A Memory of Today

Victoria Park, Regina, Saskatchewan

The heat offered me a bench in the park, 

a breeze at my back and 

a lingering summer day. 

Once more the calendar 

had been challenged by 

the shifting weather.  

Two errands completed, 

each with a good stroll between 

with a stop for lunch and tea. 

Businessmen and women, shoppers, 

and teens that should have been in school

walked and strolled, laughed and talked, 

read a book or just enjoyed the shaded sun 

for what has become a memory of today. 

“In solitude we give passionate attention to our lives, 

to our memories, to the details around us.”

~ Virginia Woolf, writer

(1882 ~ 1941)

The Real Autumn Comes

As autumn settles in 

wasps are sluggish 

yet still annoying; 

fruit flies still hover

and are yet to feel 

the cool of autumn,

playgrounds are quieter

as schools absorb our children, 

golden leaves drift from elms, 

yet to fill the corners and curbs

The air breathes sweater cool.

Calendar dictum remains in summer, 

autumn equinox only days away 

These cool days prepare the world

 for the beauty of real autumn.

“And all at once, summer collapsed into fall.”

~ Oscar Wilde

Nature's Pantry

While leaves fade into late summer, 

Sunflowers, as brilliant as ever, 

welcome bees into nature’s pantry.

“Nature never hurries. 

Atom by atom, little by little, 

she achieves her work.”

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Schedules Be Gone

 

Summer time ~ 

a world of tomorrows

when schedules melt 

    in the heat 

  shift and sway 

       with the wind to 

relieve us of 

  a tedium that has 

become too normal  ~ when we 

can go our own way like 

  

  a drive down a road dappled in sunlight, 

   

      past grasses and wheat fields, 

  stroll through a farmers’ market

share an outdoor concert with friends

or just relax on a beach while 

children of all ages play in a crystal lake 

 

     to end the day in well earned sleep.

“Summertime is always the best of what might be.”

~ Charles Bowden, author

Prairie Flowers

 

In late afternoon 

summer heat 

tough prairie flowers 

cheered my walk.

“Flowers are for our souls to enjoy.”

~ Sioux proverb

Weathered

This a tough one 

this winter of ice and snow 

and rain and ice and snow 

temperatures dip and dive 

to really, really cold and 

climb slowly to just cold. 

I have no complaints though 

because I know 

it is only temporary. 

As temporary as clouds scudding across the sky; 

as the grass grows and then fades away til next spring; 

as the wind that is blustery and bossy one day 

and next is a mere pussy cat purring 

through the hair on my head. 

So this tough one of winter will pass, 

the excitement of spring and summer 

spread dandelion umbrellas and the fluff of poplars, 

while we say that 

the rain in spring time is too much or not enough; 

the sun in summer is too hot or too bright. 

the leaves in autumn are falling too soon

So, I say, weather is just a tough one ~ but then so am I. 

“At the end of the day, we can endure much more that we think we can.”

~ Frida Kahlo, artist

An Easy Meal

November 28, 2006

Soup and sandwiches ~ comforting meals, 

rather like an old sweater. There is any old soup 

~ one from a recipe or a ‘Must Go’ soup from 

the refrigerator to fit the mood of the day. 

In summer I love a delicious cold soup 

~ this summer it was sweet potato soup 

made in March and from the freezer . 

The more high society soups are really 

no different. To make them special 

they must be served in the finest china 

with silver cutlery. Sandwiches are created 

from what’s available and for me, 

require buttered bread before 

salami or ham or tomatoes are 

nestled in with a crown of 

lettuce; a dill pickle skewered on top.

Soup and sandwiches ~ comforting meals, 

rather like an old sweater. It could be any old soup 

~ one from a recipe or a ‘Must Go’ soup from 

the refrigerator to fit the mood of the day. 

“I can make a couple of good sandwiches: tuna salad and 

chopped egg salad. And Greek bean soup.”

~ Leonard Cohen

Cycle of Life

Easing towards any season has an odd mix of excitement and disbelief, especially spring and summer. 

‘Spring is coming and 

it will never get here. 

It will be winter forever. 

We’ll all freeze solid’

Spring and summer greet chirping birds back from the south, or wherever birds go for the winter. And then there’s warmth; green trees and flowers ~ visible burgeoning life! 

It’s ok for spring to blend into summer, 

but when nights get colder and most flowers have 

become one with the grass, 

except the audacious sunflowers, 

spicy chrysanthemums and ferocious tiger lilies. 

Autumn is a beautiful month. Trees become 

bouquets of colour, preparing for the next 

cycle of falling leaves. Of course, the 

unmentionable is the season of ice and snow.

But it too will have it’s own dangerous 

beauty of glitter, frost and ice.

“Things have their time, even eminence bows to timeliness.”

~ Balthasar Gracian,  The Art of Worldly Wisdom