#WeeklySmile – Page 6 – Poetry, Short Prose and Walking

Outer Cold Inner Warmth

With roaring emotions fresh troubles may start.
Soaring of insight warms a cold heart.
Decide how this moment’s most fittingly spent.
The iron of anger with kindness is bent.
Doors opened outward bring shivers and cold,
But sunlight, bright sunlight, though cloudy stays bold.

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge where the prompt is “Outer Cold, Inner Warmth: The Comforts in Your Life”.

Also linked to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile. What made me smile this past week with gratitude was the acceptance by Kids at Heart Publishing of three of my poems for their future anthology.

Also linked to dVerse Quadrille where De Jackson (aka WhimsyGizmo) hosts with the word “roar”.

Welcome to the 2020s

The turning of the calendar
Drops decades in the past.
It’s not enough to worry me.
The present tends to last.

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge with the theme “Welcome to the 2020s”. Also linked to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile to welcome cheerfully a new decade.

2019

Filled to overflowing;
Still not full enough -
Stones protrude. With water
Walk away what’s rough.

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge with the theme of 2019 and to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile. I’m posting a couple of photos from this past year that made me smile. Happy New Year tomorrow night.

The poem is based on the difference between being filled and being full as described by David Pawson.

Christmas Light

Christmas light,
Starry night,
Winter dazzling
Angel bright.

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge with the theme “Show us your Christmas”.

Also linked to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile. It is nearly Christmas. Although there has been waiting and perhaps much else, what’s there not to smile about?

Color

Happiness will help one glow.
Happiness may not come though
One does what one thinks one should do
As colors blend with others new
Cycling through the ever same
Rebuked, reformed then round again.
Winter’s whiteness stays a while
Awaiting one more happy smile.

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge. This week the theme is ‘Color My World’.

Also linked to dVerse Quadrille. Lillian is hosting with the word “glow”.

It is also linked to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile. This past week the answers to a couple of questions on Quora suddenly made sense to me. There is nothing like understanding something (finally) to make me smile.

Smile

These photos were taken only a few days apart last October. I deliberately went out in the falling snow to take the one below. Snow looks misty when it blurs bright boundaries. I also enjoy seeing sharp contrasts such as those made by the autumn light and shadows in the one above.

Thinking back on both of those very different kinds of day when looking for some photos to post made me smile.

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge with the theme of Showcase 2019 and to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile.

Winter’s Breath

Winter turns the spirit out.
Leaves go red and fall.
Snowy silence sits about.
I wonder at it all,
But know the proof comes in the spring
When leaves and flowers bloom
When birds again have warmth to sing
And outside’s like a room.

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge where the theme is “The Coming of Winter/Winter’s Breath” or “Playing with Light”.

Also linked to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile. I realized that I don’t understand all that I think I do. No matter how bad that might seem, my smile comes from also realizing that it isn’t all that bad.

Also linked to dVerse Quadrille. De Jackson (aka WhimsyGizmo) is hosting with the word ‘spirit’.

What Dreams May Come

When pure dreaming helps the seeing
Stars shine. Sunlight’s setting, fleeing.
Deeper darkness cracks decreeing
Once aware now always being,
        Smiling, feeling all that's true.
Like a myth made fact by living,
Turning, dawning, lightness giving,
Faithful beyond magic, winning
        Life with understanding too.

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge with the theme ‘What dreams may come’ and to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile. What made me smile? When I looked up I saw Venus and then Jupiter – and then I realized that other mysterious dim light, higher up and not in the photo, was Saturn.

The poem practices imitating other poetry. What I am imitating here is Tennyson’s rhyme and meter in The Lady of Shalott. I’m not sure what my poem means. Hopefully it brings a positive smile.

Linked to dVerse Quadrille where De Jackson is hosting with the word ‘crack’.

This Thursday at dVerse Meeting the Bar I will be featuring imitation as poetic practice. You may pick whatever you want to imitate or you may pick Tennyson as I have.

A Smile from Somme Woods

This trail was made for such as me
Who’d sometimes like a woods to see
Though urban sidewalks faithfully
May lead me on elsewhere.

Without the leaves my sight can go
Between the bony branches so
I look about. Beyond them show
Home-bound streets out there.

Linked to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile. Although chilly and overcast my walk through autumn’s presentation of Somme Woods made me smile.

Also linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge with the theme “spooky”. The photo below with all the dark, bony branches seem spooky.

Autumn Leaves / Autumn Light

Linked to K’lee and Dale’s Cosmic Photo Challenge with the theme “Autumn Leaves / Autumn Light”.

Also linked to Trent P. McDonald’s The Weekly Smile. Last weekend the maple leaves were brilliant. Although most of those leaves fell, as I expected they would after the brief snowstorm, some remained on this cloudy, cold Saturday which was warm enough to melt the snow. That made me smile.