleeting minutes
wondering where the sun went
nibbled by the moon

Opted to stay home
missed totality but
enjoyed the eclipse

eclipse, we reckoned
all heads tilting at the same
angle, lips ajar

the moon’s shadow
in a brief starring role
stole the spotlight

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 8 – The Eclipse

The Eve of NaPoWriMo

Yes, we’ve circled back to the end of March, which means tomorrow is April Fools Day and YES National (Global) Poetry Writing Month.

NaPoWriMo headquarters has issued an early bird prompt and it spoke to me.

You can do this. All the days, some of the days, post them publicly or not. It’s all up to you. Just do it!

A Window

Through the window it all came
the many stories of birds
the reminders of wind and
forgiveness of rain or
its sudden brutality.
At night a distant train
called to remember the
railroad men who lay at rest
In season, the peepers,
the crickets, the katydids
In came the sound of owls
calling to each other
as though no one else heard
At times a fox yells
for the sake of yelling
or a lonely cat for the
sake of its wanting.
Come morning and the light
slices in through the blinds.
Comes a night and there’s the
ringing of snow on the glass.
Come another night and
the air can only be perfect
then moving on to rustle
the leaves outside of sleep.

The Eve of NaPoWriMo

Merry Christmas 2021!

Well we made it to Christmas! Hurrah for us!

Thinking about all of you who maybe still aren’t with your family and friends because of the pandemic. Hope we can turn it around this year. Like they say – next year in Jerusalem! Or as others say – Make It So!

I’ve been quiet here, but I’ve been plugging along. Recently I tried something new. Sort of put me off course for NaNoWriMo, but it was fun and made my brain work pretty hard at times. Gave me a few flashbacks to my start up days of doing layout and printing too. I tried lino printing and was supported by generous people on youtube who shared their knowledge and craft there so I could see the whole process, get pointers, get some warnings etc etc.

So Merry Christmas and all the best in the coming year! Here’s my holiday card to all of you!

I was reminded while working on this of what is said when the reading of each book of the Torah is completed: “Chazak, Chazak v’nitchazek!:”– Be Strong, Be Strong, and Let Us Strengthen One Another. Let’s continue to be strong and be strong for each other in the coming year.

Merry Christmas 2021!

September Arrives

The postcards are still arriving so I’m going to wait a week or two before doing final group photos. The cards have been numerous and great and at times perfectly timed. You never know when you send out a bunch of words how they’ll land, but thank you everyone who sent cards.

I enjoyed the break from watercolor/photograph cards of my own making. Using recycled grocery boxes with a few things gleaned from phone books and other sources gave a new focus to the words. This year’s poems were unrelated to the cards without a doubt but the cards weren’t unrelated to the month and the year beforehand.

My tradition of sending out a bonus card with an “end of august” poem continued. I don’t think my wishes for getting it done sooner/earlier is really possible. Somehow it needs that moment, well into the month, of thinking – oh my god – what will I do for the August 31st card???!!! So I’ll let it happen as it seems to have done for a few years. I’m grateful to Staples for taking the pressure off my home printer and getting it done quickly and efficiently.

I hope I managed to say at least ‘hi!’ on all the cards. This year there was a little more room per card for stuff like that, due to sending three to four haiku each night. I tried harder to look at the cards received pile to see what was going on there before writing but it never seems to influence me too much. I thought of it as having the recipient in mind. I always look to see first who the poems will be going to.

There’s an open mic for participants tomorrow and I hope to hear the experiences of others!

And oh yeah, signed up for next year. See you next August!

September Arrives

NaPoWriMo – Day Thirty – The End

The last day of NaPoWriMo 2021 has come and gone. It’s always a bittersweet moment for everyone participating. Perhaps some feel relieved. Thirty days is a push when you are trying to write something everyday. Snatching something from the air and putting it out there in words.

Keep on poets everywhere. See you next year if not sooner! Thanks to all my April visitors and for the reading and comments on my writings here. Means a lot.

In a swirl of green
April morphs to May
juncos to robins
last year’s leaves
tomorrow’s flowers
in a whorl of green

In a whorl of green
overnight the world changes
April bcomes May.

x

NaPoWriMo – Day Thirty – The End

November 6, 2020 – Letter to my elected reps

November 6, 2020

Dear Elected Representative,

We are in the last moments of this election and still holding our collective breath. While we are hopeful of the outcome, the thought still is there: how can “these people” feel so strongly in ways that are against what our nation stands for?

I had a moment while looking at the county breakdown of voting in this election. Most of my “blue state” was red. The signs and banners and trucks certainly indicated this to me previously but the voting didn’t lie. The only thing that kept the state blue was the concentrated votes in the populated areas. My moment wasn’t one of “thank goodness” but – how do we find common ground again? Rural areas (where I live) are the mirror of inner cities – little work opportunity, often poor education at all levels, poor pay, poor health care, food scarcity and insecurity, few cultural offerings. If we want to join together with our neighbors again we can’t dig in and WIN. We must find ways to offer ways to live better and to make room for caring for everyone so that anger subsides and being open to each other can begin.

This isn’t a new state of affairs, but a sure decline of urban and rural areas for many generations. And it is true for many of the “blue” states.

I live in an old house in a rural area. The center of the economy to those driving through here is all about cars. Old cars, a race track for racing cars, a NAPA store or two in every village. We have had minimal internet service, at times not reliable phone or electrical service. Where I live there’s no cable TV offerings at all because it’s not economically interesting to the cable companies. There are no grocery stores nearby, just convenience stores where you can pick up milk, bread and eggs with your gas fill up. In season we have farm stands.

I saw all the red signs. I heard a lot of the muttering and talk. I saw all the people who wouldn’t wear masks from the start and do so now minimally only because our local shops won’t let them in without one thanks to our governor’s strong guidance.

I see the local school whose newsletter touts the sports teams but doesn’t mention the academic results because they’re pretty bad.

There are people from downstate buying up property that was once farmland because they have the money to buy it and pay taxes on it. They rarely do much for the economy in terms of offering new industry or employment.

Why am I painting this view for you? Because to get back on track and start to push our country forward we can’t be US vs THEM. We have to make sure that opportunity is there for anyone who wants to try for it. That education is good and free at local schools and affordable to those who want to go on, and that this education prepares people for good-paying jobs that allow them to live well. That an unexpected illness or accident won’t destroy a family because of medical costs. That medical care and services are available everywhere to anyone who needs them.

I think of my childhood – all the little moments of a child’s oblivious growing up – and realize how we were not worried. We weren’t worried about losing our house or car or job, losing family members because we couldn’t get them health care. That’s privilege that comes from economics more than anything else. I grew up thinking if I worked, and it might be hard work, I could keep going and live an all right kind of life. I could take care of myself and my family.

I could be relaxed about the future, not worried and angry with worry and fear. I could save for retirement and someday not have to work.

How can we extend a better life with a sense of that to everyone? Health care, education, job training and opportunities, everyone pulling their weight to make things move for everyone?

This is what I ask of you, my elected representatives going forward. Stop catering to the billionaires and the mega-corporations and start – and finish – with the people you represent in the cities, the suburbs and the rural communities. We need your support to make the American dream of possibility and hope a reality for everyone so we can be one nation and one community again.

Mary Beth Frezon

November 6, 2020 – Letter to my elected reps

NaPoWriMo – Day Sixteen

A weird Thursday, woke to snow (and an open window since I totally missed that forecast). Bright and sunny and cold but with wild wind and changing sky. Worms are settling in. Internet finally returns after twenty-four plus hours… it’s been real -real something.

But hey, we’re here for the poems. Sometimes you get a line and just have to go with it, just like days without internet. This seems to be a weird two-parter joined by the idea of “worn”.

Worn

I.
Evening comes holding a handful of tears
something about four thirty or seven
The hill across the way is yellow-lit
in the day’s last slant, somewhere birds’ last song
Night comes by and sits in the eastern sky
we watch the light change down to grey and blue
This morning there was snow, which, just to say
that this world is a wonder of beauty
and yet tears come cold and without warning,
well, each day. If not four-thirty, seven
and not even the relief of crying
So much it seems I cannot understand
How will the world be, reentering
and seen with eyes so worn by tears?

II.
This old sweater, I see the wrist is worn
away from use – I wear it every day
almost year round, so no complaints I guess
but what will I do? become one who wears
a sweater missing parts? And what of warmth?
I’ll be sorry to see it unravelled so.
I try to be pragmatic and think of what
I’d like to wear instead. Maybe two
rather than one so I’ll be less that sweater
and more me coming up the steps,
more what I do rather than what I wear?
Perhaps a nice black wool or charcoal grey
I feel like I’m cheating on an old friend.
I’ll pretend it moved away, and may return
with newly knit cuffs and glad elbows.

NaPoWriMo – Day Sixteen

NaPoWriMo 2019 – Day Twenty-Five

She came, needing to buy
a replacement for something
broken — accidentally,
unfortunately, sadly —
and then she began to weep,
her husband, not dead six days
would have known how to fix it
how to do all those things
and she did not,
and so she stood with me
weeping, both of us
and a wordless space
holding on to each other
no heroes,
trying again to breathe.

I told a minister a little about this chance encounter and said something like – what can anyone say? He said – I can tell you as a minister there is nothing you can say in times like that. It was an interesting day – one of those days when you wonder what the world is trying to tell you, and if that’s the case, why can’t it speak a little plainer.

NaPoWriMo 2019 – Day Twenty-Five

NaPoWriMo 2019 – Day Twenty-One

There was stuff going on today, Easter, News, stuff, all kinds of stuff. So here we go at the last minute!

The water in the glass is clear
conforming perfectly
and perfect in its clarity
playing tricks with light.
Perhaps it remembers being steam
but it has never glowed
red hot as the glass did once.
They sit easily together
within reach of my hand
and being so ready
to answer that reach
strong and fluid and cool.
Quenching as they part
now I am the vessel full
and the empty glass
waits to be filled again.

Also, Mom gave me this folder she found at her house – full of drawings I’d done while in high school and some yearbook photos. Amazing!

NaPoWriMo 2019 – Day Twenty-One