Break My HeartWritten with the prompts: beware, you are bound for a heartache, break my heart buttercup, clutter, dancing fingers stole that away, extra spice, find one you do like, it takes money, leave home, not isolated, once you were only in my dreams, sweet, the trail wasn’t easy, wine dark sea, wind keeps blowing … Continue reading Break My Heart
Written with my Thursday night group with the prompts: where did you live? Love, Kennedy to Heathrow, living is a limited-time opportunity, only drowning men can see him, on the way to the funeral, he hadn’t seen her since high school graduation, there are children in the morning, in the midst of all the recklessness, please … Continue reading Seeker
I see a kildeer couple on the lower levee this morning loitering on an inhospitable edge of hard pan, a track of decomposed granite and gravel, racing back and forth on their long skinny legs, looking agitated and vigilant as a hiker approaches. One takes flight, sounding it’s shrill two-syllable alarm, its long wings pitched up … Continue reading Kildeer
There were only two prompts for today's piece: "the woods are lovely, dark and deep" (a line from Robert Frost's Stopping byWoods on a Snowy Evening) and "Things Change, Even Now." I'm calling this flash fiction even though it's based on actual events because I took license with a lot of details, so don't tell … Continue reading Dark and Deep
Annika, the Shoemaker’s Daughter Written with my Thursday writing group with the prompts: forbidden, midafternoon stop and go pattern, cracking into the present, escaping into the future, stared and waved, towels dropped over her, cheese paddle, song, shoemaker’s daughter, she was a cheap exhibitionist, with the sun in her eyes, if you want to learn the … Continue reading Annika, the Shoemaker’s Daughter
Because April is National Poetry Month, I’ve decided to share with you some ekphrastic poems I’ve written this past year. Ekphrastic poems are written about works of art, most often visual art like paintings and sculpture, but they may be about a performance piece like dancing, acting, or film. This poem reflects on a lovely … Continue reading Rivers, inspired by Georgia O’Keefe’s Chama River, Ghost Ranch 1937
I wrote this poem nearly forty years ago, give or take a decade. But it’s April, National Poetry Month, and I thought I’d drag out a few old favorites of mine. My late cat Hibiscus makes a cameo appearance in this poem. He was a long-haired gray tabby, with caramel colored strips on his face, … Continue reading The Fairy Path
April is National Poetry Month, so I’ll be posting a few poems this season. Currently I spend more time writing prose stories instead of poems, so it’s been fun for me to look back at poems I wrote in past decades. This poem is from a period when I was experimenting with classic forms. … Continue reading The Bear, a sestina
I originally shared this post two years ago after an enjoyable trip to the coast. I consider it to be a wonderful Good Friday meditation. Last week I was generously invited to join a group of friends who have been meeting every year for decades to whale watch at Point Arena Lighthouse. On our third … Continue reading The Labyrinth, an Easter Adventure
On our first trip to Europe, some of us fell in love with Paris: the art, the architecture, the tiny cafes where you could sit drinking coffee and eating bread and cheese all afternoon. Lillian took up smoking short brown cigarettes and spent hours jotting in her journal. Petra teased that Lillian was talking on a Gertrude Stein … Continue reading We Are Older Now
