Balancing

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

The upside of the downside is creativity,
downside of the downside – survivability,
upside of the upside,
anxiety-free,
downside of the upside…
..dearth of poetry.

‘In a dark time, the eye begins to see’
Theodore Roethke

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Someone who’s definitely not suffering from a dearth of inspiration at the moment is artist (and hidden poet) Bénédicte Delachanal.

Check out her wonderfully humorous marriage of art and words as she tackles this month’s NaPoWriMo challenge. C’est une joie.

Weekly Photo Challenge: A Day in My Life

This was today – catching up on university stuff – which I enjoyed, but it doesn’t make for a terribly exciting photo subject.

Never mind – it’s nearly champagne o’clock Downunder, and tomorrow’s another holiday (and golf).

For more inspired entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post.

I particularly enjoyed these five:

A Nomad in the Land of Nizwa

Brad’s Blog

northumbrian : light

Butterfly Mind

Flickr Comments

Love’s Journey

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

We know
it’s our unclaimed baggage
at the station,

more than a few lockers full.

We don’t go there,
travel light,

well enough,
without it.

But impossible journeys
plague
our dreams.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Home

“Home is where the heart is.
Home is so remote.
Home is just emotion
sticking in my throat.

Let’s go to your place.”

Lene Lovich

The decor of this Sydney restaurant is a colourful reminder of the linguistically and culturally rich country that was my home from birth to mid-life.

My favourite from this week’s challenge was this one from Jo Bryant.

See The Daily Post for more photographic interpretations of ‘Home’.

Happy New Year

We ended what has been a rather mixed year

of highs and lows

in a very good place:

 

with precious family and wonderful friends on our beautiful harbour.

Happy New Year, Fellow Bloggers!

Hope you have a wonderful 2013

Thanks for your community.

xoxox

How did you start the New Year?

Merry Christmas

Dementia

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

So many days
we are beyond bereft

at some ancient
god’s puzzled mumbles
beneath the night lamp,

his tremulous finger-fumbles
with jigsaw fragments
of our lives,

his fearful look of surprise
at the countless missing pieces
of his Master Plan,

unaware of the devil dog
chewing at his feet.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/16/nyregion/gunman-kills-20-children-at-school-in-connecticut-28-dead-in-all.html?hp&_r=0

http://jmgoyder.com/2012/12/15/children/

http://nrhatch.wordpress.com/2012/12/14/an-unblossomed-bloom/

http://thelaughinghousewife.wordpress.com/2012/12/15/no-humour-today/

http://susandanielspoetry.com/2012/12/14/body-bags/

Taking a break

Due to work and university commitments, I’ll be taking a break from blogging for a  while.

Waratah – Blue Mountains
Floral Emblem of New South Wales
©beeblu

Happy Blogging

See you on the other side

Search Engine Poetry: Gabrielle Bryden

Blogging friend, sublime poet, awesome mom and aspiring volcanologist Gabrielle Bryden has posted this found poem on her blog in response to my Search Engine Poetry challenge.

I met Gabrielle in my early days of blogging and LOVE her poetry, which ranges from the serious to the hilarious.

She also keeps us entertained with posts about her life in Queensland with her hero – Shirl, son – Michael, daughter – Tessa, and comical dogs – Jazz and Sheba, and with her photos of the weird and wonderful critters we find on this strange continent.

She has a wicked sense of humour (read her post tags) and a fighting spirit (I wouldn’t want to mess with her ).
And in the 80s, she had Big Hair.

Gabrielle’s son, Michael, was diagnosed with Autism spectrum disorder at the age of 3 and she has used her experience to create an excellent resource on dealing with the challenges of Autism and Asperger’s.

Last week, Michael turned 12 and, despite the challenges he has faced, is doing very well.  He takes great photos and is shaping up to be a talented horticulturalist.

Oh, and did I mention I love Gaberielle’s poetry?
Here are links to just a few of my favourites

Skin Deep

Decanting a Poem

Campaign Trail

In all innocence

Ransom Note Poetry – (Listen Up Gina)

Brisbane River

There is a Place

The Force of Gravity

OCD Logic

Thanks, Gabe!

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

Weekly Photo Challenge: Solitary

The wreck of the MV Sygna – Stockton Beach, NSW, Australia

What happiness is there for those who lead a solitary life through no choice of their own?

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For more entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post at WordPress.com

Weekly Photo Challenge: Everyday Life

Early morning swimmers – Bronte Beach Baths, Sydney
©beeblu

Our quotidian rituals

bring discipline,

structure

and joy

to our hours;

they are the anchors

of our existence.

****************

For more entries to this week’s photo challenge, see The Daily Post at WordPress.com

Dilettantes of Disaster

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

The shadows draw long
through our limbs,
impoverished pulses from
indolent hearts carve us
tragic sinkholes for eyes; we are sallow
spectres in the night-
mirror, painting ourselves
in dishwater tincture
for dream-time, a sludge palette
of effete sorrow.

Until abstraction
manifests from the canvas
and chokes us by the throat,
we do not know gratitude.

Neoplasia

Chewing on this

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

I read this wonderful post of Kate Shrewsday’s
before going to sleep last night and it got me thinking (they always do)
of

Six impossible things before breakfast

A world without the power of money,
a sun-powered world

Journeys across a borderless globe,
Inter-universe journeys

Born old, growing young,
Spinal cords
growing in a window box

——-xx——-

Impossible possibilities? What are your thoughts?

The Song Remains the Same

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

We were cigar-smoking sylphs,
we were angst-ridden waifs,
not quite role-model material
We were The Clash and The Cure,
Lena-Lovich demure,
but never Nirvana funereal

We were Flashdance and Fame,
we were Grease, Purple Rain,
not Dolly-sweet 9 to 5vers
We were Wham, All That Jazz,
Chorus Line razzmatazz,
Saturday Night Fever survivors

We were pathological humour,
the kohl-girls of rumour,
but never drug-addled chic
We were Dark Side of the Moon
and Kate Bush la lune,
living The Dreaming mystique

We were polka-dot punkers,
Spandau Ballerinas,
not tattooed suicide-grunge,
Twisted Sister crazies,
You were Thelma, I, Louise

But,
in the end,
only you
took that plunge

Electricity

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

It’s what we are:
shocked to life
at maximum voltage,
rewired by experience
in negative anxiety
and positive joy,
a slow-leaking energy,
static in defeat

In short,
we complete the circuit
and are gone -
subatomic particles
in an ancient storm

Weekly Photo Challenge: Simple

not moneyed lives but

the simple life of a bird

that I most envy

And for something completely different…

head over to Gabrielle Bryden’s Citrus Fiesta for a whole week’s worth of citrusy fizz and fun

Platitude Pyre

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

I try to keep warm
in the memory of you

But within embered years
a cold truth lies
beneath aphoristic ashes -
“Time heals all wounds”,
“This too shall pass” -

Over my dead body, perhaps.

The Bird

Image via http://www.sxc.hu

The bird
doesn’t mind

the indifference
of passing feet,
tossed flint-eyed scraps,
nest of a broadsheet

The bird
doesn’t mind
cold-hearted weather,
garbage-can dining,
piss-soaked shelter,
one-eyed sleep in the underpass,
the ubiquitous predator

The bird
doesn’t mind
existence
on the streets

He’s just a bird

Weekly Photo Challenge: Between

Between

is the breath between