Kat Apel, way down under, hosts our Poetry Friday today HERE at her blog. She's been doing a few cartwheels and high jumps because she has a new book out, The Bird in the Herd! You can read her "release day post" HERE! Thank you, Kat!
I am so excited that spring is, at least officially, just a couple of weeks away. It's been in the fifties and sixties this week, after our big snow last week! I know, I know that in Colorado, March, then April, are traditionally our snowiest months, thus it may be spring, but winter weather will return. In fact, yesterday was 60 and this afternoon it started to rain and will fall into snow overnight. Back warm again tomorrow. Flip-flop it does! However, warm-weather seasons are coming!
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| hoya blooming, sure sign of spring! |
I wrote my final poem in February with the group celebrating Laura Shovan's birthday to Michelle Kogan's prompt, to write about the back. Remember the theme for each day connected to the "body". This time, Michelle gave us the freedom to use "back" in the various ways it is used in our language, like "backdrop" or "throwback", not exclusively to our bodies. I chose to connect to a memory of the "backdoor" at a grandparents' home.
Backdoor in My Mind
Out the back door lies
Grandma’s garden
giving us all those growing things
you imagine. They sleep together
among the strange snarls of kohlrabi
she calls her fruit of the loom.
(Because of those tangles, you know.)
Out the back door lies
Grandpa’s shed, all those tools
leaning together like men at the
downtown bar: diggers, cutters, rakers,
saws, each one with a story to tell
(which Grandpa relates).
Out the back door lies
my maple tree, the one grown enough
to hold me while I read,
(like Mother did when I was tiny),
the one offering helicopters that really fly
and crimson leaves that predict ‘goodbye’.
Out the back door lies
the porch where warm rainy days
mean slow stories,
and clear evenings are perfumed
with sundown and starlight
and being together.
Linda Baie ©
Oh, I love this poem. I love the ending of being together with the sundown and the starlight. I had no idea how special and sweet and short my time would be with my grandparents. I miss them and their garden and the talk about the garden and the walks out to the garden. They had so much growing! Such a wonderful post, Linda. Now that it's over, February seems so short. I loved writing every day with the group.
ReplyDeleteOh, these are familiar memories, Linda. I especially loved the flow of your rhyming lines - and the image of helicopters and crimson leaves. And the build to the warmth of the conclusion.
ReplyDeleteAnd thank-you for sharing the excitement of the new picture book!💙
DeleteOh that coming warmth... and those back porch memories, which make a beautiful poem, Linda. Thank you for sharing! xo
ReplyDeleteSimply lovely, such tender observations and wonderful images. Love those tools stacked up like men at the bar, and the tree big enough to hold you as you read (like your mother's arms). Beautiful!
ReplyDeleteI love how you visited this familiar place in your mind. It made me think of my grandfather and how he loved his tools. I need to write a poem about that!
ReplyDeleteThis is a wonderful poem. I particularly love your description of the tools in the shed, a rough bunch. I'm so glad it warming up. Not here yet, but I know it will, it must!
ReplyDeleteSuch a warm, feel-good poem, with lines touching and full of love,
ReplyDelete"my maple tree, the one grown enough
to hold me while I read,
(like Mother did when I was tiny),"
Thanks for sharing your poem here Linda, I enjoyed reading it even more this time–so many pictures inside!
And I love your hoya blooming plant!
What a beautiful trip out that back door, Linda. Thankyou for sharing some warmth.
ReplyDeleteYour poem made tears spring into my eyes. As I walked out your back door, I was thinking about the back door of my childhood home. Out that back door was also the garden, the toolshed (LOVE: "all those tools / leaning together like men at the / downtown bar"), so many memories. I may have to write my own back door poem. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteLinda, this is just beautiful. All those little asides in parentheses feel like intimate details that you might say to a backdoor neighbor, so this all feels so companionable and heart-filled. Love it. Those tools leaning together...I got a whole sense of a town there.
ReplyDeleteI am so glad I got to read this poem again. It is just beautiful with those memories out the back door that enfold childhood and family and love.
ReplyDeleteLinda, it was great seeing you online last night. I hope you are enjoying your weekend with family. I love the repetition in your poem and the ending is just so lovely.
ReplyDelete"clear evenings are perfumed/with sundown and starlight/and being together."
This is such a lovely poem, Linda. It makes me feel like summer gardens are right around the corner. I'm hoping that this year we can really enjoy the smells of summer gardens not just the sight of them.
ReplyDeleteOh Linda, how lovely are your tangled vines, tools, slow stories and perfumes. I want to meander here in the backdoor or your mind a long, long while.
ReplyDeleteThis poem feels like a warm hug — so beautiful, and every image more lovely than the last. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteLovely, Linda! I am such a fan of poems about your childhood and grandparents.
ReplyDeleteThank you everyone. It's such a busy time these recent days, but I appreciate your words and that you enjoyed my poem. It is a favorite of mine from this past February!
ReplyDeleteExquisite, Linda, every single word! I'm printing this one for my writer's notebook.
ReplyDeleteMy dad had a shed out the back door too and a garden that filled 3/4 of the back yard and a clothesline! Maybe there's a slice waiting outside the back door.
Thanks, Ramona. I imagine you have a wonderful slice to write from your own 'back door'!
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