Boys of Summer
Four through seven
The wonder years
Peach-fuzz heads
Sun ripened ears
Favorite t-shirts
Sneakers, hats
Great Escape dreams
Wiffle-ball bats
Running through sprinklers
In the woods on a hike
Fishing with Dad
Riding your bike
Day Camp stories
A million times told
Boy pranks and boy jokes
That never grow old
Tree forts and climbing
From dawn until dusk
Hot dogs, ice cream
Sweet corn to husk
Sunburn and Band-aids
A weekly event
Lemonade-stand profits
Have all been spent
When the summer of boys
Finally comes to an end
The memories left
No millionaire could spend
J.R.G.5.27.09
August 25, 2009
Window
Window (A Sprint)
I love a picture window.
I love a white window.
I love replacing a broken window glass.
I love washing windows
I love looking out a picture window.
I love looking in a store window
I love climbing in a window when I forget my door key.
I love the word window and I don’t know why?
Window (Next Day)
As I awoke the next morning I instantly answered a question I had asked myself the night before, “I love the word window and I don’t know why?” I now knew the answer to that question. I love the word because I survive on introspect. I am always searching for something, a treasure, a sign, a clue. It is in everything I write. It is in everything I do. I continuously look in and out of life’s windows. It is a spirit sustaining drive that engulfs my mind. It is a hobby with no true cost, although it can take a toll on your heart when you are looking in to the window of your life or someone else’s and the picture is sad or disturbing. It may be illness, financial difficulty or the loss of a loved one. Windows do not always have happy views. If you embrace that life is going to happen with or without you, windows can help keep you alive.
If I need to breathe, I can open a window. If times are sad I can close the window, draw the shade and make the room dark for a brief moment. Seal the view; remove it for just a minute. Give myself time to regroup.
J.R.G. Summer of 2009
This was a writing exercise from Old Friend from Far Away (The Practice of Writing Memoir) by Natalie Goldberg
I love a picture window.
I love a white window.
I love replacing a broken window glass.
I love washing windows
I love looking out a picture window.
I love looking in a store window
I love climbing in a window when I forget my door key.
I love the word window and I don’t know why?
Window (Next Day)
As I awoke the next morning I instantly answered a question I had asked myself the night before, “I love the word window and I don’t know why?” I now knew the answer to that question. I love the word because I survive on introspect. I am always searching for something, a treasure, a sign, a clue. It is in everything I write. It is in everything I do. I continuously look in and out of life’s windows. It is a spirit sustaining drive that engulfs my mind. It is a hobby with no true cost, although it can take a toll on your heart when you are looking in to the window of your life or someone else’s and the picture is sad or disturbing. It may be illness, financial difficulty or the loss of a loved one. Windows do not always have happy views. If you embrace that life is going to happen with or without you, windows can help keep you alive.
If I need to breathe, I can open a window. If times are sad I can close the window, draw the shade and make the room dark for a brief moment. Seal the view; remove it for just a minute. Give myself time to regroup.
J.R.G. Summer of 2009
This was a writing exercise from Old Friend from Far Away (The Practice of Writing Memoir) by Natalie Goldberg
August 03, 2009
Alabaster Boxes
Alabaster Boxes
Do not keep the alabaster boxes of your love and tenderness sealed up, until your friends are dead. Fill their lives with sweetness. Speak approving, cheering words while their ears can hear them and while their hearts can be thrilled and made happier by them. The kind things you mean to say when they are gone, say them before they go. The flowers you mean to send-use to brighten and sweeten their homes before they leave them. If my friends have alabaster boxes laid away, full of fragrant perfumes of sympathy and affection I would rather they would bring them out in my weary and troubled hours and open them, that I may be refreshed and cheered when I need them. Let us learn to anoint our friends beforehand. Post-mortem kindnesses do not cheer the burdened spirit. Flowers cast no fragrance backward over the weary way.
-Author Unknown
Do not keep the alabaster boxes of your love and tenderness sealed up, until your friends are dead. Fill their lives with sweetness. Speak approving, cheering words while their ears can hear them and while their hearts can be thrilled and made happier by them. The kind things you mean to say when they are gone, say them before they go. The flowers you mean to send-use to brighten and sweeten their homes before they leave them. If my friends have alabaster boxes laid away, full of fragrant perfumes of sympathy and affection I would rather they would bring them out in my weary and troubled hours and open them, that I may be refreshed and cheered when I need them. Let us learn to anoint our friends beforehand. Post-mortem kindnesses do not cheer the burdened spirit. Flowers cast no fragrance backward over the weary way.
-Author Unknown
July 25, 2009
WWII
Window open
Faintly seen
In foggy distance
Eyes strain
Cupped hands
Around them
Try to focus
What does the sign say?
Wall
Of mist and haze
Covers answers
Day
After
Day
Too many pictures
To keep them straight
Who’s keeping track?
How much time
Left in the game
Two more minutes
As sleep settles in
Two more lines
To start the fire
Again…
J.R.G.7.25.09
Poem written about my search for something I can’t describe. It haunts me and exhilarates me in the same breathe. It is joyous and exhausting. It keeps me moving forward…
Window open
Faintly seen
In foggy distance
Eyes strain
Cupped hands
Around them
Try to focus
What does the sign say?
Wall
Of mist and haze
Covers answers
Day
After
Day
Too many pictures
To keep them straight
Who’s keeping track?
How much time
Left in the game
Two more minutes
As sleep settles in
Two more lines
To start the fire
Again…
J.R.G.7.25.09
Poem written about my search for something I can’t describe. It haunts me and exhilarates me in the same breathe. It is joyous and exhausting. It keeps me moving forward…
July 22, 2009
Cemetery
Cemetery
By John R. Greenwood
Stone Grey
Names
Chiseled deep
American flags fade
In sun baked wind
Summer flowers
Red, white, and yellow
Urns dry and patient
Await soft Sunday showers
Visitors wander
Through neatly placed rows
Plots long forgotten
Old cedars sway with
Brown slivered bark
Young widow weeps
Quiet tears of emptiness
Lives of war heroes made short
Shadow centuries past
Songbirds sing unaware
Their sounds soothe
Hearts below
Cemetery air
Brings a silent ease
To loved-ones left
Memorial Day
Bow your head
For those lost before
Cherish life
Up ahead
J.R.G.5.15.2009
Stone Grey
Names
Chiseled deep
American flags fade
In sun baked wind
Summer flowers
Red, white, and yellow
Urns dry and patient
Await soft Sunday showers
Visitors wander
Through neatly placed rows
Plots long forgotten
Old cedars sway with
Brown slivered bark
Young widow weeps
Quiet tears of emptiness
Lives of war heroes made short
Shadow centuries past
Songbirds sing unaware
Their sounds soothe
Hearts below
Cemetery air
Brings a silent ease
To loved-ones left
Memorial Day
Bow your head
For those lost before
Cherish life
Up ahead
J.R.G.5.15.2009
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