Wrote this yesterday at a wonderful little place on the beach called The Tipsy Turtle. Wonderful food and ambiance, plus the ocean is right there. My new schedule is agreeing with me and is helping me to slow down and focus on some of the more important things, such as the many ways my life has been blessed.
Roman soldiers used to be paid in salt. The Bible refers to Christians as “the salt of the earth.” There is a definite luxury to the mineral and a history of worth.
I’ve never seen the ocean so gray or hungry as before a storm. We’re supposed to be getting a week of rain starting today. It certainly looks like rain. Still a few brave tourists on the beach taking photographs. Seeing the waves rise up behind this family as they took a group photo, the promised storm gathering on the horizon, inspired this morning’s work.
The irony of this poem is not lost on me considering how late it is in being shared. The storm has struck and we are now in it, braced or not. Time to dance in the rain.
Today’s poem brought to you by the task before me this afternoon…uploading the poems I have fallen out of the habit of sharing as soon as I finish them. Here we go…
The titular line of this piece came to me years ago in a convoluted notion about how we weaponize our injuries. A conversation with a dear friend had me returning to the line and considering the deeper ramifications of it.
I got caught off guard by somethings that turned my head around. It’s taken me a little bit to get it back on straight. I missed two days of poetry, picked myself up, and have continued writing, if not posting as I should.
The purpose of this blog is accountability for creativity. Thank you and Wild respect to my wonderful bride for reminding me of that. The backlog is to follow shortly.
All that said, time is such a tricky thing. It is so easy both to do and to miss so much in the span of a single day. Blink and you’ll miss it.
Didn’t post it yesterday but I did write it! Today’s poem will be published later.
I originally thought I might do something significant for the hundredth day of poetry, but then I realized, it’s just another day. A benchmark to be sure, but the journey of a creative is one that doesn’t end just because a milestone is reached or a single project finished. We keep on.
Yesterday I found myself grateful for the blessing of new opportunities, of regaining my momentum, and of having reached a major benchmark in another project. It got me thinking about how much effort it is to create something and how easy it is to destroy. It all boils down to keeping on and working within a system that is designed to challenge us and to be unfair. Life is a perpetual battle against entropy.
My bride and I went to An Evening with Margaret Atwood the other night, which began with her reading some of her poetry. After listening, I took away permission to ask more blatant questions in my own poetry. I’ve made an effort to steer away from that sort of thing overtly, but Atwood reminded me of one critical rule of creative writing: if it works then it works. Sometimes you don’t know if it does or not until you’ve done it. So, which type of calm do you pursue in your life?
For my bride. I love you.
Oops! I wrote today’s poem but got interrupted when I started to put it up on the blog. Almost forgot entirely that it still needs to be shared!
My bride and I have been having problems with our technology lately. My computer has been giving me no end of grief and trying to replace it hasn’t been a picnic. Just about everything that can go wrong has. Yesterday we had one of those freak accidents that would be hilarious if it wasn’t so expensive.
Our dog got spooked by an insect biting him on the bottom and spun around. I’m doing so he caught the phone charger hooked up to my bride’s phone, pulling the phone off the table and on top of him. Already panicked, he bit the phone. I could not make this up. The phone is all but unusable. Fortunately the puppy is fine.
The entire affair has me thinking about humanity’s relationship with its tools. We really aren’t that impressive a species when you think about it, not until you begin to examine our minds, adaptability, and ingenuity. Take away our tools and it’s a drastic blow to our effectiveness and capability.
The Everyday Poet 