Poetry Friday: A Pythagorean Poem

Catherine Flynn13 Comments

“I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”
~ L.M. Montgomery ~

How is it October already? Life is a whirlwind these days, but I couldn’t miss our monthly Inkling challenge. This month, Margaret challenged us to write Pythagorean poems. What on earth?! Here’s the lowdown (thank you, Linda!):

A Pythagorean Poem
created by Shari Green

The math background:
Pythagoras’ theorem is a2 x b2 = c2
One possible triple is 3,4,5.

3×3 + 4×4 = 5×5

 9     +  16.  = 25

Using the triple, the poetic form works like this:
1st stanza: 3 lines of 3 words each
2nd stanza: 4 lines of 4 words each
3rd stanza: 5 lines of 5 words each*

*The third stanza must be composed of all the words found in stanzas one and two (in any order; variations okay).

The third stanza should also be a progression of sorts, a product of the first two in thought or theme or meaning.

I love writing Fibonacci poems and pi poems, so this appealed to that part of my brain. What I found most challenging was using all the words in the last stanza. As already mentioned, life is a bit hectic these days, so I cheated just a bit and swapped she for the in the last stanza. Poetic license and all that.

Just before dawn,
a barred owl
calls his mate.

Perched in a pine
she responds, her hoot
echoing through the trees
seeping into my dreams.

Through the pines, a barred
owl’s hoot echoes. His mate,
perched in a tree, calls 
her response just before the
dawn seeps into my dreams.

Draft, © Catherine Flynn, 2024

Please be sure to visit all the Inklings to see how they responded to this challenging challenge:

Mary Lee Hahn @ A(nother) Year of Reading
Heidi Mordhorst @ My Juicy Little Universe
Molly Hogan @ Nix the Comfort Zone
Linda Mitchell @ A Word Edgewise
Margaret Simon @ Reflections on the Teche

Then head over to visit Tabatha for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

Poetry Friday: Next Time

Catherine Flynn9 Comments

Next time, I hope I’ll be settled into the routine of the new school year and actually post on Friday! In the meantime, here is my response to Mary Lee’s challenge to “use Next Time, by Joyce Sutphen as a mentor poem for your own Next Time poem.” Seems pretty straight forward, right? I had to make a conscious effort not to revisit every past mistake, real or perceived, to keep my own “Next Time” poem from devolving into a laundry list of guilt and shame.

So here instead is a gentle reminder to myself. Maybe you need it, too.

Next time
I wander into the wild,
I’ll leave my watch
at home.

I’ll slip into shadows
of oak and pine
with only the sun
to mark my passage.

I’ll leave my worldly cares
on the threshold of a place
where time grows slow,
recorded  in years, not seconds.

I’ll breathe in the patience
of rocks and ferns
and remind myself to just
be.

Draft @ 2024, Catherine Flynn

Please be sure to visit my fellow Inklings to read their responses to Mary Lee’s challenge:

Linda @A Word Edgewise
Mary Lee @Another Year of Reading
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
Heidi @my juicy little universe

Then hear over to Buffy Silverman’s blog for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

Poetry Friday: “You Are Here”

Catherine Flynn7 Comments

The first Friday of August means it’s time for another Inkling Challenge. This month it was my turn to pose a prompt for my fabulous critique group partners. I’ve been following Ada Limón’s Poet Laureate project “You Are Here: Poetry in the Parks” on Instagram and decided summer was the perfect season to join Limón’s effort to “deepen our connection to nature through poetry.” 

In the introduction to You Are Here: Poetry In the Natural World, the anthology Limón curated as part of her project, she counsels that “nature is not a place to visit. Nature is who we are.” The epigraph to this stunning collection are these wise words from Robin Wall Kimmerer: “The land is the real teacher.” I kept thinking about these lines as my husband and I took a barnstorming tour of western South Dakota, south central Montana, and northern Wyoming. The vastness of this landscape is truly overwhelming, but it filled me up in so many ways. I was anxious to answer Ada’s question: “What would you write in response to the landscape around you?” and “offer something back to the earth” letting it know that I had noticed my “connection to the planet.”

One caveat: Threaded through our trip was a feeling of profound sadness at the loss of these extraordinary places to the Native peoples who called this area (indeed all of North America) home, and considered many of them sacred, before 1492. I don’t have the knowledge or cultural currency to address these wrongs at this time. I will keep reading and educating myself about this stain on our history.

At Lower Falls

I stand on the edge of the man-made world:
concrete and stone designed to 
Keep. Me. Safe.

Below and beyond rock and river
conspire in their ancient alchemy 
to carve a canyon.

An unrelenting cascade pours over 
the lip of a cliff, chiseling away,
its work never done. 

Columns of water foam and froth, 
roar a single, powerful note,
drowning out the rest of the world.

I am in awe of this showy display,
a peacock among hundreds of 
smaller, less spectacular falls.

Tucked into a forest of lodgepole pines,
Mystic Falls aren’t as high,
hum a softer, soothing tune,

reminding me the world needs both
showy displays of grandeur
and quiet, subtle beauty.

Draft © 2024 by Catherine Flynn

Please be sure to visit my fellow Inklings to read their “You Are Here” poems:

Linda @A Word Edgewise
Mary Lee @Another Year of Reading
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
Heidi @my juicy little universe

Then head over to say hi to Laura Purdie Salas and read other Poetry Friday offerings at the Roundup.

Poetry Friday: A Summer Postcard

Catherine Flynn13 Comments

Happy July, everyone! I hope your Independence Day celebrations were full of food, fun, and fireworks. It’s the first Friday of the month, so it’s time for another Inkling challenge. This month, Heidi suggested that we “write a short postcard poem with choice details of your vacation/holiday/getaway/escape location and activities. Conclude with “Wish you were here” or some variation!”

As usual, I did not follow these directions. Rather, used Aimee Nezhukumatahil‘s stunning poem, “What I Learned in Greenland,” from the summer issue of Orion (sadly, the poem isn’t available online. Sorry!) as a mentor. The lines I “borrowed” from Aimee’s poem are in italics.

What I Learned in the Grand Canyon
(after Aimee Nezhukumatahil)

I thought I understood summer for example–
the season of hayfields and shady maples–but I never
knew it surrounded by rock and sand. Now
I know summer as towering sandstone cliffs

of every imaginable shape, layered like an
unfrosted birthday cake, the edges rough
and uneven. And now summer will always mean
hot winds blowing sand everywhere, in 

my eyes, my hair, my ears. And the water,
not enough for our thirsty world, the color of chocolate
milk, churning over boulders the size of small cars,
so cold it takes my breath away. Wispy green tamarisks 

line the river’s banks in stark contrast to the rough reds, 
tans, and blacks of canyon walls rising a mile above me. 
And at night the arch of the sky is hemmed in by those walls, 
creating a glittering trail of stars. And just when I think 

there couldn’t be any more surprises, for what could be 
more astonishing than what I’ve seen already, a slot
canyon comes into view, its sinuous walls sculpted by
cool, clear water. Its shade beckons. Somewhere overhead 

a plane engine whines. I imagine tourists pressing faces
against small windows, oohing and aahing over the 
sight below. Soon the plane flies off. I am left in this
ancient place, flowing water the only sound and I

know that no matter how many New England summers
I think up, I know I will never forget what it feels like to 
slip into a hidden pool at the bottom of the Grand Canyon
and float.

Draft, Catherine Flynn © 2024

Please be sure to visit my fellow Inklings to read their postcard poems:

Linda @A Word Edgewise
Mary Lee @Another Year of Reading
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
Heidi @my juicy little universe

And don’t forget to visit Jan at Bookseedstudio for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

Poetry Friday: June’s Challenge

Catherine Flynn9 Comments

Happy summer! School has been out for two weeks and I finally feel that I have settled into the routine of summer: longer walks, lazy afternoons, and lots of reading!

Notice writing is not on that list. I’ve been very slowly getting back into the habit of writing every day. Amid last minute grading and writing report card comments, I completely missed our June Inkling challenge. So better late than never. Molly’s challenge was inspired by a talk she attended by Pádraig Ó Tuama. She paraphrased his remarks, asking us to “’write something narrative and by narrative I mean something that has story and observation to it…write about the first time you saw somebody who’s become a you to you…a you that you love to say…detail what else could be seen”… and let those other things convey what it all meant to you.”

Of course, I went in my own direction with this idea. On a recent episode of On Being, Krista Tippett interviewed Janine Benyus and Azita Ardakani Walton about biomimicry and what we can learn from the world around us. During the course of the conversation, Janine Benyus commented “don’t let the good stuff go.” This resonated with me on so many different levels, but really hit home regarding what is going on in the world of teaching reading in the wake of “the science of reading.” My work has been deeply impacted by the fallout from this movement and the resulting legislation, and I have really struggled this year to make sense of this.

My response to Molly’s prompt uses Benyus’s wise words in an attempt to cheer myself on as I prepare for the coming school year.

Please visit my fellow Inklings to see how they responded to this challenge:

Linda @A Word Edgewise
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
Heidi @my juicy little universe

Then be sure to visit Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

Poetry Friday: Sunday Edition

Catherine Flynn8 Comments

Linda gave us our May challenge. We were each paired up with another Inkling, then sent off a poem and received a poem. Linda asked us to “Fiddle with, play with, tinker, tear-apart, be inspired or stumped by the poem.”

Molly sent me two poems to choose from. I picked this lovely ode to spring:

Gardening

Ancient alchemy
the shine of sun
the gurgle of water
the bump of dirt-gritty fingers,
nudging seeds from sleep

to grasp and strain against soil
to rise up and up

always a becoming

©Molly Hogan

I contemplated Molly’s words for several days, turning them over and over in my brain, waiting for them to nudge a new idea. Then, as I listened to The Slowdown one morning, Major Jackson’s question, “What if I never fell in love with the world?” finally helped an idea “rise up.” Full disclosure: many lines from this poem are taken from other poems of mine.

 What if I never fell in love with the world?

What if the ancient alchemy
that turns light into life
never captured my imagination?

Would the first trills of the peepers still 
fill me with glee?

Would I notice the sharp-lobed hepatica 
erupting from leaf litter,
their pale pink petals
streaked like the morning sky?

So often life pulls us from
our intended path,
distracts us from
our true north.

This morning’s bird-bright
joy
confettiwraps
the world,

reminding me to meet
each day with eyes wide open,
clear intentions,
and optimism
in the face of a fickle world.

Draft © Catherine Flynn, 2024

Please be sure to visit all the Inklings to read their responses to Linda’s challenge:

Linda @A Word Edgewise
Mary Lee @Another Year of Reading
Heidi @my juicy little universe
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche

Then head over to visit Buffy Silverman for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

Poetry Friday: The Progressive Poem is Here!

Catherine Flynn17 Comments

Welcome to today’s installment of the 2024 Progressive Poem. The story of this year’s poem feels more critical and desperate than past poems. Our hearts are cheering for these two young migrants; our heads know there are almost insurmountable challenges ahead.

cradled in stars, our planet sleeps,
clinging to tender dreams of peace
sister moon watches from afar,
singing lunar lullabies of hope.

almost dawn, I walk with others,
keeping close, my little brother.
hand in hand, we carry courage
escaping closer to the border

My feet are lightning;
My heart is thunder.
Our pace draws us closer
to a new land of wonder.

I bristle against rough brush—
poppies ahead brighten the browns.
Morning light won’t stay away—
hearts jump at every sound.

I hum my own little song
like ripples in a stream
Humming Mami’s lullaby
reminds me I have her letter

My fingers linger on well-worn creases,
shielding an address, a name, a promise–
Sister Moon will find always us
surrounding us with beams of kindness

But last night as we rested in the dusty field,
worries crept in about matters back home.
I huddled close to my brother. Tears revealed
the no-choice need to escape. I feel grown.

Leaving all I’ve ever known
the tender, heavy, harsh of home.
On to maybes, on to dreams,
on to whispers we hope could be.

But I don’t want to whisper! I squeeze Manu’s hand.
“¡Más cerca ahora!” Our feet pound the sand.
We race, we pant, we lean on each other
I open my canteen and drink gratefully.

Thirst is slaked, but I know we’ll need
more than water to achieve our dreams.

Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect has the next couplet. Please be sure to visit Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

April 1 Patricia Franz at Reverie
April 2 Jone MacCulloch
April 3 Janice Scully at Salt City Verse
April 4 Leigh Anne Eck at A Day in the Life
April 5 Irene at Live Your Poem
April 6 Margaret at Reflections on the Teche
April 7 Marcie Atkins
April 8 Ruth at There is No Such Thing as a God Forsaken Town
April 9 Karen Eastlund
April 10 Linda Baie at Teacher Dance
April 11 Buffy Silverman
April 12 Linda Mitchell at A Word Edgewise
April 13 Denise Krebs at Dare to Care
April 14 Carol Varsalona at Beyond Literacy Link
April 15 Rose Cappelli at Imagine the Possibilities
April 16 Sarah Grace Tuttle
April 17 Heidi Mordhorst at my juicy little universe
April 18 Tabatha at Opposite of Indifference
April 19 Catherine Flynn at Reading to the Core
April 20 Tricia Stohr-Hunt at The Miss Rumphius Effect
April 21 Janet, hosted here at Reflections on the Teche
April 22 Mary Lee Hahn at A(nother) Year of Reading
April 23 Tanita Davis at (fiction, instead of lies)
April 24 Molly Hogan at Nix the Comfort Zone
April 25 Joanne Emery at Word Dancer
April 26 Karin Fisher-Golton at Still in Awe
April 27 Donna Smith at Mainely Write
April 28 Dave at Leap of Dave
April 29 Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge
April 30 Michelle Kogan at More Art for All

Poetry Friday: Spring Haiku

Catherine Flynn10 Comments

At the beginning of the year, I began teaching a section of 6th grade in addition to my literacy specialist role. Then, just as I was finally feeling comfortable with my new routine, two sections of 7th grade were added to my schedule. Suffice it to say, I didn’t have a lot of bandwidth left for writing poetry. Still, I’ve tried to keep up with our Inkling challenges. This month, Mary Lee asked us to “write a haiku sequence that talks about poetry without mentioning it by name.”

I wasn’t sure how to approach this challenge, but as usual, a walk helped me find a place to begin.

a woolly bear
stirs, stretches, slips from her bed
hungry for spring sun

her inner compass
steers her toward delicate greens
transformation fuel

suddenly our paths
cross; I swerve and stumble
she keeps inching along 

Draft © Catherine Flynn, 2024

Be sure to visit my fellow Inklings to read their haiku, then visit Irene Latham at Live Your Poem for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

Heidi @my juicy little universe
Linda @A Word Edgewise
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
Mary Lee @ Another Year of Reading

Poetry Friday: Persona Poems

Catherine Flynn7 Comments

In her brilliant book, Poems Are Teachers: How Studying Poetry Strengthens Writing in All Genres, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater tells us to “strengthen our abilities to see the world from multiple points of view” because developing this muscle helps us realize that “each leaf, each mouse, each stranger [is] important and worthy of our attention and care.” (pg. 77) What an important lesson for our fractured world.

I reread Amy’s thoughts on Persona poems this week as I attempted to write one for the Inklings March challenge. Margaret asked us to write a poem that “conveys a message, is written in the voice of another person, place, or thing, uses direct address.”

This seemingly straight-forward task stumped me. I tried writing about my great-grandmother. When that didn’t work, I scoured Google Arts & Culture and found an intriguing painting of a woman with blue hair, but that went nowhere. Finally, this morning (Saturday!), I remembered a poem I wrote several years ago. It’s been sitting in my notebook all this time because I wasn’t completely satisfied with it. And although it’s not exactly a persona poem, it’s close enough. Also, as I’ve been writing this, I think it’s an appropriate poem to share at the beginning of Women’s History Month.

Peasant Girl

Stitch after stitch her story grows
As nimble fingers wrap coarse yarn
Swift needles sing an ancient song

Row by row, old truths unfold
A woman’s voice is not her own
Stitch after stitch her story grows

Blocked from using pen and ink
She knits the truth of her fiery soul
Swift needles sing an ancient song

She plies her skill to share her tale
Pain and longing encoded in wool
Stitch after stitch her story grows

Texture and color are her vocabulary
She chooses each with loving care
Swift needles sing an ancient song

Pearls of hard-won wisdom shared
For all who care to see
Stitch after stitch her story grows
Swift needles sing an ancient song

Draft © 2024, Catherine Flynn

Peasant girl
Eugenio Hermoso Martínez 1904 via Google Arts & Culture

Please be sure to see how my fellow Inklings responded to this challenge here:

Heidi @my juicy little universe
Linda @A Word Edgewise
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
Mary Lee @Another Year of Reading

Also, be sure to visit Linda Baie, our gracious hostess, for this week’s Poetry Friday Roundup.

Poetry Friday: The Secret

Catherine Flynn18 Comments

Happy New Year! Life has been a bit tumultuous over the past few months (everyone is fine; everything–the jury is still out) and has left me with no brainpower for writing poetry. Reading poetry, yes, always. Writing, not so much. But it’s time for the Inkling’s monthly challenge. And since it was my turn to pose the prompt, I figured I’d better get my act together.

Even coming up with a prompt was beyond me. Early in January, Molly shared a list of prompts from the Modesto-Stanislaus Poetry Center. I asked her if she would mind if I picked a prompt from this collection. Of course she didn’t. Here’s the one I chose:

Our Lips are Sealed…Or Not
            Write a poem about secrets——family, community/societal, governmental, personal, etc.  This could be a narrative (how the secret(s) started, where it or they led, the along-the-way and final (if any) consequences.  For inspiration or starting blocks for your poem, here’s this poem, “Family Secret” by Nancy Kuhl:
            https://poets.org/poem/family-secret
            Secret loves, guilty (or not-so) secrets, happy secrets (like the gift you bought for __________ and secreted until the Big Day/Right Moment, and what happened next), whistle-blower secrets… It’s an unlimited grab-bag since humans can (or can’t) keep an incalculable supply of secrets.  Maybe there’s a big-box store or warehouse out there somewhere where our discounted secrets are kept until ordered and dispatched with 2-day shipping guaranteed.
            SO:  unsheathe the Shushhhhhh… and happy writing!  Ready and Steady and Go…

As I said, reading poetry, yes. Writing, no. So I decided to create a cento. (But I cheated and added some words of my own to help the lines flow. These lines are italicized.) Source poems and texts are listed in order at the bottom of the poem.

The secret of life
can’t be found in
the whole volume of S…
The secret is that
nothing can be permanently settled or solved;
air takes shape in shadow and light
and
time is the substance we are made of. 

So,
Err on the side of generosity.
When you love someone… offer that person … your presence.
Offer poems of love to a burning world.
Treasure…the greenness that rises out of the ashes.

“The Secret” by Denise Levertov
“The World Book” by Patricia Hooper
The Future, by Naomi Alderman
“Body’s Ken” by Simon West
Jorge Luis Borges, quoted in The Marginalia
“When in Doubt” by Sandra Cisneros
Thich Nhat Hanh, quoted in The Marginalia
“Why Write Love Poetry in a Burning World” by Katie Farris
“Wild Joy” in The Comfort of Crows, by Margaret Renkl

Please be sure to visit my fellow Inkling, Mary Lee Hahn, for the Poetry Friday Roundup. And don’t forget to visit all the Inklings to learn all their secrets!

Heidi @my juicy little universe
Linda @A Word Edgewise
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche