BUSYBODY: An Animal Mask Poem



 

Yesterday, I watched my granddaughter Julia as she looked out the side door at two gray squirrels scampering along the old rock wall that serves as the boundary line between our “new” property and the property of our next door neighbors. It’s fun for me to look at a familiar scene like squirrels skittering around through the eyes of little Julia who gets so excited about such things. I enjoy  listening to her excited noises when she gets wrapped up in the wonder of things that are new to her young eyes.

 

Today, I’m sharing an animal mask poem. In it, I tried to capture the voice of a squirrel busy scavenging for food in autumn.

BUSYBODY

By Elaine Magliaro

I’m a hurrier
scurrier
scamperer
scavenger
searching for acorns
and maple tree seeds
stashing them now
for my wintertime needs.

It’s autumn…

I’m busy.
I’ve much work to do.
So sorry I can’t stop
To visit with you.

Must hurry,

Must scurry…
Can’t chatter today.
I’m busy…too busy
Must be on my way.

 

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Here are some pictures of Julia enjoying her first tastes of her Grampy’s yummy homemade lasagna:



 Here are two pictures that I took of her when we vacationed in Maine in late August:



 

Here is a picture that I took of Julia at her first birthday party in August:



 



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Marjorie has the Poetry Friday Roundup at Paper Tigers this week.

 

APPLES--A Memoir Poem

I apologize for being absent from Wild Rose Reader for so long. It has been an especially busy and hectic summer for me. Just this past month, I’ve attended two family weddings, celebrated my granddaughter Julia's first birthday, vacationed in Maine, and bought a house! My husband and I hadn’t planned on moving because we love the house we are living in at the present time--and we love our neighborhood. I have, however, been spending a lot of time away from home living at my daughter’s and providing daycare for my granddaughter. That has left me little time to read, write, blog, spend with my husband, or visit with friends and other family. My husband, daughter, son-in-law, and I decided a few months ago that it would best for all of us if we could find a home where we could all live together. I didn’t think we’d find the perfect place so soon...but we did. It was the first property that we looked at.

Here are some pictures that I took yesterday of the grounds around the house:

My daughter, son-in-law, and Julia will live in the main house—a Georgian farmhouse built around 1790--with an addition that was built circa 1850. My husband and I will live in the in-law suite--the carriage house that was converted into an apartment in 1999.

The original owner of the house was a woodworker and an apple farmer. In fact, he had an apple orchard on our property. The thought of an apple orchard brought to mind a memoir poem that I wrote about my maternal grandparents and the apples that grew in their yard.

APPLES

We tasted the green apples of summer,

watched the season pass through Dzidzi’s garden,

shared its bounty.

Now we help harvest the autumn apples.

Dzidzi places two large baskets beneath the tree.

He stands on a ladder and reaches for the highest apples.

We stand on wooden crates and pick apples

from the bottom branches

and salvage what we can from the ground.

In one basket we place the best apples we pick,

the eating apples, the perfect ones.

We fill the other basket with cooking apples—

the ones with brown spots and bruises

that Babci will cook into thick applesauce,

the ones she will bake in fat apple pies

steaming clouds of cinnamon spice,

the ones she will make perfect again.

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The Poetry Friday Roundup is at Random Noodling this week.

BACKYARD MERMAIDS: A Memoir Poem

Backyard Mermaids is a memoir poem. It relates a memory of one of the summer experiences I had with two of my first cousins at the home of my maternal grandparents. My cousins lived on one side of my grandparents’ house. We spent lots of vacation days together—running through the lawn sprinkler, picking vegetables in my grandfather’s garden, playing dress-up in the basement, meeting in our clubhouse under my grandparents’ front porch. 

 

BACKYARD MERMAIDS

An August afternoon,

the air hangs over us like a moist veil.

A cicada stings the silence.

Dzidzi turns on the sprinkler.

Thin ribbons of silver beads

stream upward, glisten in the sun.

We run back and forth through the tiny waterfall,

our bare feet squishing through wet grass,

liquid diamonds cooling our sunburned skin,

seaweed hair clinging to our heads and necks.

We are mermaids of the deep

and the sun, a giant topaz,

floats above us in a sea of sapphire blue.

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Violet Nesdoly has the Poetry FridayRoundup this week.

MOLE POEMS: Variations on a Theme

 

Every now and then, I like to write poems about a particular subject in a number of different ways. I have arranged the following three mole poems in the order in which I wrote them. The first poem is a “things to do” list poem; the second and third are mask poems.

THINGS TO DO IF YOU ARE A MOLE

Make your home

in the damp darkness

underground

unknowing of snow

and stars

and summer breezes.

Live among roots

and rocks

and sleeping cicadas.

Excavate tunnels

in the moist brown earth.

Listen for the soft music

of seeds sprouting,

worms wiggling,

rain pattering on your grassy roof.

Spend your days in a world

of unending night.

MOLE ANSWERS AN INTERVIEW QUESTION

I live in the earth.

I burrow through soil.

A claw-footed creature,

In darkness I toil.

I excavate tunnels.

I really DIG dirt!

I’m a fine engineer.

I do hate to be curt…

But I’m here on the job…

I can’t stop now to chat.

I’m a hole-digging mole.

I’ll just leave it at that!

MOLE

Psst! Psst! HEY! I’m right down here.

I’m a busy little engineer

Building tunnels underground.

You rarely hear ME make a sound.

My life is lonely…one of toil.

I claw my way through darkness soil.

The sun’s is not a face I know.

I live where seeds begin to grow.

Dear Mother Earth is my good friend

And through her big brown heart I wend

Digging tunnels right down here.

Listen! Listen! Cup an ear.

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The Poetry Friday Roundup is at Life Is Better with Books.

CRICKETS: An Original Acrostic

One of my favorite sounds is that of crickets chirping on summer nights. I haven’t had the opportunity to listen to them lately because it has been so hot around here lately that we’ve had to run the air conditioner in our bedroom.

Here’s an acrostic poem I wrote some years ago about crickets strumming on summer evenings:

Chirping in the dark, their song

Resonates

In the still air. A

Chorus of summer night strummers in concert with

Katydids

Entertaining warm evenings with

Their

Symphony of wings.

One of my favorite things to do is to feed my little granddaughter. She enjoys eating all kinds of food—including broccoli, snap peas, carrots, and bananas. In addition, I can usually snap my best pictures of her when she’s sitting in her high chair and can't make a fast getaway. Here are some recent pictures of Julia:

Julia enjoyed dropping food on the floor

when we took her out to eat

on Father's Day.

Yum...broccoli!

A two-fisted eater!

 She can now drink from a "sippy" cup.

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The Poetry Friday Roundup is at A Teaching Life.