Haiku Back Atchoo, You Betcha

Toby, have you heard?

we have a message to post

from email last week

it came from our friends

in Tucson, Paula and Carl

it's all in Haiku

would you like to hear?

he rolled on his back and said

you betcha I do

________

A Haiku for Judy

We liked your haiku

of you and Toby chatting

and discussing naps.

It was fun to read!

Yes, we counted syllables:

five, seven and five.

You're clever with words

and an amazing artist.

Cat whisperer too!

Your blog makes us smile

and cherish our good friendship.

Thanks for all your wit!

We send all our love:

lots of healthy happy thoughts

from Tucson, Ay Zee.

~ Paula & Carl

(April 23, 2023)

________

________
 

"Toby, it looks like poetry is our focus today. My sister Susie has been writing poems all this month of April which is Poetry Month."

"Please, read a sample of Susie's poems, he replied." (He's really gotten into the arts.)

"Why sure, here's one..."

THE CLICK OF DOROTHEA LANGE’S LENS
Just as poets render truth
in carefully chosen words
that lay reality
at the feet of the reader,

so did Dorothea Lange
through the click of her lens,
the stark black and white
of poverty,
broken promises,
loss.

Beauty flushes forth
in the crimson rose
set against a muted canvas,
(snap!)
but how do you convey
the truth of a mother
whose child she cannot feed;
how do you capture
the humanity
in men who lost identity
and gained a place in the bread line?

Polio might have halted Ms. Lange,
but she picked up a camera at 17,
navigated a man’s world,
and let her lens click the stories,
the histories of a country
with mud on its face,
and lies in its pockets.

Books and poems
get burned
and banned,
and the honesty of Lange’s photographs
of Japanese Americans’
banishment to internment camps,
stains on the fabric
of California, to be sure,
but also scars on Utah, Wyoming,
Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado,
and the skin of the politicos
enforcing this atrocity,
were likewise censored, muted --
too honest a testimony?

Occluded, buried out of sight
in the National Archives
for nearly 30 years,
these photos
outlived their commission,
outlived wars,
outlived Dorothea Lange,
outlived the lame excuses
that Americans
can’t handle the truth.

They live to document
our lack of decency,
promise and integrity,
and give us
reason
to write for truth,
photograph for truth,
stand up
for
truth.
Click!
by Susie Morice, April 23, 2023©

________

Thank you, Susie! from me and Toby.

***

Thanks, everyone else, too. Give away smiles and hugs. It feels good.

                      ***

Naptime

JM:

Toby, I ask you

do you miss our condo home

that you and I shared

Toby:

yes, I miss it lots

but the menu here is huge

many mice and rats

JM:

hmmm, I see your point

your purpose is different

barn life suits you well

Toby:

but, remember this

I'm almost as old as you

that is, in cat years

JM:

Toby, you have reached

retirement age and soon you

will be old as me

Toby:

you have lately seen

high leaps are impossible

through the barn cat door

JM:

you could live with me

are you up to life indoors

there are many rules

Toby: 

recall, I'm a cat

discipline is not feline

ask me something else

JM:

how about canned food

your personal litter box

and two window sills

Toby:

I'm interested

let's talk about it later

now I need a nap.

JM:

okay, my old friend

our discussion has been good

I need a nap, too

***

The Arts Desk

In Cincinnati, Aidan put together a recital...

What a treat to "be there" via our electronic devices. Here is his recording of it...

Bach: at 5:30

Haydn: at 26:30

Merry-Go-Round: at 50:50

Aidan's Sophomore Recital

A surprise we didn't know about is that Marge now lives about 45 minutes away from Aidan, and she and her sister Pam went to Aidan's recital...

Aidan & Marge

Aidan and his Cello friends who joined him for the last recital piece.

________

It's wonderful to see that Paula has been steadily producing her art and sharing it on her Substack blog Paula Borchardt - Visual Storyteller. View her latest entries there and learn more about her art journalling and the processes she uses. To see even more of her arts over time go to her website here. 

Here's one of my favorites from her journal...

________

Great grandson Kingston (age 8) has been at work, too, and his daddy Jeff sent these to me...

________

Here on the home front, I finished the pastel for Keoni. Here it is with the process...

***

***

                           Stay tuned, there's plenty of catching up to do.

Milestones

Even while we mourn those lost and harmed by the tragedies of our times, we need a vision of the immense good still all around us. My spirit is lifted to be a part of the lives of family and friends and to celebrate and love them. So, I will now launch this post to shine a light on some milestones. Thank you, for being with me.

***

Last week, was for this grand and great-grandmother, one to love forever. Lots of family, stir in some friends, add milestones and you just smile, and your heart beats a little faster as you see your families' young people grow up and prosper. 

***

We'll begin at The Sports Desk:

Great-grandson Elijah "Big E!" a high school Senior out west in Utah, received awards for his beloved basketball playing with Roy High School Royals. Jeff put a video on YouTube of the Awards Banquet to commemorate Big E's moments.

They are at appx 5:12 min., 7:12 min., and 13:18 minutes...

Jeff reported that Elijah is ranked 36th of all Utah BB Seniors, and 9th of all forwards in the state.

You rock, Big E!

_______

Happening at almost the same time, there was another milestone to celebrate. It had a touch of poignance because it was a last hurrah when family and friends piled into cars and drove into Philly for one of the Bolding boys' music events. This time was Keoni's music recital for his Artist's Diploma from Curtis Institute of Music which completes his educational pursuits, Bachelor's at McDuffy/Mercer in Georgia, a Master's at Juilliard in NYC, and this completion at Curtis in Philly which brings us to 

The Arts Desk...

Here is the program:

The players with Keoni are friends he's made during his music studies and travels. This is the recital in its entirety...

(Earbuds help with the audio.)

Keoni has since re-posted this portion of the recital, Tosca Paraphrase, and combined it with its printed music...

And, it was so good to have Aidan back for the event, too...

What a great treat to have each of them here with us again. And, in a couple more months, Elijah, Kingston, Sonja, Jeff, and Valerie will fly in from the west for a visit here with us in Pennsylvania. 

What's not to love!!!

_________

But wait! There's more!!! A new beginning. Our friend Paula in Tucson just launched her new Substack blog where you can see her latest art and sign up to receive it in your inbox...

Paula Borchardt - Visual Storyteller

***

Weather Report:

When your mind pictures snow, where is the snow? Colorado? North Dakota? Hmmm...picture this...

Tucson had more snow this winter than Philadephia.

***

On June 20, 2015, following the Charleston Mother AME shootings on June 17, 2015, I wrote to help my mind and my heart process the sheer hideousness of the crime. Combing through old files I ran across those written words following that fearful, awful day. I re-read it and felt a wave of shock. The killings never stopped, never paused. It's even worse. Reload, repeat, over and over again--mass murders, single murders, suicides, old people, young people, tender children, gone forever. Those who survive indelibly maimed in body, in spirit. All the friends and families and communities hurt in the worst ways. A whole nation, our America stained by letting it happen. 

I wanted to celebrate the good milestones of young people growing up in my family with this posting. Instead, I'll set those words and images aside for a while in respect for those lost on Monday to gun violence. With love for them, for the many others who have likewise fallen, and for all those who loved and cared for them, I bow my head.

It doesn't have to be this way.

Thank You, Many Hands

It's Tuesday, it's spring, and our day is a palindrome, at least the way it's typed here:

3/21/23

***

Arts Desk

Experience, know-how, inspiration, kindness, and a big heart bring food to people surviving disasters happening near and far. World Central Kitchen is the creation of José Andrés. He shows us again and again how to share our abundance. A portrait in his March 20, 2023, Substack newsletter called Longer Tables begins our Arts Desk today...

 Longer Tables 

________

With our own hands and those of countless, nameless others we receive nourishment from Earth's provisions. 

_________

In Missouri, my niece Paula started painting...

________

In Tucson, Paula Borchardt continues turning out her art pieces reflecting the life around her. Two pages (two weeks) from her Perpetual Journal...

...and her October Yard Journal is complete...

***

Back in Pennsylvania...

...at Ray's Farm Market.

***

Past and Present Come Together

The Arts Desk:

Let us begin today with art from Paula, our artist friend in Tucson...

It's like looking at an old friend to see her beautiful prickly pear rendering. It is so much a part of Tucson and the southwest's environs. I imagine in the world of cacti images that prickly pears are as iconic as the saguaro. 

Paula found The Tucson Botanical Gardens include cacti from other worlds, too...

Besides this, Paula has kept up her Perpetual Journal entries as well. Here is January 8 thru February 25...

________

In Missouri, Susie and some of her friends have taken up their paint brushes to learn about making art in a local class they are attending together. Here's Susie's result from about a week ago...

Fishing is one of Susie's love's, too. Keep it up, Susie!

________

Recently, on a visit to Michener Museum of Art in Doylestown there were some music sculpture installations along the sidewalk as I walked from the parking to the museum...

...and, anyone could play them. Even though it was hard to hold the phone and play them at the same time, you can sort of get the idea here...

***

The Weather Desk on February 25th: 

it is Saturday

my pony Subaru and I

are heading home 

carrying groceries

the past enters the present

as my pony's radio fills the air

with Caruso's tenor

snow flurries brush the windshield

a formation of geese flies over

life smiles

and my pony glides

***

May you glide through your day.

***

Zine

 

There's a lot more waiting to upload and to talk about, but today it's all about love. 

I'll see you again soon.