pink, to chase away the winter blues

after a long day sitting in a gray drab courthouse, doing my civic duty as a juror, i thought it would be fun to play along with Liz and put a little pink in my world...one from the archives (cause you can't bring a camera to court!!)

Stretching

I can't believe how quiet I've been here this month. Maybe it's because I participated in Nablapomo this year. And then December Views (a spottier record, but still an effort) and then January rolled around and the new year left me feeling still and silent and I haven't been able to find my voice.

I've been reading. A lot. More than I have in a long time (other than blogs, that is). I read this. Which left me heartbroken and feeling a bit helpless in the face of so much pain. And I'm reading this and this simultaneously, because something about reading a novel and short stories at the same time feels right to me. And in between I am reading this, for inspiration.

And when all the books are done, I'm thinking about trying to write a poem every day for the month of February. No pressure, just an attempt at stretching my creative wings in a different direction. Seeing where the road leads...

Speechless

2010 has left me quite speechless so far. Can't come up with the words I want to speak, here or anywhere. But a painting I worked on yesterday and this beautiful bird of prey I was watching from my yard today brought forth these words, so I'll leave them ... for now.


We may never know what made Robert Book
take out his microscope to stare intently at a piece of cork.
But I am fascinated by his clear impression,
his comparison to a monk’s spare cell
and I wonder
how those thin walls create such a barrier
against external forces.
How those same thin walls prevent my cells
from expanding
from bursting.
I can only wish that someone
within my long ancestral chain
had made such a discovery,
left me the genetic code--
a way to place my fragile heart
into such a rigid envelope.