(Joseph MacRae, January 15, 2025, feast day of Our Lady of Banneux and Our Lady of the Seeds, Image from here.)
Wind, the Voice of Earth Mother
sometimes strong,
sometimes soft --
Listen to her
gently caressing
the tall fir trees
of the forest green
rocking to and fro
branches flowing
I close my eyes,
imagine
a ballet performed
on nature’s stage
*From prompt: Freewrite as inspired by . From Daisy Barrett Nash’s Legacy Lines series, January 15, 2025.
Opening this book
and coming up on the author's advice to the reader
and seeing the original reader (a child, her name is June, last name faded, circa 1930's) perhaps response to this challenge -- below is my "finishing" of it...
(Joseph MacRae, September 4, 2024, New Moon of Elul and the (above) Unburnt Bush Icon of the Mother of God. Image from here.)
Bear-Love
Love is a pot of honey
Pooh bear would understand —
Inner sweetness.
Who’s guarding your jar?
[Note:Sticky paw prints throughout the kitchen,
they were planted I tell you, planted!
They’re not from me.]
*From prompt: freewrite as inspired by “love is ___”, after considering Edwin Morgan's The Unspoken. From Daisy Barrett-Nash’s Legacy Lines (Writers at Play), September 4, 2024.
(Joseph MacRae, August 28, 2024, feast day of the Dormition of the Mother of God (old calendar) and Our Lady of Kiev. Image from here.)
Standing Helm Watch Today
Standing Helm watch today
one hand on a tiny joystick
watching a Dell computer screen.
See a red line scrolling through a digital map.
No need for a compass.
Just like a computer game, just like a computer game.
Not many of us remember
running on dead Reckoning.
I long to be back on an old wooden vessel
standing my watch as the propeller turns.
Thrusting water against the rudder, can feel it against the wheel.
Gently rocking in your hands, gently rocking in your hands.
Steering by a compass
Reading your charts
Using the aid of lighthouses, landmarks
Reading the buoys
Using radio direction to find beacons
No need for them today, no need for them today.
Now we have GPS
Global repositioning system.
A plotter on our onboard screen.
So with the passing of time
is the passing of a romantic era
In an old Sailor's life, in an old sailor's life.
*From prompt: Write of something longed for, past, present, or future (in this case the longing for miracles). Daisy Barrett-Nash’s Legacy Lines (Writers at Play), August 28, 2024.
(Joseph MacRae, July 6, 2022. Image is of The Merc, from Joseph MacRae.)
I: I Could Write About
I (pronoun): …12th century, a shortening of Old English ic, the first person singular nominative
I could write about living in our tiny rural town, Alsea, Oregon–-just 234 souls. Unincorporated, and like being in the 50’s. There’s John Boy’s Mercantile (the Merc), an old timey general store. History murals fill the outer walls, inside there’s fishing and hunting gear, fresh local meats at the deli. Though remote, we’re on a big cycle route. Sometimes the Merc’s little parking lot near bursts with Harleys, their riders scoring coffee for the road. Or there's Deb’s Cafe (true confession can’t get enough of the biscuits and gravy). There’s a library, out its window can see cows a stone’s throw away–- if you stare they’ll stare back! There’s the Church, school, medical clinic, post office, fire station, grange, organic farm, park, mountains round, birds roaming about--otherwise a whole lot of quiet--and the Alsea river running through it all. And that’s about it. But then, what more do you need?
*From Prompt: Create a “Telling Trails” piece (basically to take a letter/a word beginning with that letter/a definition of that word/a picture drawn to/maybe a song drawn to--and write what comes); from Iris Jackson’s Finding Your Storyteller’s Voice with Telling Trails (Pat Conroy Literary Center, Beaufort, SC), June/July 2022.
(Joseph MacRae, January 15, 2025, feast day of Our Lady of Banneux and Our Lady of the Seeds, Image from here .) Wind, the Voice ...
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