icon caret-left icon caret-right instagram pinterest linkedin facebook twitter goodreads question-circle facebook circle twitter circle linkedin circle instagram circle goodreads circle pinterest circle

Life on the Deckle Edge

Poetry Friday - Valentine-ing....

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers!

 

How did it get to be February so fast?!

 

Tonight for Beaufort's "First Friday" celebration, with shops and galleries and such open late and offering wine and goodies, the theme is "Luv-in Downtown."  So, I have Valentines on my mind!

 

Most of you know I'm hopelessly addicted to antique maps, manuscripts, and ephemera.  I've enjoyed conjuring up some cards for the occasion incorporating collaged images I've reproduced from paper treasures I've collected. The bottom card features a lacy background image from a Victorian card, topped with a specially cropped image of our Lowcountry portion of a South Carolina map from a 1909 atlas. The top card features re-combined elements from some Victorian Valentines, with the warm notion,

 

May true

friends be

around you

 

- not really a poem, but a lovely sentiment.  

 

Speaking of sentiment... Oh, those Victorians.  The poem inside one of the aforementioned cards went like this:

 

From me

   to you,

      in greeting

Affectionate

       and true;

 

To say one heart

    is beating

That still

  remembers you.

 

(Gotta love 'em.)  

 

I do get all warm and fuzzy thinking about Poetry Friday friends, must admit - and I loved the poetry postcards which brought January greetings, and some other correspondence with dear PF friends. 

 

And... I confess I love VICTORIA on Masterpiece.  Took me a few episodes to get hooked when it first started, but now I'm hopelessy trapped in front of the TV on Sunday nights at 9 p.m., lamenting that the seasons aren't long enough.

 

Speaking of Valentines, if 'watercolorful' is more your speed, our own Michelle Kogan chimed in last week with a link to some she's made in her Etsy shop, too! 

 

Be sure to visit all the poetry links rounded up for us this week by the marvelous Tabatha at The Opposite of Indifference. And, especially you all in the Midwest and Northeast, please stay cozy and safe!

21 Comments
Post a comment

Poetry Friday - New Year Poem Postcard

Greertings, Poetry Lovers! 

 

Last weekend I was on the road, and more of the same this weekend, truth be told.  

 

But I wanted to pop in with a wave and a THANK YOU to you dear and talented poets who have brightened my January with poem postcards.  (& BIG hugs to Jone Rush MacCulloch, who conjured up the exchange.) The examples above are brimming with New Year natural imagery, and pigs (it's the Year of the Pig), and - some touches of pink! (The flip side of Irene's card sports a pink flamingo, in homage to my home state of Florida.) If I misplaced a card in my haste to snap a photograph, my apologies. [And I owe a couple of folks responses to other wonderful surprises via the mail... I plan to catch up next week!  Thank you.]

 

The postcard I sent out, above, echoed a similar theme to the ones I was lucky enough to receive. Sea fog sometimes shrouds our usually bright little town with mystery and wonder.  And if the sun comes out, well - Nature takes her course. I'm hoping some of the fog I feel over our country right now might lift in favor of light and warmth this year, too.

 

 

new year
sea fog surrenders
to sun

 

©Robyn Hood Black. All rights reserved.

 

 

Photo credit goes to my hubby, Jeff, who kindly and speedily rolled down the passenger window as I was driving us to church recently, crossing over the bridge.  "You have a new phone with a good camera - Quick!  I need a picture of fog over the marsh!"

 

Then I played with the image a little, "floating" a picture of a compass from a 1700s replica map I  have, featuring the Southeastern coast. To this I dabbed a sparkle or two of metallic gold paint, then "antiqued" the edges with brown ink. 

 

Making several, in case I messed up, I decided to list a few in my Etsy shop, too. :0) Thanks for the inspiration, Jone, and all the other participants.  

 

Here's hoping the sunny days outnumber the others in your year ahead.... 

 

In fact, at Going to Walden, Tara is offering a Linda Pastan poem pondering the goings-on of the world, and rounding up lots of enlightening poetry links! Enjoy. 

11 Comments
Post a comment

Poetry Friday - Just a Wee Wave on toward Tricia's...

Greetings, All - On my way to a dear friend's this weekend, so skipping a Poetry Friday post.  But be sure to call on our oh-so-clever Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect for this week's Roundup! See you soon. :0)

Be the first to comment

Poetry Friday - Resolutions?

 

Greetings, Poetry Lovers!

 

I hope your New Year is off to a positive start. 

 

Maybe a good time to share a one-line haiku of mine from Frogpond last spring: 

 

 

 

drips of melting ice my resolutions

  


Frogpond, Vol. 41:2, Spring 2018

poem ©Robyn Hood Black

 

 

How about you - are you a New Year's Resolution-Maker? 

 

I wouldn't automatically say "yes" for myself, BUT... the reality is:

 

1.) I've just added a new nutrition book & cookbook to our crowded kitchen (mainly because I wanted to make the veggie soup similar to what my stepdad, "Poppy," keeps in their Florida fridge to have every day) and stuffed our own fridge with not only the soup, but half of the entire produce section....

 

2.) I might have ordered a stationary bike from Amazon this week, to go in the spot where the Christmas tree was....

 

3.) I might also have gone to Staples to get notebooks and dividers to actually corral the eight-plus years of material I've written as part of the CORE ESSENTIALS character ed. program, so I can be better organized for writing the new assignments about this time every year. 

 

So, maybe I am a resolution-maker, even if I don't want to claim it?  I'm fortunate that my hubby is a student and practitioner of Ayurveda, and he is always trying out new recipes for healthful food.  [I'd rather eat yummy food but do most of my creating at my studio or a writing desk, except for that soup!]  We've been vegetarians for 31 years now (!), and he's been a vegan for the last several of those. 

 

I already have to do wee bits of yoga, too, because of a couple prior injuries - a good motivator to stretch. But  the cardio is a bit wanting, when the pace of regular walking must allow for the pace of a 3 1/2-pound Chihuahua. ;0)  And because I know I'm a wimp about getting out in winter weather - even if it IS Southern-Coastal-Mild winter weather -, I ordered the indoor bike.

 

Whatever goals or practices you're embracing this year, I wish you success and ease as well as dashes of humor when things don't always go as planned.  

 

Our wonderful Kat is welcoming everyone to the Poetry Friday Roundup with a hearty "G'Day" - enjoy all the offerings, and I DO resolve to make it around to more posts this year than in recent months! 

24 Comments
Post a comment

Poetry Friday - Wrap Your Arms (& Arms & Arms & Arms) Around Poetic Postcards with Irene Latham

--Interior detail from Love, Agnes by Irene Latham, illustrated by Thea Baker (Millbrook Press/Lerner, 2018).

 

 

Greetings and HAPPY NEW YEAR, Poetry Lovers!

 

I hope your 2019 is beginning with poetic inspirations.  

 

I had hoped to start off the year with a sparkly clean house, office, studio... but actually, I resonated more with David G. Lanoue's DAILY ISSA for Thursday:

 

     basking
     in the New Year's sun...
     my trashy hut

 

     year unknown

 

translation by David G. Lanoue.  Learn how to up for your own DAILY ISSA in your inbox here.

 

So organizing is going a little slowly, but at least I'm finally able to catch up on a wee bit of book-loving after the busy holiday/retail holiday season.

 

Here's hoping you've already joined all the fun fanfare for Agnes, the postcard-penning Octopus and star of our own Irene Latham's book, Love, Agnes- Postcards from an Octopus, illustrated by Thea Baker (Millbrook Press/Lerner). Evidently octupuses were a literary trend this fall, which Irene shares in her September blog post here; and be sure to swim around all the October posts celebrating Octopus Month and featuring wonderful poetry and art by fellow Poetry-Friday-ers and others!

 

Love, Agnes is not a poetry collection but is a wittily entertaining fantastical narrative, with lots of facts blended in and strong emotions deftly portrayed.  (So you see, it's much like poetry.) Characters include a young boy who writes about family frustrations; Agnes, an aged Octopus who is not afraid to speak her mind and who nurtures her zillions of babies; and a few more creatures, crabby and otherwise,  hanging out in the underwater neighborhood. Much of the story unfolds through postcards written by these salty personalities.  (It's worth a visual trip through the book just to see the postage stamps & cancellations created by Thea Baker!)

 

While it's not technically poetry, you'll find tasty rhymes and other poetic devices hiding in the pint-sized epistles as well as the regular text. 

 

Like this:

 

     Dear Crab,

 

     Okay, I'll leave you and

     your friends alone.  IF you'll

     promise me this:  BE QUIET.

     No skittering or scuttling

     near my nest. My babies need

     their rest.

 

     Thanks in advance,

 

     Exhausted Agnes

 

Each character has such a fun voice, and the voice of the whole book is definitely Irene's.  No wonder it has raked in rave reviews like coquina shells at the seashore.

 

One reason I was keen to share this book this week is that I've signed up to participate in Jone MacCulloch's Poem Postcard swap for January!  November and December were too much of a whoosh for me to get myself signed up for Tabatha's wonderful winter poem swap. But this I aim to do.  

 

As it happens, I've already received two WONDERFUL postcard poems in the mail on Thursday.  (Looking forward to sharing later.)  These poets are obviuosly way more together than I (you know who you are).  We are actually still doing family travel for Christmas, with my side of the family having celebrated just before and through the holiday, and my hubby's side meeting up this first weekend in January.  I haven't quite got both feet in the New Year yet!  

 

Be sure to take your poetic tentacles over to POETRY FOR CHILDREN with our amazing Syliva, and grab lots of great poetry to get your year off on the right foot (and arm, and arm, and arm, and - well - you get the idea.)  You can learn more about Irene and her lovely, lively work here

21 Comments
Post a comment