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Reno 3.31.10

by Shaun

A poem, here at the end of March:

Clouds hug the elevated ridges,

snow lays down

and the mountains are white, growing old,

showing all our age.

---

(looking at the carson range of the "sierra nevada," loose spanish for "snow capped mountain range")

My Paper, in Wordle

by Shaun

My first, article-length paper for the literary nonfiction class I'm taking this semester - on the link between Loren Eiseley and Wendell Berry.  I needed a representation other than the 15 pages...

Drinking coffee and listening

by Shaun

Thoreau wrote, "When we are unhurried and wise, we perceive that only great and worthy
things have any permanent and absolute existence, that petty fears and
petty pleasures are but the shadow of the reality." 
Thus, I begin to shape my weekend with a simple wonder:
 
--

Drinking coffee and listening
to Amiina, my eyes catching
a shadow-dance of roof-ice losing solidity, becoming
liquid, changing, free, falling, and
my ears catching its tinker unionizing
with Amiina's universal hymns.
The inside and the outside
coalesce; we are all on the same side.

--

link to amiina, a visual

Celebrations!

We had two great things to celebrate around the Ohome recently.
One was Kyndra's birthday last week - April 30th!  I think we had some fun, just taking time to hang out together and enjoy some down time.  I know that she deeply appreciated her friends at school and how they took time to celebrate her.  Then we had some delicious pizza and wine at Olivella's at University Park in Dallas.  It was a beautiful night all around.

And a few days before that, Kyndra presented at TWU's Annual Celebration of Scholarship.  She and her partner Kacey had worked hard on research about the occupation of care givers in end of life care, and  it was a great opportunity to share new info with other students and teachers and Therapists there. 
Kyndra's family and her good friend Media (and her husband Darrell) from past work came to cheer her on.  And it all went great - we are all PROUD ... and we all can look at Kyndra differently now.  It's hard to know what really goes on in classes and in studying up at school; her presentation is a testimony to great work for the past 3 semesters!  What a way to begin wrapping up her studies.  Way to Go Kyndra!!

       

Just Write!

by kyndra

from the Healing Environments Conference - Baylor Dallas:
A number of recent occurrences have led me to begin writing again. It has been a long time since I have written ... much before the blog world! In the past, I spent most of my time writing in my red leather journal, the one with a heart engraved on the front. I think I may have gotten away from personal writing because I have spent so many of the past years writing for school. I will never forget the words of my honor’s composition professor, Dr. Greer, saying, “The only way to be a good writer is to practice, practice, practice.” I hated the agonizing writing assignments day after day and week after week, but looking back on that class now, I can’t imagine a better way to have learned! I learned the value of practice. And though any kind of writing is good practice, writing for school isn’t always the most meaningful and thus self-satisfying to write. I am lucky to be in a field, occupational therapy, where my research and writing content actually is very interesting to me. But still, writing to express is a very different experience.
    I enjoy writing. It is a way to release my thoughts as well as a way to self-explore. I often feel that writing for me is a spiritual connection too. I have to go deep within, and connect my heart and mind. And somehow, that act results in an expression of my spirit.
    This weekend I volunteered at the Healing Environments Conference at Baylor Hospital. I attended a session called: Just Write! The Spiritual Art of Creative Expression.  Alan Wright, MDiv led the discussion on writing. A few critical points stuck out to me ...
... God did not create, and it was over. He is always creating. We can participate with him in creating when we use our imagination ...
... Are you your “worst critic?” ... or are you really just trying to please someone or avoid negative criticism? Is writing worth writing that way? Write for you. Write for the experience. Write and focus on the process.

And so because of those thoughts ... I will share two poems that I wrote in that class...

A printed painting was in the room as a prompt to help us begin writing. The print was from the Dallas Morning News and was used in an article about cancer. It was a picture of a woman with smily faced - sunshine glasses, red lips, and tears streaming down her face ...

Sunshine glasses, happy girl to all the world.
Bright red lips, she smiles with.
Quiet blue tears line her cheek, camouflaged.
Sadness behind, overlooked by the world.
Tears pool inside, she cannot speak.

--

Happy memories for those five years.
Little Miss Sunshine was her office name.
Countless smiles and helping hands.
Loyalty, unique as she.
All Ended.
Coward could not do the right thing.
She went away sad and disappointed.
When she remembers the glasses, she smiles.
When she remembers the people, she smiles.
When she remembers what happened, a tear of sadness falls.

Another post about the conference (and a great Tai Chi experience) coming soon.

-kyndra

Hair Poem - Trichomes

Again prompted by Sunday Scribblings' theme, hair.  Here's a poem:

Trichomes

The world is connected.
Though sometimes that seems like
a mislaid reverie,
I hold fast, still imagining.

No matter where I am,
however shut-away,
I can find one strand of green growth, and there
make contact with villous dendrites and trichomes,
the intricate hair-system of plant-life.

My fingers brush the tiny fibers and
in gentle fellowship acknowledge
that, despite our divorce,
we flower together.

"Slippery" - Sunday Scribblings

Per Reagan's suggestion, I plan to answer the call of some sites and blogs for creative writing from other bloggers.  One Reagan mentioned is Sunday Scribblings - a site that offers up a weekly challenge to write on a certain topic or prompt.  This past week was "slippery," and I did some poetry/prose in response.  It was fun, so I hope to keep it up.  (also, it's a work-in-progress and a working title!)  Humbly, here it is:

Walk from Work

Our work and life lead to inevitables; we exist upon a slippery slope. 
I live down the street from the building in which I work, and convenience was good, at first.

Now the proximity is in my life. 
Things are too close, and blurred,
and I stumble through the mess of tangled umbrage.

Sometimes I arrive home dirty, because the hill behind where I work is often saturated with rain and run-off.  Splashes of bitchy mud bind to my legs and shoes as I walk down the hill to my car, headed home. 

Once, I slipped and fell, performing an awful emergency landing on the tufts of grass and mud.  I threw my backpack off my shoulders and punched the ground, my fist vibrating hard like an old church bell, ringing out time, or announcing ... something.

And I began to laugh.  Not in sorrow or joy, just unzipping frustration.

I laughed at the work I was coming from.
I laughed at the home I was going to.
And I laughed at the short, but potent, journey between them -

A dirty, slippery, dangerous little hill,
wild clarity,
my daily mini-hike.