One Shoot Sunday and Peek:Purple Profundity: Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley

Here is entry number Two! There is a lot that can be done with this week’s image!

Good Morning! It’s One Shoot Sunday again! The following is quoted to attribute the photographer and the site that supports and encourages The Poetry Challenge of One Shoot Sunday.

“Hello one and all – welcome to the latest edition of One Shoot Sunday. Normally, you would hear me (Chris Galford) wax philosophic here or provide you with an introduction to our latest photographic find. Today, however, we’re simply going to be providing you with a prompt from an old friend of One Stop’s.

You may remember Roger Allen Baut @ChasingTao from the early days of OneShoot (Roger’s One Shoot Interview). If not, you should definitely take a look now. A talented and friendly photographer, he makes his return to One Stop today with something a little more abstract. Look beneath the surface. What speaks to you here? Let your imagination go for this one.”

Accept Today’s Poetry Challenge!

Peek–Purple Profundity:Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley

snow
snow
and more snow

falling gently
covering
crossing and uncrossing
a toe
stuck up a man’s nose

stolen kisses
objections of wind
shrieking at the seams
of windows
frosted over with steam

reflected
in the mirror over the sink
seen
by eye
at the center of you
peeking

–by Elisabeth Connelley, Purple Profundity

One Shoot Sunday and Winter–Purple Profundity: Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley

Good Morning! It’s One Shoot Sunday again! The following is quoted to attribute the photographer and the site that supports and encourages The Poetry Challenge of One Shoot Sunday.

“Hello one and all – welcome to the latest edition of One Shoot Sunday. Normally, you would hear me (Chris Galford) wax philosophic here or provide you with an introduction to our latest photographic find. Today, however, we’re simply going to be providing you with a prompt from an old friend of One Stop’s.

You may remember Roger Allen Baut @ChasingTao from the early days of OneShoot (Roger’s One Shoot Interview). If not, you should definitely take a look now. A talented and friendly photographer, he makes his return to One Stop today with something a little more abstract. Look beneath the surface. What speaks to you here? Let your imagination go for this one.”

Accept Today’s Poetry Challenge!

Winter–Purple Profundity: Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley

Winter
that season
stark
cold hard
stripped bare
happy, hope
springs
remembered fondly
woven
created
great vines and twists of leaves
glory
sun soaked, and seduced until
the mind floats off into the sound
the wind making love with leaves
fruits hanging heavy
falling
the golden lushness
the red flames
consume the view
the lust
harvest of summer dreams
greedily
stripped bare
now, harsh wind
a leaf hangs
here or there
steadfast
stubborn clinging
to believe
winter is not bare
winter is not naked
winter is not what is

–elisabeth connelley

Morning Trip (52)

“Why do we bother with the rest of the day, the swale of the afternoon, the sudden dip into evening, then night with his notorious perfumes, his many-pointed stars? This is the best – throwing off the light covers, feet on the cold floor, and buzzing around the house on espresso – maybe a splash of water on the face, a palmful of vitamins – but mostly buzzing around the house on espresso, dictionary and atlas open on the rug, the typewriter waiting for the key of the head, a cello on the radio, and, if necessary, the windows – trees fifty, a hundred years old out there, heavy clouds on the way and the lawn steaming like a horse in the early morning.”
– Billy Collins

The Peach–Purple Profundity: Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley

Last Week

I found your orchard
and walked upon green grasses
and leaves danced
the eyes of the child
and shy peaches
perched upon the limbs
and lilting rays
pushed slashing down
and momentary glimpses
her perfection—luminescent
quickly hidden
snatched away
the dancing of those leaves

I plucked the peach so carefully
and cupped her in my hands
–her firmness, yet fragility
echoed with the dance

I touched my lips to silken flesh
to taste what lay beneath
Her flesh,
gave way my tongue
her juices,
tang and sweet

My hunger grew
desires fulfilled—swaying with the dance,
The sky
it circled round about,
falling down upon the grass

My thoughts are whispering with those leaves
they dance to you and say—
I plucked this peach for you my love,
enjoy it whilst you may.

–by elisabeth connelley

 

Morning Trip (51)

“I am not at all interested in immortality, only in the taste of tea.
–From Lu Tong (also spelled as Lu Tung)”

“Lu Tong’s Seven Bowls of Tea 七碗诗 卢仝（唐. 790~835）

The first bowl moistens my lips and throat; 一碗喉吻潤，

The second bowl breaks my loneliness; 二碗破孤悶，

The third bowl searches my barren entrails but to find 三碗搜枯腸，

Therein some five thousand scrolls; 惟有文字五千卷，

The fourth bowl raises a slight perspiration 四碗發輕汗，

And all life’s inequities pass out through my pores; 平生不平事盡向毛孔散，

The fifth bowl purifies my flesh and bones; 五碗肌骨清，

The sixth bowl calls me to the immortals. 六碗通仙靈，

The seventh bowl could not be drunk, 七碗吃不得也，

only the breath of the cool wind raises in my sleeves. 唯覺兩腋習習清風生。

Where is Penglai Island, Yuchuanzi wishes to ride on this sweet breeze and go back. 蓬萊山﹐在何處，玉川子乘此清風欲歸去。

(Steven R. Jones 2008)”

Morning Trip (50)

“The man who promises everything is sure to fulfil [sic] nothing, and everyone who promises too much is in danger of using evil means in order to carry out his promises, and is already on the road to perdition.
Carl Jung”

“The road to perdition has ever been accompanied by lip service to an ideal.
Albert Einstein”

And now this, to express the other morning ponderers within…
“The early hours of morning; you still aren’t writing (rather, you aren’t even trying), you just read lazily. Everything is idle, quiet, full, as if it were a gift from the muse of sluggishness,

just as earlier, in childhood, on vacation, when a colored map was slowly scrutinized before a trip, a map promising so much, deep ponds in the forest like glittering butterfly eyes, mountain meadows drowning in sharp grass;

or the moment before sleep, when no dreams have appeared, but they whisper their approach from all parts of the world, their march, their pilgrimage, their vigil at the sickbed (grown sick of wakefulness), and the quickening among medieval figures

compressed in endless stasis over the cathedral; the early hours of morning, silence — you still aren’t writing,

you still understand so much. Joy is close.”
– Adam Zagajewski
Without End

Joy within, even in Perdition.

One Shoot Sunday and On The Way–Purple Profundity: Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley

A bit ago, I found something in the blog on Writing Without Paper. An event, activity, called One Shoot Sunday.  Anyone interested can read the full and requested directions there. Part was to credit the Photographer:

This week’s One Shoot takes us to the Isles with English Photographer Fee Easton. Though a self-described “amateur photographer,” Fee’s work is far from amateur. One need look no further than the cathedral pictures below to see some of the intricacy at work. Just take a moment and note if you will the engaging interlace of the shadows on the floor.

Now please, join Fee as she takes the time to guide us through her photographic journey…

~Chris Galford

Accept the Picture Prompt Challenge!  (please click on the image below to see it in the size and proportion in which the artist intended)

Image by Fee Easton and Granted Use for Picture Prompt Challenge

On The Way

soft moving hands
slide along
the grace
of me
clay
sliding along
the wheel
is it my fingers that create
or the turning of the wheel that uses them
expression cries out in the light of the dark
union found
remembered

–by Elisabeth Connelley, Purple Profundity

One Shoot Sunday and Autopilot: Purple Profundity–Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley

A bit ago, I found something in today’s blog on Writing Without Paper. An event, activity, called One Shoot Sunday
. Anyone interested can read the full and requested directions there. Part was to credit the Photographer:
“This week, on behalf of the One Stop Poetry crew, I would like to introduce you all to Jacob Lucas, a Seattle-based photographer with a simple philosophy: to enjoy photography’s creative rewards and to shoot what he wants, how he wants.

A bit of a dabbler in all things photographic, Jacob finds his city to be a great muse, but he’s also traveled as far as the temples of Angkor Wat, a journey that launched a series of images on his blog, and memories he’ll never forget.”

"The Show Must Go On"

Next, were directions to submit my own poetry, inspired by the image.

Autopilot

I remembered
only by pain
to look
again at simple things
only because it took effort to do them

to wake up
push thru the blanket in the mind
pulling it off sensually
efforts to avoid the slap of reality
but life on life’s terms
reminded me

i felt the breath
felt the fabric slide across my skin
stretch awake each fibre finger and toe
as I thought i wanted to postpone
awareness

firm floor under my feet
warm clothes sliding on
keys jingling down into my pocket
tea in my mouth
bright light outside
cold
the tempting scent of spring
the smile bubbling forth with that spring
reminded to have joy in each moment

bumpy wheat toast
nutty scent
beautiful tangy cheeses
fresh apple slice crisp
tender green leaves
another happy sip of tea

hiding
knowing
experiencing
wisdom
running away
maybe
they feel the same

–by elisabeth connelley, Purple Profundity