Lebanese shortbread cookies (Ma’amoul) stuffed with figs, dates or walnuts (the original Fig Newton???)
The year we shaped our lives in the redwood forest,
you brought a wounded salamander inside to heal.
We gathered woodsy things, thistles and pinecones.
We made rose-hip syrup, dried the last of the herbs.
I decorated the cabin in an ensemble of earth tones,
a spicy blend to match the fires you built in the hearth
and the scent of the East in the ma’amoul baking. Our
seasonal hibernation was swathed in sweets and books.
Our winter warmed on the gold-dust of our love.
Well, here we are in my part of the world waking up to cold mornings and enjoying it. Over my morning coffee I was remembering particularly enjoyable winters and pondering what I’ll write about this winter. In prose or poem, tell us about a favorite winter memory. If you feel comfortable to do so, share it – or a link to it – in the comments section below. All work shared on theme will be published here next Tuesday. You have until Monday evening at 8 pm PST to respond. Have fun!
Hi Jamie,
I loved your poem. Here are two from me. One written today, Snowball Wars, and one written last February, A Long Winter’s Sleep.
Snowball Wars
Red rubber boots, unlined and stiff, crackling with the cold,
stuffed with small round snowballs at days’ end,
attached to our snowpant cuffs
like the thistle burrs in summer to our socks,
we seven heedlessly dumped it all out on the kitchen linoleum,
pulling off those puffy clown pants,
draping wet woolen mittens, grandma knit,
over the wooden rack in the corner.
The mittens and hats never dried between forays
into that foot-deep,
knee-deep white stuff,
yet back on they went, wet and clammy next day
our enthusiasm warming the wet threads.
We never tired of building the snow forts
creating our cover, our barricade for attacking the neighbor kids,
defending our clan against them all,
my job to form the balls,
keep the pyramid pile stacked
so my brothers could jump up and fire them
over the top of the u-shaped fort.
I cowered from the enemy’s rock-hard snow bullets,
happy to make the ammunition behind the front line.
Were we catching a sense of what a war would be like,
years before my brother was sent to Vietnam?
I tried hard to follow directions,
pack the snow hard,
slapping the balls together in my smaller hands.
They were older, my brothers, like savages sometimes,
so maybe that’s why they invented the ice ball—
snow dipped in a bucket of water,
then surrounded with more snow—
so dangerous when they connected.
Perhaps our padded clothing kept us safe,
the ice ball dipping the source of their soaked mittens.
Gram had hot chocolate on the stove sometimes
when we came inside in the twilight
on the best winter days.
And no, my balls never measured up to theirs.
The dash says 53 today,
not bad for January.
I glance across the street
into the opening of his tent
pitched there
on the sidewalk
under the overpass.
What tethers his tent there?
His body? His belongings?
He’s a white man, balding.
I can’t stop looking at him.
I check the light.
I invade his tent again.
He’s putting on his shoes, I think,
his tent flap rolled up
to catch the morning light.
Cars move through the intersection
rolling by one after the other.
It’s my turn to go.
Winter’s cut crystal breath
blasts concrete city
and clement countryside alike
as darkness drops down.
We live mostly inside these days.
Some live outside,
connected without choice
to nature’s moods and rhythms.
Gelid wind rushes ‘round corners
down brick and steel canyons,
sneaks beneath crackling tarps
pitched in peril
on grass-barren ground.
Mean homes huddled together,
snugged up behind a stone pole,
the metal dumpster,
a frigid freeway barricade
in hopes of blocking sleety rain.
Who blows on numb hands
inside these rimed plastic walls?
He lies on back-breaking sidewalks
night after night,
hears stiff tarps snapping
with the same indifference
as the taps of sharp-soled boots
skirting his home.
It’s colder than a witch’s tit out there,
we tell each other
over a drink at the bar
while hundreds
hunker down
that frozen-in-time night,
shivering,
waiting for morning
when the tent flap can roll up.
Lovely! Ashley, since this is your first time here, would you send a short bio to me thepoetbyday@gmail.com include a photo if you are comfortable with that. Need ASAP. thanks! Delighted to read your poems and see you here.
In response of your marvellous poem Jamie :
#None keeps promise #
That scarlet evening beside Shilabati is still sleepless
That earthen road through which we did wayfaring
is still waiting for you
That deck bridge across the river
is abiding still now just for you
Some wintry leaves are flying on its chest agonized
On that severe brumal evening
lights of sideway poles were reflecting from the crystalline rivulet
After a long walk we settled on a giant pebble
Grasses -sedges and bamboos were grown most for their foliage
Remains of some aquatic plants were kissing our mortal feet
Divers waterbirds were peeping through hydrilla
You uttered softly witnessing the pole star
,”Jhimli -we will come here again during the next fall of dew .”
and touch the last pole
Now it is a wintry evening anew
I’m tramping again restless and lonely here
Tears rolling down my cheeks are amalgamating with crystalline water of the rivulet
You haven’t kept your words
The mild bridge is calling me
saying -“Don’t wait anymore -none would come –
none would wipe your tears -none keeps promise .”…..
Kakali Das Ghosh
Lovely! Thank you Anthony. See it published here next Tuesday. Since this is your first time with us, might I have a short bio and photo (if you are comortable with that. Please send it to thepoetbyday@gmail.com
Gray chalk hills fade one behind another
until they dissolve into oyster sky.
Ice crystals dance on gelid air,
glisten highway’s edge, and settle
in the crooks of sleeping maples.
Evergreens bend with the weight
of their thick winter shawls.
In spite of its bleakness, we are taken by
the stark frost-coated beauty of it all.
Northbound…
my core senses those timeworn mountains
long before my eyes discern them.
Yet, it is not these ancient mounds
that draw me back, but the folks therein
I long to see—those I love who wait for me.
With each mile passed, the years begin to dissipate;
like those hills now veiled by mist and gloam;
my pulse beats faster as this heart anticpates
that final stretch of road that leads me home.
Ginny Brannan
Second Response:
Comfort Zone
A sudden snow shower,
flakes fly past the panes,
we watch in silence
mugs in hand; steam rising.
You turn on an old movie—
one seen a dozen times,
maybe more…
we laugh in unison,
quoting favorite lines,
echoing off each other,
anticipating what comes next…
as the steam rises
that now perceives a full moon in darkness
slightly hazy behind the thinnest of cloud coverings
behind the stark grasp of wintered branches –
a something – but in reality an absolute nothing
dreaming inconsequentially that it’s a something
by reason of the idea that it guides the scudding pen
across the page in the way it learned long ago to do
to produce a modicum of words – just sufficient
to say that there’s a something that perceives…
and so on and on; there will come other occasions
when it will choose to allow itself to be beguiled
into imagining that grand & conspicuous heaps
and heaps of words make some kind of sense –
all the stout metaphors and the dancing images
circumlocutions qualifications periphrastics…
but in these bold moments before this winter dawn
it has a sudden understanding that between words
– whatever words you so carefully choose –
and the infinite scintillations of externality there are
gross mucky swamps and dire deserts monstrous
mountains & galaxies that can never ever be traversed
by 
Jamie Dedes' THE POET BY DAY Webzine 
Hi Jamie,
I loved your poem. Here are two from me. One written today, Snowball Wars, and one written last February, A Long Winter’s Sleep.
Snowball Wars
Red rubber boots, unlined and stiff, crackling with the cold,
stuffed with small round snowballs at days’ end,
attached to our snowpant cuffs
like the thistle burrs in summer to our socks,
we seven heedlessly dumped it all out on the kitchen linoleum,
pulling off those puffy clown pants,
draping wet woolen mittens, grandma knit,
over the wooden rack in the corner.
The mittens and hats never dried between forays
into that foot-deep,
knee-deep white stuff,
yet back on they went, wet and clammy next day
our enthusiasm warming the wet threads.
We never tired of building the snow forts
creating our cover, our barricade for attacking the neighbor kids,
defending our clan against them all,
my job to form the balls,
keep the pyramid pile stacked
so my brothers could jump up and fire them
over the top of the u-shaped fort.
I cowered from the enemy’s rock-hard snow bullets,
happy to make the ammunition behind the front line.
Were we catching a sense of what a war would be like,
years before my brother was sent to Vietnam?
I tried hard to follow directions,
pack the snow hard,
slapping the balls together in my smaller hands.
They were older, my brothers, like savages sometimes,
so maybe that’s why they invented the ice ball—
snow dipped in a bucket of water,
then surrounded with more snow—
so dangerous when they connected.
Perhaps our padded clothing kept us safe,
the ice ball dipping the source of their soaked mittens.
Gram had hot chocolate on the stove sometimes
when we came inside in the twilight
on the best winter days.
And no, my balls never measured up to theirs.
© Snowball Wars, a poem, Lisa Ashley
October 23, 2017
A Long Winter’s Sleep
The dash says 53 today,
not bad for January.
I glance across the street
into the opening of his tent
pitched there
on the sidewalk
under the overpass.
What tethers his tent there?
His body? His belongings?
He’s a white man, balding.
I can’t stop looking at him.
I check the light.
I invade his tent again.
He’s putting on his shoes, I think,
his tent flap rolled up
to catch the morning light.
Cars move through the intersection
rolling by one after the other.
It’s my turn to go.
Winter’s cut crystal breath
blasts concrete city
and clement countryside alike
as darkness drops down.
We live mostly inside these days.
Some live outside,
connected without choice
to nature’s moods and rhythms.
Gelid wind rushes ‘round corners
down brick and steel canyons,
sneaks beneath crackling tarps
pitched in peril
on grass-barren ground.
Mean homes huddled together,
snugged up behind a stone pole,
the metal dumpster,
a frigid freeway barricade
in hopes of blocking sleety rain.
Who blows on numb hands
inside these rimed plastic walls?
He lies on back-breaking sidewalks
night after night,
hears stiff tarps snapping
with the same indifference
as the taps of sharp-soled boots
skirting his home.
It’s colder than a witch’s tit out there,
we tell each other
over a drink at the bar
while hundreds
hunker down
that frozen-in-time night,
shivering,
waiting for morning
when the tent flap can roll up.
© A Long Winter’s Sleep, a poem,
Lisa Ashley, February 15, 2017
LikeLiked by 1 person
Lovely! Ashley, since this is your first time here, would you send a short bio to me thepoetbyday@gmail.com include a photo if you are comfortable with that. Need ASAP. thanks! Delighted to read your poems and see you here.
LikeLike
Am clipping the bio from the zine. Hope that’s okay. We can always upate it. Sorry to see that you took your blog down, Lisa.
LikeLike
In response of your marvellous poem Jamie :
#None keeps promise #
That scarlet evening beside Shilabati is still sleepless
That earthen road through which we did wayfaring
is still waiting for you
That deck bridge across the river
is abiding still now just for you
Some wintry leaves are flying on its chest agonized
On that severe brumal evening
lights of sideway poles were reflecting from the crystalline rivulet
After a long walk we settled on a giant pebble
Grasses -sedges and bamboos were grown most for their foliage
Remains of some aquatic plants were kissing our mortal feet
Divers waterbirds were peeping through hydrilla
You uttered softly witnessing the pole star
,”Jhimli -we will come here again during the next fall of dew .”
and touch the last pole
Now it is a wintry evening anew
I’m tramping again restless and lonely here
Tears rolling down my cheeks are amalgamating with crystalline water of the rivulet
You haven’t kept your words
The mild bridge is calling me
saying -“Don’t wait anymore -none would come –
none would wipe your tears -none keeps promise .”…..
Kakali Das Ghosh
LikeLiked by 1 person
winter offering
the first frozen
day and my whole
world is swallowed
in snow. quiet air
chills my bones
as i draw each breath.
exhale.
every grey puff
is winter’s sacred
meditation chime,
an invocation
of gratitude as time
fades quickly away.
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Lovely! Thank you Anthony. See it published here next Tuesday. Since this is your first time with us, might I have a short bio and photo (if you are comortable with that. Please send it to thepoetbyday@gmail.com
LikeLiked by 1 person
Love when you write about food in your poems. Please read mine at https://reneejustturtleflight.com/2017/10/20/magic-and-a-mystery. Be well
LikeLiked by 1 person
First response:
Mile Markers
Gray chalk hills fade one behind another
until they dissolve into oyster sky.
Ice crystals dance on gelid air,
glisten highway’s edge, and settle
in the crooks of sleeping maples.
Evergreens bend with the weight
of their thick winter shawls.
In spite of its bleakness, we are taken by
the stark frost-coated beauty of it all.
Northbound…
my core senses those timeworn mountains
long before my eyes discern them.
Yet, it is not these ancient mounds
that draw me back, but the folks therein
I long to see—those I love who wait for me.
With each mile passed, the years begin to dissipate;
like those hills now veiled by mist and gloam;
my pulse beats faster as this heart anticpates
that final stretch of road that leads me home.
Ginny Brannan
Second Response:
Comfort Zone
A sudden snow shower,
flakes fly past the panes,
we watch in silence
mugs in hand; steam rising.
You turn on an old movie—
one seen a dozen times,
maybe more…
we laugh in unison,
quoting favorite lines,
echoing off each other,
anticipating what comes next…
as the steam rises
Ginny Brannan
LikeLike
something there is
that now perceives a full moon in darkness
slightly hazy behind the thinnest of cloud coverings
behind the stark grasp of wintered branches –
a something – but in reality an absolute nothing
dreaming inconsequentially that it’s a something
by reason of the idea that it guides the scudding pen
across the page in the way it learned long ago to do
to produce a modicum of words – just sufficient
to say that there’s a something that perceives…
and so on and on; there will come other occasions
when it will choose to allow itself to be beguiled
into imagining that grand & conspicuous heaps
and heaps of words make some kind of sense –
all the stout metaphors and the dancing images
circumlocutions qualifications periphrastics…
but in these bold moments before this winter dawn
it has a sudden understanding that between words
– whatever words you so carefully choose –
and the infinite scintillations of externality there are
gross mucky swamps and dire deserts monstrous
mountains & galaxies that can never ever be traversed
*
From a 2011 collection ‘pseudo-clarities’…
LikeLiked by 1 person
second response
..twigs again..
it has always been the same,
water going down hill,
thick frost of winter’s morning.
now the birds song at 4 am,
bad news soften by dreams,
new days. it has usually
been the same.
sbm.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thank you Jamie – first response
..that feeling that..
arrives unexpected from darkness, some winters’ mornings,
opening the door to the sound of one black bran bird calling.
track four repeated. that
comes on waking finding peace and comfort bound in clean
linen.
arises with perfume, an uncertain memory.
it may be chemicals, peptides in the brain as love, what
ever the germ or warfare
I find no word to describe, no random feather nor dust on
my plate. pass a finger.
that feeling of trimmed nails upon the keys pounding
words and silences.
while music plays. that feeling. that.
syrup stings my tongue.
sbm.
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Hi Jamie,
Here’s my second response:
This Winter Tercet
Cold snuffles wound round lean naked limbs.
Wet wends beneath sinew, soaks into blind bone.
Ice builds crystal by crystal simple net of things.
A cracked miniscus mirrors low sun’s sharp moan.
A fallen ocean blinks between blood red bricks.
As gust raises bare barkskin, snaps rendered stone.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Jamie,
Here is my first response:
Nudd Offered
At bottom of this Winter ale
had a word about end of the world
with Nudd, Lord of the Underworld
Nudd says “Your wife and kids are dead
and gone with the other Lord
pustuled and poxed, ill fed
come with me below
to the lake beneath the mountain
never age never hunger never ail
meet your wife and kids again
I agree, get up to go
lift the latch
trip and fall in snow.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Beautiful!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Thank you, Alethea.
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