November 2025
what hides in silence–
entire worlds beyond words–
deeper energies
windsongs swimming through
the mirror of mind–
melodies that float
boundless, pure–currents
from a distant hazy shore–
a glittered stillness
sailing the setting
sun like a boat on becalmed
enchanted waters
nothing exists on the edge
of meaning but fate, drifting
For the W3 prompt this week from Artie to write “a mystery of landscape”. November has always seemed like a riddle to me, much more layered than any other month. I’ve also used Esther Chilton’s prompt word edge.
For my grid I cut up a painting of an owl from an old calendar and a recent advertisement bundled with my newspaper which featured a leopard. Both mysterious creatures, as so many of the world’s wonders are.
September 2025
September is complicated with ends and beginnings. It’s not always clear which is which. The year has accumulated, and there is so much left undone. I always mean to simplify, but instead of subtracting, everything seems to multiply. Again, again.
Crow is back, spending his mornings standing his chosen ground as high as he can perch on the water tower two buildings over. He complains and proclaims his right to call the neighborhood to attention with the first hint of dawn. Wake up! Wise up!
Too soon the trees will lose their green and their foliage and the branches will make their beautiful winter patterns against the sky.
I puzzle out a grid
while my mind wanders the crossroads
looking for lost time
This is another grid I created by cutting up some of my old textile print designs. The pieces were irregular, which made it like putting together a puzzle. It’s not at all a perfect fit, which is pretty much how life unwinds, at least for me
July 2025
oasis–
inside the heat dome,
cool sweetness–
icy pink
lemonade, watermelon,
beneath backyard trees
I’m a bit late for last week’s Tanka Tuesday prompt from Colleen to incorporate fruit into a poem, but it’s perfect for beginning the month of July. Today promises to be another hot and steamy day, just right for the watermelon I brought home last week from the fruit stand on Broadway. If only I had a forest inside my apartment too…
Once again I’ve made a grid from cutting up some prints I did in my textile design days. I left the third design in the group (the circles in the second image) alone though–it reminds me very much of the beach, which would also be an excellent place to be in this weather.
My boyfriend in 1969 looked a lot like John Sebastian here, sideburns and all. I still see boys with hair like this, but I haven’t seen sideburns on anyone in a long long time.
Abstract Expressions
This week’s Kick-About takes it’s inspiration from the varied work of Abstract Expressionist Lee Krasner.
June 2025
she dreams of
rippled water lazily
reflected in shadowed
sun, long hours humming
behind, stretching
out before
A seox for Tanka Tuesday, where Willow is the host this week.
May 2025 Late Cherry Blossoms
Spring begins like the first page of a journal, an anticipation open to every possibility. The first tentative marks are inflused with expectation—are they image words or word images or both merged together? Can we keep the entries in chronological order or must they be unbound, tossed like a salad?
Myriad landscapes and passages become layered with intricacies of form, lines and shadows, subtle changes in hue, sudden burst of color and light. The sky beckons in blue.
pink blossoms linger
amidst newborn greenery
shifting points of view
It’s been a beautiful spring week in NYC. Above, Central Park on Tuesday.
My haibun is for Frank’s dVerse prompt, late cherry blossoms.
April 2025
April always has
its own ideas of spring–
today clouds, rain, warm
winds—tomorrow a chilly
sun. But the flowers persist,
insist. Robins are
everywhere–jays flying, crows-
a constant chorus
of unruly wings—sparrows
in groups, looking for handouts.
A haze of buds wait
to open and clothe the still
bare branches in green.
Refusing forecasts, April
comes uncharted—look, it says,
listen, inhale–keep
patience and senses open,
acuminous, fresh.
Suddenly spring is singing–
showers and flowers in tune.
I spent a few years of my garment center career designing prints, which in those days consisted of painting patterns in gouache. I had a rep who took a portfolio of all her artists around to different firms to sell. I still have some of the unsold designs.
For this month’s grid I cut up and rearranged two flower prints, and also did a circle collage with them as well.
Sitting in the park on Sunday, the birds and daffodils were out in force, the tree branches fuzzy with the beginnings of leaves. Even though it was grey and chilly, spring was in the air.
Here’s a fun version of “April Showers”.
February 2025
In the shadow of an endless night, the singing of Aurora Borealis.
In the shadow of hibernation, dreams sailing the Milky Way.
In the shadow of shifting paths, an incandescent orbiting.
In the shadow of bitter winds, the fullness of the Snow Moon.
In the shadow of candlelight, spirits dancing like galaxies.
In the shadow of a beating heart, veins threaded with stardust.
In the shadow of time passing, a dawn that floats like feathers through shimmering light.
I had a lot of trouble trying to juggle all the different criteria for Jaideep’s W3 prompt this week. There’s definitely no narrative arc, but I did start each line with the proper phrase “in the shadow of”.
February is a month full of shadows.
December 2023
Early December—surprised,
winter creeps into my bones.
Dusk seems to last forever,
all day and all night.
Chilly both inside and out–
north migrates south, reseasons.
Winds rattle all the loose ends,
blow between the gaps.
Warmth is a glow that extends
around cold spells, twined within
the conversation of friends–
hearthbound in accord.
I’ve written my poem in the form of dodoitsu, which is part of Colleen’s Tanka Tuesday prompt this week, although I’ve not used the kigo phrases as she intended. Instead of incorporating entire lines into my stanzas, I used the words of each phrase as the first word in my lines–kind of an opposite to a golden shovel (doing it this way has a name, but I can’t remember what it is). I like the dodoitsu–I’ve used it before, and will do so again.
The grid was inspired by a glass and clay piece from Claudia McGill–you can see it, and read her accompanying haiku, here. Instead of clay and glass I layered and glued pieces of wax paper that had paint on them, along with tracing paper, onto some handmade paper I had.
Laura’s MTB prompt at dVerse was to write a cherita. I took the poem above and reworked it into that form. This is an exercise I’ve done before–I find it helps me to pay attention to what I want to say and how I say it, as each form requires different choices.
December surprises me.
Early winter
creeps into my bones.
Dusk seems to last forever.
I am chilled
both inside and out.
North migrates south,
reseasons me.
Winds rattle all the loose ends.
Warmth’s a glow twined within
the conversation of friends—
filled with goodwill.
December’s appearance really did surprise me this year. May it fulfill its promise of the returning of light–to earth and all its inhabitants.
Medusa (Thursday Doors)
voice
beckons: come
closer she said
venom
frozen in
metal, in time
once
her gaze
was lethal, final
now
only myths
catch the light
This is another door from my files. I know it was taken on the East Side, but looking online for photos of number fives for 20 or 30 blocks between the East 60s and the 90s produced no match. Perhaps in my wanderings I’ll come across it again.
Medusa is a curious choice of guardian. I like the Greek keys surrounding the figure–the door was clearly carefully designed. The round windows are also an interesting touch. I’m sorry I didn’t take a close up photo of those as well.
The poem for the door was done for Michelle Navajas’ W3 prompt although since I neglected to notice the theme was love lost and found it doesn’t really count. I did use the form she suggested though.
I’ve portrayed Medusa in my art several times. Above is an embroidery of the original non-beautiful gorgon, before the poets got hold of her.
I’m not sure what the inspiration was for this collage I found in my archives, but it was labeled “Medusa”.
I had also written another Medusa poem which I never posted. I revised it a bit for Merril’s dVerse prompt to write a poem including the word give.
My visions disappear almost
before they are formed–
What was I thinking?–
I don’t know.
Sometimes I am given a tiny piece,
an image that means something
to something I’ve already forgotten.
Is this mortality?–
an incurable dementia
of misplaced references
to things long departed,
to things incomplete–
or are the threads of time
so frayed so tangled
so densely packed that
they have rewoven themselves
into another life?–one
that combines what I once
gazed upon with the secrets
I gave to the mirror.
My abstractions of Caravaggio’s famous Medusa. If you don’t know her many stories, you can read some of them here.
And for more wonderful doors, visit Thursday Doors, hosted by Dan Antion.
method two madness 
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