The day I started writing poetry was the day I slowed down. Well perhaps not literally. But maybe in a poetic way, I started seeing the world with the eyes of a “noticer”.

The Art of Noticing – The Series

(If you’d like, click here to read all posts in the series. There is a bench waiting for you when you return. It is worn and stable. Not wobbly. It is perched on the edge of a quiet pond, reflective and still. We’ll wait. It is quiet here. Well except for the birdsong.)

There are days when life seems to go by at speeds that rival a BMW on the Autobahn. I know.  But more and more I feel created by Artist God, Creator God, God of wild color and detail to participate in this world with all of my senses. The days I fail to notice feel lacking. As if I were closed off from creation. Removed in an ivory tower, imprisoned. One of my very own making. So I feel the nudges of gentle reminder to notice.

I am so humbled that you are here. I sense your participation in this series and I am overwhelmed with gratitude. See I am blowing up gold and silver balloon, tying them with french ribboning of every color on the Autumnal side of the color wheel. And I am placing a hand-calligraphied name card on the tail end. This is a celebration, this noticing.

Recently I sat and wrote a piece for a workshop I am participating in at Tweetspeak Poetry. I want to come alive in my seeing, my being present. I recently wrote a  manifesto, my challenge to wake up, wash off the blurry portals with a huge roll of papertowels and a new bottle of Windex.  Later in the series I will share “Throwing Off The Training Wheels of Noticing (A Manifesto). Perhaps a line or two there will resonate with you. Looking closely at everyday objects seems to be a big piece of the noticing puzzle.

Today I read a quote from Jeff Goins. Listen to Jeff’s spin on being present. “A life filled with movement, with constant motion and no rest stops, isn’t a life at all. It’s tourism.”

Can you challenge yourself to find a simple object of beauty, joy or simplicity in your otherwise whirling dervish day. Poetry slows me down as a child of God, as a writer and as savorer of beauty and simplicity. Here is my poetry. Here is my offering. Ready, set, go notice.

The Tire Swing

She has a haunting
Hallow Whisper
Invitation hanging
To come play
Suspending childhood
She knows
No Sleep
Stands as a sentinel
Through every storm
And season
Time is hers
To give, she gives
Generously
Worn down
Black threads
Tell her story
Wobbly wild
Yet anchored suspended
Years in motion
Sacrifice
Of matte dull black
Repurposed by the sun
Hanging by a thread
Bleached and trusting tether
Thrown up and over oak’s wide
Outstretched strongest
Limb
She whispers
To all ages
Do you have time to give to play
She is idle
Alone and lonely
With only footprints
Faintly stamped
By children of the past
Worn in the chestnut dirt swirled like
Alien ships have landed
Leaving cryptic swirls
And curls
Reminders of earlier
Stolen moments
She is worn but not weary
The smell of rubber fresh from
Firestone’s factory, faded fast
Years suspended in the waiting
Rubber worn, no treads now smooth
Non-threatening
She’s transformed
From work horse into
A ready playmate
We all decide
Does play have time for us.

Elizabeth W. Marshall, poet/writer/noticer

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