Frog Oasis

July 2nd 2021

Every summer we have at least one frog that lives at the wettest spot on the property: right by the back door step where rain easily accumulates and is always the last place to dry out, even though it is also the hottest place at 3 PM due to concentrated solar radiation.

As to the degree of just how wet this oasis is at the moment, this season is numerically classified as a Three Frog Summer.

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June 25th 2021

I turned the power off to my computer when the storm passed through. When I started my Windows PC back up, I was greeted with an image of nearby Palo Duro Canyon, Lighthouse Rock. But then I was curious because it looked ‘off’. I examined several photographs online, and it appears that the Microsoft image is reversed!

You might need to click on the second image to see the ‘correct’ orientation, at least that’s the one that has several similar views. Notice the small protrusion on the pathway that I highlighted with a red arrow.

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June 8th 2021

I have no idea why I am getting flooded with piano restoration ads in FB. I haven’t needed a piano stored or restored or been to a piano store in a veRy long time. Even then a decade ago I just wound up giving away a piano, baby grand; it never even made it to my house. I was warned that it never stayed in tune, it just had sentimental value, being in the family. But alas it was too cumbersome and large and far away. Another time I thought my wife bought me an old piano that she asked me to test drive between a pair of antiques at her church, both upright, but it somehow skipped my mind after that jam session and it obviously skipped hers. I need to ask her about that one sometime to see if she paid for it.

Forte - Poem - on hearing about a book of poetry being burned

Poem based loosely on D.H. Lawrence's 'Piano', one of my favorites

Occasion: I heard that one of my friends was burning a book of poetry due to a lack of shelf space.

Forte

Softly, in the dusk, a woman is burning me;

Taking me back down to the state of ashes, till I see

Myself sitting on a book store shelf anew,

Waiting for the first human to crack me open and take a view.

In spite of myself, the insidious mystery of rhyme

Betrays me back, till the spine of me weeps to belong

To the old Sunday evenings at home, with April 25th outside

And hymns by the cozy fireplace, the blinkling iPod our guide.

So now it is vain for the book to burst into flames

With the tiny black Apple audio appliance appassionato.

The glamour of editorial days is upon me, my table of contents is cast

Down in the flood of remembrance, I smolder like a charcoal briquette for the past.

POETRY LINK: next poem in my blog ...