April is National Poetry Month—let’s celebrate poetry this month. I plan to share poetry on Wednesdays this month for your enjoyment. You say, “I don’t like poetry.” Please, give it a chance this month. Look for the emotion in the poetry—don’t do the high school literature classroom dissection that didn’t make sense to most readers. Look for imagery, delight and emotion! Hopefully, I might convert you this month!
“Launched by the Academy of American Poets in April 1996, National Poetry Month is a special occasion that celebrates poets’ integral role in our culture and that poetry matters.”
So, what did you think? Can you relate? Did it stir up any emotions at all? I love the opening line, “You do not have to be good.” I felt relief immediately because all my childhood my parents told me to be good!
My book cover for Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming & Humorous Christmas Memoir, won 1st place in the March nonfiction book cover contest on AllAuthors.com. Thanks to all who supported me this month by voting on each round! I know I emailed you and posted on all my social media sites many times, but it worked—because of you!
Commemorate Earth Day! Today, I read Mary Oliver’s poem, “Spring,” as the inspirational reading for my meditation group.
A couples of lines jumped out from the poem, “There is only one question; how to love this world.” And “Whatever else my life is with its poems and its music. . .” Mary Oliver, Devotions (New York: Penguin Press, 2017), 317-318.
In response, I wrote the following haikus:
How to love this world—
Be God’s hands and nurture it.
It’s your home, you know.
#
Do you see this world
As your home? Your place to grow?
Smother it with love.
#
Love is the balm that
Heals this world. Don’t be stingy.
Smother it with love.
#
I gave you this world.
Be a good steward of it.
Others will follow.
The lines from Mary Oliver’s poem ignited some deep thoughts in me about this world, our earth home. As always, let’s make the love the answer, and we have to think about the future and our kin who inherit whatever we do today to keep this earth spinning.
I had some difficulties with dictation last week! Yes, I experienced difficulties with two aspects: poetry and Spanish words. See what happened.
Difficulties with Dictating Poetry
The second piece I found while rummaging around in files in my bookcase was a poem I wrote April 20, 1991 after driving from Raton, New Mexico to Chimayo, New Mexico on Good Friday. Finding this gem thrilled me, but again I didn’t want to type it up—these old arthritic fingers of mine groaned! So, I continued my experiment with dictating.
Because of the breaks in the lines, I had to deal with that. I tried saying, “Return,” but it just typed the word, so I had to stop reading the poem and press, “Return” for each line. I thought I could give the command and it would work. I need to research that!
Difficulties with Spanish
When I read the Spanish words, Microsoft Word’s dictionary didn’t recognize the word. So, for the word “sanctuario”, it put in “saint.” I had to retype all the other Spanish words because it did the best it could do! In reality, there weren’t that many.
So enjoy my found treasure that I dictated!
A Modern-Day Pilgrimage to Chimayo
April 20, 1991
A modern-day pilgrimage to a
Very holy New Mexico spot for Good Friday–
El Sancturio de Chimayo!
I drove a car; others did too!
I worried I’d be the only one not walking.
I drove 180 miles – anticipating, wondering
About how absurd this waste of a day was,
yet compelled to go.
Traditional pilgrims – walking miles
Sore feet and backs,
Walking sticks!
Sweat, blisters and dedication.
I studied the faces as I drove by;
Later, as I stood in line with these dedicated souls.
Old wrinkled faces who had done this many times before,
The young being introduced to a lifelong tradition,
Families – sharing a meaningful experience,
an event mixed with the air of reverence and the joy of a picnic,
mostly Hispanics, solemn.
Cowboys, hats, horses – expectant,
Shorts, backpacks – water bottles,
Anglos—capturing a borrowed tradition.
Dogs on leashes. An expectant atmosphere.
National Guard men carrying our two flags –
Blowing in the cool breeze,
United States – red, white, and blue
New Mexico – red and gold
waving softly.
I first saw pilgrims
At the east edge of Santa Fe –
A sprinkle.
Miles from Chimayo.
A few deserted vehicles parked
on the roadside.
The farther west, I drove the more they were.
Steadily the number increased
The closer we got to Chimayo.
Clouds hung low, threatening snow on this spring day.
We arrived.
Although I was alone in my car
With Windy, my ten-pound black poodle,
I felt a part – a piece of
Something so holy and special –
A part of a deep, reverent belief
in a beautiful celebration.
Finding a spot, I parked, pulling off of the main road.
I followed the hordes of people.
I followed the sounds.
A priest saying the words of the day on a PA
System that could be heard from a distance.
I dropped down the hillside on a warn path
Into the sleepy New Mexican village, and
El Sanctuario De Chimayo.
Thousands of people milled around – some in line,
Waiting to enter, eating spicy burritos,
Some had accomplished their task early
and enjoyed the leisure time afterward.
Large, wet snowflakes, drifted down lazily,
A New Mexico mountain gift.
I stood in line – silent, hopeful, drinking it all in,
Anticipating the event I had
Driven three hours for, yet wondering.
The Spanish language caught my ear –
The rhythmic voicing of words,
So beautiful!
First, we passed through an old wooden gate,
Worn and sacred with the hands that came seeking,
Old, dilapidated and marked
With weather and time.
No rush, no hurry, no worry!
I touched it.
I touched life and pain and times before me.
Other hands had touched it.
Thousands of hurting, hopeful people ready for the blessings
This place had.
Step-by-step, we meandered our way
into the courtyard which is a cemetery.
The buried people here in this place, special and honored.
Trees shaded this place – peaceful and serene.
We neared the door to the sanctuary,
Closer and closer,
Massive wooden doors guarding this mountain treasure.
Now I entered.
The dirt floor inside the door slanted downward.
A charged energy – anticipation – filled the air –
Solemnity of the moment.
No voices, a holy silence.
Incense, chili, burning cedar – luscious smells mixed
with our anticipation.
People expectant of something –
A miracle.
Reredos lined the walls of the church.
Faded, colorful pictures –
Meaning
Sacred stories told.
Shoulder to shoulder, two lines threaded their way toward the altar.
People sat in the pews
praying,
absorbing the spirit of the place.
As we approached the altar, first, something appeared
As diamonds laying there,
Sparkling and shine.
Then I realized – bags of dirt,
Holy dirt
Healing dirt
Why I came!
Finally, the altar rail—
I’m there!
As I touched the bag that is mine,
I felt it, the power.
On the altar, a bultos stood, El Señor Santiago,
riding his horse, sacred.
We slowly threaded our way
Into a small side room.
0h, be careful—low doorway.
Then another small room to the side.
The source of this holy soil,
The hole in the ground.
I knelt down and touched it,
Prayed with it in my hands,
Rubbed it in my fingers,
Wondering what I could do
to commemorate this moment –
Pray, sing, dance, or scream for joy?
No, out of the place—not appropriate.
Upon leaving, I passed through another room,
Lined ceiling to floor with evidence –
Thankful letters, abandoned crutches and braces!
So many pieces of
Evidence of healings –
Miracles!
I left the church.
Outside, I walked around the grounds,
Shaded with tall cottonwood trees,
Almost in a daze.
Light puffy clouds still filled the sky.
I felt so peaceful,
Connected
Grounded to the Earth.
My hands still dirty and moist.
Alone, no one knew my name – yet a part of something
Larger than me!
I wanted to stay!
To drink in the peaceful liqueur of the moment
To watch more and soak it all in,
But the snow returned.
Reluctantly, I left – to go home.
Windy slept peacefully in the passenger seat
But happy for my return.
The mystery of this age-old tradition filled me
My healing came with a connection with
Like-minded people
A sacred place
And my God!
A day taken from my busy schedule.
A step back in time
A day spent alone— yet a part,
Reflecting –
Listening from my heart –
And fulfilling a dream –
Good Friday at
The Sanctuario de Chimayo.
Gate into courtyard of El Sanctuario de Chimayo
Ash Wednesday is this Wednesday, February 14. Sharing this poem now is timely as we face the forty days of Lent. Hopefully it inspires you to do something memorable this year to commemorate this special time of the year.
Finally, have you tried dictation on your computer this week? Hopefully, my experiment last week spurred you on. Let me know if you did!
Lin standing at the gate of El Sanctuario de Chimayo
In April 2015, Lin and I visited El Santuario de Chimayo, and once again, I experienced the sacred atmosphere of this holy treasure of New Mexico.
MAJOR SALE: Buy my first book, This Tumbleweed Landed, at a 60% discount at my Etsy Shop, Larada’s Reading Loft!
A hummingbird party continues to rage at our house on the deck where the feeders are. The birds arrived late this summer—first or second week of July. We lamented over their absence in June, but they’re here now and chugging the nectar Lin puts out daily! And what a stunning spectacle!
Hummingbird Party
On Tuesday, August 8, 2023, I selected our deck to lead a meditation group I’m in. Why the deck? So the participants could see the massive amount of hummingbirds we have and join the party. Those tiny birdy rebel-rousers came out in full force.
Our group time together began with: I read my favorite poet, Mary Oliver’s poem, Hummingbirds, for the inspiration part of our time.
Hummingbirds
By Mary Oliver
The female, and two chicks,
each no bigger than my thumb,
scattered,
shimmering
in their pale-green dresses;
then they rose, tiny fireworks,
into the leaves
and hovered;
then they sat down,
each one with dainty, charcoal feet –
each one on a slender branch –
and looked at me.
I had meant no harm,
I had simply
climbed the tree
for something to do
on a summer day,
not knowing they were there,
ready to burst the ledges
of their mossy nest
and to fly, for the first time,
in their sea-green helmets,
with brisk, metallic tails –
each tulled wing,
with every dollop of flight,
drawing a perfect wheel
across the air.
Then, with a series of jerks,
they paused in front of me
and, dark-eyed, stared –
as though I were a flower –
and then,
like three tosses of silvery water,
they were gone.
Alone,
in the crown of the tree,
I went to China,
I went to Prague;
I died, and was born in the spring;
I found you, and loved you, again.
Later the darkness fell
and the solid moon
like a white pond rose.
But I wasn’t in any hurry.
Likely I visited all
the shimmering, heart-stabbing
questions without answers
before I climbed down.
At first, my reading of the poem featuring them chased off all of those hummers. They flee from any sound we make. During the meditation part and the quiet, they came back in full force—dipping and diving. One vied for a position near the feeder, then another ran him off—probably an ornery rufous. I love the collective sound they make—probably their wings flapping, “10-15 times a second. Hummingbirds can fly forward, backward, and even upside down.”
Is all the sound from their wings flapping or do they sing? “While most birdwatchers can identify a Hummingbird by the furious buzzing of their wings, they also have a series of calls, songs, and vocalizations to communicate with each other.”
The herd of hummingbirds and Oliver’s poem inspired me to write the following haikus about hummingbirds and tree climbing:
My Haikus
You are the Lord of
The dainty hummingbird gift!
They make me laugh so!
Climb a tree at my
Age? Why not? Discover life!
Nature heals my heart!
Come and sit on our
Deck to see hummingbirds feed.
Sweet nectar lures them.
I can visit the
Whole world, sitting in a tree.
My deep concerns melt.
Clouds hang over the
Sandias. Hummingbirds dance.
A picturesque scene!
New Mexico True!
(I had trouble deciding on the third line. Which do you like?)
Jesus orchestrates
The hummingbirds’ migration.
Thanks for stopping here!
The thirsty crowd has
Arrived! Hummingbirds party!
Be quiet and watch!
Yes, living in the mountains has many blessings, but these fanciful little hummingbirds have to be the best. They continue to come—hopefully for the rest of August. Yesterday, Lin prepared two gallons of nectar which according to some formula he uses, means he fed 1000 hummingbirds yesterday—wow! Also, he only plants flowers and plants in his garden like penstemons, to feed and attract hummingbirds, bees and butterflies!
Finally, yes, when they gather to party and drink the nectar, the hummingbirds disturb the quiet, but naturally. As I sit and type this, those hungry little lovelies gather at the feeders I can see. Two feeders need filling, but there are ten spread out on the deck, and Lin has a schedule of keeping them full.
I love to sit outside and watch their maneuvers and marvel at their speed and antics. Do hummingbirds party at your house? Do you feed any? many? Let me know! Join the hummingbird party!
I’d like to leave you with a treat—a video Lin took last week! Let the party begin!
Pre-order my new book, Hair on Fire: A Heartwarming and Humorous Christmas Memoir, ahead of the Christmas rush. To be released in September for your early shopping pleasure!
