Category Archives: agate

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Chalcedony

Many of my trinkets are rocks. Agates or calcedny nodules or lots of others. Fossil snails and fossil clams.

This agate initially looks better on the ground.

But wait, let’s turn it.

Half clear and half clouded. I found this one on Marrowstone Island.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: trinket.

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Rock rasp

There is a raspy sound when the beach is pebbles and the waves wash in and they rasp together. It is a singing clicking rasp. Beautiful!

I walk Marrowstone Island early yesterday, since there is a very low tide in the morning and it was sunny and gorgeous. The clear agates light up.

This one is clear in the center. I have to dig it out of the mud flat with another rock.

Turn again.

There, isn’t it beautiful with the light shining through?

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: raspy.

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In deep

Time to return
again

Human, pfaugh
I give up
I don’t want to be one
I can be anything I want to be
I want to be a mermaid
again

I sink into the sea
and down to the depths
scales and tail and breathe the sea
the water cools the burns
my charred burnt skin
and lungs

Such a fail again
every time I try
to be human
yes, legs, I can do that
it always makes my voice hurt
but those damn wings
come with the legs

It’s hard to hide the wings.

I don’t know how
but they sense them
even when I hide them

It really pisses me off.
It’s the broken ones that show up
though now I think maybe
they are all broken
they all wander around
pretending they are ok
using lies to try to appear nice
hating parts of themselves
calling those parts unclean spirits
and casting them out
DEMON! DEVIL!
over and over

I try to pretend they aren’t there
the cast out
and I am human too
but the demons kneel and lay their monstrous heads
in my lap
crying
cluster round me
begging for my help

I always fail.

I try to stay present
with the person and the cast out
but eventually I can’t stand it
and I say something wrong
and the stupid human thinks I am the demon
and casts me out too.

I wait and hope.

I wait and hope with the monsters
with the rough beasts.
“You have wings,” say the demons, “Help us!”
“I can’t.” I say, “The humans must help themselves.”
The monsters weep and wail.
Finally I am sick of it again.
I send them home
and I go home too.
I have failed again
and must endure falling through the atmosphere
my feathers and skin a burning star

I am sick of it.
I give up, Beloved.
I am a failure.
I can’t do this.
I must go to the sea again.

Here is the trench, the deepest part of the ocean
I stop swimming and let myself sink
Slowly the light disappears
I am in the ink black

Slowly the others appear
glowing
in the deep

_________________________

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: liquid.

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Wrought iron man

I know a man from an iron dale.
Stiff and creaky, he won’t change.
Rust flakes off as he hunts his grail:
the perfect woman, but he has aged.
She’ll let him do just what he wills,
drink and sing and run and hide.
A plastic doll might fit the bill.
While his joints freeze, dudettes abide.
He could do with rustoleum, a coat of paint.
He doesn’t see that he leaves a trail.
His friends cringe at his rusted taint.
I note that now they are all male.
He’s proud as hell of his iron will.
He’ll soon wake frozen, rusted still.

______________________________________

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: wrought iron.

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Fear

When someone tries to hit me
I fight back
I didn’t worry much in clinic
even when patients yelled
it indicated they were upset
and usually I knew why

Not much fear there.

So what do I fear?

Abandonment
and lies
the one who says they care
that we will be friends
even that they love me
and later walk away

But that has already happened
more than once
and I survive
and the Beloved is still here
and there
and everywhere I am
and everywhere you are
and everything is connected
so there is no fear
and even a chance
that abandoned
I still thrive

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The photograph is from Marrowstone Island in July 2022.

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Littoral zone

I walked on Marrowstone Island yesterday, south from East Beach. There was a super low tide, to -3.38 at 1:07 pm. When the tide came in, it was at +8.76, so that is a huge difference.

There were almost no people, but the group enjoying the low tide were the great blue herons! I counted 14. At one point they all alerted, and a bald eagle came down and perched on the rock that a heron had been on. There must be some very delicious food for the herons with the low tide. The eagle seemed to be considering heron to be a delicacy.

Here is the eagle (and the great blue herons moved!)

I came home with one very lovely agate.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: littoral.

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Breathe

I was trying to think of a debacle. Oh. Getting my fourth pneumonia, March 21, 2021, Covid-19. This is the first pneumonia that put me on oxygen. The fast heart rate, dropping ten pounds, and feeling anxious were familiar from the other three. This photograph was from December 2021, visiting Maryland. We did a bike ride. I was pretty happy that I was able to do it, though the last mile had a sloping uphill that made me think I was not very strong. Oxygen helped.

And Covid-19 is a debacle that we are still trying to understand and absorb and avoid and heal and recover from. I am reading an article that entirely denies viruses existing. I guess it’s like porn on the internet: they say if there is a story, there is a porn version. Every possible idea of what has happened over the last three years is out there, though this article doesn’t make any sense at all.

I don’t remember who took the photograph of me. It may be a steathie. I needed oxygen at night and whenever I was being active, but not at rest. Ok, at rest talking.

Things and people were lost and found and lost during Covid-19. I spent a lot of time on our beaches. I am so grateful for the beaches.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: debacle.

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Stone heart

My mind is done and unsurprised. My heart a stubborn rock.
My heart does not give up: loves where it loves. It doesn’t care
about reality or whether it is derided or mocked.
My mind moves on and kicks my heart, wondering where
this tenacity stems from. My heart is done with tears.
It agrees to new friends and joys in dance.
When my mind says forget, my heart jumps and steers
my body into a warrior fighting stance.
My mind is cynical and laughs and derides my heart.
I let them fight back and forth every day.
I cannot reach an end unless I start
to honor my feelings, the heart must hold sway.
My mind moves on, ignoring what you do.
Yet my stubborn heart remains a friend, strong and true.