Also look out for blog posts by our guest writers this month, on topics such as creativity, writing and mindfulness. Click here to view the guest posts.
Do leave your seventh small stone of the challenge in the comments below.
A last reminder for our two courses starting on Monday - A Year of Questions and Writing Towards Healing.
"Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash."
~ Leonard Cohen
106 comments:
Dah Dit, Dah Dit, Dah Dit, Dah Dit, Dah Dit!
Plum jam, home-made with love and care
Awaits to have after the feeding the fowls.
Served on toast where all the seeds are there;
It’s good, I’m told, for the movement of my bowels.
Existential malfunction
I step on the bathroom scales. The electronic display reads 0.0 kg. Note to self: Must work on becoming more grounded.
some nights
the stars dive down
for a swim in the lake
while mother moon plays lifeguard
In the flat, unused corner of the tennis court,
yellow fuzz collects
from balls now flat and unused.
this evening at dusk, she decided to calm my spirit, this lovely, waxing moon underlined by stripes of pink and baby blue that tugged closely to the horizon's promise...
her nightly destination did not allow her to tarry close to my tears, but through my large third-floor picture window I rejoiced with her for an hour before she passed elsewhere to spread her calm beauty to another needy soul...
to tarry close
[2012.6.1...b]
saturday morning
single snowflakes sail
from a grey sky
On a freezing cold winter night, billions of sparkling stars cover the vast span of sky above me. The milky way, like a silvery snow covered highway across the sky. The half moon reflecting the sunlight. The camera is ready on the tripod, my eyes scanning the northern horizon. Shooting at 20 seconds a shot. Jack Frost biting at my fingers every time I press the release button. Then there it is, the green shimmer of Northern Lights. The reward for being patient.
Go here for the full post:
http://writtenbyim.blogspot.com/2012/01/day-7-northern-lights.html
Pristine
Between each wave,
the silence is complete,
the foam, pristine,
lingering.
I want to tiptoe out,
believe this is new snow.
Stone #7
(I see it)
*Flash*
an old bug, an old sticker on it "KILL YOUR TELEVISION"
*Flash*
my daughter loaned it to me *images of her growing up*
*Flash*
"KILL YOUR TELEVISION" is an authentic '70s credo
*images of my teenage years in a bug, much fun*
*Flash*
(My breathing starts again)
(insert sound, eight thousand megahertz, ringing in my ears)
(Blink)
The expectant atmosphere discombobulates me.
A morning visit to the little creature’s cage – in the corner a small ball of fur. Hoping, hoping… hope come true. Inert, gone on its journey - suffering over. Surrounded to the last by words and prayers of love.
Flood alert high
Dykes watched
Evacuees waiting
Fingers crossed
Sun shining
Mine is at:
http://miskmask.wordpress.com/2012/01/07/7-january-2012-river-of-stones/
Eyes finding each other,
recognize, though older, smile,
blink and close.
And when you are almost gone,
moved on in the crowd,
I look over my shoulder.
So do you.
Eyes, do they wink? and close.
No one else notices.
Nobody knows.
Sugar rubbed on lips to rid dry skin, filth, gloom. Sugar lips.
Tiny crystals scratching on dull, rose flesh. Glistening lifelessness.
I'm sitting on my sofa with my Grandma's blanket around my shoulders, bathed in sunlight from the south window. I know why cats lay in sunny patches. It's akin to the moment of sinking into a warm bath - the 'aaaaah' moment. The whole of sunbathing is like that 'aaaaah' moment, when there isn't a goal of tanning attached to it.
yard swathed in black
eleven minutes before daybreak
oak tree in next yard a rising dog bone
against a strip of deep blue sky not
night or day
changing light
the silent language
of nature
~IN THE WORKS~
Peering beyond layers,
Branches piled thick
With fresh snow...
Perpetually-pink sky,
Being recreated by
Melon-ripe orange,
Cloud-soft and supple;
Teir, upon teir, happy cumulus.
My mind automatically
Edits out all that is man-made:
Telephone wires, laundry line,
Tall, tired street-light
dimming to day,
Ruddy-red brick building...
Until all that is left is me
And an intricate weave
Cool-down covered limbs
And the delicious tincture
Of eye-pleasing pink.
© Hannah Gosselin and Metaphors and Smiles, 2012.
Sitting at the kitchen table with Liliana and Carmela; we are more or less the same age but I am suddenly aware that I no longer find it strange or agitating that they call me aunt. Conscious acceptance brings me such peace.
"Sometimes it is the
most SIMPLE and smallest of
things that remind us what is
most important in our lives."
~Indigenous Shamanic Winds
Pulled from sleep, I leave the warmth of the bed, pad barefoot across the cold hardwood floor. At the window, the golden glow of an almost full moon lights up the sky, and pours over the icy surface of the pond. We greet each other in the stillness of early morning, a luminous embrace.
blue
and wheat.
january daybreak
in all her nebulous splendor.
Petting you, I stop myself for a moment, sink in to the moment, and really see you. I find you already there, always there, in that space where dogs live–now. I notice the warm gold of your eyes, the flecks of gold and brown in the fur around them, so strange since from a distance you look like a black dog. That coloring is what made Dr. Mulnix, the first time he saw you at eleven weeks old, say “he definitely has some Shepherd in him.”
I look in your eyes now, and you look back. We are in this moment together, connected, a communication that has no need for words. No future and no past, only now–the place I can always find you. http://thousandshadesofgray.wordpress.com/2012/01/07/small-stone-day-seven/
The trees are standing tall but look ugly in their nakedness as they wait for spring and Mother Nature to clothe them in their greens and make them beautiful once more.
A crow on every fence post - ravens and hoodie-craws - sentinel the gloomy, grey garden. Many beady eyes look at me as I open the kitchen curtains. No cheery chirping from these bully boys. They are menacingly beautiful and intelligent creatures. The perfect January birds.
The sun lifts the curtain of night and peeks out with a crimson eye. Last night’s rain raises misty arms to sleepily wave “hello.” A little bird calls out. Her happiness erupts in song out of the silence like a fountain of brightly colored rubber balls. They go rolling down the streets and bouncing off the buildings gaily, rapping on stubborn sleeping foreheads. It’s time to greet the day.
This appears on my blog here: http://moonlightenedshelves.wordpress.com/2012/01/07/misty-waves-and-rubber-balls/
periwinkle yarn
soft and woolly heather hue
sentimental tones
There’s a fuzzy ball of periwinkle yarn sitting incongruously on my desk. Periwinkle is one of my favorite colors and I love yarns (they are stories, after all!) but this ball seems both at home and strangely out of place, in an area that’s designed for computers, paper, pencils and scissors. Then again, just like an editor, you need scissors to cut the right length of yarn, and in that, there is at least one connection.
Stone for 1-7
I don’t want to be an adult. Strict notions of growing up ebb their pointy ways to my oh-so structured days. I’ll sleep when I die. I’ll grow up when I die.
blog for Small Stones:
http://annie-allthingsimportant.blogspot.com/2012/01/river-of-stones.html
The day grows late.
He has not sent the Orders for the Day.
Shall I phone or relax into slothfulness?
Rusted leaves,
straw colored swamp,
a smattering of snow -
Where did winter go?
I awake to the sight of pink candy-floss clouds
drifting up behind the barren branches
of the silver birches, looking good enough to eat.
Breaking down
Boxes then
‘Sea’ label gives
Up the
Glue and floats
Down my body.
Tiny,
Yet still
Packed
With all London
Gone by.
empty blue bottle
on the windowsill
nearly camouflaged
in early-morning light
The nail on both of my ring fingers is flat, not rounded. When I first examined my newborn sons, I was delighted to see they'd both inherited my "Frankenstein fingernail." I knew they were mine because they shared my imperfection.
A quiet room. Only a thought disturbs. A pulse of blood, a breath, the sunlight crawling across the wall. The pen on the page.
Sunshine pours down from a serene, blue sky. Gound solid with ice just a few days ago is melting into slushy puddles. Here and there, buds are swelling, green-tipped, ready to open..NO! I want to scream. " Go Back! This is way too early!" January has barely begun. More ice and snow is lined up in the arctic, ready to invade. I want to push the sunshine back into the clouds, pull some snowflakes down from the sky. I want winter to behave like winter should!!
hustle
tumble
ball
hoggery
shoot
dang!
come on
foul
scowl
hustle
lanky
swanky
woosh
yeah!
P.S. Just got home from my son's first basketball game of the season.
In a dream I was given a ring so real
When I woke it was still there
Only holding my hand to the thin morning light
Made the golden band disappear
Winter swing seat sits solid, finds solace in isolation
6th January: Twelfth night and the vacuum is vomiting pungent prickly pine needles
While walking today I made an observation that I put in this brief blog entry titled Abandoned Nests. http://jsosmallstones.blogspot.com/2012/01/abandoned-nests.html
the moon was playful last night,
bouncing over the water, leaving puddles of gold,
pouncing on the piling next door ( the seagull's perch),
then splashing through my window,
painting a chiaroscuro of ghostly shadows on my wall.
hundreds of resident geese
obeying nature --
honking and migrating in place
Only the top branches of the rosemary are sunlit. Three of them make the same down-up swoop with their reaching tips. A whiff of fresh rosemary rises in the still air.
~Laura Hoopes
The smell of singed hair,
I warm my hands
over the open flame.
Long-withered leaves cling to a twiggy shrub, casting enigmatic shadows like a foreign script on a nearby tree trunk.
Blowsy clouds billow across the sky, their edges blurred and puffy. Vapour trails streak through them in the opposite direction like missiles intent on their prey. A symbol, I wonder, of humanity's alienation from the natural world.
When did people start to leave cuddly toys on the graves of lost children? I’ve always found it sad to see them, fresh and new at first and then over months and years, seeing how they become weather beaten and faded. What I saw today was one of the bleakest things I have ever seen, a Christmas gift for a daughter who has passed. Still in its box, I almost dread to see it deteriorate and wonder about the pain of the parent who left it. Does it help their grieving?
http://lucidgypsy.wordpress.com/2012/01/07/january-small-stones-7/
The flamingos strutted in the greenery like walking flowers.
I've been brainstorming about my financial situation for half an hour, and I've come up with this: I'm going to live on oatmeal and green beans. [beat] But I'm going to have to grab the oatmeal and green beans and run really fast.
A trip over the Pennines
This river of tarmac surges to the horizon to meet the grey sky which hangs heavy with the threat of rain. We sail our way amid darkened fields and curtained windows, wishing we were heading home.
It is dusk. I am waiting at the bus stop to go home after a day at work. Westminster tube station yawns open behind me.
People emerge. Visitors to London. The look up and gasp, fumble for cameras and 'phones. I do not need to know their languages to understand their delight in this iconic sight.
Two cranberry English muffin halves
enter the toaster oven.
Bending over, I strain my eyes
to find the dial's correct location.
Straightening up, I wonder, "now some fun?"
Startled as I turn,
I find myself devoured
by two pairs of rapt eyes:
"Pill time! Pill time!", the eyes say,
emphasizing the message with
wiggles, hops, dances and squirms.
Across the kitchen I grab a small, green biscuit.
Back at my station, I break it in two,
the eyes never once missing a motion or gesture,
ensuring, thereby, proper order in all things.
A dollop of peanut butter graces
first one piece, then the other.
On one, first a while pill,
then an orange one appears,
the eyes still carefully ensuring
no mistakes on my part.
Taking up the "pills" I turn.
Immediately, my small friend
glues her butt to the floor,
aquiver in anticipation.
She has leaned that treats require seats.
My large friend, too lame to sit, stands patiently,
eyes boring into my soul
lest I forget the pills' destination.
Slowly, I bend down,
with my arms at different levels,
so the pills can reach their targets simultaneously.
But first, I ask, "what's the best part of the day?
Pill time? Afternoon walk? or supper?"
The eyes tell me that every time is a best time.
And so, I am reminded, it should be thus.
'Join me in
the fellowship of prayer,'
I said.
But Patrick stopped us
and asked that
we hold hands.
'I need you all,' he said,
as he placed his
trembling hand
in mine.
Connected, we
breathed together,
the holy abiding in
and through us all.
The house to myself for a whole day
first time in ages
and I am as a long-tethered balloon
At breakfast,
the one-year-old
crawls through the tunnel
of cafeteria chairs.
A mild winter day, but the icicles cling to the thick wall of craggy rock, some like fangs dripping and glistening, others pooling like wax at the end of a long night of cheap red wine and guitar music.
Other writers know that a writer writes.
Poised for muse to strike; up all night.
A non-writer does not know a writer writes;
for a non-writer writes not!
I bought eggnog on sale for half price. On the way home I felt lucky and could hardly wait to have coffee with eggnog in it.
sunshine settles nicely
on the garden wall
cool wind moves
shadows through redwoods
winter calm motivates
sleepy bones
I step into the Stationer's. The familiar smell. What? Paper? Varnish? Makes me feel at home. If home is where the heart is then mine is among the pencils and the wrapping paper and greeting cards in this small shop in the village where I live.
The wind has come out to play. A couple of traffic cones lie intimately on the grass, noses kissing. A bare tree has been decorated with a bright orange plastic bag and an invisible child frolics on a dancing swing.
Even though they tried to take all they could, joy was still hers.
softness has crept into the room -
candlelight shading the walls,
an oil burner bubbling with cedarwood and sweet jasmine,
my cat's gentle presence,
my wife's warm hand folded into mine.
A gardener’s memo: Prune in January.
Tomato plants, gone.
Pelargonium and lavender, cut back.
Vines, sheared.
Yet, the fountain of color
needs to stay a bit longer.
It's 2am and I'm not asleep. I'm downstairs and nobody cares, except a kindly Australian lactation consultant with whom I am friends on Facebook. And the baby when he wakes up and wants "mmmm... mmm-mmm... mum-ahum-ahum. ahum-ahum MIIIILLLLK," which I am now willing and able and glad to provide.
Small Stone January 7th 2012
Tiny cups
white porcelain, translucent
gold rim, painted gentians
the wedding present
She kept for best.
On my table,
coffee in cup, paint in saucer.
The fields and hedgerows,
my wild church.
Water thrown on embers aglow
makes a satisfying sizzle,
then smoke that floats
up like a ghost.
http://pseu1.wordpress.com/2012/01/07/river-of-stones-vii/
Caught on a blade of dry grass, the small brown feather flutters in the breeze. It will need a bigger wind to take flight.
Our hands hold our history.
From the baby's full tiny fist
Through the growing strength
Of youth and competency of
Adulthood, we use up our hands
Into the leaner, gnarled, revealing
Ones we exhibit as we age.
Workers lock the gate
Bright signs along the building
Ready for the night
Seven men and two women
Leave for home, tired but happy
http://genealogytraces.blogspot.com/2012/01/january-river-of-small-stone-jan-7-2012.html
I can hear the rumble through glass, legs covered in black leather, seam-splitting sides. Even in traffic, idling, that time we almost got caught in the park, the thin skin of my inner thigh burning, your fault.
http://www.elizabethaquino.blogspot.com
A day of feeding my senses.. smelling and tasting the sweet strawberries. such bliss.. until my hands played with the clay. smooth and cool. You are already filled with love and soon nourishment.
I started a dream, so long ago, of baby things in pinks and blues, of small hands clasped in mine, of a child knit together of him and me and us. Seventeen years ago, that dream took hold and grew and moved and became the son I see today. Everyday I dream some more because everyday I see his promise grow.
Forest, the crossroads of time, space and distance.
Time: the passage witnessed by the seasons and the growth and death of things, and the stuff left behind.
Space: the depth into the trees and trails, evidence of the past, potential of the future.
Distance: length and breadth travelled, to chronicle it all.
It all just is, and yet changes.
"A Trio of Sparrows"
(Stone #7 by Rhonda L. Johnson)
A trio of cherubic sparrows
alight a rusted winter rail,
their dainty song breaking
through the soundless,
mottled pink of dawn
she doesn’t look back
it’s as it should be
Small Stone: Passport
boxes upon boxes
staring at me beckoning
to become a container
of who i am. each demanding
something new. holding the
promise of creating a
new container of
growth and wonder.
We've grown so familiar on our walk
that dogs don't bother to rise from their naps
to bark at us. The squirrels ignore us.
Even the deer wait just until we pass
before crossing the road behind us.
Only the crows seem indignant
enough at our trespass into their territory
to raise a ruckus behind our backs.
On the floor,
Beside my furry, winter boots,
Lies a small plastic palm tree.
Either it belongs to Malibu Barbie,
Or the gods are mocking me.
Perhaps it's a sign
That I should jump on an airplane and flee
Down to Florida.
The back of my legs are turning red.
I can feel them beginning to sting.
Yet I can't resist the heat,
and how good it feels.
Rain on our roof as
his page turns.
Animal feet click and scrabble on the hardwood floor
as pets play.
Dog sneezes.
Doffee in the air and on my tongue.
My robe is too warm.
time to get out and walk:
it's almost light.
reading with Sasha
Tchaikovsky’s Sixth
surrounds us
Brass Girl
My mother’s gift of love: a tiny, brass girl wearing a green dress. Her dress reminds me of the handmade dresses my grandmother use to sew. Her hair is tied in a ponytail and set high on her head. She sits on my desk, beside the only house plant, engrossed in her tiny, brass book. Covered in a thin layer of dust, she reminds me that I haven’t moved in awhile. Time to stretch and take a mini-break from writing, but not for too long I have a book of my own to write.
Heat rises, accelerating from toes to head.
An inferno from within, the body contains it,
before it ignites the air.
Mid- to late-afternoon, southbound on Eldron Boulevard, where we turn to my dad's but not today, we pass the giant blue agave in the manicured southeast corner. Standing past at least five feet - much, much higher than me, gigantic in height and breadth and the thickness of every cold shoot (like a lotus flower caught in a predator shark's body...you cannot call it a shoot but it's more like an arm - with armor thorns. Today, again, I wonder how it is sweet nectar could come from such an immovable thing, one that doesn't strike me as a "plant" but makes me think how it is one.
A delicate peach-skinned lobe glides between tongue and teeth.
Since you left I feel like a bell without a clapper.
The drift of honeyed scent from the jasmine candle next to my bed is suddenly undercut by a sharp animal tang from the cat litter tray in the bathroom.
On the couch, my leg draped over my husband’s, he watches the game, the announcer explaining why the play was incomplete; my son, earphones in, lets out an occasional chuckle as he sprawls on another couch and watches Dr. Who on his Christmas iPad; my other son talks too loudly in the other room on Skype about Warcraft; I read a long book I must finish soon for book club; I smile, a moment of peace, all apart and yet all together too.
Dread. It feels like a rotted hole in my gut, until the appointed time. A twisted cousin to anticipation. Wishing for precious time to pass, just to get it over with.
Fingers made inelegant by viscous, white sludge become a pungent temptation. An intense saltiness explodes in my mouth as I lick the creamy feta.
The last leaf on the tree:
Dogged, determined, he'd won his bet,
Smiled, as lesser ones gave up and fell.
Now he's triumphant, the only survivor,
Ready and waiting for the victory bell.
....And yet...
Who is there now to applaud him and bow,
to share the cold winds and the icing of snow?
..and who'll give him welcome upon his arrival?
They're all swept away now,
- he just has to ...go!
Too late now to be moaning in anguish
The victors' victory's finally vanquished!
Day 7 noticing the body
my brain says “Poem!”
but words are stubborn,
hiding while fingers mindlessly
scratch an ankle too dry
from winter’s arid air.
my focus becomes small,
this patch of skin, one ankle.
if I had a microscope, I might
watch layer by layer as dryness
flaked into the air. A circle
of dust motes twirl and sway
above the grate in the floor
borne on the hot, dry breath
of furnace two floors below.
outside the moment, ears attune
to the low hum of humidifier
two rooms away, as it spills moisture
that never reaches thirsty skin.
Outside January’s warm enough
to melt the snow that fell three days ago,
sun-sharp and bright as a June day and
warm, if you stand out of the wind.
Carol A. Stephen
January 7, 2012- Small Stones
Stubborn by Teri H Hoover
Small, old, white dog, at the end of it's tattered leash.
Standing immovable.
Like dried out toothpaste, left on the side of a grungy, bathroom sink.
The candle has burnt itself out, sacrificing its waxiness for us, flickering itself gently away, and in its beautiful death has flooded the room with its sweet and generous fragrance.
How can it be that such a thing – a profusion of glorious violet trumpet-shaped blooms – could in reality be a noxious weed?
Slippery little suckers, these small stones
slimy and slick and sometimes not so easy to throw.
Today perhaps I will simply sit by river’s edge
mesmerized by this pebbled blanket.
Diffused
Cloud of bronze touches
Gently Kissing the sea with a tobacco
Caress
I am a puddle.
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