We live our lives in a rough draft — Scott McCloskey

Mere minutes upon leaving the meeting

I regretted the words I failed to say;

it was turning into that kind of day

for #verselove

Morning sipping Chico out of a mug

coffee beans inside seem to wake me up

I'm remembering now the creative bent

of fellow writing teachers and how tech we went

for #verselove and the National Writing Project Tech Matters

These woods, I am deep in

this river, I still lean in

these rocks, where I remember

this land, embodies me

for #verselove

Some poems may stay as a nuisance ... — from The Creative Drive by Catherine Barnett https://poets.org/poem/creative-drive?mc_cid=4032f83aaf&mc_eid=76f6a82f66

Annoying, they are, like brittle shards of glass in the side, pressing in through skin until a poet finally begins to work their way out, writing words to expose the ghosts

for #verselove

Music syncopation, down beats on our rhythm a genetic disposition: listen

an American Cinquain for #verselove

Discovered inside a kitchen drawer: wire ties to abandoned bags; broken cords to lost devices; a voice recorder emptied of sound; a plastic fork with no knife; a ticket stub we never won; a sticky note written for someone; batteries and bulbs and half-written poems and all the other detritus of a life lived together

for #verselove

She is Truth, spoken in the old stone church in Akron, Ohio, reminding this audience of men and women, both, that hardship has followed her, and hope, too, and the last thing she needs is for a man to carry her body over a muddy rain ditch or lifted into horse carriages, and that if the world's been turned all upside down, ain't it a woman who's the one best suited to turn it all back, right

for Sojourner Truth https://www.nps.gov/articles/sojourner-truth.htm

#verselove

Misery Island rests alone in the Atlantic, a tiny rock of barren nothingness save waves and wind, and still, she's desperate to go there, by paddle or not at all, and to have me with her, too, for her ride against relentless time and tide

for #verselove

Father, your house is older than you, a tiny concert hall filled with a resonance of drums

When the time change comes, we will leave it behind as a foundation for another family

Still, there's a memory of music in these rooms, where the slow roll of snare drum sings out

Father, it brings out your best - this home rumbling in the percussive heartbeat of you

for #verselove

What, she wonders, are these scribbles and these scratch-outs in this mess of paper and lined pages of your notebook left upon the table in the mornings?

Songs, I reply, or the seeds of something to maybe becoming music, if I can only find the rhythm again when strumming the guitar in my mind

for #verselove