NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 26

I had good intentions of getting stuff done this morning. But I guess my brain needed to decompress after all the legal-news-watching yesterday so getting up and out didn’t happen. Instead mom and I had an early dinner and then I tried to take us to see Cohoes Falls and failed not once but twice to get into the right lane to stay on 787 to get to Cohoes so we had a lovely tour of downtown Troy and spent a warm few minutes behind the Arts Center looking at the Hudson.

Then I came home and celebrated TGIF. These two haiku went out on a postcard as part of a yearlong poetry exchange.

Never a postmark
your words come to me again
unsullied

On the flipside
exotic destination
momentary trip.

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 26

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 21

Ventured out to see Mom, get sunflower seed for the birdies, get katfüd for the kitties and have some dinner. Amazing the changes in the world in a week plus. Although it was quite nippy today, sp many flowers and trees in bloom!

closed my eyes briefly
now the hills are fringed in white
lacy wild cherries

magnolia and
weeping almond and cherry
line my mother’s street

in my own garden
the first of the daffodils
are fading

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 21

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

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 4

Had a bit of strong weather go through the area last night in those wee hours. I am sure we would have had more snow on the ground this morning if there had been less rain, sleet and ice. I am grateful no big limbs came down since I guessed 70-80 mph wind gusts but the local weather service reports 60-70 but still – nothing to sneer at in the middle of the night. It really shook the house and all the windows! Mom and I decided to stay put this morning and I got a nap in. This afternoon I sorted out some paint stuff and filled a tiny palette for travel.

wind hammered the house
last night preventing sleep while
close trees sang along

tree boughs scrape against
the edge of the roof, singing
with low vibrato

peppered ice and snow
against the window all night
brief winter reprise

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 4

Day 2 NaPoWriMo 2024

While waiting for Mom doing her PT, I pondered today’s prompt:

…write a platonic love poem. In other words, a poem not about a romantic partner, but some other kind of love – your love for your sister, or a friend, or even your love for a really good Chicago deep dish pizza. The poem should be written directly to the object of your affections (like a letter is written to “you”), and should describe at least three memories of you engaging with that person/thing.

And as I slurped the last of my coffee, it came to me in a flash!

This familiar paper cup
This brown cardboard sleeve
this carefully molded white lid —
How I look forward to our meetings!
I know the level of half and half
I know how much sweetener
I know how to pour the fragrant liquid
quickly and neatly
I have exact change ready
We fling open the door
to face the day!

And a couple haiku:

A card from a friend
pen to paper, add a stamp
reading in the yard

Three postcards today
happiness in the mailbox
unexpectedly

Day 2 NaPoWriMo 2024

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 1

Mom and I are having a busy week of appointments and such but tonight we listened to Ada Limon host three other poets: Kevin Young, Patricia Smith and Ilya Kaminsky and an actor, Crystal Dickinson reading from her newly released book (part of her stint as Poet Laureate of the US), You Are Here.

The cat sits on me
pretending to listen as
poetry unfolds

And even better, came home to find three postcards from three wonderful folks that I was just thrilled to hear from!

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 1

Warez MB Been? But Exciting News!

I was doing a 30 day paint thing with a friend and posting more privately so apologies for the gap.

The last few days though I’ve had a little interruption – as two new kittens have arrived. Shout out to Kitten Angels and their fostering network and to Emily of Tiny But Mighty who fostered four black kittens and their black mama! We are taking it slow and steady and today spent some quality time downstairs. The little girl-cat discovered a nice cat bed with a view of a bird feeder and let her brother wander around downstairs giving pitiful wails without so much as a little prrrrt in response. The bed could easily hold four kittens but no – she didn’t feel like sharing or reassuring. I showed him where she was and he wasn’t interested.

So I used the time to update the cat cam. Stay tuned for future adventures with these two! I don’t know if we’ll be able to tell them apart once the collars come off but we shall see. (Names to be determined – in foster they were Maude and Frances.) And I better brush up my photo skills to accommodate two all-black cats.

PS Ginny and Harry are wonderfully ensconced with my Mom – but alas no cat cam there.

Warez MB Been? But Exciting News!

TGIF – Flowers

Had a nice outing with Mom to Becker’s in town for some hanging baskets and bedding plants. It was hotter than we thought but we made it home with no one wilting!

Here’s one of the coleus I got.

And here’s the star of the show, a hanging basket that we liked so much we each got one.

TGIF – Flowers

Sunday Concert – or All About Lyrics and Music

This morning I squeezed in a little time with a couple fountain pens. One, the Pineider Avatar TTT needed cleaning so I could move it from blue to red ink (Diamine Poppy Red) and the other, my Sailor Pro Gear – Stellar Black Hole needed a refill. All successful and writing well and minimal mess!

Then I put on “real” clothes after some reinforcing coffee and breakfast and picked up Mom for an afternoon concert at Troy Music Hall.

The program was “Music for Peace in a Time of War” with two pieces. The first was Franz Joseph Haydn’s Missa in Tempore Belli, which was written in 1796 in the period of war in Europe following the French revolution. I found it interesting to have parts of a mass in waltz time but it did make for very lyrical parts. After intermission the baritone soloist Philip Lima read a poem by Charles Anthony Silvestri, Peace is Fire! Then “Dona Nobis Pacem” by Ralph Vaughn Williams began.

Afterwards I looked up what had been mentioned, that Williams had served in World War One (in his 40’s!) and then was very affected when the signs of a second world war were apparent. This was written and first performed in 1936. It is written around three Walt Whitman poems, a mass, the bible and a political speech.

Both pieces were well received by the audience who gave a standing ovation at the end.

Afterwards Mom and I took ourselves to Dinosaur BBQ for a delicious dinner. Brought her home, came home myself to the delightful music of Paul Simon:

Peace like a river ran through the city
Long past the midnight curfew
We sat starry-eyed
Oh, we were satisfied

And I remember
Misinformation followed us like a plague
Nobody knew from time to time
If the plans were changed
Oh, if the plans were changed

You can beat us with wires
You can beat us with chains
You can run out your rules
But you know you can’t outrun the history train
I‘ve seen a glorious day

Four in the morning
I woke up from out of my dreams
Nowhere to go but back to sleep
But I’m reconciled
Oh, oh, oh, I’m gonna be up for a while
Oh, oh, oh, I’m gonna be up for a while
Oh, oh, oh, I’m gonna be up for a while
— Paul Simon

still a little damp and unflat, but it will get there:

But seriously folks – Paul Simon…

…One and one-half wandering JewsReturned to their natural coasts
To resume old acquaintances
And step out occasionally
And speculate who had been damaged the most
Easy time will determine if these consolations
Will be their reward
The arc of a love affair

Waiting to be restored
You take two bodies and you twirl them into one
Their hearts and their bones
And they won’t come undone
Hearts and bones
Hearts and bones
Hearts and bones

Sunday Concert – or All About Lyrics and Music

May The Fourth – Quiet Thursday

Did a little grocery shop for Mom and me basics and some festive breakfast things for Saturday’s doings. Came home and scuffled the ground a bit but no plants arrived that needed planting and the ground is really too wet to work if not needed.

Stole this from the flurry of May the fourth memes that went by today. Not only did I steal it, but I printed it out and found a little frame to put it in and put a nail in a wall near my bathroom mirror and hung it there!

Did a late night paint of a scene a couple miles from here.

May The Fourth – Quiet Thursday