What’s My Truth? (JM)

  

(Joseph MacRae, published in published in Writers at Play Presents: The Art of Letter Writing, edited by Daisy Barrett-Nash, Equal Arts, 2023. From April 27, Bright Wednesday, feast day of Our Lady of Montserrat/Moreneta, the Kasperov Icon of the Mother of God (Saint Tatiana and Saint John the Baptist on sides), Burning of Saint Sava'a Relics, feast day of Saint Zita of Lucca, Saint Enoder (grandson of Saint Brychan), Blessed Hosanna of Cattaro and Blessed Maria Antonia Bandres Elosegui. Jewish calendar today commemorates the Passing of (above) Joshua (1245 BC). Image from here.)

What’s My Truth?

1. My truth walks the last of pristine wilderness.

2. My truth is a culture living closer to Earth Mother.

3. My truth is a fresh morning breeze, the aroma of salt air. 

4. My truth treks in a timeless land.

5. My truth gathers together–-in oneness.

[Answers:

1. Working in Alaskan Outback–forester, fishery tech, logger, ship hand

2. Bonding with Haida, and other Native friends

3. Fishing!

4. Hiking in the Alaskan Outback, but also now in nearby Oregon trails

5. Prayer and Meditation]

*From prompt: As a way of introducing self: Make “mindmap” with lists of your likes, dislikes, places/people important to you, and hobbies/ talents. Choose 5 or 6 things from above, and describe these things without using the actual title/word of thing itself. Form into list poem, each line beginning “My truth is (or use verb vs is)” and going on to personify. Provide Answers/Actual things listed, separately. From Daisy Barrett-Nash’s Writers At Play, April 27, 2022.

River-smooth (WC)

  

(April 23, 2022, Orthodox Great and Holy Saturday, Last Day of Passover, and feast day of Saint George Great Martyr,  Saint Alexandra the Empress (wife of Diocletian), Saint Marolus of Milan, Blessed Teresa Maria of the Cross, Blessed Helen del Cavalcanti, and the French Mercedarian Martyrs. Jewish calendar today celebrates Moshiach's Meal, Isaac Circumcised (1713 BC), and the Encirclement of Jericho. Image from here.)

River-smooth

The shell that snaps, our Lana tells

us, doesn't matter. “I hate edges’, she says, 

shellacking the overlap in collage. But more to the point 

examining a shell in dream, as proof. “My life”, she 

explains, a thousand shards, glued together. When He 

mends you seek in vain for one crack, one small spot 

not river-smooth...

*From prompt: Freewrite as inspired by Elizabeth Alexaner’s Ars Poetica #100: I Believe; from Lisa Freedman's Imagination and Justice BreatheReadWrite (International Women's Writing Guild), April 23, 2022.