Day 342...

A couple of days ago my Polar Bear sent me this picture...

of my favourite pixie girl...reading MY book!

swoon.

melted heart.

I. Love. This.

Day 327...

My grandparents.

G'ma & G'pa Greene.

Grandma Muskie.

and my Grampie. 

The smell of pipe tobacco reminds me of My Grampie...Grandpa Graignic. I remember his house in Seattle and Christmastime surrounded by uncles, aunts and cousins, playing chutes and ladders in the living room, and my older cousin reading the lines of my palm; casting my future.

Grandma Moskovita...Gramma Muskie. I believe my love of willow trees began with her. Her home in Everett, Washington had what I remember to be the biggest, most incredible willow tree hanging its lovely weeping branches over the driveway. I always felt like the tree was welcoming me into a secret hideaway as my mother eased the car up the drive.

My Grandparents Greene...best remembered in the following poem, (written under my pen name Kerin Riley-Bishop, and which appeared in the Silver Boomer Books anthology From the Porch Swing - memories of our grandparents:

Caramels and Ginger Ale

Memory can be brutal; invasive,

or tenderly nudge its way in.

White Shoulders.

Tall trees.

Winding driveway in the woods.

Horses in green pasture.

Scent of grease and gasoline.

His perfect white flat-top,

soft and tempting to our fingers;

patting grandfather’s head as long as allowed.

Baby doll.

Old black leather trunk.

Dark paneled walls,

highboy dresser, chenille bedspread

and the end table next to the sofa;

glass bowl crowded with Kraft Caramels.

“Karen, would you like some ginger ale?”

“Yes, please, Grandma!” 

Day 257...

I've been feeling creatively constipated for a long time now. like all my words have been trapped behind some stupid barricade I can't get around or break through.

It's been frustrating. to say the least.

I've been processing a lot of grief this year...and what I learned today, after spending hours writing a few lines, putting my notebook away, coming back to it, reading what I wrote, editing, writing a bit more, putting it away again...repeat repeat repeat...what I learned is that anger is ridiculously easy to write about...but grief. grief is a bit more elusive.

today, I finally broke through. and wrote the first of many pieces that have been bouncing around in fragments within me.

it is both cathartic and heartbreaking to visit those emotions...to look at them head-on and put them on paper.

but it is better to be writing than not. because I don't feel "normal" when I'm not writing.

Day 256...

Today I received my signed copy of Dead Birds Fall from the Sky - selected poems by Stephan Cox

I'm so thrilled!

Some of you know about my friend Stephan's Thing a Day project of 2011...Stephan collected his favourites from the year and turned that project into DBFftS.

Stephan, I'm so happy for you! I'm so proud of you!

Day 201...

One of my mama's favourite pieces of mine...from my collection Three Thousand Doors.

Unleashed
by Karen Elaine Greene

I am limitless...
no orchard rows of conformity,
no delicate, pale nectar concocted to tame me.
I am infused with an unquenchable thirst for the
     incomparable.
I refuse to be mundane.
I am a pillar of light
walking in harmony with the moon.
I will carve my destiny from the stars and echo softly
     with their song.

Day 198 - I love...poetry day 16

The lyrics to this song, paired with the music, brings me to tears nearly every time.


Colours
Grace Potter and the Nocturnals

You don't have to ask me why
Because I know you understand
All the treasures of my life
Are right here in my hand...

Day 197 - I love...poetry day 15

The Road Not Taken

by Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both...

Day 196 - I love...poetry day 14

Moonlight, Summer Moonlight

by Emily Bronte

'Tis moonlight, summer moonlight,
All soft and still and fair;
The solemn hour of midnight...

Day 195 - I love...poetry day 13

Ragged Edges

by Karen Elaine Greene

borders

distorted and untidy

unravel quickly

as thread pulled gently 

from unfinished hems

no shame in the disheveled

unwrap your gifts 

and share them

like stars wait patiently 

to be unhooked 

and thrown free

Day 194 - I love...poetry day 12

People Who Live 

by Erica Jong

People who live by the sea
understand eternity...

Day 192 - I love...poetry day 10

another piece from my poetry collection Three Thousand Doors.

Forgiveness
by Karen Elaine Greene

It's about forgetting...
No.
It's about letting go.
Unlocking the anger
and allowing it to have its day,
closing that door
and moving into the future.
Little beads of hope
like raindrops
falling in the ether,
cleansing the soul,
renewing the heart,
breaking through stone barriers...
washing memory clean.

Day 189 - I love...poetry day 7

This is one of mine...from my collection Three Thousand Doors.

Wild Grass

by Karen Elaine Greene

I am the wind charging through you

disturbing crisp leaves on a fresh autumn morning. 

I am the phoenix risen from the ashes.

Burst into flames

scatter

rise again.

I am the butterfly wandering from flower to flower

unaccustomed too settling long on one blossom or

    another.

I am the grass that grows wild at the fence.

I will not be tamed; shaped into some pattern.

I am yours to treasure for a time

until my roots grow soft and I drift away

with the wind I am forever disciple to. 

Day 188 - I love...poetry day 6

for Christopher. always, my brother. love...to the end of the stars. 

i carry your heart with me

by e e cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it...

Christopher... 

Day 152 - I love...doors

I shot all the doors for the cover of my poetry collection, Three Thousand Doors. 

It was gloriously wonderful to drive around my town, stopping every now and then in various different sections in order to shoot a large variety of doors to choose from.

I had the idea in my head, how I wanted the cover to look, I just had to get the pieces of the puzzle together and then arrange them in the most aesthetically pleasing way.

 One very hot afternoon I was shooting several church doors, and stumbled upon this beautiful RED door.  

Abilene, Texas - May 2010 - keg

There is a beautiful red church door here in Louisville I plan to get out and shoot soon as well.

It was my fascination with doors which led to the title of my book, and prompted me to take those first tentative steps toward publication.

Thank you, doors.

Day ninety-two - I love...a poetry challenge

It's April.

National Poetry Month.

and that means it's time for the 5th annual Poem A Day Challenge with Robert Lee Brewer at Poetic Asides.

I'm pretty excited. I always get a wee bit giddy when it's poetry challenge time. April and November.

it's the best way to jumpstart my writing...which sometimes gets a bit stagnant in the first couple months of the year.

so here I go...off to the races. Day One.

Day sixty-six - I love...four seasons

One of my personal favourites from my poetry collection Three Thousand Doors:

Four Seasons

I should take the time to

go back to California in the spring...

the orange groves

full of intoxicating 

citrus blossoms

the air laced

with warm promise.

I should make a point to

be in Washington in autumn...

walk through the orchards

at picking time, 

the heady scent of apples

hanging in the air like ornaments.

I should go back to

New Orleans in the summer...

Sultry mists form a steamy shawl

wrapped 'round my arms, 

and warm wind settles in

among the swamps, 

hangs softly; drips

like Spanish moss.

I should be in Kentucky

in the winter...

where snowflakes fat as fists

fall softly from the sky

creating mounds of white divinity

to be razed by tentative footprints.

Day fifty-two - I love...gentle reminders

Sometimes I forget I'm published.

My friends laugh at me.

My friend Celeste has the most fun with it. This is my friend Karen, she's published!

me: oh yah. I forgot.

Or, when I updated my resume last year and sent it to my mother and a few friends for review, the response was: This is great, but you forgot your publishing credits.

sigh.

It's not that I think it's unfabulous, I think it's quite fabulous, and a life-long dream come true. It's just not something I think about every day. and I don't walk around introducing myself to people "Hi, I'm Karen. I'm published."

It's a part of me. but not all of me.

The other day, my friend Pauly posted on Facebook the following: If you don't have at least 100 books in your house then I worry for your children's future.
me: I don't currently. Because most of my books are in storage. But I have hundreds waiting for me to come get them. They call to me. Kiki........
Pauly: You know that you don't count. You are an actual published writer.
me: ‎:). I forget that part.
Pauly: And one would think that might be a bit relevant.
me: I have to be reminded.
Pauly: It's kind of hard to forgOMG SOMETHING SHINY!!!

This is truly the beauty of our friendship. Pauly nicknamed me Kiki the Wonder Ferret several years ago.

and so, because I am published, I will share another piece from my poetry collection, Three Thousand Doors, published by Laughing Cactus Press. It's a piece my friend Justen recently commented on:

Waterfalls

the sky is dripping
a woolen blanket hoisted atop the canopy
in vain effort to hold back the rain,
wool and water do not mix,
heavy begets heavy

souls are dormant
waiting patiently as the water carves
new pathways into the soil,
canyons forged from deluge,
mysteries begin and end in quiet contemplation,
silence begets silence.

A new dream founders in the clouds
while the rain recoils
awaiting the new torrent

Day twenty-five - I love...my muse

She has been uber challenging and inspirational lately. 

knocking around in my head, sometimes jumping around in my thoughts and emotions like she is on a trampoline. making me write furiously; passionately.

so much so...I'm pretty confident I'm ready to start pulling together another collection.

of course the next steps are compiling said collection, finding the title, and figuring out my publication route.

but that's all secondary. the most important thing is that I am writing. and I'm proud of what I'm writing. and I am in a place where I am ready to share more of my work. (even though the first run into publishing gave me serious panic attacks)

I WANT to put another collection out into the world. I WANT to read reviews and receive feedback. I WANT to know that my writing is reaching out and touching the people who read it.

because really, to me, the whole wonderful point of being a published poet, are those moments when someone says to me, "You said what I couldn't say. It's like you're in my head, writing my thoughts, my heart, my feelings. thank you!"

Day thirteen - I love...the gift of poetry

I am a poet.

have been since about age 12, when writing grabbed me by the shoulders, shook me hard and said, "Whatever else you will be or not be, you will be this! first and foremost, a poet!"

and that is what I am.

my writing has grown and blossomed in the years since I first placed pen on paper.
I am often in awe of what I've written, as though I've been in a momentary trance, channeling the stars, taking bits of dust and nebula and building worlds. I sometimes read what I've penned and think to myself, "wow! I wrote that!?"

I write other things: blogs (obviously) essays, short stories, beginnings of novels...and those are all written on the screens of my computer...but poetry...poetry is always pen to paper. letters forming words, racing across the page, scribbles and cross-outs, and arrows drawn for lines that need to move further up or down the page...only after this furious frenzy are they typed up and saved in the digital.

In 2010, a long-held dream was realised in the publication of my first collection of poetry, Three Thousand Doors. It was terrifying, and a bit surreal. it was amazing and thrilling. Thank you to Laughing Cactus Press for helping make one of my dreams come true.

here, a piece from that collection:

Dandelion

Souls are like seeds.
Some find purchase
in the first soil that may beckon.
Others
ride bareback on the wind, 
wild and drifting
until they find
the place they belong.