Before The World Came to Town
the St. Simons Island that we know
isn’t the touristy mecca
everyone else thinks they know
we knew its infancy
my brother and I
(before the world
came to town) ~
at its
best
June 26: We Knew It Nonet
June 25: Breakfast in London, 1984
In the spring of 1984, Dad took our family of four to London for a weeklong vacation. Those were the best breakfasts – broiled tomatoes, toast, bacon, and eggs. We stayed at Bed and Breakfasts where we had to share a bathroom with other families on our same floor. These are the family photos that make me want to push a button and make it real again – – to be able to sit and chat with Mom. Time stands still for no one, though, and now it’s just my brother and I who are here to have those talks.
And I am so blessed that we frequently do.
At the Eaton House B&B Tricube
one snapshot
frozen time
breakfasting
three of us
Mom, Ken, me
in London
buttered toast
orange juice
hot coffee
Homeless in Portland: Outside the Zone
I was in Portland, Oregon at the first annual Stafford Challenge Poetry Conference, and I’m not sure how one can feel exhilarated and exhausted at the same time, but I did. The days of writing held such magic here in the Pacific Northwest. From Powell’s City of Books to Lewis and Clark College to the Willamette River and the 30th floor of the Portland City Grill, I’ve breathed the air of artists everywhere.
This is a city of literature, visual art, music and dance. Have you ever been immersed in a city so filled with the unexpected?
But one humanitarian challenge is the homeless population here. All these years I’ve walked past, minded my business, tried not to look. But something has tugged at my heartstrings on this trip, and I’m rethinking my stance. Something must change.
Outside the Zone in Portland, Oregon
oh my ~ he was there/ on the street / outside Powell’s City of Books in Portland /this young man/
locking his white-blue eyes with mine/ pleading / Excuse me, Ma’am? / as I walked past/
outside the zone/a few blocks later it smacked my heart wide open/ this is someone’s child/ a mother’s baby boy/ and I? I have neglected this soul / a disco ball of fragmented pieces/ reflection’ll do that/
refracting in pieces that scatter and haunt my being as I walk on/ ripped apart / outside the zone/ wanting even now to return to hear his story/ a sermon of life there on the street/ giving more than he requests/ listen: he has a story/ we all have a story/
this poem knows regret can do a 180/ change a line like an edit/ a tide of change/ one small act of knowing someone/ asking their story/ seeing, listening, validating humanity/ on a concrete city sidewalk/ where someone needs a human outside the zone/ to enter the zone and see them, hear them, understand them
Chapel Allium
After six days of travel to Portland, Oregon for a poetry conference at Lewis and Clark College with Stafford Challenge members, I am back home in Georgia and attempting to transition back to my regular time zone. I made myself get up at 5:45 this morning for coffee and yogurt and a snuggle with my schnoodles. I stepped outside to check the world, and the birdsong assures me the harmony on the farm is still in tune here in the quiet hush of the rural countryside.
It’s my first day home being off contract for summer before I officially retire in August, and I have two goals: write/post, and get myself back in the zone. I might push it and do a load of laundry just to have clean socks. Memories are swimming in my head, full of the love and exhaustion of travel – the best kind of tired that tells you you made the most of it all and came home changed in a way that only travel and friends can change you. How truly Steinbeck the journey, the best kind that leaves you stumbling around with a cup of strong coffee trying to recover from one trip while simultaneously and secretly plotting the next.
But whatever the day holds, my heart and mind will carry all the fresh air and green trees and memories of the Pacific Northwest. I’ll read poems and remember my time there, holding it all close with a foot on both sides of the country today.
Be
there’s a bench beyond the allium
nestled beneath a tree
beside the cobbled sidewalk
come sit and be with me!
June Open Write Day 3: Souvenirs
Today’s host of the third and final day of the June Open Write at http://www.ethicalela.com is Leilya Pitre of Louisiana. She inspires us to write poems about the souvenirs we bring home from trips. You can read her full prompt here, along with the poems of others and the feedback given. I have written mine today as I await a flight home from Portland, Oregon to rural Georgia, fresh on the heels of a delightful writer’s conference trip with my friend Glenda Funk of Idaho. I’ve used the style of Ada Limon’s Instructions On Not Giving Up.
Souvenirs from Portland, Oregon
more than the t-shirts and canvas bags
more than the keychains and shot glasses
more than that obnoxious prayer request card
cussing to God about the souls
of His other children
in the pew back compartment
someone intentionally forgot
to put in the offering plate
that I claimed as a bookmark
so I can pray the same sort
of prayer for Sam, Gavin, Kellen and all of us sinful humans
(yes, all of us !*(^ing %*m#@$$es)
more than the signed books of other writers
more than the leather shopping treasures,
it’s the photographs that really get to me
that keep the memories alive
stances of trees, slants of slate rooftops,
smiles of strangers and those we love
(yes, all of us !*(^ing %*m#@$$es)
standing beneath waterfalls
in the bend of the rainbow
God’s promise of hope for all His children
cloaked in the prayer shawl of His grace and mercy
(yes, all of us !*(^ing %*m#@$$es)
yes, I’ll take them. I’ll take them all.
Summer Travel Companion for the Open Write
Leilya Pitre of Louisiana is our host today at http://www.ethicalela.com for the June Open Write. She asks us to write a poem about the person we would choose to ask to go traveling with us this summer if we could take someone. I’ve been awaiting the release of Lauren Hough’s Monster of a Land for months. She takes a Travels with Charley journey, modern day, with her dog, Woody Guthrie. So instead of pre-ordering, I waited to buy the book at Powell’s City of Books in Portland. This bookstore is an entire city block and when you’re waiting on a book about a monster of a land, it makes sense to buy it in the monster of all bookstores.
Let’s Go, Lauren Hough!
a Steinbeck-like is Lauren Hough
an author I would ask to go
to join my summer travel band
to see this Monster of a Land!
Taking Notes in Portland, Oregon
I’m in Portland, Oregon for the Stafford Challenge Poetry Conference, and Glenda Funk and I have been out meeting people on the streets, taking notes of what to do while we are here.
Taking Notes
Glenda and I went people-ing
on the streets of Portland
asking folks
What’s your favorite thing
to do here?
then smiled for quick snapshots
to remember these kind souls
Ellie likes parks ~ waterfalls and Pioneer Square
Josh likes fishing ~ salmon and rivers
Joe likes running and showed us to a garden
Cheriss likes staying home (she attracts dead ancestors)
Arthur yawns ~ he likes sleeping
Higinio likes remembering Venezuela and Miami
Librarian poet Leslie likes reading and eating Ethiopian food
Matt likes adventure ~ camping on Mt. Hood (he has a feral cat named Big O)
Scott’s favorite thing to do is eat
we are all a human tribe~
how can we not be filled with
such a vast love,
this diverse and unified living of life?
Photography Tips While Traveling
It’s America’s birthday year, and like thousands of families across the country during its Bicentennial, my family went to Washington, D.C. in July to visit our local congressman. At that time, we lived on St. Simons Island, Georgia. We loaded up our station wagon with two of our grandparents and went to visit Congressman Ronald Bryan “Bo” Ginn, our 1st Congressional District representative who served from 1973-1983, and who was instrumental in forming the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) in Brunswick. He was a strong advocate for coastal Georgia, and it was an iconic year to take that trip to our nation’s capital.
There we were, in his office: my dad’s parents Georgia Lee and W.F. Haynes, Sr.; my dad, Felix Haynes (W.F. Haynes, Jr.); my brother Ken, me, Bo Ginn in the striped tie, and my mother, Miriam Haynes. My grandmother had her usual look of hidden amusement as if she’d witnessed something funny the rest of us hadn’t seen and holding her pocketbook like she always did, giving the impression she was always ready to get in the car and go back home. My grandfather was always smiling, too, probably believing that there was a lot to smile about in the world; he was 58 in this photo, and I turn 60 this month – – so perhaps the smile is rooted in the joy of being alive and kicking. Now Dad, I’m not sure why he picked that shirt; he was a Southern Baptist minister, but his collar makes him appear more Catholic, as if he’s about to lead a mass in a Congressional cathedral. My mother and Bo look like they know what’s going on and would be competent to handle any world news situation that might arise at any time. My brother and I, sharing the honors of sitting in the decision chair, look as if we’ve been jumping on the bed in the hotel room and had a few arm wrestling matches on the way to this moment in time; we were ten and five. In the days of film photography, this might have been the best the photographer could do. But I can see the same stance tendencies my grandmother had already forming in me, with those folded arms and gaze set to the left.
There is much to learn about taking photos from this trip, as I look back. Expressions and stance matter, and the photographer should feel free to make a few suggestions to help.
Even novice photographers (likely my grandfather, who I know was legally blind in one eye, but still….) can also take an extra moment to be sure things will turn out as intended. Take this photo below, for example. Maybe take a minute and make sure there are no thumbs or unwanted derrieres in the photo, for starters. Even though it’s clear the photographer was attempting to follow the famous rule of thirds in the photo, it might have been thoughtful to crop some of those steps. Likewise, it would have gone a long way to take a moment and yell at my brother. He was on the steps of the Nation’s Capital, for Lord’s sake, and I was the only one – a mere ten year old – trying to make him behave. And I hate mentioning this, but just asking me to put my hand down might have been a good idea that apparently went unsuggested. It brings to mind the sheer reality of how movies like National Lampoon’s Vacation and the things that make us look back and laugh are all sitting right there in all our own family photographs.
National Emergency First Responder
It remains
unclear
to me how
my mother
is still
smiling
at this point
in the trip.
I think
she was
mostly
more geared
for handling
national emergencies
than the at-home kind.
Family Pictures: Childhood Kitchen Table
Here we are, my brother Ken and I, November 1972. He was turning 1, and I was helping him celebrate at the round oak kitchen table where we shared so many childhood memories. Ken was the non-morning kid who hid behind the cereal box, daring anyone to look at him in the mornings and promptly growling at those who stole a glance. He turned out just great – – I couldn’t ask for a better brother, and we are blessed to be close siblings in adulthood when so many brothers and sisters aren’t. Even though he was the proverbial Grinch of his morning domain as a child, today he is in the top two percent of the most loving and giving adults I know. Kind, smart, and cool under pressure – – a very level-headed person, especially compared to me – – not always kind, not nearly as smart, and certainly not cool under pressure. Level-headed is debatable.
We’ve spent the past year cleaning out our parents’ home of long-held treasures (and some we found in seven storage units that were picked up at estate sales along the way for a retirement plan antique store they never quite got off the ground once Mom got sick). Somehow, I was fortunate enough to end up with our childhood breakfast table, and while not every memory right now with Dad brings warmth because there is a certain amount of anger in all the grief, the table is the ONE piece of furniture I can look at and actually smile and remember nothing but the happy times, including the way my brother grumped to the table in his “footer things,” pajamas with feet, slumped his blanket up in the chair, climbed up and moved “his” cereal box into a shield position like a morning cheerfulness boundary between him and the morning people family he was born into. It was an unspoken rule in our home to look anywhere but in his direction, because he was vigilantly guarding the air space on his side of the table, like a soldier in a trench with a growl gun propped and loaded.
And I think of all the coffee and conversations, decisions, laughter and tears throughout the years.
Table Tanka
today I sit here
with family history
faded memories
running my fingers along
the edge of present and past
Family Pictures: Christmas Flower Show
Sometimes the picture speaks in ways we cannot. I’ve been sifting through tubs and tubs of family photos, digitizing them and organizing them in folders to share with family members who, like me, would rather have them on a flash drive than taking up prime real estate in photo albums in the back of the attic. In some cases, I’m sharing via Facebook Messenger if I find those taken with friends who would enjoy the throwback. On a random weekday morning last week, I sent this one to my childhood friend Nancy so we could both remember the years we created floral arrangements with the help of our mothers as we competed in the annual Garden Club’s Christmas Flower Shows.
I wasn’t expecting this response, and it showed me how the power of the photograph can often reach back through the years and find the places that older generations can remember – – like trying to scratch an itch that you never quite can find, and then suddenly you find the sweet spot of relief. This is Nancy’s reply:
How to Make it Count
you’ve bought the shoes
you’ve worn the dress
you’ve taken the trip
now….
send the picture
tell the story
share the memories
Common Threads 