Dear Henry – “Letters From The Village” – Day Two

provider two mcclellanville

A letter for my future grandchild calls him to see, calling him to be, aware, alive and grateful for the beauty in his grace-filled days.

Dearest Henry,

The squid ink squirts across the night
Sky, a canvas
Blackening, a blanket for sleepy day’s cover
And you will look up while holding my hand
To soak in a heavenly sea of delight
The pin pricked sky over Jeremy Creek
Twinkles its twinkling radiant stars
Flashing and blinking and winking at you

Cast your eyes, your chin tilted skyward
Throw out your vision as shrimpers their nets
Connect the dots with your gaze make big dipper
Then squeeze tight my hand while we gaze
At the moon,together
The man in the moon is smiling at you
Sweet Henry, sweet child
He’s smiling at me, he’s grinning at us

And one night its cuticle thin like a sliver
Cut with precision, smooth as french silk
Capture the glory now in your memory
Maker
Capture it now for tomorrow brings change
Somewhere so briefly between the waxing and waning
A thin sliver hangs graceful over our dreams
Blink and it changes, sleep and its gone.

Tomorrow when sleepy day goes down for the night
You and I will walk out to the edge of the world
The edge of the water its lapping and flapping
Bobbing the shrimper’s boats like toys in the bath
And the sky will become radiant with color
We’ll stare at the pinks, the hot and the cool ones
Right before orange blazes her brush through the sky.

And off to the heavenlies the day will retreat
To sleep beside dipper and man in the moon
The day will rest up for her glorious tomorrow
And you dear Henry will sleep awhile too
For tomorrow there are treasures and glorious discoveries
To make and unwrap, to claim and collect
Tomorrow the sea will deliver her beauties right at the feet of sleepy-head you.

Love, Lent, And Letters From The Village (Day One)

After an unplanned sabbatical from writing, I am beginning  anew today  with a series dovetailing the Lenten season. I hope you will walk with me through these days leading up to Easter as I write in the form of letters. Both poetry and prose. But each day a letter expressing prayers, deep searching, mediations of the heart, wonderings, wanderings and an exploration of grace. Grace in the everyday. 

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I have become increasingly drawn to the beauty of the art of letter writing. Its intimacy, its romantic vehicle for reaching the soul of another calls me to seek and know more.  The beauty found in writing tender thoughts from one to another intrigues me. And so I want to explore the art form here in a series entitled “Letters From The Village.”  Happily, I am spending some time in a small shrimping village. This is a place I have known and loved for a long season of my life. Hidden here are memories of marriage, raising three children and celebration upon celebration with friends. Tucked away. Folded in. Wrapped in the salty soil of this place. And so there is deep meaning and significance in beginning these letters to you from “the village.”  That you will open and read, break the wax seal on each is gift. The first is penned on Valentines Day and  is being written from the heart of this place. 

It is my hope and prayer that the art of grace will set the tone as we walk through the holy days of Lent, preparing for Easter and the sacred days waiting for celebration in Holy Week.

There is a thinness, sparseness woven in these days. A dignified seriousness to the pulse and cadence of these moments. The beat is sacred. The breathing measured. Breathe deep the grace of Lent.

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Dear Patient One,

I write to you on Valentines Day, a poem, the first in a series entitled “Letters From The Village.”

May others discover more of their story in reading some of ours.

Love,

elizabeth

Waves of Grace

We washed up here years ago
Its been years since we first
Drove up and saw that Hugo water marked wall
And fell in love
It was potential we saw
And knew a life could be built

We came back here after tears before them too
And fell for it and each other
We kept coming back
Wave on wave of worry
Left at the entrance
We rocked under the moon and stars

You drove a nail and held that hammer
And we drove kids down
We packed a bag
And fled the mundane
To discover the extraordinary in this ordinary
Life has a way of repeating

Like the scavenger gulls that cry
We have 
And laughed and lost our way
On that sea
A time or two
And now only
A year or so remains they grew

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Joining Emily and my community at Imperfect Prose on Thursday’s for today’s word prompt LOVE

Dream Casting

shrimp boat sunsets HM

Dream Casting

In my dreams I toss fine lace,
Nylon netting webbed
Intricate watery webs like
Spiders wait to catch
Nourishment
But for the soul
And love of poetry
Like Lowcountry anglers cast
For bait, for shrimp
Far and wide
Fling it, with measured might
But I  throw out quiet
No net
To capture  poetic dreams
Under hushed breath they hover
Fear of being heard
The dream is the cover of dreams
Of poetry, a dream,
The poem the hidding place
It is safe here
There a shadow of  white peace
Quiet peace of page
Under and between, there amid
The lines of poetry

Into the fog of dreamy state
She walks into the fragrant breath
And stares
And listens
Aches with labor pains made bearable by the
Beauty of the baby
Dream
Speaking on her passion
Captured caught up in her net
Soft and comforted by the heart of one who knows
She knows and understands
And hears her reading in her lilting dancing cadence
Soft southern smooth as camelia petal
Pale,  strong cooing sounds she makes as she reads
Her own poetry
Draws with the heart
Bleeding  words
From her pen
They sing a gentle winsome ballad of brave
Beauty

Corners of her smile creep
As she speaks
And says she is a cheerleader
Of words
For poetry
She has a soul
That longs for a rallying cry
From someone from the South
Who knows the compelling
Cries inside the heart
To write the words
Not prose as much
As poetry
And knows what transpires on a page when
Memory unravels and reveals the past in bits
Of resurrected acts from stages of her life
Past, her past life
And knows how memory on the page looks different
But reminds creating archival treasures to tuck away
And keep sweet memory alive
And well
She knows

She leaks a bit of brave herself
No where to go it is too
Bold and wily
Untamed beast of brave

But she can tuck it in a poem
Like morse code, tells but hides
Well unless you know how to crack it
Translate the cryptic phrases from the
Insides of the writen lines

He says her office is in the attic
Humble place of dwelling
Tucked up high amid the books and archives
Available to talk of poetry

She, the Poet Laureate
He says she sits
Her office there keeping the pulse of poetry
For a nation
Available to talk of poetry

A dream is cast
Far and wide
She flings, she slings

In secret dreams of what she’d spill
What she’d reveal if she could
Climb the stairs and sit with her
Tete a tete toss her net
Amid the likes of
Natasha Trethewey

And dream a dream of poetry
And memory
Of where it goes
Where it’s stalled
How it dredges insides up
Like metal massive Gulf Shores
Oil riggers
Lowcountry Shrimp Boats
Plunderers amid the pluff

Of life  at the same Virginia
School at different times
In the valley
Of lines and rhyme
As the net untangles picks up love of words
And brings on shore the load of dreams

From an attic meeting with
The Poet Laureate
Soulful poet
Artist beauty
Word weaver, women
From the South

As I
Dream of casting
Nets for words
Of poetry

In the musty
Darkened attic of my heart

I brush off dreams of poetry
And tell no soul
They would not care
Nor keep it well

The dreams are cast in secret

The dreams are cast and

Rest for now with other poems
On quiet white
Pages of poetry

Harbinger of well healed memory

And dreams.

God's Grace shrimp boat

The Cowardly Lioness Finds Courage, The End

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Joining Lisa Jo Baker and a wonderful community of writers for her five minute friday writing prompt. Today’s word is afraid.

5_minute_friday4The Cowardly Lioness Finds Courage, The End

The beginning and middle are there
But it is the end that matters
The most
It is the end that is a beginning
Really
Starting at the place where the Courage
Was found and the fear fled
Starting over at the point where the spirit of brave
Replaced a spirit of timidity
Beginning anew life of freedom, being born free
Without the bonds of cowardice and fear weighing
Heavy on the backbone and oh the weight and
Oppression in shaking and trembling

But the end is good
And the end is worthy of celebration
And it is as if all the stars shine bright in a celestial celebration
Of new birth
They shimmer and shine
The speak with their twinkling, speaking good news
Of new and brave
Shouting courage for living, courage for flying, courage for soaring
She is born anew

And it is as if the heavens light a candle on the backdrop of ebony velveteen draping
And unveil the new creature

And her name will be

Unafraid

The Lioness who lights up the night sky.

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(And thanks for grace for a bit over the five.)
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