West Coast Wildlife, Three Haiku

Welcome to Poetry Friday! Bridget is hosting today and she invites us to a dance party, acknowledging that all of us need occasional respite from the troubles and worry in the world. Check out her happy post and video:

https://weewordsforweeones.blogspot.com

Thank you Bridget, for hosting! It has been a tough week with war a constant preoccupation.

I spent the last three weeks with my son and his wife in Pacifica, California, so have been away from Poetry Friday. But I’ve been gathering photos and thinking about posts. I look forward to catching up on the poetry goodness this week that I know is waiting.

While on the west coast, My husband and I walked the quiet beach nearby almost daily to check out the wild life. Western squirrels were a little different.

This little friend doesn’t live in trees like the squirrels in New York State do. They live in burrows and we saw them darting into cracks between the boulders by the ocean. Ground squirrels have a less fluffy tail and are known for their strong hind legs that allows them, like this squirrel, to keep a sharp lookout for predators. My husband, quick with his phone, was lucky to snap this. 

small furry ground squirrel
casting a lengthy shadow--
but ready to hide.

©Janice Scully 2023

Besides these numerous squirrels, we loved watching the gulls who were in turn watching the fishermen on the pier. 

gulls and fishermen 
watch the baited lines for tugs--
everyone hungry 

©Janice Scully 2023

Sunset in Pacifica

beaches at sunset--
shades of tan and gray blacken
as the sky ignites.

I hope everyone is well. My thoughts are with all those in danger in the Middle East and in Ukraine.

Black-eyed Susan

Welcome to Poetry Friday, this week hosted by photographer and poet, Carol, Here at her blog Beyond Literacy. Thank you for hosting, Carol.

I have been busy revising my novel in verse after a trusted friend read it. When I began writing, over twenty years ago, I had no idea how long it would take me to become a writer. But I’ve finally fictionalized members of my family and have enjoyed getting to know them and myself as characters.

Soon I’ll be traveling out west again to visit my son and I’ll be looking for pictures and poems to share. But today, I will share something beautiful in my yard. These flowers are fading, but that seems to add more beauty. There a diversity in color here, shades of brown against the yellow and green. 

BLACK-EYED SUSANS IN FALL

September colors,
different hues--
Do I see 
the best of you?

Your eyes so shocking,
in a yellow blaze
each flower in its
autumn faze.
.
But still you seem,
quite calm, unrushed,
and settled in
the evening hush. 
 
© Janice Scully 2023 (Draft)








WORM, a Poem by Gail McConnell

Welcome to Poetry Friday, this week hosted by Rose at Imagine the Possibilities. Thank you, Rose, for hosting here https://imaginethepossibilities.blog

On a road trip Delaware this summer, I bought this book. It’s a poetry anthology with useful insights on each poem by poet Pádraig Ó Tuama.

In Ó Tuama’s anthology, I discovered a poem by Gail O’Connell that expresses the gratitude I hope everyone might feel for the humble Earthworm. Some might find this subject creepy and the life of an earthworm not worth poetry. But that isn’t true, in my opinion.

When I was about ten, I used to go out in our yard after a summer rain with my brother and catch earthworms that were lounging on the grass. We sold them to a sports store across the street, never fully appreciating their genius. 

WORM
BY GAIL McCONNELL

Burrowing in your allotted patch you
   move through the dark, muscles contract one by one

in every part, lengthening and shortening
   the slick segmented tube of you, furrows in your wake.

Devising passages for water, air,
   you plot the gaps that keep the structure from collapse.


READ MORE HERE: https://onbeing.org/poetry/worm/

This poem made me wonder why we can be more like earthworms. We might think we are more advanced, but when it comes to the future, are we?

EARTHWORM ENVY
(After the poem WORM, by Gail McConnell)

How wise they are 
to burrow and recycle, 
leaving their patch of earth 
          a better place.

Brilliant, 
worthy of emulation, 
even if they
are (unlike us?)
not much to look at.  


© Janice Scully 2023

The helpful but homely earthworm

Celebrate Earth

Welcome to Poetry Friday, this week hosted by poet Amy Ludwig Vanderwater at her blog The Poem Farm at http://thepoemfarm@amylv.com. Thank you, Amy for hosting!

Over the summer, Linda Baie sent me a packet of words. Today I spilled them out and chose one.

I often visit one of my favorite parks by Skaneateles Lake, a Finger Lakes here in Central New York. It was ninety degrees there this week, and I found a cool spot under a large tree. It is well known that lakes, the rivers and wetlands work as heat sinks. They cool the environment and make it possible for us to live on Earth.

Skaneateles Lake in New York

Recently, according to the Associated Press, the Supreme Court is removing some wetland protections from development and pollution. You can read it here: https://apnews.com/article/supreme-court-wetlands-development-biden-fe976e69bb24c937aabdf0e2868cb5f3

The decision will make it easier to develop wetlands that help protect us from the heat. There are those who are for and others against this. What do you think? It seems short sighted to see any wetland as dispensable.

So, I for my poem, from Linda’s packet of words, I chose the word “earth.” It’s simple but I don’t find taking sides on this issue difficult. 

WHAT SHOULD WE DO WITH THE WETLANDS IN 2023?

Boggy wetlands,
rushing streams,
flowing rivers,
deep dark lakes.

Why not celebrate
and give a wide berth
to these keepers
of Planet Earth?

© Janice Scully 2023

Poetry Swap: Visitors from Other Worlds

Welcome to Poetry Friday, this week, hosted by Romona, at https://pleasuresfromthepage.blogspot.com. Thank you for hosting, Romona!

What is Poetry Friday? Find out at https://www.nowaterriver.com/what-is-poetry-friday/

Previously I posted concerning questions about the universe at https://janicescully.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=4858&action=edit

I shared this Golden Shovel poem entitled Einstein’s Theory of Relativity:

Einstein's Theory of Relativity

 ". . . we are luminous beings made of energy." (Quote from "Frequently asked Questions about the Universe," by Jorge Cham & Daniel Whiteson.


Because of Einstein, we
find out that we aren’t what we think we are.
Can you sense the luminous
forces that bind molecules inside Human beings
together? Our arms and legs seem made
to appear solid, but we are simply sculpted of 
pure energy. 

© Janice Scully 2023

In my recent poetry swap gift, Tabatha responded to my poem, imagining what the visitors from other worlds might look like, how energy might “shape itself” in the alien world. It’s a wonderful poem, and we all might wonder if life on other planets are like us or “a new formulation, unrecognizable to us.” 

VISITORS FROM OTHER WORLDS
by Tabatha Yeatts
 
They could be anything, couldn't they?
The possibility of cosmic life circles us like a comet,
leaves a trail of stardust we fall asleep beneath, 
dreaming of creatures whose ship descends in our midst 
like a ladder being lowered from the galactic attic.
 
They could be anything, couldn't they?
We know this because we see what's here–
long-necked, long-limbed spotted leaf-eaters,
underwater jelly dancers, nighttime light darters,
zipping sword beaks, round-tailed waterslappers.
Even wolves come in a thousand unlikely variants,
including ones we can carry with us like a yapping moon.
 
Energy shapes itself in startling ways– asserts itself– 
is the recipe, the chef, and the waiting mouth.
What has it cooked up in other watery, windy worlds?
What life-forms are brewing, sloshing out of their primordial sea?
Are they primate-shaped, mammalian? Like us at all? 
Or perhaps they are a new formulation, unrecognizable to us,
which treasures the atmosphere, the elements, the star-span
that cups the flame of their existence, 
keeping it from blowing out.

Her poem arrived with a quote from Thoreau about gratitude that begins, “I am grateful for what I am and have.” I know I am grateful to Tabatha and the Poetry Friday community.

How shall I end this post? I’ll end with a haiku inspired about swimming and especially floating in a lake or a pool. For a few minutes I can make all external sounds go away and all is silent. 

I float, ears submerged.
Swaying tree tops are silent.
Is it them breathing?

©Janice Scully 2023

I wonder if some aliens have ears and might similarly enjoy floating?

Have a wonderful weekend.

A Book for Bear by Ellen Ramsey, and a Poetry Gift

Welcome to Poetry Friday!

What is Poetry Friday? Find out Here.

This week we are hosted by Linda Baie, book aficionado and poet. Thank you for hosting, Linda! Be sure to check out her post for today at her blog, Teacher Dance, http://teacherdance.org.

First, I want to recommend a new picture book.

I hope everyone will have a chance to read A BOOK FOR BEAR, written by Ellen Ramsey ( http://ellenramsey.com) and illustrated by MacKenzie Haley (http://mackenziehaley.com). Though Ellen is also a poet, this book is written in prose.

The book begins with the sentence, “Bear loved books.”

Bear, who has been listening to a girl named Ellen read stories out loud in the forest, has fallen in love with books. He loves books so much one day he says, “I want a book of my very own.”

For Bear to acquire a book of his own, will not be easy.

Together the bear and Ellen search and search for a book for Bear. They look in the obvious places, such as the library and in stores, where bears aren’t all that welcome. Still, they work hard at it, but he fails to find a book to call his very own.

Does Bear finally succeed?

Ellen’s storytelling and the colorful illustrations will keep you turning pages to discover what happens.

As a book lover, I could relate well to Ellen and Bear and loved these ardent characters. And I know there are many kids who will, too.

The back book cover.

This week, it just so happens to have just received a poetry swap gift from Linda Baie. Besides a lovely journal, a packet of words to prompt future poems, and a book of poems, she sent me an sweet and imaginative poem she wrote that she nestled in a scene she created with paper, cut-outs and a bit of cotton for clouds. 

FOR WEAVING TOMORROWS
by Linda Baie

Remember gentle thoughts, when rising--
     more comes with brainy exercising.
Your pen will sweep a nimbus cloud
     over the waiting Gulf Stream sky.

Clouds will become the sky mail
     sent from way up high.
Use them for your air-tales,
     words parading by. 

  Now add a solar-powered smile.

Writing takes me places. I know that a pen can “sweep nimbus clouds” and become “sky mail” even if only for myself.

I read Linda’s poem as a reminder of what I have been missing this summer, that is, time with my pen poised, head in the clouds, thinking about words.

I’ll end with a haiku inspired by weather today here in Central New York. 

Summer rain today
not too little not too much--
a fairy tale storm. 

© Janice Scully 2023

I hope everyone has a great weekend. Thank you, Linda, for hosting!

A Poetry Swap gift and August Haiku

Welcome to Poetry Friday, this week hosted by Molly at her blog: Nix the Comfort Zone.

I have been away from Poetry Friday for a while and found I missed, not surprisingly, this community and its celebration of words, writing, and all things artistic.

I want to thank Tabatha Yeatts for organizing the summer Poetry Swap. Patricia Franzen sent me an amazing poem about a sugar pine tree, which is a beloved Sierra species. The poem came just after I visited California and had seen a Redwood forest that was returning to life after a forest fire. Patricia’s gratitude for her beloved Sugar Pine tree, which she has been observing over time, resonated.

pinus lambertiana

In death as in life

you find your home in a mixed-conifer forest

a fallen sugar pine’s twisted remains

nestled between friends

generous to a fault

you sacrificed cone and seed

to feed the insatiable

pocket mouse or ground squirrel

benevolent ruler of this alpine slope

stripped bare, yet steadfast

cavity nesters find a home

in your heartwood

Patricia Franzen July 15, 2023

She also sent a card with one of her photos of Lake Tahoe and some whimsical stickers. It was wonderful to hear from her!

This week I’m sharing a series of haiku inspired by an August of summer vegetables, brought to me in abundance from a generous neighbor. These, of course, are leeks. 

FARM TO TABLE HAIKU

1)
Fresh beets in a box
wearing thick mud from the field—
tender greens wilting.

2)
Found meandering
among tasteless and tough weeds,
sweet carrots and leeks.

3)
Not too long or short—
Green and yellow beans flourish.
Hurry up! Pick them!

4)
Bite marks on veggies
But corn and okra don’t care
if raccoons eat them.

5)
By myself cooking,
I slide the window open—
let in cricket sound.

© Janice Scully 2023

What are you celebrating this August? Have a great week! Thank you, Molly, for hosting Poetry Friday.

Lost Trail, a poem

Welcome to Poetry Friday, this week hosted by poet Marcie Flinchum Atkins Here. Thank you Marcie for hosting.

I’ve been away for a couple of weeks. I traveled to California to see my son’s wedding. While there, I met and got to know Philip’s delightful new in-laws, who are from China. Phil arranged some pre-wedding activities that included some lovely Chinese food, a trip to a State Park, and a ferry to Alcatraz Prison! It was fun and I do love history and cool souvenirs.

Because of Meng and her parents, our small family is much bigger and my world is full of new things to learn, like Chinese for instance, (at least within my limited capability). Meng was an amazing translator. I also discovered the WeChat translation app and spoke to Meng’s Mom directly.

The wedding took place at the San Francisco City Hall. I figure that since I mentioned the wedding during my last post along with a haiku, I have to follow it up with a photo. Below is Phil and Meng.

Meng and Philip

Other brides and grooms waited their turn, all so different. It was a joyful, bustling place.

The next photo is my husband and I, me wearing an emerald green scarf that is a gift from Meng’s generous parents that displays a Chinese painting from the 1100’s. No, the scarf is not that old.

Besides the good news of the wedding, one of my poems was published this week.

Lost Trail, can be found this week in the Tiny Seed Literary Journal, and I’ve written it here:

Lost Trail

One day,
walking with my mother,
she stopped. 

It was early spring.

She cupped in her hand 
a stem of tiny white flowers,
so bright they glowed
among matted leaves at the base
of a pine.

because of the way
she recognized the pale buds
as friends,
I now understand
she had been here before

and I imagine that
someone once took her walking
and with soft knowing eyes,
bent over the same
wondrous flowers
and said,
"See? Trailing Arbutus!
Native to here."

I wish I'd asked, "Who?"

©Janice Scully 2023

It’s been a summer full of love, and hopefully I will have time to write more poems and work on revision in the coming months. I look forward to checking out the posts from the Poetry Friday community this week.

What is Poetry Friday? Look Here.

I wish everyone a leisurely summer with time off, and some shady cool places in which to hang out. (It’s 95 degrees here in Syracuse today! I know it’s not the only sweltering place. )

Flowering Dogwood

Welcome to Poetry Friday! This week Poetry Friday is hosted by poet and artist Michelle Kogan HERE. Thank you for hosting.

Today, I am beginning a brief couple of week’s break from posting on Salt City Verse. It’s because I’ll be with my family celebrating our oldest son’s wedding. It seems a long while since we’ve had an important momentous event, besides holidays, to bring us together. I am excited!!

Sometimes good things happen at once. That is the case with the Flowering Dogwood blooming outside my office window. The tree is right against my window so when it blooms, it fills the window and I imagine a forest of dogwoods, though it’s only one tree.

Flowering Dogwood.

Why the name Dogwood? According to Google, one theory on the tree’s name is: “The common name dogwood comes from one colonial description of the fruit as being edible but not fit for a dog.”

I have noticed each year the small very pretty knobby red round fruit that comes after the flowers are gone. I guess I will assume that things not fit for dogs are not fit for humans, and though edible are not very tasty.

Here’s a haiku: 

Dogwood's full white blooms
catching light by my window--
time for a wedding. 




© Janice Scully 2023

Have a wonderful weekend! I hope I have some time to catch up with Poetry Friday when I’m away.

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE

Welcome to Poetry Friday! This week we are hosted by the wonderfully talented poet and photographer, Buffy Silverman, Here. Please stop by and find out what she’s up to this week.

What is Poetry Friday? Find out HERE.

This week, I’m up to something captivating, at least to me: The Universe!

I’ve had many of my unanswered questions answered, at least partly, and I also have a whole host of new questions since reading FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE, written by robotics scientist, Jorge Cham and physicist Daniel Whiteson. Scientists are sometimes hard to understand, but Cham and Whiteson write with wonderful clarity not to mention wonderful humor. This would be a fun read for high school kids and a must read, in my opinion, for all adults. It is perspective changing:

If you think our solar system is big and we humans are very important, you’ll change those notions fast. If you think the current conversations among some in America is about urgent things, you come to understand see how small many ideas about humanity and our entire culture have become.

Just saying.

The book covers a great deal. For example, it’s given me an appreciation for just how humongous the universe might be and also how far away other possible civilizations might be. How likely is life in other parts of the universe? Have they already been here? Will they want to meet us or not so much?

In this book you’ll find discussions about the possibility of an after life and how that might work. You might come to understand that we are all made up of the same matter, (protons, neutrons, electrons, etc) but our particles are just simply arranged differently. Could this arrangement of a person’s particles be preserved after death and the essence of “You” be transported somewhere else?

Other highlights? Definitely the chapter on Einstein’s relativity equation: Energy is equal to Mass multiplied by the speed of light squared. E=mc2.

What is mass really? I learned to think about things such as a heavy rock differently. I came to understand that a rock’s weight is not due to the sum of all it’s particles, but the ENERGY holding them all together. In fact, we weigh what we weigh because of the bonds holding all of our particles together!

The chair in the corner of your office weighs what it weighs because of energy that binds it’s particles, (such as quarks and electrons) together:

So, if you sit in this chair, you will be held up by energy, (unless of course there is a nail missing or a screw loose.)

Mass is almost entirely Energy. Here is a Golden Shovel poem I wrote from a short quote from the book. 

Einstein's Theory of relativity

 ". . . we are luminous beings made of energy." (From Frequently asked Questions about the Universe, by Jorge Cham & Daniel Whiteson.


Because of Einstein, we
find out that we aren’t what we think we are.
Can you sense the luminous
forces that bind molecules inside Human beings
together? Our arms and legs seem made
to appear solid, but we are simply sculpted of 
pure energy. 

© Janice Scully 2023

This book has been a joy to read! I am about to re-read it because it’s the kind of knowledge I want to remember . . . and maybe because the bonds between my particles aren’t as strong as they used to be? I wonder. Who knows? Maybe they grow stronger after age 30.

Have a great weekend!