Fifteen-minute writing exercise day 4

Writing prompt: "Silent Friend of Many Distances"

Wild child unspoken

lost young woman

knowing always there was more than

this bitter misunderstood taste 

of failure

Bell resounding

heart responds

breath deepens as

turning once more inward

I encounter my silent self - 

true one, friend of all the years

Fifteen-minute writing exercise day 3

Writing prompt: "Climbing" by Lucille Clifton

Hungry hands long filled

empty nest long-abandoned,

swimming, calm-floating the drifting currents of desire - 

maybe I should have wanted less?

Well-past the gnarled rope-notch marked 60

braids, if I grow them now

will in truth shine like slated rain

But still the sunshine falls

gold on the silver sea

still the white birds call

and the white stones mark the way

Fifteen-minute writing exercise day 2

Writing prompt: "Blackwater Woods" by Mary Oliver

Ah, familiar words,

these I have quoted

over and over

in the cinnamon and wood-scented rooms of memory

to those faced with the loss

of all we hold most dear -

father, mother, 

child (oh nameless, fathomless horror!)

How CAN I stand before their losses, cries torn from our bodies, and quote her words?

Only bearing compassion in my hand and heart,

All must, when the time comes, be relinquished, and to live our lives now we can only practise

letting go

Fifteen-minute writing exercise day 1

Writing prompt: 'From Blossoms' by Li-Young Lee

Oh to breathe in what we love -

all the impossible

possible

all the blossom-light dapple-dark

of the world

in each inhale

Ah to take wing over

the orchard of the world

soar upwards on the scented air

of  healing

scatter love and light

like bright petals 

as we drift