Wednesday, March 29, 2017

378

[image from google dot com]


And the man said: this one at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh! She is to be called woman
[Gen 2:23]

THE WAY IT IS
Gender gender goose and gander
What on earth is there to wonder
Boys are the males
And girls are the females
When these two meet as divinely
Ordained life goes on

Gender gender fox and vixen
Roles are not gender
Colours are not gender
Doctor man meets Lady astronaut
They have dinner and watch a movie
The start of something groovy
THE WAY IT IS © gillena cox 2017

Blog hopping today with
Midweek Motif ~ Gender

Tuesday, March 28, 2017

377



BALLOONS
Wetness stirs, tossing essence;
Reveling in sweet laughter of lavender,
My grandchild and I, float periwinkle dreams,
In shallow sheer delight, of crystal clear bliss.
We imbue exciting fragrances of make believe.
Us, connoisseurs, in our very own fables.
Pastel coloured balloons bunch overhead
© gillena cox 2017

Blog hopping today with

Prompt NightsFly (over) Friday – [1]


Quadrille #29 Balloon

Imaginary Garden With Real Toads
Tuesday Platform


Revisit
28 March 2015

Monday, March 27, 2017

Monday WRites 101


[image courtesy Wikipedia]

From 'Omeros' - Poem by Derek Walcott
BOOK SIX

Chapter XLIV

I

In hill-towns, from San Fernando to Mayagüez,
the same sunrise stirred the feathered lances of cane
down the archipelago's highways. The first breeze

rattled the spears and their noise was like distant rain
marching down from the hills, like a shell at your ears.
In the cool asphalt Sundays of the Antilles

the light brought the bitter history of sugar
across the squared fields, heightening towards harvest,
to the bleached flags of the Indian diaspora.

The drizzling light blew across the savannah
darkening the racehorses' hides; mist slowly erased
the royal palms on the crests of the hills and the

hills themselves. The brown patches the horses had grazed
shone as wet as their hides. A skittish stallion
jerked at his bridle, marble-eyed at the thunder

muffling the hills, but the groom was drawing him in
like a fisherman, wrapping the slack line under
one fist, then with the other tightening the rein

and narrowing the circle. The sky cracked asunder
and a forked tree flashed, and suddenly that black rain
which can lose an entire archipelago

in broad daylight was pouring tin nails on the roof,
hammering the balcony. I closed the French window,
and thought of the horses in their stalls with one hoof

tilted, watching the ropes of rain. I lay in bed
with current gone from the bed-lamp and heard the roar
of wind shaking the windows, and I remembered

Achille on his own mattress and desperate Hector
trying to save his canoe, I thought of Helen
as my island lost in the haze, and I was sure

I'd never see her again. All of a sudden
the rain stopped and I heard the sluicing of water
down the guttering. I opened the window when

the sun came out. It replaced the tiny brooms
of palms on the ridges. On the red galvanized
roof of the paddock, the wet sparkled, then the grooms

led the horses over the new grass and exercised
them again, and there was a different brightness
in everything, in the leaves, in the horses' eyes.

READ THE REST HERE

verses

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You've heard about the Monday Blues ❧✿❧ well this is Monday WRites (musing on the definition here of rite, as any customary observance or practice eg the rite of afternoon tea).
Honouring 1992-Nobel Laureate, St Lucia born Derek Walcott [1930-2017] ❧✿❧ Welcome to Monday WRites #101 ❧✿❧ No poem from me today ❧✿❧ What's your mood like today ❧✿❧ I invite you to link in with one of your WRites



❧✿❧

Enjoy The Music


Saturday, March 25, 2017

375

[kiskadee from google dot com]
KISKADEE
Kiskadee kis kis kadee
you sing your syllables
a morning tune for free
another of life's miracles

someone notes your calling
and ponders, this be poem
the art of some installing
word craft, a worthy totem.
KISKADEE © gillena cox 2017

Blog hopping today with
Imaginary Garden With Real Toads
Weekend Mini Challenge: Thought Animals
Today Kim has challenged us - Today’s challenge is to choose an animal, any animal you like, and turn it into a poem about a poem, writing in quatrains and following as closely as you can the process of writing a poem.

...


Kiskadee Call from Environment & Natural Resources on Vimeo.

Tuesday, March 21, 2017

374


TWO SPIDER LILIES
two spider lilies greet my morning footsteps
with smiles as slim as slices of day moon

sincere silence of a kiskadee adds witness
white banded head, beak closed in observance

knowing streaks of gratitude radiate sunbeams
for are not lilies happy of this timely flirt?
TWO SPIDER LILIES © gillena cox 2017


Blog hopping today with
Imaginary Garden With Real Toads
The Tuesday Platform



Carpe Diem
#1176 Theme Week Hafiz (2) lover

...


...
Revisit

21 March 2016
...
YES (✿◠‿◠) The Spider Lilies are from my garden this morning

Monday, March 20, 2017

Monday WRites 100

[image from google dot com]


LENT
Lord Jesus, you died for us;
bEfore you gave up your divine self,
to Newness in your resurrected self,
you Turned to heaven, and forgave us.
LENT © gillena cox 2008 [first published at Wordchimes]

verses

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You've heard about the Monday Blues ❧✿❧ well this is Monday WRites (musing on the definition here of rite, as any customary observance or practice eg the rite of afternoon tea).
Welcome to Monday WRites #100, ❧✿❧ What's your mood like today ❧✿❧ I invite you to link in with one of your WRites



❧✿❧

Friday, March 17, 2017

372

[image from google dot com]

MATTIE
she's on that darn bicycle again
this time she wears a purple hat

a purple lace fascinator droops
over her determined charcoal face

a charcoal face with lion-green eyes
her gold bracelet glistens the sunlight

the gold bracelet her daddy gave her
gifted to her on her fifteenth birthday

an inscribed gift, branding, ownership tag
like they did at the slave auction long ago

today she was determined
she would raise that fascinator

look upon his closed lion-green eyes one last time
and whisper, "daddy, i too, am your daughter".
MATTIE © gillena cox 2017

Blog hopping today with
Imaginary Garden With Real Toads
Fireblossom Friday: Incongruity

...

Process Note

After reading a few days ago Candy Don't Come In Gray by Roslyn Carrington, and attending a meet-the-author session with my book club; i was inspired to write this poem about my favourite character in the book 'MATTIE'. This poem is not saying that this is all there is to Roslyn's Mattie, but rather my impression, meeting and observing Mattie in a very brief encounter in one of the chapters of the book. I'm sharing in response to Fireblossom's prompt

Tuesday, March 14, 2017

371

[image from pixaby dot com]


BUTTERCUPS
sunshine
what do i do
with your lustre today?
paint buttercups furled in bouquet
yellow
BUTTERCUPS © gillena cox 2017

Blog hopping today with
Imaginary Garden With Real Toads
The Tuesday Platform

Monday, March 13, 2017

Monday WRites 99

[image from google dot com]

PORTION AND CUP
You are my portion, you are my cup;
My life sustains only because of you;
Words from your fountain streams to sup;
You are my portion, you are my cup;
He, whom sent, his cross did take up;
Buying back life as fresh morning dew
You are my portion, you are my cup;
My life sustains only because of you.
PORTION AND CUP © gillena cox 2013
[first published at Wordchimes]

verses

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You've heard about the Monday Blues ❧✿❧ well this is Monday WRites (musing on the definition here of rite, as any customary observance or practice eg the rite of afternoon tea).
Welcome to Monday WRites #99, ❧✿❧ What's your mood like today ❧✿❧ I invite you to link in with one of your WRites






❧✿❧

Saturday, March 11, 2017

369


[Tiger Orchid - image from google dot com]

EVER WONDERED HOW THE FIRST ORCHID GOT THERE...JUST SAYING
When the salt torched her skin, she shrieked like ten thousand banshees bumping into age-old trees in the jungle. They has banished her to the heart of the jungle, calling her a witch. Only because the King (i don't remember his name now) loved her so much. She was the most beautiful woman in her tribe. (i dont rightly remember the name of her tribe now either)

She knew then for sure, they didn't want her around anymore. Her pride was hurt, and her heart was beating lapses of lemons. Not even Anancy in all his trickery mastery, could revenge her, she thought. So she withered, right there in the jungle.

When next they passed by, every one stopped to look at her, she was so beautiful. Her mouth still open from her dead lips screaming. Her petals speckled from their wicked salting.
But how did she get here? They mused with their mighty minds and called her epiphyte.
MAKING MYTHS[3] EVER WONDERED HOW THE FIRST ORCHID GOT THERE...JUST SAYING © gillena cox 2017


epiphyte - A plant, such as a tropical orchid or a staghorn fern, that grows on another plant upon which it depends for mechanical support but not for nutrients. Also called aerophyte, air plant.

Today Magaly gave us a list of really really funny titles, and asked us to be inspired to write a poem or story after choosing one from her given list. I chose: #12. People Who Don’t Know They’re Dead: How They Attach Themselves
to Unsuspecting Bystanders and What to Do About It, by Gary Leon Hill

Blog hopping today with
Imaginary Garden With Real Toads
Title-Tale
(Poetry and Flash Fiction with Magaly)

...

Revisit
11 March 2015
11 March 2016

Friday, March 10, 2017

368


[image from google dot com]

ORANGE BUTTERFLY
orange butterfly -
flight of fanciful thoughts spin
the stuff of dreams

"Ah I see you have cut off your dread locks. You look very handsome. I was just about to get dressed for church. Would you like to go to church with me. We can carry the gran with us. I will have to get her ready though.

I have never seen you with your hair cut this low. Do you remember when we first met? Your hair was styled in a blown out Afro. You looked handsome then too. But I like this older more somber, matured look.

After being apart for so long and living with this longing to see you, it was so shocking to see you in grey dreadlocks. I had seen photos you sent to your mother when the dreadlocks were still young-looking.

One of your friends had met me on Frederick Street one day. She told me she had seen you in Brooklyn and she was shocked at how old you looked. She said,she had stopped to talk to you and when she was finished talking to you and walked away. Her little grandson of five asked her. Granny is that your grandfather. I smiled at that story. Still not in my wildest imaginings ever thinking I would see you looking this way.

I couldn't grieve at Uncle Lincoln's funeral. Not because I wasn't sad at his passing. No, not so at all. I couldn't grieve because I was so happy to lay eyes on you again. Isn't life strange? A happy family - was that too much of me to ask of life?
Maybe this was your uncle's way of saying to me I know how much you love your husband. Be happy. Don't be sad."

The light of morning is my gift on returning from dreamscape; where colours are real, only more intense and longing is etched, only deeper.

a watering can -
enough water filled to clean
bird crap off the steps
ORANGE BUTTERFLY © gillena cox 2017


Blog hopping today with
Prompt Nights
Women are the real architects of Society – International Women’s Day Special 🌹

...


Thursday, March 9, 2017

367


[image from google dot com]

the sky is full of clouds today

at the fair i watch the stick fluff out
into pink puffy cotton candy delights

when i tasted morning
the air was still except for
its report of birdsongs
© gillena cox 2017


Blog hopping today with

Imaginary Garden With Real Toads
Synesthesia
Rommy challenges us to: Compose a poem based around personal perceptions of joined sensory experiences.





Revisit
March 9th 2015

Tuesday, March 7, 2017

366


[image from google dot com]

LASH BACK
see him, scourged so lowly
see him, crowned with thorns
see his cross, now holy

see me, under The Blood
see me, in my life of mercy
see me, praising joyfully

dare you look, can you see?

blinding are shafts;
of despair and defeat
LASH BACK © gillena cox 2017

Blog hopping today at
Imaginary Garden With Real Toads
The Tuesday Platform



Revisit
7 March 2016

Monday, March 6, 2017

365

Click to Mix and Solve
early blooms daub in pink

an azure sky is witness
to this a lovely scene

forecast to Easter
to brightness
and new beginnings
© gillena cox 2017

verses

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You've heard about the Monday Blues ❧✿❧ well this is Monday WRites (musing on the definition here of rite, as any customary observance or practice eg the rite of afternoon tea).
Welcome to Monday WRites #99, ❧✿❧ What's your mood like today ❧✿❧ I invite you to link in with one of your WRites






❧✿❧

Revisit
March 6th 2015