Last poem of Poetry Month

My news is that our poetry reading at the library seemed to be a success last night. We enjoyed, once again, being able to share some work of other poets, and some of our own with others. At the end of Poetry Month, I feel oddly reflective about how much poetry has changed my life, and the lives of many others I know. About how much I continue to need it, probably more than the genre needs me. I learned young to turn to writing, and I will forever be grateful. A Scandinavian myth says that "Poetry is a mix of blood and honey." I agree.

So, now that I have stepped down from my soap box:) Here is one of the poems I read last night. It really hits home for me.

Daughters of Eve
by Lianne Spidel

I have found DNA in skeletons thousands of years old and seen exactly the same genes in my own friends... We are all connected through our mothers to only a handful of women living tens of thousands of years ago.
-Bryan Sykes, "The Seven Daughters of Eve"

Mother, even if you questioned the mystery
of dividing cells, I doubt you thought
of them as I do - a line of ragtag recruits
committed to making a new person.

You passed to me one constant strain,
tidy as the spices lined on your kitchen shelf -
cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, - those
your mother favored, and hers before.

The clan mothers were hunters who bore
their daughters in caves. Perhaps the one
the scientists call Tara claims us,
who never saw the green-hilled land

your mother's mother never saw, who played
a flute made from the wing bone of a swan,
who strung a dozen strands of shells
and wore them to her sand dune grave.

Of all who came before, no one can tell
whose laugh you made your own, whose
stubbornness, but one of seven laid down
in you good timber for a necessary fire.

You wondered how you got me anyway, always
my father's child. Know that you gave me
the flame of myself and that it ends
with me, a mother of sons.

Another classic poem

Tonight is my group's annual reading at the library. I am posting a classic poem in celebration. You've got to love Dickinson.

Hope is the Thing with Feathers

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chilliest land
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.

Emily Dickinson

New found pictures

Thanks to the Dastrup family organization, I found two pictures of me with my parents that I had never seen before. They were both taken at Zion's National Park, one in 1968 and one in 1972. So, here they are. Today's poem is my own and is lovingly dedicated to Mom and Dad. I miss them.


I’m Still Your Child

The only peace I found
in your absence,
tiny bursts of memory.
Familiar gestures
which make me forever
your reflection.

Stacy Julin

Another poem for today

You know I like poetry! Only a few more days and I will be back to my regular blogging. Here is a poem by an up-and-coming poet that I like. Her first chapbook contained poems written as odes to the record holders in the Guinness Book of World Records. Here is one of them.

Making Love to Leopard Man

Though I’m not a needle, let me touch you.
Let me look into the pink secret of your ear.
Let me part, one by one, your reclusive, unmarked toes.

Trust me, you are not the first man I’ve known
who thought he was an animal, who’s sharpened
his claws without knowing what to do with them.

Like continents, your bruise-green spots drift apart.
Lying beside you, I watch the ink bleed slowly
into the tiny channels of skin, edges blurring

into your yellow sea. One-hundred-six islands
I’ve counted so far: that one looks like a storm cloud,
that one at your hip like the head of a woman.

You’re not the only one who knows how to make
the body an elaborate disguise. How I wish
the children who torment you would throw stones

at the ugly hut of my life and scatter like birds
when I glare at them. I want to bathe my scars
in the isle’s dirty river. I want fangs.

Let me show you how hermit crabs do it: tap
my borrowed shell until I uncurl like a raw finger,
exposing myself to salt. Out there, I could be eaten,

I could be carried by the current into the mouth
of prey. Hold me closer with your human claws.
For now, let’s pretend we have nothing to hide.

Stephanie Lenox

From: The Heart That Lies Outside The Body

And another poem for Poetry month

This poem is by a classic Russian poet, another of my favorites...

Lot's Wife
by Anna Akhmatova
Translated by Max Hayward and Stanley Kunitz

And the just man trailed God's shining agent,
over a black mountain, in his giant track,
while a restless voice kept harrying his woman:
"It's not too late, you can still look back

at the red towers of your native Sodom,
the square where once you sang, the spinning-shed
at the empty windows set in the tall house
where sons and daughters blessed your marriage-bed."

A single glance: a sudden dart of pain
stitching her eyes before she made a sound...
Her body flaked into transparent salt,
and her swift legs rooted to the ground.

Who will grieve for this woman? Does she not seem
too insignificant for our concern?
Yet in my heart I never will deny her,
who suffered death because she chose to turn.

Today's Poem

The Tyger
by William Blake

Tyger, Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deep or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare sieze the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art
could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
"What dread hand? & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain,
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears
And water'd heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger, Tyger, burning bright
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame they fearful symmetry?

National Poetry Month

In celebration of National Poetry Month, I will be posting some poems that I love. Here is today's poem, by Li-Young Lee:

I Ask My Mother To Sing

She begins, and my grandmother joins her.
Mother and daughter sing like young girls.
If my father were alive, he would play
his accordian and sway like a boat.

I've never been in Peking, or the Summer Palace,
nor stood on the great Stone Boat to watch
the rain begin on Kuen Ming Lake, the picnickers
running away in the grass.

But I love to hear it sung;
how the waterlilies fill with rain until
they overturn, spilling water into water,
then rock back, and fill with more.

Both women have begun to cry.
But neither stops her song.

Li-Young Lee

Great news

Today was Carson's annual Echo and Cardiology appointment at Primary Children's. It was a long day for us. He was able to watch the entire movie of "Night At The Museum, Battle of the Smithsonian" while laying on the table having his Echo done. What an amazing child. He never complains about the things he has to do. He always enjoys seeing Dr. Williams, who has cared for him since right after surgery, when he was a newborn. Anyway, his tests and physical exam show that he is doing very well. He gets to skip a year of Echo and just have an exam next year. He is so excited about that. I am so thankful for this good news, once again. I am grateful everyday for my 10 year old miracle boy.

A quote

"If you cannot find peace within yourself, you will never find it anywhere else."

Marvin Gaye

Dying Easter eggs and losing teeth

Easter was a fun time. We did the traditional Easter egg, clothing, and hand dying:) My fingers are still blue-ish. Micah lost his third baby tooth on some candy. So, it was the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy for him. He enjoyed that timing.

We were invited to have lunch on Sunday with our cousins (who were in town visiting). We had a great time with Joan, Steve, Aaron, Andy, Adam, Alex, and a few more of their friends and relatives. It was nice to be with some family for the holiday.

With the help of the good Lord above and some activity packets from the internet, we also made it through more watching of General Conference than we ever have before. We are thankful this time of year (and all year) that our Savior lives.