A blessing in disguise
is the very best kind.
When everything seems all wrong,
and your heart is wrung with sadness-
the proverbial ‘dark night of the soul’,
the breaking dawn reveals
a deeper understanding,
a deeper gratitude.
Pain is the price of wisdom.
In the coming year,
the only drama I want to see
is that of a bird taking flight,
or a riotous garden of blooms.
The only shade thrown is
sunlight through leaves.
The only influencer I want to follow
is the one who encourages me
to be still, the one who welcomes me
with branches spread wide,
like grandmother’s arms,
the one who caresses my face
with winds that whisper in high tree tops-
“Welcome home.”
© Amy Porterfield 2021
In response to February Writing Prompts at Putting My Feet in the Dirt. (I love these prompts! Thank you so much for the inspiration!)
Burying Yesterdays
I buried my yesterdays,
buried them deep
in the rich earth.
I nourished them with tears,
warmed them with joy,
and watched them grow
into a beautiful today,
fortified by wisdom,
wanting nothing more
than to stand in the
light of now
and be happy.
© Amy Porterfield 2021
In response to November Writing Prompts at https://puttingmyfeetinthedirt.com/.
I went for a walk today to take in what may be the last of the fall colors. Most of the trees are near naked now, but I did capture a few gems.
The colors have been beautiful this year, a literal feast for the eyes. Autumn is my favorite time of year.
In response to November Writing Prompts at https://puttingmyfeetinthedirt.com/.
Compare not my love
to a butterfly’s wings,
butterfly wings
are delicate things.
My love is a bear’s paw-
big and clumsy
and stuck in a hunny jar.
Oh bother.
© Amy Porterfield 2020
My response to today’s prompt at ‘Putting My Feet in the Dirt’, which can be found here:
Today’s poem was inspired by this photo from my friend in Colorado, of the smoke from the fire near Estes Park (The Stanley Hotel from the Shining is there). She says the place this photo was taken is about an hour away from her home, and while she is fairly sure they will be safe, it is getting pretty close. Prayers for everyone affected by the fires in Colorado!
Cataclysmic Reduction, haiku
Fire on the mountain
cataclysmic reduction
rampant destruction
© Amy Porterfield 2020
This is my response to the prompt for 10/23 over at October Writing Prompts.
(I’m a day late. Oops. But I really liked this prompt.)
But I wanted to do something different this time, so I tried a new form, Joseph’s Star, which I had never heard of but I found over at OctPoWriMo 2020. I was going to try to meld the prompts together but it was more than I could manage when it was so early and all.
Anyway, here is a Joseph’s Star poem about cowardly connections.
Troll
looking for
weaknesses exposed
a cowardly connection
your unabashed cruelty
missed it’s mark this time
you can’t hurt
me
© Amy Porterfield 2020
Responding to today’s prompt at
A smear of yellow mustard on a sandwich,
a crisp, red apple,
plump, purple grapes,
crunchy orange carrots
all lovingly packed in a brown paper sack,
the color of her affections.
© Amy Porterfield, 2020
“Entertaining a notion, like entertaining a baby cousin or entertaining a pack of hyenas, is a dangerous thing to refuse to do. If you refuse to entertain a baby cousin, the baby cousin may get bored and entertain itself by wandering off and falling down a well. If you refuse to entertain a pack of hyenas, they may become restless and entertain themselves by devouring you. But if you refuse to entertain a notion – which is just a fancy way of saying that you refuse to think about a certain idea – you have to be much braver than someone who is merely facing some blood-thirsty animals, or some parents who are upset to find their little darling at the bottom of a well, because nobody knows what an idea will do when it goes off to entertain itself.” – Lemony Snicket
I’m all out of ideas. I haven’t had a really good idea in a long time. Maybe it’s because I refused to entertain so many of them. They just didn’t seem right at the time, or I was afraid, or I decided someone else would be a better candidate, or whatever. There was always a reason. I can’t do that, I have to take care of my babies. I can’t do that, I have to work. I can’t do that, I don’t have any money. I can’t do that, I don’t have time. I can’t do that, I’m not qualified. There was always a reason.
So the ideas stopped coming. They dried up like mother’s milk. If you don’t use it, you lose it. The brilliant ideas that were meant for me moved on to someone who would entertain them, all because I was too busy spinning my cocoon of comfort and stability.
And now I’m 41 and I’m sooooooooo bored. Work, laundry, dinner, ball practice. Wash, rinse, repeat. And the only thoughts I have beyond scheduling and budgeting and caring for my family is “How can I possibly make more money?”
I’m bored and I’m boring. Trying to envision a big, bold life, but it’s just this nebulous idea I can’t grasp. Maybe I need a vision board. But a vision board implies that you have a vision to begin with. Maybe I need to meditate. I can do that while I fold the laundry or wash the dishes. Maybe I need to journal.
Whatever it takes to attract the muses back. I promise to entertain them this time.
playing in the dappled sunshine 