Of Books and Blooms

not-quite Journaling, 62

My autumns are wild
magic, uncanny prose
and storms,
storms of dark poetry.

11/21/2023: Chilly fall(ing) months are for delighting in hot coffee and creepy bits by some of my favorite word weavers--Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson, Stephen King, Poppy Z. Brite… And I just picked up “Monstrosity”, a short story collection by Laura Diaz de Arce. I was seduced by the cover… 😏📚

 

11/28/2023: One of my radiation therapists traveled to the Dominican Republic (the island of my birth) and brought me back an avocado the size of my head. Fine, I might be exaggerating--I have an enormous skull--still, the thing was huge. I planted the seed. And I’ve been harvesting (and eating) the leaves--which happen to be yummy (and grow as ginormous as the seed that sprouted them).  Click HERE for photos of the growing process.

 

12/1/2023: If the sight of my cactus’s growing erections didn’t make you chuckle or giggle a bit, then your sense of humor is a lot more grownup than mine--which doesn’t say much, so stop gloating--my sense of humor has been stuck at the hormonal teenage phase for a few decades.

 

When the universe told my kabocha squash soup that she could be whatever she wanted, she bloomed nuttily. 🤭

 Poets and Storytellers United--Friday Writings #106: Seasonal Readings.

Loss Is Loss

This senryu was my response to someone who asked, “Who do you stand with [on the Israel-Hamas conflict]?” War is a terrible thing. I’ll always hurt for innocent lives crushed because they couldn’t get away fast enough. Soldiers sort of know what to expect, when they go to war. But noncombatants caught in middle--women, men, children…--they didn’t sign up for all the dying. I stand with them. 💔

- for Poets and Storytellers United--Friday Writings #104: Small Kindnesses.