No Bones About It

My late mom once noticed a lone fly buzzing about. I told her to swat it, but she said it was her friend for the moment. That memory resurfaced when a moth landed on my screen door. It reminded me of how closely we’re tied to everything around us as we move through different stages of existence. We’re never alone, indoors or out, even when we don’t see the creatures that flitter, crawl, or scamper under our floors and amid the foliage. Some wander into our homes, as the moth might have wanted to before it flew off. The moth and mouse in my poem (at bottom) is about all sorts of flighty relationships hopeful for deeper meaning. Though the poem veers from the Poets and Storytellers United prompt "bones", I will note moths and flies have none, while mice, due to tiny vertebrae in their tails, have some 230, more than the 206 in humans. And oddly, horses, too, have about 206, their tails perfect for swatting flies.

Afterthought: In view of increasing wildfires worldwide, I wonder if we are equally a little bit moth, drawn to the light of our screens, and a little bit mouse, hiding from the damage we caused to the environment that we need to sustain us beyond the screens.

Explore more at Poets and Storytellers United, SKYWATCH and Saturday's Critters. 

Check out my sites: Postcards from Penelope Puddle and Musings of A Puddlist In B.C.

Because the state of our planet is the most pressing issue of our time, link up and learn about the  Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report and watch environmental activist, 90-year-old David Suzuki, in an interview.

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Hanging By A Thread

A recent appointment took me to Vancouver and the window overlooking False Creek and city skyline where Science World's dome was dressed like a soccer ball for FIFA playing at BC Place. I watched a few televised matches and got swept up in the energy, just as crowds in the stadiums did. Their wild excitement reminded me that humans once gathered in coliseums and town squares for contests ending in death and public executions. Now we settle for relatively mild injuries and distant violence, easier on our supposed “evolved sensibilities.” Still, FIFA players showed we are better off entwined in hugs and handshakes at battle's end. And as my poem for Poets and Storytellers United suggests, a desperate need to win, not just in sports and physical fights but in emotional arguments, can have us unraveling as if our very survival hangs by a thread.

At ground-level amid the highrises, victory for seagulls means heisting a tasty snack. 

Explore more at Poets and Storytellers United, SKYWATCH and Saturday's Critters. 

Check out my sites: Postcards from Penelope Puddle and Musings of A Puddlist In B.C.

Because the state of our planet is the most pressing issue of our time, link up and learn about the  Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report and watch environmental activist, 90-year-old David Suzuki, in an interview.

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No Backtracking

"Each one has to find his peace from within. And peace to be real must be unaffected by outside circumstances." - Mahatma Gandhi

    

White Rock, Ocean Park and Crescent Beach are sleepy coastal communities that trains waken. I've written a lot about the BNSF Railway into Canada from the US that ribbons the West Coast seaside, heading to terminals in Metro Vancouver with cargoes of coal and chemicals to load onto massive ships for export largely to China. Environmental and safety concerns abound, particularly since a long string of boxcars (sometimes stacked), and tanks, cut off beach access. In Crescent Beach, the train coming through can prevent residents from exiting the village sometimes for a half hour or more, a serious concern should an emergency needing an ambulance occur. My recent sighting of the train in White Rock and the Poets and Storytellers United prompt "body of water" inspired my poem Overload below, not only about trains but a metaphor for airways carrying the weight of the world's discourse. Water, tracks, the internet: all conduits. 

     

Explore more at Poets and Storytellers United, SKYWATCH and Saturday's Critters. 

Check out my sites: Postcards from Penelope Puddle and Musings of A Puddlist In B.C.

Because the state of our planet is the most pressing issue of our time, link up and learn about the  Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report and watch environmental activist, 90-year-old David Suzuki, in an interview.

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Unfurnished

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Consumed By The Cloud

“You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” - C.S. Lewis

The Cloud is deceptively, brilliantly, named but humanity again finds that what starts as a manageable useful tool can become overbearing and destructive. The Lewis quote from Poets and Storytellers United reminds me that the dreams of some fulfilled can be our nightmares and in waking hours take us down rabbit holes. It sounds dramatic and far less romantic to admit that our data is not resting on a nebulous Cloud. Rather, data is stored ofttimes in huge buildings that drain masses of water and electrical resources, non-stop humming loudly to the despair of neighbours. Wish I had a solution for this monster we feed as reliance on the digital grows to "lock box" our keepsakes, personal and business dealings and even our identities. Below is my poem and recent pictures I took on walks, to be stored, of course, on the Cloud. Currently, Canada has some 300 data centres and Google says 4,000 to 5,400 operational data centers are in the U.S., representing nearly half of all facilities worldwide.

Explore more at Poets and Storytellers United, SKYWATCH and Saturday's Critters. 

Check out my sites: Postcards from Penelope Puddle and Musings of A Puddlist In B.C.

Because the state of our planet is the most pressing issue of our time, link up and learn about the  Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report and watch environmental activist, 90-year-old David Suzuki, in an interview.

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Symphony Of Sensations

For some, it’s about suntanning. For me, the seaside compels me to listen and feel my existence. The birds, the breeze, the nature I sense all around have their pitch‑perfect tempos. The universe is alive with meaning, and if you tune yourself to it, you can feel its music in your own heartbeat. But music does not feel, we do. Life feels, and so life becomes the source of meaning in the seemingly indifferent universe. Whatever lies beyond is keeping its curtains closed and its keys hidden. This, along with the Poets and Storytellers United prompts, "teeth, hammer and blooms" inspires my poem as I swing from being the snowman whose season is over still lingering, to an eagle flying.

   

Explore more at Poets and Storytellers United, SKYWATCH and Saturday's Critters. 

Check out my sites: Postcards from Penelope Puddle and Musings of A Puddlist In B.C.

Because the state of our planet is the most pressing issue of our time, link up and learn about the  Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report and watch environmental activist, 90-year-old David Suzuki, in an interview.

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Words Have Wings

"From the wide window towards the granite shore/The white sails still fly seaward, seaward flying/ Unbroken wings ..." - from Ash Wednesday by T.S. Eliot

    

The Ocean Park Hall that opened in 1926 was the perfect place to celebrate its 100-year-history this June. Outside were games, food and face painting. Inside, grainy photos were on display of days gone by, including of the original post office. Deemed the world's smallest at the time, the six foot by six foot building made it into Ripley's Believe It Or Not!. Nowadays, most messages are sent electronically on keyboards and hand written letters in the mail seem a luxury. My poem (at bottom) is an ode to the hand written letter, inspired in part by the Poets and Storytellers United prompt, the quote by T.S. Eliot, reminding that words have wings though they travel by different means and that even Eliot preferred a typewriter in the early 1900's to ink and pen.

       

For clarity, above and below are digital reproductions of faded black/white photos. Mail arrived to the Ocean Park community via the railway by the shore and carried uphill.

   

My poem in flowery font is from the heart, although not written by hand on paper.

Explore more at Poets and Storytellers United, SKYWATCH and Saturday's Critters. 

Check out my sites: Postcards from Penelope Puddle and Musings of A Puddlist In B.C.

Because the state of our planet is the most pressing issue of our time, link up and learn about the  Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report and watch environmental activist, 90-year-old David Suzuki, in an interview.

HOLD ONTO THE LIGHT

Read more