let yourself fall hard

Anything worth doing is worth falling hard for
to do it with passion as if your life force will fade away if you don't
..Don't believe in baby steps....jump! I say!
But trust me, it is a lesson I need to learn over and over
It takes focus and trust and belief in yourself
It is a robe you wrap around your being.....you are what you want to be
and you will be...because you fall hard for yourself
and your desire for whatever it is that you wish to accomplish

do it with gusto or don't bother

do it with full intent and deliberateness

or it wont happen

photo by N.Blei

love it....let yourself fall hard

microfiction #50!

140 character meme

from Susan at http://www.stonyriver.ie/

She held the found wallet in her hands.

She could use the money.

But,the quietness of the sea and the setting sun

changed her mind.

-135- characters

Boo grows up

June 4th, a little 2 week old kitten was put in my hands to care for
and like a good mom I met the challenge
through every two hour feedings
to box training
to introducing him to grown up kitty food
to taking the bottle away from the reluctant baby
I've done my job
...and together we
survived a car crash ...the firemen and paramedics loved him
and he has rewarded me with being the greatest
little joy in my life right now
Oh...and he changed his name.....
used to be Mr. Darcy
but he likes Boo better
thought you'd like to know
how he looks now

Magpie #33

http://magpietales.blogspot.com/

Willow's writing meme
Write a poem or vignette using the
below photo

She had garish red hair that was pulled off of her forehead with a sequined bobby pin,and her nails were always a whorey shade of red.   When she would come over to visit she would plant herself on our nicest chair and begin her demanding. My mother in an effort to please her mother, always gave her what she wanted and I was often used as a go between....bringing her beer after beer...having to suffer the smell of her perfume that was obviously poured onto her body before she arrived. I have since learned that the name of it was Acqua di Parma....the favorite scent of movie stars from the 30's. That figures. She had a delusional opinion of herself..and it wasn't of being a loving grandmother...but rather of being a pioneer woman of the 40's striking out on her own...divorcing my grandfather...joining a cult like religion.  She thought herself a woman better than the ordinary women of her circle....she dabbled  being into herbs and natural foods...way ahead of her time if it were true. And maybe there was a bit of her that was ahead of her time....but she didn't live a natural life as we know it today. Instead she brought shame onto my mother and heartache to my grandfather. She threw off the dictates of her faith and lived as a free woman. But she wasn't free,she was only dependant in a different way.  When she realized her big mistake it was too late...grandpa had remarried. He survived the depression and he survived her leaving. I called someone else grandmother.

I never wear perfume...couldn't think of it...and I never wear red polish on my nails. I know this is foolish..gives her power still over me even though she is dead 30 years.

I am a grandmother now, and I am forever thinking of what she was unable to enjoy in her life,

what she was unable to see as her treasure.

She never changed. She was always self-centered and saw others as the cause of her unhappiness.

It is me that has changed. I only have forgiveness for her

 and compassion for the unknown suffering inside of her that loved Acqua di Parma.

Magpie tale of fiction # 33

Creature Comfort- Wednesday poem

wednesday poem at http://oneshotpoetry.blogspot.com/


I turned in bed last night
aware of my bodily aches
that would not relent as I lay
still in the dark, alone in that
black space of quiet night hours
that the weary know,when
cat paws tiptoed across the bed
with stealth percision over crumpled bedding
and stopped beside my body
and began to knead in my darkness
and I moved ,and she began to purr
with furious delight.
Here is where she wanted to be.
I lifted my hand and petted her
moving my hand across her soft fur
to the tip of her tail
answering back.

Magpie

We always think we have time. My dad certainly did when he laid down one October night and never saw the sand drain out of the hourglass, and his named was called from the Book of Life and he was no more with us...he was 54. And my brother never gave it a thought having served and survived two tours of duty in Vietnam. Hell, he flipped his own hourglass upright....time was his now that he was safe at home. But sleep was a bullet he didn't know was the one that would stop his youthful life when he fell asleep behind the wheel of a car.

No, we think we have time,all the time in the world.  I guess that is what we call living....not thinking of dying.

As I laid in the emergency room last week, my son called from California...stressed out that he couldn't be with us.

After exchanging comforting words to each other he told me that a business friend of his had just died in an accident. ..a game designer....a terrific guy. His friend was in the car with his 6month pregnant wife and they were hit almost head on by a drug using driver. His wife and unborn child survived. He died instantly.

This was the glass through which he was looking.  Grateful and sad all at the same time...a happy heart and a hurting heart all living within one chest....keenly aware of shifting sand descending in different ways for each of us.  A lesson only life can teach one.

glorious annuals..

September 11, I didn't make it to Galena. I spent the weekend in the hospital
car crash
miracles happen
we are home and this morning we took a walk in the garden
so beautiful even in its decline
but the glorious annuals
are huffing and puffing to show us what they still have
bless them
....a sight for sore eyes.

banged up.. bruised...but home
and a bit blue..so I'll just be reading my favorite blogs
don't feel like writing much..so write some good stuff!

September 11

Today I remember the terrorist act against my country, September 11, 2001
I will never forget the sight of the second plane hitting the building
I witnessed it on the television live
It will forever be burnt into my eyes and heart.
God Bless America
the land that I love
and may we never as a country
forget the ones who lost their lives
and their families

Magpie tale # 31

Willow,at http://magpietales.blogspot.com

host a weekly prompt

Using the below photo write a vignette or poem

Holy Mothers

I was afraid of the lady with the long gown

who stood in the window of the shop on the corner

near my school. I had to pass her each and every day.

My friend Maisie said she was the Holy Mother,

but to me she was just a huge statue placed there

to scare kids.

Maisie said I could pray to her in time of need. Now why would I pray to

something that scared me?

Then my grandma died, and our house caught fire,

and my dad lost his job, and my mother

was going to have another baby,

and we were a family without a place to call our our own,

and I was often hungry and my mother cried a lot.

So I left the house we were staying at one night and walked over

to the shop on the corner and took off my knit hat

and stood in front of the window and I tapped on the glass and whispered,

"Holy Mother, Maisie said I could pray to you. I don't believe in you

but our family needs help and I am hungry." 

Rain started to fall in large drops and the lights inside of the store went on

casting the Holy Mother in golden light.

I waited but nothing happened and my stomach began hurting from hunger

and my feet were getting cold.

Maisie lied I said under my breath. I don't believe in anything. The only holy mother is my own.

So I turned around and started heading back to where I was living, Mrs. Turner's house. She was our neighbor, and the night our house burnt down she gathered us up and took us in, all of us. She's a holy mother,too, not that hunk of statue. I was almost home when I realized that I had left my hat in front of the store, so I headed back despite the fact that my feet were cold and soaked. When I got to the store Mr. Howard,the shop's owner, was out in front of the window with my hat in his hand.

 "This yours young lady?"

I was about to answer him when I was struck with fear.  The lady in the window... Holy Mother... was now facing the window and staring right at me.

 "Well, is it or isn't it?" he asked.

I pointed at the window, my mouth wide open in shock. I was scared right down to my cold,wet, feet.

And as he turned around and looked up, his mouth opened in shock also.

"Who did that?" he called out, "She's going to fall right over...  Excuse me miss, here's your hat. I have to go take care of that before it crashes through that window."

I stood there watching as he went inside hollering as he struggled to turn the lady around. The windows were beginning to fog up and the reflection of waving leaves in the window made the sight all the more frightening.

  So I stashed my red knit hat into my pocket and was about to run away when I mustered up the courage to take one last look at her.  And this time... her face wasn't scary at all. It was soft and kind with a little bit of sadness in her eyes.

I stood there still not believing, but I didn't fear her anymore either.

On the way home I wondered... what would I tell Maisie....and would it matter...

she'd just say it was a miracle.

microfiction #47

Microfiction # 47

Susan,at http://www.stonyriver.ie/

host a weekly writing prompt

using the below image

write something using 140 character or less

Summer storm,high waves

In flimsy boat he calls out

to remembered God

*

-70- characters of fiction

Apples...a magpie tale

Magpie Tale #30
 Hosted by Willow
http://magpietales.blogspot.com/

Apples

He was like an organic apple

lying on a copy of Vanity Fair.

Sandy enjoyed any apple

as long as it was red,crisp

and unblemished.

She ate them with sharp cheddar cheese

while sitting down with a glass of Merlot

and a copy of The Sun in her hands.

Her friends wanted her to give this guy a try,

this organic specimen before her.

He's different,

they assured her,

he's polished,comes from good stock,

has superior taste.

But she found out that even organics

have blemishes,and this one

had been nibbled on before,

and his stem was nothing

to brag about. In the end

she wasn't willing to pay

a high price for an ordinary apple,

especially since she found out

the magazine he was lying on

was his wife.

A favorite poem

                                                                           

The Third Body
by Robert Bly

A man and woman sit near each other, and they do
  not long
At this moment to be older, or younger, or born

In any other nation, or any other time, or any other

  place.
They are content to be where they are, talking or not
  talking.
Their breaths together feed someone whom we do
  not know.

The man sees the way his fingers move;

He sees her hands close around a book she hands to

  him.

They obey a third body that they share in common.
They have promised to love that body.
Age may come; parting may come; death will come!
A man and a woman sit near each other;
As they breathe they feed someone we do not know,

Someone we know of, whom we have never see.

-from the book Eating the Honey of Words

NOW,THAT'S A POEM

Mama's Things

They're mine now
but they were her's first,
my mother's
We lived in the same house
most of our lives
and these sat on shelves
in a corner hutch in the kitchen
The kitchen with green and white
checkerboard floor tiles
with the white metal cabinets
and a white porcelain sink
with the double drainboards
There used to be an elephant creamer
but we broke it
my brothers and I
no one owning up to it
Now it is gone forever
as is one of my brothers
The tablecloth is my mother's also
one of those brightly patterned ones from
the 50's
...the decade of my early days of growing up
We didn't have much
but we had a family that gathered
each and every day to share meals
all of them
With Mama kitty and her brood
Piggy and her little one
watching over us

What precious things did you have handed down to you?
Or what do wish will be handed down to you?

-suz

Wednesday"s One Shot Poem

It's Wednesday
another opportunity to post a poem
hosted by One shot Wednesday

http://oneshotpoetry.blogspot.com/

Heartache Blue

There are days
I look to the sky
to find you
and all I see are clouds
masquerading as
glory

Where do you go
when there's war?
Do you hide your face
behind a volcano?
Do you hear our pleas
in molten lava?

Where do you go
to be alone?
Do you sit in the future
walk in the past?

Where do you go
to behold?
Do you visit dreams
carve your name in the earth?

Where do you go
to be happy?
Do you linger in the laughter
of children?
Do you warm an act of kindness?

Where do you go
to cry?
Do you lie across a dying child
cup your ear to our sorrow?

There are days
I look to
 find you

What does the sky hold?
The thoughts of God
the clouds,are they his breath?

What does the ocean hold?
the movement of God
the sun,is it His shadow?

Where are we in all of this?
The loneliness of God?
Our presence, is it His desire?

There are days
I look to the sky
to find you
and all I see are clouds
masquerading as
glory