Reminiscing

__________________

Texting with my daughter

Serving

Oh to be able to taste again

sweet tapas of Malaga

restaurants flung wide open

olives served which we never ordered

but still had to pay for

_____________

dVerse prompt on food. One too many servings of covid right now.

Procrastination

• 

Rain is falling

branches ready to snap

leaves blow everywhere

he waits to go rake

leaves pile higher

at least clear a path so I won’t fall down

little at a time will get the job done

🍁🍁🍁🍁🍁🍁🍁

Rain is falling

look the sun just came out

grab your rake and go

it might not last long

glistening on tree

how can you take a nap at times like this

it could be the last time we see this sun

________________

dVerse prompt on a pet peeve— like when my husband doesn’t help raking leaves 🍁 and I sit writing this

A Place in the Sun

• 

Houses for sale in the Algarve

follow the cobblestone to the yellow one

imagine myself speaking Portuguese

eu escrevo em poesia

nadar no Mediterrâneo

cultivar vegetais

_________________

dVerse prompt concerning an imagined house — I’ll take one in the Algarve of Portugal. Translation:

I write in poetry/ swim in the Mediterranean/grow vegetables

My Bread is Rising

• 

My bread is rising

long loaves placed on a pan

now side by side

twice the size

and still growing

a hot oven is waiting

for the right time

to bake it crisp

yet soft and chewy

serve it warm

with Greek olive oil

Palinode

• 

• 

______________

dVerse prompt to write a palinode

Devils Lake

• 

Dakotas spoke it as mni wak’an

mni (water)

wak’an (pure source or sacred)

there was no concept of devil

til white man saw it as bad spirit

water that was undrinkable

created mirages like spirits

over the waters

marked it on the map

Devils Lake

______________

Traveling in North Dakota, I camped at this lake.

My Dog and I

• 

It is bath time for the dog

he looks at me

like he knows the word bath

really it’s a shower

but I call it bath

he lets me take him in my arms

and placed in the tub

I spray him with water

rub him vigorously with suds

between the toes (especially between his toes)

and all over

I still remember a time when someone

showered me

dried my skin

and put ringlets in my hair

Burial

  

Although I am gone I see you there

so nice how you gathered flowers while I

(below in my coffin)

smiled the mortician’s smile

and watched as each of you

placed a rose upon the lid

before I was lowered into the earth

Now I would rather be placed

in a tree pod

my decomposition 

feeding a fig tree

(remember the one 

on the south side of the house)

you can eat my figs

There is sorrow in that

I would have to die twice

_________________

NaPoWriMo Day 8 — writing from the POV of a dead person.  Photo of an ancient burial urn taken at Muséo Archeologico Regionale Paolo Orsi in Syracuse, Sicily

Return

Will men understand the mysterious language of those tears?                                                              Pope Pius XII October 17, 1954

  
I went there

Basilica Santuario Madonna Delle Lacrime 

Siracusa, Sicily

Weeping Madonna

housed in the architecture of a tear

I took a photo there

ignorant of its meaning

until now

when asked to fill a space with poetry

and now

I want to know the meaning of those tears

Does she weep for His suffering

or for the plight of a humanity

trying to return to God?

________________

NaPoWriMo Day 4 prompt.  I took my own photo of the Basilica Santuario Madonna Delle Lacrime in October 2019, not knowing that it was home of the weeping Madonna.