I had trouble with my internet and couldn’t post Hours 11 & 12 until now.
Good luck to all those doing the full marathon. You rock!
Wendie Donabie
Wendie Donabie
My love of language drives my passion to write but I’ve truly been only a writing dabbler most of my life. I’m a good starter but getting to that finish line with my writing has been a problem. Even so, I’ve had a few small pieces published in magazines and won an award for a flash fiction piece on Mother Earth. My poetry springs from something that touches my deepest emotions, most often connected to relationships in my life. I also find poetry cropping up in my prose in the form of similes and metaphors to convey a sense of place and experience. Painting what stirs my heart and soul in my other passion – mostly work inspired by my love and concern for our planet. Artwork has consumed much of my time since moving to Muskoka in 2010 and led to opening a small gallery (Heron’s Nest Studio Gallery) out of my home where I carry my paintings along with the work of 5 other artists. Finding time and figuring how to balance both the writing and painting is a challenge. If you have any tips, I’m open to hearing them!
Magical Moment – Hour 12
I heard your call before you appeared
mystical bird of the north.
Your haunting, plaintive song
echoed across the still lake.
Striking a regal pose, head held high,
in formal black and white attire,
your doppelgänger perfectly reflected in the water.
You called again, and your mate arrived
Together you dove for dinner
and I waited … and waited … and waited …
At last, you broke the surface –
right in front of me.
Your intense red eyes met my curious green ones
for a magical moment we connected.
IMAGE: painting copyright Wendie Donabie
Agents of Change – Hour 11
Beyond the pines, stars sail by as we spin through another night.
We ponder what lies out there beyond our myopic view?
Are there beings watching us destroy our beautiful planet?
Do we expect a space cowboy in shining armour
to arrive in his pure white spaceship
to save us in the eleventh hour?
Fools we be if this is our belief.
Our hope, our answers lie within us.
We must be the agents of change.
Where there is the will,
there will be a way.
and the time to act is today.
IMAGE: Stay Rooted While Reaching for the Stars, copyright Wendie Donabie
Creative Challenge – Hour 10
If I threw everything in my studio into a pot,
what would I get?
Paints, papers, inks, glues, rocks, feathers, books and brushes
computer, pens, pencils, erasers, easel, desk and cabinets
canvases, boards, tiles, buckets, and more
Would I create a masterpiece like our universe?
Would I produce life
like the unknown force that tossed everything in existence together
to trigger the Big Bang?
No,
that won’t happen
but it could be a way to find a new direction for my work.
I need to mix it up.
Put disparate items together.
Nietzsche said, out of chaos, comes order.
That’s my plan – create a mess and find a way out of it.
Challenge myself to discover a new creative expression.
Yes, this is it!
Curse of the Apple Crisp – HOUR 9
I searched in my cupboard for a food that brought up a childhood memory
but nothing worked.
I’m descended from a long line of omnivores.
I’m a boomer whose mom cooked with canned foods and processed flours, every kind of fat, and she baked a lot.
I’m not her.
For eight years, I’ve eaten a plant-based diet, low in fat, dairy, and meat free.
I don’t want to eat meat any longer. The texture and taste do nothing for me. Although I do indulge in the occasional piece of cheese.
At the beginning, I had trouble finding products to keep me plant- based but today with more people joining the movement, it’s easier to purchase foods for my diet.
I felt bad that I failed in finding a something in my cupboard that triggered a childhood memory, so I went back to take another look, and there it was – brown sugar. I recalled one of my favourite desserts – hot apple crisp with that rich, sugary, crunchy, cinnamon and nutmeg, oatmeal, and butter topping crowned with a scoop of melting vanilla ice cream.
Mom used food as a reward and made this dessert often. Unfortunately for my waistline, it’s a lesson I have yet to unlearn. It’s the curse of the apple crisp.
Don’t tell anyone, I still make it today! And I use Mom’s recipe!
Wade Wins – Women Lose – HOUR 8
(Response to Gigan challenge)
Summer swelters beyond my exhausted window
hot inside air pulled outside where it belongs.
I’m comfortable here at my computer –
a cool cat writing poetry,
sporting a beret back in a 1950s café.
When I was nine to thirteen, I loved Maynard G. Krebs,
the Beatnik poet on Dobie Gillis.
He broke all the rules my parents lived by –
the ones I knew I dare not break.
Strange the memories that surface while
summer swelters beyond my exhausted window?
When I was nine to thirteen, I loved Maynard G. Krebs,
at fifteen had a crush on a poet friend in high school,
discovered I was bound by societal rules of engagement.
Then, at eighteen, I broke the rules, got pregnant, had an illegal abortion –
a decision many of our American sisters may have to make again.
Sharing a View – Hour 7
Based on the photo prompt
There’s no greater pleasure
than time spent with you
your arm wrapped around me
as we take in a view.
The warmth of your body,
pressed close to my side,
shows all around us
a love we won’t hide.
The touch of your hand
makes me tingle inside;
I’m a woman in love
my heart true and tried.
Please keep on sharing
your views of this life,
for working together
we can live free from strife.
THE MOON – Hour 6
I fall into a swoon
at the sight of the moon
like a romantic tune
or the call of a loon.
Though singers will croon
about love coming soon
of the Strawberry moon
appearing in June,
at night I cocoon
at home in my woon
and commune with the moon
my life to attune.
Woon definition – domicile, residence, home, abode (place of living) residence.
IMAGE: Muskoka Moonlight copyright Wendie Donabie
Hope – Hour 5
Pick 5 words from the list in the prompt:
space, wine glass, pavement, sunflower, oak
In the space,
between the pavement
and the bomb-levelled home,
the oak tree clung to life,
its limbs splintered
by shrapnel.
Beside it a solitary sunflower
its face bent in sorrow
looked down at a wine glass,
shattered.
Nature grieves for us,
yet hopes
for an end to war.
IMAGE: Sunflower copyright Wendie Donabie
Haunted Melody – Hour 4
(inspired by the photo prompt)
I wandered one day in the forest,
feeling as if I was led,
when I heard what sounded like music
from a piano somewhere up ahead.
I followed the strains of the melody
drawing me deeper into the wood.
The song strangely haunting, familiar –
inspired by evil or good?
The trees seemed to gather around me,
the path I had trod turned to sand
when there in a clearing before me
stood a decrepit, upright grand.
How had this tired old fellow
come to this desolate glade
his torso filled with dry, brown leaves
his keys no longer played?
I felt a presence answer me
as I cautiously lingered there,
“I’ve called you to be with me
I’m the love you’ve sought elsewhere.”
A chill ran through my body
when I heard the specter speak.
I turned to run away from there,
my lungs let out a shriek.
I raced out of the forest
escaping from that hell,
I still could hear the music
coming from the haunted shell.
I look back on that frightful day
and question, was it real,
as I sit here with my lover
tickling ivories with zeal.