May is a rush: a birthday, our wedding anniversary, school is winding down with concerts and activities, scouts, sports, Mother’s Day. I hurry from activity to activity and, in my haste, leave a wreck of half-done and poorly-done. Yesterday I was weeding the garden path while thinking about a writing project until I pulled up one of my beloved scilla bulbs. Staring at the bulb in my hand, I remembered these lines from Robert Frost’s The Master Speed:
And you were given this swiftness, not for haste
Nor chiefly that you may go where you will,
But in the rush of everything to waste,
That you may have the power of standing still-
I spend May living in the next moment — thinking about the garden while driving the kids to sports, worrying about dinner while quilting, planning writing while gardening. I need to slow down and live in the now.
Two such as you with such a master speed
Cannot be parted nor be swept away
From one another once you are agreed
That life is only life forevermore
Together wing to wing and oar to oar.
Because “life is only life forevermore.” The only life you have is the life that you are living — right now. Today, I am going to my son’s Fairy Tale Theater. I am going to leave my phone in my car and give him my undivided attention. What moment will you be present in, today?
* * * * * THE LINKS * * * * *
April at Teaching Authors is sharing the first book she wrote — a free verse poem about a child who runs away to live with rabbits and slowly turns into one. And she has a giveaway as part of the blog’s 3rd Blogiversary book gift
certificate giveaway extravaganza.
Heidi at My Juicy Little Universe is back from a poetry workshop. She’s sharing a poem about baseball and poetry by Robert Francis.
At A Year of Reading Mary Lee Hahn shares an original poem about distractible ducklings.
Tara at A Teaching Life shares Maria Hummel’s poem Station.
Over at The Poem Farm Amy has a poem about making music with a blade of grass. She also has a fascinating interview with a speech-language pathologist who shares one of her student’s poem.
Go visit Jama’s Friday Feast but bring me back some dessert. Jama and Greg share poems from Greg Pincus’s new book The Late Bird and a luscious recipe for Chocolate Chess Pie.
Laura Salas is sharing To One Dead by Francis Ledwidge and a 15 Words or Less poem inspired by a leaning spruce.
Robin Hood Black shares her experiences at the “Poetry for All” Highlights Founders workshop. She also shared a few lines from my childhood neighbor, the incomparable Jean Craighead George, whom we lost this week.
At The Opposite of Indifference Tabatha is sharing an original poem about the O.O.U. and inviting us to join a Summer Poem Swap.
If you need a great poetry lesson plan, Laura at Author Amok shares a fascinating lesson plan for writing portrait poems. She also has some pretty awesome news to share — congratulations, Laura!
Ed at Think, Kid. Think! shares a funny poem about gnats. Be sure to click on his gnice illustration to see it up close.
Great minds must think alike because Carol also has several poems about savoring the moment.
Diane is sharing an original poem, “William the Liar,” at Random Noodling today. Kurious Kitty gets silly with Spike Milligan. Kurious K’s Kwotes’ P.F. quote is by May Sarton. At The Write Sisters she has “First Girls in Little League Baseball” by J. Patrick Lewis.
Linda at TeacherDance has a poem about the goodbyes that the end of the school year brings.
At Friday Reads, Anastasia shares a snippet from Big Birthday by Kate Hosford.
Dori is thinking about a quiet moment in her garden and planting Zinnias.
Violet wrote a funny poem about a teacher we all hope to neve get — Mrs. Backward.
Ruth has written a clever and touching poem about the ocean, and Siri.
At Gathering Books, Iphigene offers a poem about the life of an immigrant today entitled “Life in the Overseas” by a Filipino poet, Jose Dalisay, Jr.
Liz at Growing Wild shares “Birth Moon” — a poem she wrote at the Poetry for All workshop.
Andromeda has a poem from Arnold Adoff’s My Black Me at A Wrung Sponge today.
Father Goose has an original poem about creepy pets.
If you’ve been out in the garden, you’ll appreciate the acrostic bumble bee poem over at Hey Jim Hill.
Over at Check It Out, Ms. Mac has a new collection of haiku and photographs called Solace in Nature. Enter for a chance to win a signed copy.
Greg is up with a re-issue of the first poem he actually got paid to write, I Don’t Like Words over at GottaBook.
At Wild Rose Reader, Elaine has an original poem about Jonas Salk that she wrote for an anthology that is coming out this fall.
Renee at No Water River entertains us with Joshua Seigal’s “The Homesick Pirate”.
If you’re in a nautical mood after visiting Renee, visit Lori at On Point to read her haiku, Yellow Raft.
Janet at All About the Books shares a neat book called “Eureka!: poems about inventors” written by Joyce Sidman.
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Leave your links in the comments and I’ll get them up throughout the day. Except from 10-1 when I’ll be watching fairy tales performed by second graders.
