Enticing Souls and Quickening Soil

not-quite Journaling, 67

3/17/2024: My enthusiasm for starting avocado seeds might’ve gone slightly wild. Also, I’m wondering if Crazy Sh*t Presidents Said (in 1^st photo), The Thackery T. Lambshead Pocket Guide to Eccentric & Discredited Diseases (in 2^nd photo), and Cien años de soledad/One Hundred Years of Solitude (in 3^rd photo) have any effect on avocado seeds’ sprouting cycles. Then again, there is a chance that this is just my brain playing the let’s-think-about-anything-else-but-this-freaking-pain-in-your-joints old game. What do you think? 🤔

 

Spring has arrived,

blooming warmth
and sprouting

kisses,
to entice souls
and quicken soil.

3/19/2024: To celebrate the first day of spring, my potted mini-orange grove and I enjoyed the sunrise together. It’s still too chilly for tender seedlings, so I didn’t keep the pot outside for long. Since my coffee and I are made of hotter stuff, we stayed until my cup was empty (and the hostile looks on several blue jays’ eyes suggested that enough was enough, they wanted time alone with their birdfeeder). May this spring bring you warmth, health, growth, smiles (and, perhaps, birds that aren’t so greedy).

 

(i) still the monster
with writing.

3/26/2024: Also with doodling, stitching, letting my muse ink wild, planting every seed in sight, obsessively reorganizing my books… Whatever works, right?

The morning stretches awake to the song of gut and bone wailing echoes of pain. The universe living in my skull wonders if the rest of my flesh is ready to carry a new day. Then I see him smile for me, his lips feed me a kiss, and the beats under my ribs roar, “We can do anything!”

3/29/2024: Some days (all right, most days) a smile, a kiss, a hug, a bit of gossip, a picture of a plant, a hysterical meme, a new book, an old song, a “You’ve been in my thoughts, Ms. Wicked”, and pretty much any gesture, from the ones we love and are loved by, can be the best painkiller.

– for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #120: A Touch of Formality)

Tapestry

I’ve been weaving my words
for you, gathering
living threads of laughter and pain,
of loss and growth,
of real dreams and dreamed realities.
I’ve been weaving hurt and joy and hope
into a tapestry of all my love
for you.

 

photo by Yannick Pulver, on Unsplash

 – for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #119: In Memoriam)

In this Story, Nature Soothes My Aches

not-quite Journaling, 66

2/8/2024: I might’ve spent the last hour ogling Ms. Amaryllis. Fine, I was doing my lymphatic draining massage while the ogling went on, but… I still wonder if she’s considering whether or not I’m a creep. What say you, Ms. Amaryllis? She’s not saying much. Maybe she’s just the sensuously silent type. 🤔

 

Steel cut oats
on a snowy day,
hot and sweet
memories blooming
delight on my tongue.

2/13/2024: I’m waiting for Nature to stop frosting New York City, before going to explore the woods. For now, let the exploration be of oats, cinnamon, nutmeg, raw sugar, roasted pecans… and a favorite story.

 

small magics
keep a wintered soul warm
until spring

more photos here

2/22/2024: I woke up to gut-crushing pain. You know, the sort of agony that curls your body in a whimpering ball and shrouds your skin in cold sweat?  After hours of tests (and loudly creative language), I got to go for a walk. Nature (knowing I was having a crappy day) gifted me with glimpses of snow and berries bedecking holly, hellebore and periwinkle springing through the cold, and a few minutes of sunlight on a cloudy day. The pain remains at rather nasty levels, but Nature’s gifts make the torture not matter so very much.   

 

In this story, the woods eat my aches.

3/7/2024: New York City has been in a rainy mood. I haven’t been able to go for a stroll in days. It’s cloudy but rainless now. So, on my walk back from the hospital, I cut through the woods. Every step was balm for muscle, bone, spirit… The sight of extra verdant moss, mushrooms, crocuses, hellebores, periwinkles, and budding daffodils was high quality smile-fuel. The sun is supposed to come out tomorrow. I think I’ll go for a run… All right, it’ll be more like a walk/jog. Still, it’ll be glorious. 

 

“I love amaryllis because they are plump and juicy.
They feel like spring even in the middle of winter.”
~ Jonathan Adler

more photos here

 

Were I snow, I would fall on you
gently--caressing, coating…
warming winter-kissed limbs
until spring blossoms.

 Light and love and lust are in the air. Spring is coming…
🌸🥰🌸

 

– for Poets and Storytellers United (Friday Writings #118: Strange Springs)