Despite everything

the amphibian inside us

Because it's summer.  Because the air is heavy with heat and nostalgia.

Because this is what we have to keep remembering, the way our bodies

know the waves, the amphibian inside us unafraid of going under,

of what ripples beneath the surface.  Because waiting on the dock

for the signal to jump is like thinking someone else is responsible.  Because

there is no one else responsible.  Because despite the current,

it is possible to swim against it, or even stand, inverted, balancing

on a slippery mulch of murk and mud, and stay perfectly still.

Because when the world tips from view, we have to do everything we can

to tip it back.

~ Maya Stein

:  :  :

from Maya Stein's "10-Line Tuesday" poetry series

... the backlog can be enjoyed  here

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The most important voice

~ Dream Boat, River Tay, Scotland ~

START CLOSE IN

Start close in,
don't take the second step
or the third,
start with the first
thing
close in,
the step
you don't want to take.

Start with
the ground
you know,
the pale ground
beneath your feet,
your own
way of starting
the conversation.

Start with your own
question,
give up on other
people's questions,
don't let them
smother something
simple.

To find
another's voice,
follow
your own voice,
wait until
that voice
becomes a
private ear
listening
to another.

Start right now
take a small step
you can call your own
don't follow
someone else's
heroics, be humble
and focused,
start close in,
don't mistake
that other
for your own.

Start close in,
don't take
the second step
or the third,
start with the first
thing
close in,
the step
you don't want to take.

~ David Whyte, from "River Flow: New & Selected Poems"

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So much

There is so much to share, so much I want to tell you

about my recent travels in Scotland ...

about another wonder-filled masterclass at Big Cat Textiles,

tutored by India Flint to a roomful of generous hearted, spirit seeking women ...

about wanders into the wild Scottish landscape

botanizing all along the way ...

but

I'm not one to summarize quickly.

I need time

to let everything percolate,

time to allow the experience to sink into my bones.

~ Sunset light at low tide, River Tay, Newburgh, Fife ~

So for now I will leave you with a splendid poem from Maya Stein today,

one that captures quite beautifully

some of my feelings spending time along this river again.

Please enjoy.

And I'll be back before too long.

: : :

with summer still in their eyes

The sun was setting earlier than yesterday, and the cows

were uneventful.  The road would bring no more traffic

that evening.  Fifteen miles away, a town rested its tired arms.

The travelers were tired, too.  They cobbled dinner together

from the findings in a country store - iceberg lettuce, baked potatoes,

a wedge of local cheese - then slunk outdoors to catch the final light.

They each felt a scratch at their backs, a new season tapping its nails

against their thin shirts.  They knew this moment couldn't last.

And yet, with summer still in their eyes, they waited until the final rays

disappeared behind the mountains, until the stars arrived, like answers.

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Found while walking

It's possible to determine the seasons here

by what is washing up on the beach.  The tides

bring oyster shells in early summer,

multitudes of itty bitty crabs

and the particular seaweed that prints red on cloth.

Driftwood is plentiful

bleaching & cracking like rough skin in the sunshine.

It's heaven for the dogs.  Quinn is exuberant over her stick-chasing swims

while Isla is content to quietly sniff every log

up and down the shoreline for as long and as far as you'll let her.

Simple pleasures

enjoyed while I beach comb.

A lovely poem flew into my mailbox this morning from American Life in Poetry.

Although referencing the other coast, there's a truth here

to be found on all of them ... and within all of us.

I thought you might enjoy it.

Strewn 

It’d been a long winter, rags of snow hanging on; then, at the end

of April, an icy nor’easter, powerful as a hurricane. But now 

I’ve landed on the coast of Maine, visiting a friend who lives

two blocks from the ocean, and I can’t believe my luck, 

out this mild morning, race-walking along the strand. 

Every dog within fifty miles is off-leash, running 

for the sheer dopey joy of it. No one’s in the water,

but walkers and shellers leave their tracks on the hardpack. 

The flat sand shines as if varnished in a painting. Underfoot, 

strewn, are broken bits and pieces, deep indigo mussels, whorls

of whelk, chips of purple and white wampum, hinges of quahog, 

fragments of sand dollars. Nothing whole, everything 

broken, washed up here, stranded. The light pours down, a rinse 

of lemon on a cold plate. All of us, broken, some way 

or other. All of us dazzling in the brilliant slanting light.

~ by Barbara Crooker

 : : :

photo processing notes:

images shot with iPhone

double exposure created with Diana Photo app

edited on an iPad with Snapseed & Stackables apps

copyright added online with PicMonkey

: : :

... and if you've ever dreamed about walking the entire coastline of the UK

have a peek over on Ruth's Coastal Walk blog.

She's just been to Rhossili Beach

and you will not believe the unspoiled beauty ....

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Moon watching

What a moon we've had developing the past few days ...

clear, star-filled nights make for contemplative viewing;

being out late with the dogs, a delight for stargazers like me.

A few days back, while it was waxing,

I posted this image on Instagram

"what night feels like towards the end of winter when spring is on the cusp

but wearing her icy mantle ..."

because although nights still call for two layers of warmth,

daytimes are for shirtsleeves and wide-brimmed hats already.

The full moon last night was glorious and I was extremely grateful for a kind winter

with very few dark days ... both in the weather, and in my mind.

I'd like to share today's "mindfulness poetry" originally posted on A Year of Being Here,

for the record - my record.  My winter of eleven winters here ... the first without seasonal angst.

Because it just might have something to do with acceptance.

: : :

Dear Ezra

I have to confess:

there are abstractions

I no longer go in fear of.

Take loneliness.

I've started calling it solitude.

It feels so new and improved now,

I can honestly say it soaks up time

better than a sponge soaks up water.

The other day I actually washed this poem with it.

Ez, let me tell you,

aging is a Laundromat,

and eventually you find yourself

watching what you spurned

and dreaded for years

spread out in widening gyres,

like sheets fluffed in the dryer.

Life is quite a bit cozier

when you let all the bugaboos-

you know- say, sadness and fear

crawl into bed with you.

Pace them with your breathing

and they fall asleep

fast as a couple of kids.

The other night we huddled together

staring at the moon

as it slid past my window:

big-bellied sail on a wet black sea.

~ by Eileen Moeller. Text as published in Poems of Awakening: An International Anthology of Spiritual Poetry.

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Unimpeded

Thought it might be fitting to wind down this year of posts

with some thought-provoking verse from Maya Stein.  I've borrowed one of her words

for the title of this one.   "a dream" appeared in this morning's mail with perfect timing,

as her poetry so often does, and not only includes a reference to potholes, but arrived

exactly when I am ripe for the reading.

Unimpeded

yes, this will be a fine word to hold onto for the new year ... a heady reminder

that most blockades I feel are actually the ones I've put up myself.

First though, I owe you kind folks a debt of gratitude for your extremely helpful comments

on my last post about a Sweetpea Path makeover.  You've given me much to consider

and I'm so glad I asked!  It's been very  very  enlightening

and heartwarming

to receive your feedback, both on the blog and via private emails.

Thank you so much for taking the time to do that.

My 'idea hat' is now filled to the brim.

~ Mt. Baker view, while riding the ferry across the Salish sea ~

... so without further ado

a dream

For a moment, it all disappeared: the potholes tripping up your stride,

the broken love story, the difficult decision, the rigor of worry about things

you know you can't possibly fix.  Suddenly, some vacuum sucked it all inside

and you leaned back, unimpeded, innocent, casual with your gaze, the stings

of your life returned to their nascent nettles.  For a moment, you were able

to neutralize your place in the world, find fresh buoyancy in the waves.

For a moment, you saw, even, the geometry of loss, each cradle

that holds our grief so steady, each heartbeat threading through the maze.

But this was no sunny island reverie, some implausible and pointless dream.

It was you, remembering where you've always been.

~ Maya Stein

: : :

from "10-Line Tuesday" poetry series

... a backlog can be viewed   here

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Branches

just some serendipity this morn between

tree photos from the editing lightbox

and penetrating verse found in the inbox ...

chess anyone?

I'm imagining someone bent over a fresh board, poised for footsteps.  Despite

an early winter draft snaking upstairs, despite the almost-dinner hour and the too-small

likelihood of a passerby plucky enough to take the plunge, they are listening and patient,

ready for any stranger who might sit down. Such sturdy optimism. The invitation of it all.

I wonder if, at the heart of it, we forget to say exactly what we're looking for, anxious

that the details will cloister and confine, keep us from the thing we want.  The sign I read, 

narrowed as it was, stood beside an open door, and no matter what was next, there was,

at least, the certain knowledge it would include the pieces for a game to be played.

What little flag could I hold out?  What batch of words would say it best?

What would I ask if asking were the only branch I'd need to build my nest?

~ Maya Stein

: : :

"10-Line Tuesday" poetry

by Maya Stein ... a backlog can be viewed   here

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Speaking

what there aren't words for yet

What those hummingbirds in your chest whisper when you tell

your first lie. The toothy rumble of the lions that scare

your lungs into giving up. The edges of a leap - half-murmur, half-yell -

that steer your feet away. The guffaw from the shadows tempting you to ignore

your own magnificence. The boisterous roosters pecking holes in your plans. The tire

tracks cajoling you to stay on course. How we search for a plain sentence

to fill the cracks of heartache, for language to pull us, like a ladder,

out of each dark and muddled well. We think thunder is a metaphor. Or the fence

dividing one yard from the next, its own instruction. But the story's yours, you know.

There is no better way to say it. Make the words up as you go.

~ Maya Stein

  from her 10-Line Tuesday series

: : :

stitch, shibori, indigo, photography

Some means of expression

but only a small portion of the longer story unfolding.

Is there any better way

than to make it up as we go along?

I mean, really ... is there.

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Towards another edge ...

how to dive in

Be afraid. Tremble at the thought. Sleep poorly. Eat potato chips in

nervous succession.  Get angry when you least expected it. Feel

impatient at small talk, how much it delays and distracts. Yearn

for silence, that necessary blank canvas. Take note of the way clouds steal

across the sky, shaping themselves into the faces of celebrities, or a rabbit.

Find yourself, unexpectedly, advancing toward an edge, electric and unsure.

Notice the texture of the ground under your feet - loose pebbles, hot granite.

See what you do when no one's watching, how you lean in, how you want more,

aching for that first kiss of wind on your face, that smile of sun, beaming.

Catch your breath, close your eyes, then remember: you're not dreaming.

Maya Stein

~ from the 10-line Tuesday series

: : :

It's not the first time one of Maya's poems has arrived in my Tuesday box

somehow being so perfectly tuned

to here and now.

For you see, I'm heading out on a wee adventure shortly

to another edge,

or two,

some 4,450 miles from home ...

and I am feeling all these things Maya speaks of

[although I may have to admit to French fries over potato chips].

Shall be quiet here for a little while

but surely I'll have some tales to tell when I return.

The happiest of summers to each of you ...

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Paying some attention to what I take for granted

Lie Down

Lie down with your belly to the ground,

like an old dog in the sun.  Smell

the greenness of the cloverleaf, feel the damp

earth through your clothes, let an ant

wander the uncharted territory

of your skin.  Lie down

with your belly to the ground.  Melt into

the earth's contours like a harmless snake.

All else is mere bravado.

Let your mind resolve itself

in a tangle of grass.

Lie down with your belly

to the ground, flat out, on ground level.

Prostrate yourself before the soil

you will someday enter.

Stop doing.

Stop judging, fearing, trying.

This is not dying, but the way to live

in a world of change and gravity.

Let go.  Let your burdens drop.

Let your grief-charge bleed off

into the ground.

Lie down with your belly to the ground

and then rise up

with the earth still in you.

~ by Nancy Paddock, from Trust the Wild Heart ~

: : :

I've put a pot on the boil today, some cloth filled with leaves & twigs

and handfuls of weeds.  As I yanked those weeds from the spots they didn't belong

[didn't belong only because I said so ... they were quite happy]

the intense smell of damp earth surrounded me;  that dark brown smell,

the one that comes after a long hibernation

and for me only belongs to spring.

I thought about belonging.

I thought about what it means to get up every time.

How I first have to lie down before I can get up.

And then

I rolled all those thoughts into the cloth

with the leaves

the twigs

and the weeds.

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Pizza for breakfast

The weekend was stacking up to contain some possibly

wild weather,

forecasters detailing a big cold front headed our way

gliding down from the frigid Fraser River Valley in B.C.

One never knows living out in these islands

which way the winds will end up blowing,

if an "event" will or will not actually happen,

so yesterday while a few flakes drifted over Little Pond

I took some photos.

That cluster of bare alders in the center is a simple armiture this time of year

but gives a welcome view deeper into the woods.

I love how lichen puts a fluffy blanket on the willow grove back there.

Then, this morning there was this.  It's wet & sloshy but oh, so pretty.

I ate leftover pizza for breakfast [gluten free & spicy],

drank strong coffee

and decided to not do the laundry after all.

It's that kind of Sunday

and I may not get out of my sweats all day either ...

Upstairs,

I'm working on my piece for India's celebration book & this is a good thing

because [you know I have this problem with completing things]

she's set a deadline ... March 19th.

Maybe with an end date I will actually  finish  something.

I'm a little nervous

although forging ahead with great determination.

I hope she receives a tidal wave of submissions

so the book will be very

FAT.

And if you're reading about this for the first time

& happen to be one of her former students,

the details for participating can be found  HERE.

What a wonderful project for her to offer everyone ...

:::

Lately I've been filling my head with poetry before going to sleep.

Here's one I like from last night:

What The Dog Perhaps Hears

If an inaudible whistle

blown between our lips

can send him home to us,

then silence is perhaps

the sound of spiders breathing

and roots mining the earth;

it may be asparagus heaving,

headfirst, into the light

and the long brown sound

of cracked cups, when it happens.

We would like to ask the dog

if there is a continuous whir

because the child in the house

keeps growing, if the snake

really stretches full length

without a click and the sun

breaks through clouds without

a decibel of effort,

whether in autumn, when the trees

dry up their wells, there isn't a shudder

too high for us to hear.

What is it like up there

above the shut-off level

of our simple ears?

For us there was no birth cry,

the newborn bird is suddenly here,

the egg broken, the nest alive,

and we heard nothing when the world changed.

~ by Lisel Mueller ~

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New

what's to come

Say, for a moment, you gave yourself the luxury of floating your mind's

eye to the next chapter or your story. I know, you are still thick in the present tense,

married - for richer or poorer - to these pages. Or else you were told that what matters

is the now you're standing in, and you're a fool to take a stab before the hows and whens

announce themselves. But today, suspend the disbelief of your own wizardry. Imagine

words like roots not yet been planted, the sentences noodle and pliant.

Picture yourself in that ungardened garden,

the soil dark and porous, that loamy scent of what's to come not a defiant

question mark to shrink from but a light to lean against. How the tint and shade

begins to shape this vague new world your heart's already made.

~ Maya Stein

[... her last 10-line poem of 2013]

: : :

Thank you for all your visits here ...

It's been grand.

Let's celebrate new chapters 

 and the many ways we may "write" them next.

I like that idea of suspending disbelief in our own wizardry ... 

more of that, I'd say!

And that littlest seedling in the middle of the photo?

Grew just as tall and produced just as many beans

as all its companions.

No matter, really, if it appears we're lagging behind.

Everything 

and all of us

in our own good time.

Happy  new ~ a toast to you all on this very fine eve!

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Texture Tuesday ... being clear

clear in our need

She never questioned her hankering for oranges, never

wondered why something in her palate or the deeper request

of her belly insisted on that handful of tart-sweet wedges.  The body is clever,

hearing so precisely its own call we don't stop to contemplate, What is this thirst?

No, we make a beeline for the fridge, find fruit, slice it open.  And yet,

this long pause before the other longings, as if these were any more

complex, as if the wild heart of our hunger couldn't possibly be met.

Isn't it enough to be clear in our need?  What else is there to know before

we reach our hand in?  What better invitation than the cells stirring from their bed,

shrugging from an old slumber, wanting, simply, to be fed?

Maya Stein

: : :

This poem from Maya Stein is one from her  10-Line Tuesday  series,

a weekly poetry practice she started in 2005 ...

there's a beautiful backlog of them  HERE.

I often like to combine her prose with one of my pictures

and link up with Kim Klassen's  'Texture Tuesday'  set ...

texture lovers may want to have a peek  OVER THERE.

: : :

Photo recipe:

Shot with an iPhone through the jeep windshield

Dynamic Light app

Snapseed app

Romantic Photo app

Kim Klassen's texture,  framed

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2 for two hundred ...

Thank you

to all who stopped by to participate in my little giveaway ...

it was entirely lovely to hear from some of you who are normally

so

very

quiet,

and equally as lovely to have old

[and some not so old]

pals stopping by to join the celebration.

Alrighty then, shall we have a  {{{{{ drumroll }}}}}  for the names

pulled out of the hat?!

Here we go .....

Scraps in any colorway or combo of your choosing goes to

Debbie, from Tapestry @Sand Studio

Beads in any colorway or combo of your choosing goes to

Jennifer S., from true companion

So gals, please send me an email [link in the sidebar] with your

slow-mail addresses ... don't forget to tell me your color choices.

And just because I want to ....

I'm giving a special shout-out, hip-hip, and a BIG THANK YOU VERY MUCH!  to

 onepieceofstring

who was the  ONLY  participant who actually followed my directions, which read,

Simply leave a comment below with one word,

"scraps"  OR   "beads"

I tend to be a direction-follower myself so I wholeheartedly appreciate

her  one word  response.  (And as it happens

she lives on an island, too  HERE).

:::

Anyone remember this charming fellow?

I'll leave you with this ... seems appropriate for the occasion ...

Happiness runs in a circular motion

Thought is like a little boat upon the sea

Everybody is a part of everything anyway

You can have everything if you let yourself be.

~ Donovan Leitch ~

Thanks again.  See you later.

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Marking two hundred ...

Can hardly believe it.  This is my 200th blog post.

Will you join me in a giveaway to celebrate?

Not too fancy ... just a couple of small tokens

to let you know how much I appreciate your visits here.

I probably wouldn't have kept at it this so long if it hadn't been for

all of you stopping by to read and take the time to leave kind comments & such.

Your good suggestions, commiseration, pieces of advice, gentle observations, helpful tips

 ... oh, and the humor! the camaraderie!  the friendships from afar ... well, it's been grand.

Every bit of it

and I've loved it all.

So let's keep going on together for a while longer

since it appears [rolling eyes upward] I have not yet run out of things to say ...

nor have I run out of pictures to share ... 

[Autumn has arrived and the leafage has embarked on 

its miraculous dance tour again!]

Anyhoo, let's get down to it, shall we?

Here's how it shall go:  I've decided we should have 

TWO

giveaway items

(it is the  two  hundredth post after all) ...

One person will receive a small stash of cloth  scraps  in the color combo of

their choice, ripped & torn from my collection of lovelies in the cupboard,

mainly from old clothing and assorted textile items;

A second person will receive a small stash of  beads  in the color combo of

their choice, chosen especially for them from my [embarrassingly] good-sized

hoard  HOARD  collection of beads.

Simply leave a comment below with one word,

"scraps"  OR   "beads"

(no, no, you cannot have both, stop twitching)

and come this Saturday night, one name will be chosen out of each hat.

The recipients will be announced Sunday, sometime after morning coffee ~

that means sometime before noon.

Are you in?  All are welcome, 

even those who have never left a comment before.

If you are not signed in to Blogger, feel free to use the email link in the sidebar.

Deadline to enter:  Saturday, October 26th, 10pm, Pacific Time USA

I'll ship anywhere in the world

because we're all in this together.

And for that, I give you my deepest thanks.

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