Category Archives: poetry

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Funeral pyre

The words for the Ronovan Writes weekly haiku prompt are inspire and loss.

the word inspire
I breath in, out, sorrow, loss
sister expired

The photo is of my maternal grandfather, my father, my sister with her back to the camera and a “shirt-tail” cousin. My cousin Katy who is not a blood cousin but is still family, and who is named after my maternal grandmother. From about 1967 or 8, I think.

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Mother Daughter Show III

The Mother Daughter Show III is hanging, with a few additions still to come, at Pippa’s Real Tea, in Port Townsend, Washington.

Gallery Walk is Saturday June 6, 2015 from 5 to 8 pm and the first Saturday in July as well.

The photo is of four framed etchings: state I, II, III and IV of the Four Seasons. Each is a limited edition etching individually run and numbered, twenty of each edition. Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall. These are by my mother, Helen Burling Ottaway, not by me.

I have not done a full inventory of our art, so I don’t know how many I have of each of these etchings. These are 18 by 24, so technically difficult. I do not have the press, but I may have the plates, though they may have been damaged. And even though I know how to run etchings, I don’t have her skills in inking the plates and more importantly, wiping the right amount of ink off. I may have notes about the ink colors, but the trick would be finding them. And is the same paper still made?

At any rate, I am really delighted to have our work up and ready to show for the months of June and July.

I lost my father today two years ago, so am thinking of both my parents.

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Think fresh

For Ronovan writes weekly haiku prompt: the words are think and fresh.

think fresh: oranges, tea
think of lettuce, roses, peas
think boys, fresh words, glee

The photograph is of one of my mother’s watercolors: Helen Burling Ottaway. We have another Mother Daughter Art Show going up for the month of June and July. I am cleaning, framing, pricing and getting ready….

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Parking

I park on the hill

I walk to the coffee shop by the water
because I dream of earthquakes

The car is up the hill

I say to the earth
Wait
Please wait until the construction is done
So the old buildings won’t fall down

Today I see
The earthquake has happened

You died

Death heals any split left within us

I know you are healed

You are with our mother
Our grandparents
Our ancestors
And know you are loved

I know I am not really separated from you

I know that I will see you again

And yet each minute lasts 1000 years
Until I see you again

The earthquake has happened

I still ask the earth to wait

I still park on the hill.

5/10/12

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Shadows

S is for Shadow in the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

I wrote this poem in April of 2014 after hearing a sermon based on the bible passage that if you cast one devil out, it will return with 7 more.

Mathew 12:45 “Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first.”

My minister was talking about how feeling virtuous can make us behave worse than ever, and that we don’t acknowledge our own bad thoughts even to ourselves. I thought about how hard it must be to be an unloved shadow or feeling who is cast out or denied.

Shadows

I.

I am happy today
Because I let the shadows alone

I see them
I did not name them

They aren’t mine
Unless I name them
Then I add to them
They stick to me
Their owners disavow them
Their owners recoil in horror
from me, a huge talking shadow

Their owners disavow them

Poor shadows
They are so lonely

But it doesn’t serve if I name them
Their owners think they are mine
Their owners think they are gone
Relief
Freedom
Evil named and cast out

Once I am alone, the shadows roil
They cry for home
They cry for their people
They are fearful
They gather into gangs
To face the terrible journey home
To their owners

When the shadow is offered
I don’t reject it
I don’t name it
I wait

It is in the room
Manifest
Between us

And mostly the owner
Speaks of something
Else

And the shadow sinks
Waits
Bides

I hear the shadows weeping
To be loved

II.

I hear the shadows weeping
To be loved

I thought if I named the shadows
They would be visible
Freed
Loved

I was wrong

I am so sorry, shadows
I am so sorry, owners

I was wrong

I send you all my love
and tears

I hear the shadows weeping
to be loved.

4/5/2014

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Not quite acculturated

N for Not quite, in the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

Not quite acculturated

And she was unsympathetic
That doctor
That immigrant doctor
I heard she told a patient
“You’re too fat.”
This was whispered
In accents of pleased shocked horror

She came to dinner
That unsympathetic doctor
Southeast asian
Told a little of her story
To my wide eyed children

When she was 10
They were boat people
Escapees
Refugees
Pirates caught them
Real pirates
“They weren’t so bad,” she said
“We were about to die from lack
of food and water.
Though we heard other stories
that were very bad.”

My daughter could imagine the boat.
She moved to my lap.
The pirates were too real.

Perhaps plenty is not always taken
for granted
And sympathy is a matter of degree.

previously published on everything2.com

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Just, Justice, Juxtaposition

J in the Blogging from A to Z.

Just, Justice, Juxtaposition

It is funny

R says that I should not
associate with J
leave the wrong
impression
everyone watches
judges in a small town

I am committed
to J

J wants more
pushes

I can’t tell
if J thinks
I’m joking
or just
is pushing me
past my limits

I don’t know

but it is funny

because J and R
are alike
passionate
idealistic
madmen

ethical
committed

R does money
J does improv

yet alike

and R is the joker
and J is the taskmaster

and everyone
is not
what they seem

and my reputation
is shards
anyhow
in the surf
my X
told all
that I wasn’t
putting out

before
we were X

one
in the surf
was my office manager’s
daughter
and my office manager
asked me
next day
couldn’t
I control
the X

I laughed

someday
I want to bring
J to R
or
R to J
and watch

them
circle
like cats
antipathy
or recognize
the heart
that stands open

which is why
I love them both

previously published on everything2.com