Writing Practice

My pen hesitates longly before it can engage with the blank, white page. Sometimes it's enough just to imagine writing. To let the thoughts, the rhymed and rhythmic sentences, reverberate within the skull's walls.

 

But the point of writing group is full participation, so pen hits page and words tumble as I let the somethings fall as they may (pieces? That's too mundane to have become a saying. Oh yes: Chips! Let them fall, those bits of the old block—old blockhead—fall as they may, scattering like a bride's rose petals onto the lines of my white page.)

 

Sometimes it's enough to wander without focus because sometimes that's all there is.

 

 

 

Copyright © 2023 Ann Tudor
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What It's Like in Words

I'm ready now to give up on words.

For years I've been telling anyone who would listen

what it's like.

I've been using words for that because they were handy,

available, popping to the fore as needed.

 

And then the words began their disappearing act,

which started slow and seemed innocuous

until it snowballed down the path of my life

taking no prisoners

and leaving me a pauper for words.

 

I know what it has been like in words.

Now what will replace them?

This is a time of change:

I gave up the piano, I can give up words

(hardly a choice, since they are the rats

leaving this sinking ship).

What will remain when I can no longer say

what it's like in words?

What it's like in fabric?

What it's like in paper and paint?

In quiet introspection and observation?

 

 

 

Copyright © 2023 Ann Tudor
Musings blog: http://www.scenesfromthejourney.blogspot.com

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Sadness

A whole poem on sadness?

Pictures of sadness are plastered

on the insides of my eyelids,

daring me to close my eyes in search of sleep.

 

I don't need or want a sadness poem.

Sadness I can do quite well all by myself,

thank you,

with no help from a poem.

 

So what else is in the quiver?

Pull out an arrow of attention

or one of calm acceptance.

Is there an arrow of compassion?

Empathy?

 

How about the standard Cupid's arrow?

A dart of love to prick the thickest skin.

Tipped with healing herbs from the garden,

this dart can change us all.

At the very least

the shock of its sting

will eclipse sadness.

 

 

Copyright © 2023 Ann Tudor
Musings blog: http://www.scenesfromthejourney.blogspot.com

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A Round of Applause

 

A round of applause for each of us—

the just and the unjust,

the deserving and the . . . no, wait!

The point is that we are all deserving,

whether or not we believe it.

Wouldn't it be welcome,

that sound of a pair of hands coming together

at day's end

to recognize your accomplishments--

no matter how mundane they are

(wake up, brush your teeth, wash your face,

feed the cat, walk the dog)?

We don't even have to go beyond

the everyday

to be worthy of applause.

 

Though we could.

We could go beyond.

We could juxtapose the heavy spring snow

with the still upstanding tulips, for example,

and let that scene echo in the mind's eye.

 

 

Copyright © 2023 Ann Tudor
Musings blog: http://www.scenesfromthejourney.blogspot.com

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