SNORTBUCKET

 Poetry From My Youth

 

Mother died several years ago at 93 after a life full of joy and wonder.  I have several boxes of her belongings, which I have been slowly going through, a little at a time. Last week I hit a treasure trove.  The bottom of the box was filled with all the things of mine that a mother would keep—report cards, homemade Mother’s Day cards, objets d’art from Scout camp, term papers, poetry. I spent all the rest of the day reading the contents of the red file folder there—my writings from second grade on.  I had forgotten lots of them.  Some are pretty bad; some are pretty good; some are hilarious. Here’s a poem from the eighth grade.  The theme for our journal writing for the week was imagination.      

Snortbucket

She got away with anything.

She got away with it all.

She was Sneaky;

She was Bold.

She tore across the back porch with no clothes on at all!

 “Do this, do that,” my Momma said.”

“You must clean up your room.”

But Snortbucket did nothing.

No tasks did she assume.

She got away with anything.

She got away with it all.

She was Sneaky;

She was Bold.

She tore across the back porch with no clothes on at all!

She laughed when grown-ups scolded.

 She said smart-alec stuff. 

She never got  switched for nothing;

No eye was fast enough.

She got away with anything.

She got away with it all.

She was Sneaky:

She was Bold.

She tore across the back porch with no clothes on at all!

 

 At dinner time she had her way.

“Artichokes make me regurgitate”

Ice cream, cookies, popcorn, cake--

Whatever she wanted, that’s what she ate.

She got away with anything.

She got away with it all.

She was Sneaky;

She was Bold.

She tore across the back porch with no clothes on at all!

Snortbucket bullied the cats and the dogs.

She tore up the neighbor’s yard.

All of us got the blame for her tricks.

She would laugh at us really hard.

She got away with anything.

She got away with it all.

She was Sneaky;

She was Bold.

She tore across the back porch with no clothes on at all!

 Snortbucket was my nemesis.

I wished that she was dead!

And when I grew up--

She went away.

See, Snortbucket lived in my head.

POOR HILDEGARD COCKROACH

In my last post I spoke of my intense dislike of cockroaches and blogger Shaw Kenawe shared a poem she created in hopes that she could change my attitude:

 HILDEGARD COCKROACH

Hildegard Cockroach lives in the city
And lives a life that's not very pretty.
She spends her days down in the drain
Of a smelly old sink. It's really a pain.

At night she crawls onto a sticky plate
or a stain of gravy that's second rate.
And if she's lucky, she's sometimes able
to feast on leftover food on the table.

"Nobody likes me," Hildegard thought,
"because of the life I lead, and it ought
not to influence how the feel.
It isn't my fault I must scrounge for a meal.

They jump when they see me, they run and yell.
They reach for the bug spray, and I can tell
how they hate me. But what did I do?
Just munched on a moldy old crumb or two.
O, it's true. The life of a cockroach is very hard,"
sighed the sad little cockroach, Hildegard.

It is a very nice poem and I appreciate her efforts.  Here is my response.

POOR HILDEGARD COCKROACH

I’m almost persuaded.

She near touched my soul.

As the many sad hardships

Of her bug life she told.

Poor Hildegard Cockroach

A cockroach life is no crystal stair

And Hildy certainly does have a story to tell.

She’s a real sob sister

And a pitiful victim as well.

Poor Hildegard Cockroach

First she complains she must scrounge for her food.

Oh. she whines about every little this and little that.

“Nobody likes me; everybody hates me.”

The wailing and  moaning Hildy has down pat.

Poor Hildegard Cockroach

Tom writes in the comments, loving those bugs still.

How could he? One jumped on his head!

And Jeny write of bugs in her mouth!

Blaaah—I want all Hildys DEAD!

Gross Hildegard Cockroach

Not one to give up in having his say,

Tom maintains there’s good in all bugs—even Hildy, by the way.

So, quite disdainfully,  and sure I am right, I googled cockroaches today.

6 million nasty hits--but wait--2 were good

 What can I say!

AH Hildegard Cockroach!

It seems in September of 2010

The Docs found cockroaches to be of some use

Fighting infections they searched for new antibiotics and found,

if you please, hot diggidy,  they could use cockroach brain juice!!!

Valuable Hildegard Cockroach

I’ll donate to science; I’m up for that.

I’ll kill ‘em and keep the carcasses all 

In a trash bag out of my sight

Till the bug hearsh comes to call.

Recycled Hildegard Cockroach

 Do we jump when we see her?

 Do we reach for the bug spray?

Oh yeah, you betcha! Without delay!

Disgusting Hildegard Cockroach

I’ve searched my heart in iambic pentameter* verse         *sort of

Should we cut her a break? Does she deserve her fate?

Yeah, cause she’s icky, she’s yucky, she carries disease.

Stomp on her; smash her;  run her down. Hate! Hate! Hate!

Goodby  Hildegard Cockroach

Poor Hildegard Cockroach

THANKS FOR NOTHING, DAD!

Thanks for Nothing, Dad!

A sort of Poem

On this Father’s Day week I want to thank you for those things you passed down  through your DNA, Dad

The things to be grateful for

As I look at your picture on my wall, frozen in time, your long, slender frame I see--

To My brother you passed it, to our son, Jeff, you passed it

good gosh

what happened to me!

 As I step on the scales and look down at the numbers

I can only say—Thanks for nothing,  Dad!

Huuum, so many other things ----------------

That brain of yours, Georgia Tech educated,  engineer honed

Which awed me every night—“yeah, Dad--but how did we do the equation? get that answer, tomorrow in class I have to know?”  “Well—It just comes to me,” you’d say. “I can’t explain it to you.” And really, you couldn’t.

So Grandaughter Madeline and Davis too have mad math skills they got from you.

And me, a grown woman—I still can hardly add two plus two

So as I try to balance the ledger, in vain,  I can only say

Thanks for nothing, Dad!

You drank way too much and chain smoked too, but still had some pretty awesome healthy DNA.

Till the day you died you eyes were clear and you could hear what was said a mile away.

So as I twist in my hearing aids each morning and clean my glasses to put them on.

I look in the mirror to see if they’re straight and I can only say

Thanks for nothing, Dad!

But then there're other things I think of -- not so much DNA

Nature or nurture kind of stuff, see-- if you want them to be a certain way, live it and they will see, they say----

The time we had with you--too short
Death ripped in one night and you were gone.
In all the years you had on earth, I never heard you say an unkind word about a living soul--

 that’s just how you were, every day.

 And another thing Dad—you never ever raised your voice in anger, ever—for me the calm in the center of a storm, so kind a man,

You know—I’m working on all that, still

And someday maybe I’ll get it, I so hope that I will

So as I look in my heart, I can only say

Thanks for everything,  Dad! 

THE SIMPLICITY POEM

Tom and I are members of  the Simplicity movement—involved in voluntary simplicity – the resolve to rescue ourselves  from the runaway consumerist culture and begin making intentional decisions about how to live our lives. We honor simple, just, and sustainable ways of life and act to inform and organize others like us to actively work towards changing the culture and policies that drive overwork and overconsumption.

We realize that simplicity is not just about making personal decisions to slow down and simplify, to unclutter our lives and the earth we live on, but in fact we need to change society to make it more simplicity friendly.  Right now the structures of our society discourage simplicity and encourage the opposite – overconsumption, overproduction, overwork, overcommitment. We are organizing to change that.

At a Simplicity Forum meeting in Seattle, there was a talent show.  Tom and I  wrote a song/poem  as our contribution.

The Simplicity Poem

A Parody of

I'm Late, I'm Late

With apologies to Lewis Carroll and Walt Disney

I'm late....I'm late...

For a very important date.

No time to say hello, goodbye,

I'm late, I'm late, I'm late, I'm late.

Consumption reigns, Our lives are out of whack

Our time is not our own -- to play, to rest, to dream

We must get back on track

No time to cook a meal at home

No time to play with kids

It's sad to say, It's the American way

And here's the reason why

(You see)

The ads tell me to buy, buy, buy

And you and you and you

I'm mall ward bound, consumption to be found

I hurry off to shop, shop, shop

I just can't seem to stop, stop, stop

Shop till we drop, shop till we drop

Electronic leash, I want to make it cease

Voice mail, e mail, phone, fax mail too

Quite more than I can do, do do.

I surf the web, and then I channel surf

But none of it is real and true

Don't really talk to you or you

Keep up the pace,  no time to waste

We work from dawn till dark, dark dark

To guarantee our place

Overload, I'm in a burnout mode

Must make my corporate mark, mark, mark

What danger if I dare to stop !!

I'm late, I'm late, I'm late

I'm overdue, make way I'm coming through

Can't even grab a lunch to go

I'm late, I'm late, I'm late

What will the neighbors think

 If we don't have enough---

Hummers, yachts and all that stuff

Keeping up with the Joneses is tough, tough, tough

To please our yen for SUVs and such

We attack Iraq and kill, kill, kill

For oil to bring it back, back, back

Up to our ears in stuff,

can't seem to get enough

To get rid of it is rough, rough, rough

We sort it out and run about and take it to the dump

Where does it go? Tis not our woe

Our landfills they are full, full, full

Our streams with filth oerflow

We're late, we're late, we're using up the earth

We're in a stew, the solution's over due

But  wait, but wait

We haven't sealed our fate

We  can still save planet earth

it's not too late, late, late

We've got a plan for you and you

of ideas there is no dearth

Just slow it down, take back your time

and then get others to,

sides me and you, and you and me, and me and you, and you and me

The future's clear to see

Simplicity is here to stay

and here's the reason why

(You see)

It's overdue, there is no turning back

It's up to us to save the world

AND THAT'S A FACT 

LESSONS FROM MY DAUGHTER 2

If you scratch Jeny, she bleeds green.  She is conscious of her family’s carbon footprint on the planet at all times.  She composts, plants a garden, recycles everything—glass, plastics, paper, clothes, toys, books. The family uses cloth napkins, one for each family member for three days, instead of stacks of paper ones.

We have been doing many of the same things for a long time, but Jeny always seems to be ahead of the curve. Just when I think I am doing pretty well, she will mention something that has yet to occur to me, or something I have thought about, but which has seemed too much trouble so far.

Both Jeny and I switched from plastic to canvas grocery bags long ago—with her leading the way. Tom and I bought a number of Publix bags and were off and running. For the longest time we had the bags, but would forget and leave them at home--in the house or in the garage--and be forced to use plastic again.  Finally we got in the habit of taking them back out to the car as soon as we emptied the trunk  and put up the groceries.  We felt really good about that. Problem was, we keep misplacing them.  We would leave one at Finlay Park when we went to feed the homeless on Sunday, or another at Penn Center at the church conference, or wherever……

I was complaining to Jeny one day about how much I was spending on replacing canvas bags because of our carelessness. “Mom, really! Are you buying canvas bags? There’s another whole way for you to think green!”  Well, that was sure beyond me.  What more could we do?  I was not quite willing to put the groceries into the car one by one without using a bag at all.

“Go to the middle bedroom and look in your closet”, she said. What was that all about, I thought? Clueless, I marched in and took a look.  There they were shoved up on the corner shelf.   The stack of empty, canvas bags I had collected from conferences, recently, and over the years.  C-Span, Trial Lawyers, The Democratic Party, Palmetto Health, Interfaith Alliance, Pro-Law, and, the most recent one from just two weeks ago, Robert Ford for Governor. All colors, all shapes, all sizes.  Waiting to be recycled. Waiting to be filled with groceries. 

Why hadn’t I thought of that? Another lesson from my daughter.   

JUDY'S POETRY

WE SHALL NOT CEASE TO BE

When I cease to be

And there are for me

No more bends in the road

No more grand adventures to come

I shall not cease to be

For me there is no end

I will live on

Forever and a day

In the happy dreams of my children

And the hopes of the ones I love.

For our children reflect the best in us

And pass it on down the line.

The dreams of our children live on in the lives

Of their children, you see

And that’s why I know each precious one

Has just a spark in them of me.

In Elliot’s lopsided grin and the twinkle in her eye—

When you see her merrily twirling round

I hope you will think of me.

For she is part of me and I of her.

In her I will live on.

Our Madeline, the lover of stories

Drowns in books and the tales that they tell.

Her mother passed that love on to her

But she got it from me,  as well.

The serious side of me I see in Davis

Her way of silently studying a thing just so

To understand how it must go

Though no gift in math I own

That’s hers and Gil’s alone

And one that inspires pure awe.

What about our sweet rambunctious Sam,

Who gives a squeeze and hug on the fly and then is off, posthaste?

What of me is in him?

The glint in his eye, his grin?

Somewhere in there

Is a hint of me and someday

It’ll come out.

You’ll see

And someone will say

That’s just the way of her

Isn’t that just like his JuJu!

Oh my many friends, can you not see?

We shall never cease to be!

For us there is no end.

We will live on

Forever and a day.

In the glorious dreams of our children

And the lives of the ones we love.