The beech rises
stalwart on the ridge
brooking no challenge,
his smooth gray bark
shining in Fall sun
among yellowing leaves
and as I lean
to watch, a golden leaf
falls, whippling,
barely stirring air
to come to rest gently
on a twigged fork.
On a day
when politics
is too much with us,
I repair to the woods
to admire the beech
with a crook
like an elephant’s knee
in its massive trunk.
Each day is a new one
Made special by me.
I breathe deeper, dream harder, look closer.
It’s all here right now,
All that I need or want it to
be.
I’ve no time for playing
Earth Mother, Hecate or Crone.
I’ve found out the mystery—
My wise woman’s alive
Every minute inside me.
I practice a hundred frugalities
I eat my toast without jam
I shut off each light I’m not using
I try to live small as I can.
But, music keeps playing inside me
My mind sings a million new tunes
My-self is a universe unfolding
I’m a river that will not be damned
I run into mornings with laughter
Little Goddesses dance on my windowsills.
Perchance a bleak future awaits me
Living does take what it can
and
Death may be an added adventure
Yet, to living I answer
I am!!!!!
Poets, how are you faring? We are on day 26 of writing a poem per day for national poetry month. So far, I’m 26 for 26, some of which I’m happy with, and some of which need tweaking. Moo of Writing has been working for me. When I relax and don’t try hard, the words flow. Some days I feel like this nesting mother goose waiting for eggs to hatch. How about you?
Happy writing!
Nan
Will you join me in a challenge? In my handbook, Moo of Writing, I advocate a belief in abundance. We can all be like Linus in the pumpkin patch, believing with all our heart that a great pumpkin bursting with the seeds of prolific writing will descend upon us, indeed lives within us every day! I am now throwing down a challenge to myself—and I invite you to join me—to enter a contest. We will pick a theme and write one poem a day every day for the month of April for a total of 30 poems in honor of National Poetry Month. The contest is sponsored by localgemspoetrypress.com, and they want $25 from you by March 25 to enter. If you choose not to enter the contest, but want to participate, send me your poems through this website by May 1, and we’ll choose some to publish here. Usually, I spend weeks if not months on a poem, keeping several in the hopper at once, returning to them to reconsider, putting them through critiquing workshops, mulling them over, sleeping on them. In April, I will allow myself no such luxury of time. Winner of the contest receives $300 and Local Gems Press publishes the winner’s chapbook. I’m excited about the challenge. Time to see how well Moo of Writing really works! Moo/Mu!
The weather’s unsettled on Easter Eve
like a restless cow about to calve,
the land licked clean by heady winds.
By early evening
sleet takes the land
collects on branches
slicks old snow
burdens old limbs—
conquered
they conjure thunderous cracks
like mindless destruction.
Lights flicker off
a match flares
a kerosene lantern
a smoke-smeared chimney.
The dark kitchen presses
in on Mother, Daddy, and me
huddled in a puddle of light
over eggs, the tang of vinegar
in cups of
rose
blue
yellow
green.
One by one
we balance them
on spoons,
lift them into the night.
You look at me and see
everything you fear:
every truth,
every lie,
every puddle,
every apple,
every brick in the wall.
I look at you and see
the sample boy
in a wool factory.
And that is the difference
between us.
Taking my work out into the world delights and scares me. You’d think I were 7 instead of 71! (Or maybe a 7-year-old would be braver). I’m happy to return to my homeland, DeWitt, Iowa, for an event at Crossroads Inspired Living & Garden Cafe on Nov. 22—the Saturday before Thanksgiving. We’ve named the event “Poetry of Gratitude.” I’ll read from Black Dirt Days: Poems as Memoir which is a tribute to my parents, Marian & Louie Bliesmer, and a tribute to the land—Iowa, which helped feed the world when I was growing up in the 1950s & still does. Black Dirt Days celebrates my parent’s forbidden romance, sleigh rides, wiener roasts, feeding cattle, even hauling manure! Most of all it’s about faith no matter what challenges we faced—tornadoes, ill health, the uncertainty of weather for the farmer. I’m looking forward to seeing cousins and old friends. And I’m grateful to Linda Snyder, owner of Crossroads, for welcoming me to her shop & cafe. Here’s what’s on the menu for the luncheon– Harvest Salad consisting of Fresh Spinach, Toasted Pine Nuts, Dried Cranberries, Crisp Apples, Roasted Butternut Squash sprinkled w/ Goat Cheese & drizzled w/ Honey Maple Vinaigrette. Turkey Pot Pie with tender pieces of Turkey Breast, Peas, Carrots, Corn & Potatoes in a Creamy Sauce. Topped w/ a Flaky Pie Crust. Caramel-Cranberry Pumpkin Tart. Coffee or Tea. The luncheon (sounds yummy, doesn’t it?) will follow the reading, discussion, and book signing. Click here to read “I Give Thanks,” the key poem for the event. I’ll let you know how it goes.
heat lightning,
I give thanks.
For fear at bedsides,
for faith that held
us all in sturdy arms
even when we cried,
I give thanks.
For school folks,
for church folks,
for the music of perking coffee
during the last hand of cards,
I give thanks.
For two old elms
creaking outside my bedroom window
leaning toward each other
like old women telling stories,
I give thanks.
For a kitchen swelled by the smell
of baking bread,
for Grandma’s feet treading
the Singer sewing machine,
I give thanks.
For kerosene lanterns
when ice storms rattled the house,
for the wall phone’s melodious ring,
for the angel of mercy
ending suffering at last,
I give thanks.
For the wonder of library books,
for teachers who were kind,
for a dog to keep me company,
for parents who loved me,
I give thanks.
For tornadoes, for hailstorms,
for blizzards and sweltering summer days,
for the sweet rich soil of my youth,
I give thanks.
Lilian Steichen Sandburg was famous in her own right as a breeder of goats. These goats are enjoying a spot of shade under the structure that holds hay in their barnyard at the Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site at Flat Rock, NC. The site offers visitors not only shade under gorgeous old hemlocks it offers a spot of peace. Lilian, known to Carl as Paula, believed goat milk helped settle her long-time digestive problems. She began breeding goats to improve blood lines and milk production in 1935 when the couple lived in Berrien County Michigan. They were not to move to Flat Rock until 1945 when she was 62 and he was 67 years of age. A social activist, he was a journalist, a poet (Pulitzer winner), a hobo, a world traveler, a biographer (Pulitzer for a history of Lincoln), songwriter, writer of children’s books, and troubadour. Whether or not you love poetry, this home that Lilian and daughter Margaret helped the National Park Service preserve to truly carry the spirit of the “Poet of the People,” is worth a visit. Say hi to the goats for me.
Happy writing!
Nan Lundeen
www.nanlundeen.com
Do you remember your first kiss? Mine happened (first time for both of us) in the back seat of a Dodge on an Iowa gravel road while two of his buddies egged him on from the front seat. It was what passed for a wild night in the 1950s. They were driving way too fast, spitting gravel, taking hills up the center of the road, on our way home from a dance class in town. Somebody had taken pity on us country bumpkins or just couldn’t stand to watch us bumbling around in the gym at sock hops and arranged a few classes for us high school freshmen in the basement of a ranch house in Clinton. Poets will write about anything, so when I was writing Black Dirt Days: Poems as Memoir, this prose poem popped out. The names have been changed to protect the guilty. How about it? Do you remember your first kiss?
Enjoy the audio.
Happy writing!
Nan Lundeen
www.nanlundeen.com
Woman who
was wise
Was new
Was first
Was equal
Walked tall
Who would not stay
When once or maybe twice
She wished to mount and
Ride on top
Wild and free
But was denied
Put no claim on the holy,
For we are as vulnerable as the field mice
Playing among the tall grasses
Hiding beneath the strawberry vines
For God roars in with the morning,
Spilling the new day’s pain over his shoulder
And all we can do
Is all we have ever done.
Open ourselves to the light
When it comes;
Let light enter us
Until we become the Flame
the Burning Bush