Day 5

Day 5: What do you collect?

Hoard

You could make a military obstacle of my room some days;
it’s just missing the smoke and mud and gunfire.
I’m getting better, but this, I believe, will be a lifelong struggle.
I want to keep everything because it helps me remember,
even though they say that objects are not memories.
Declutter. Purge. Donate and throw away.
But what about my undecipherable childhood drawings?
What about the hospital bracelets from kindergarten?
What about the genius ideas scrawled on papers?
And what about my life that’s been lived with these things?
I feel less-stressed when I have more space,
but I hesitate to toss something I might have a use for one day.
I have stacks of boxes filled with projects I want to do.
They are uncompleted and wait, unopened potential.
Will I wake up 50 years from now, a hermit in a wasteland?
I want to live my life in the experiences,
not in the things that I accumulate.
So I am changing. Slowly. But yes, surely.

Day 4

Day 4: Take a five-minute walk [aka browse through old files on my computer], then make something where you’ve ended up.


I found some writing ideas and combined two phrases. Then I decided to go visual, found three pictures to work with, and spent some time playing with Photoshop.


How sweet the sound that echoes, echoes from the walls.


Process (oh, my goodness, I'm sharing my PROGRESS!):


What was "good enough", a philosophy one of my aunts so kindly suggested I try so that I actually get things done:

Day 3

Day 3: something out of paper




Dolls

Those paper clothes
punched out of magazines
had little tabs that bent
around the cardstock people.
Hats and coats and galoshes
from last season
were kept in an envelope
out of my brothers' sight.
I don't remember
what I used to pretend
as I dressed and redressed
those smiling forms.
I found them again last year
somewhere in my closet
next to Kiddles and Barbies
and G.I. Joes.

Day 2

Day 2: your [least] favorite animal




The Dust Bunny

There are some animals I don't want to meet.
One in particular I wouldn't greet is
the dust bunny
who's not funny
because he lurks in wait to stick to my feet.

Day 1

Technically, this is day 1 and 2 since it just so happens to be January 2nd today. So I will work with the first two prompts.

Day 1: something that fits in the palm of your hand





Marbles

There are marbles all around the house
as if someone lost them
or planted them like the acorns
the squirrels are busy burying in fall,
which, in the spring a few years from now,
will have sprouted into slender trees
with big green leaves poking through
the weeds in the corners of the yard.

I keep them in a basket in a chest in my room
as if I will play a game
or examine them like the treasure
of a sunken pirate ship,
which, forgotten at the bottom of the sea,
is found one day
among other trinkets and held up
to sparkle in the sunlight.