Birthday Books #1

My granddaughter. Lizzy, turned four in December. For birthdays, I've been recording two books for each grandchild in my voice and sending along the book and the CD. (My cycle starts in December for my eight grands.) This year, I've set myself the task of writing an acrostic for each child that reflects my thoughts and their amazing personalities.  

Here is the first one.

Listen to the love
Inside your heart, then
Zip and
Zoom through another
Year!

One of Lizzy's books this year were Oh, No! by Candace Fleming and Eric Rohmann.

This one wasn't Lizzy's favorite, though I think she will grow to appreciate it. I love the simple repetitive text and the illustrations are strong and beautiful. The animals of the forest fall into the tiger's trap, a deep hole. When they escape and trap the tiger instead, Lizzie says, "It hurts my feelings." I think she's on the tiger's side. 

This one was a huge hit. A lovely bedtime tale by Mary Logue, Sleep Like a Tiger takes a princess through the ritual every parent loves and dreads, convincing a child to go to sleep. 

I hope you sleep like a tiger tonight!

For more Poetry Friday visit Paul at these 4 corners.

Words

Words are such wonderful things. Especially when you are actually putting them on paper, making sentences, making paragraphs, making scenes. Who cares if they have to be edited, thrown out, or rewritten. That can happen later.

I love words.

Sigh.

The Unwritten

As I find my way back to getting words on paper, this poem by W.S. Merwin caught my eye this week. Enjoy. Then stop visit Tara, our host for the Poetry Friday Roundup at A Teaching Life.

The Unwritten
 by W. S. Merwin

Inside this pencil
crouch words that have never been written
never been spoken
never been taught

they're hiding

they're awake in there
dark in the dark
hearing us
but they won't come out
not for love not for time not for fire

even when the dark has worn away
they'll still be there
hiding in the air
multitudes in days to come may walk through them
breathe them
be none the wiser

what script can it be
that they won't unroll
in what language
would I recognize it
would I be able to follow it
to make out the real names
of everything

maybe there aren't
many
it could be that there's only one word
and it's all we need
it's here in this pencil

every pencil in the world
is like this

Tara host the Poetry Friday Roundup at A Teaching Life.

One Little Word for 2015

Resolution

Yes, you heard me correctly. I don't mean resolution in the sense of making promises to change my ways. I tend to break those before the end of January. I am thinking of a different meaning. My definition of choice is way down the list of possible options.

5. the act or process of resolving or separating something into constituent
or elementary parts.
6.the resulting state.

Technically, this is talking about breaking down a chemical compound, but recently I've been feeling like I'm a chemical compound that needs a little breaking down, a little figuring out. What are those constituent parts?
I also like this one:

: the act of finding an answer or solution to a conflict, problem, etc. : the act of resolving something
: an answer or solution to something

So, yeah. There are a few things I'd like to see find some resolution this year. One has been a serious, ongoing case of writer's block. I think perhaps I've had a few constituent parts out of place. I'm looking forward to reclaiming my joy in putting words on paper. Another is a shoulder injury that requires patience, persistence, and balance as I pursue resolution and healing. And there are probably a few others that we won't go into at the moment!

Then, there is this one:

d : the passing of a voice part from a dissonant to a consonant tone or the progression of a chord from dissonance to consonance

Sometimes modulating from one key to another in a musical composition requires a period of dissonance before finding resolution in the new key. I recognize that my one little word for the year may cause some periodic dissonance, but I'm willing to risk it to get to the resolution.

Composing Life

I am the motif, the rif, the repeat.

I am the counterpoint of bass, bassoon,
or brassy cacophony that drowns gentler sound.

I am the movement, at once a skipping vivace,
the next a labored largo.
I am the dance.
I am the dirge.

I am the interpretation
formed in the mind of the maestro,
the transition, the modulation, the dissonant seventh,
seeking consonance.

I am the resolution.

                     © Doraine Bennett 2015

Below is a piece called "Resolution" composed by John Coltrane and performed by Musical Art Quintet. It's fairly long. If you don't have time to listen to the whole piece, slide through to the last 45-60 seconds and enjoy.

Join Tabatha Yeatts at The Opposite of Indifference for the Roundup today.

A Little More Holidaying on Poetry Friday

I'm still visiting with my daughters (plus hubby), so the holidays are not quite over. I'll be back to normal (I hope!) next week and will share my one little word for the new year. In the meantime, enjoy Poetry Friday at Miss Rumphius Effect.

One of the grands I didn't get to see this season!

from The Prelude

                                            ...All shod with steel,
We hissed along the polished ice in games. . . .
So through the darkness and the cold we flew,
And not a voice was idle; with the din,
Meanwhile, the precipices rang aloud;
The leafless trees and every icy crag
Tinkled like iron, . . .
While the star
Eastward were sparkling clear, and in the west
The orange sky of evening died away.

                          ---William Wordsworth

Happy New Year!

A pile of Christmas decorations collects on my dining room table. As I pass through a room, I collect a few bits of Christmas and carry them to the table. Before the weekend is over, I'll reclaim the mantle and the top of the TV cabinet. My Venetian lamp will replace the Christmas tree. And a new year will begin. It's not official until the Christmas decorations are gone. Of course last year, we missed the wooden Santa on top of the china cabinet and didn't notice it until June. So half of 2014 elapsed with Santa's approval. I'm doing my best this year to capture all of Christmas, store the treasures and carry the sweet memories with me into 2015. There are a few more meals to be shared before we walk fully into the new year. In the meantime, I'm watching the birds in my back yard and cherishing these last few days with family.