I believe perspective creates reality and though we may not have turned the corner on good things outweighing the bad, there is a lot of good inside of me, you, everywhere that can fill us up. My wish for us in 2021 is that we carry with us the surprising gratitude, the moments we realized our treasures, that we keep that hard-earned perspective and keep dreaming. 

Happy New Year! 

​Love - Amy Kay

Image credit: Pexels on Pixabay

Almost. 

I did some reflecting on my 2020 intention setting poem. Remember that one? It was "I Will Be A Corpse Whale". You can read it here. I wrote it's second response poem tonight. 

Image credit: Photograph on pixabay

Sometimes my traditional MBA courses make me irate as hell. 

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I had some virtual family time today and it was fantastic. 

I'm holding a paradox in my heart on this one. I do, sincerely wish for peace and joy and comfort to you this holiday season, and, I believe we could be doing a better job. My poem today carries a bit of my sadness from some things I heard in the news report today. 

Here are three poems for the last three days. I've been rejuvenating, sleeping in, painting my house, and working on a pre-requisite for my MBA program. It's a blizzard in Minnesota right now and my house is cozy and perfect. It makes me feel very thankful for what I have. The solstice was on Monday and also made me feel thankful. The days will just keep getting brighter from here. 

"Solstice" is an ekphrastic poem in Shadorma form inspired by this image by David Sockrider. 

"Descendant" is an ekphrastic poem inspired by this image by Jacob Sutton.  

Image credit: Jill Wellington on Pixabay

Check out my inspiration for this ekphrastic poem here: https://www.artistaday.com/?p=143815.  Arielle Pytka is the artist. I've written quite a few poems about the concept of clowns and this might be my favorite. Thanks again to Rattle for inspiration on ekphrasitc poems. 

Shout out to Rattle for their monthly ekphrastic poetry challenge that inspired this one. Shout out to Dominique Dève whom they chose as the featured artist to inspire us in December. 

art credit: Dominque Dève 

Let there be peace on earth. 

Image credit: Robert Armstrong on Pixabay

A collum lune and a shadorma. I'm in the holiday spirit. Tonight I addressed all of my holiday cards while watching two holiday movies back to back. So you get two holiday poems, back to back. 

I am greatly enjoying my first few days of school break. 

A collum lune and a self-portrait poem. 

Anybody in love with looking at their houseplants lately? 

Image credit: Darth Zuzanka on Pixabay

Something I'm grateful for, eating. 

I repeat the mantra "I am kind" often. I find that a gentle reminder helps steer my course. 

Here's a shadorma I wrote today with the prompt "write a poem about permanence". 

Some encouragement. 

To nurture is powerful. 

Write your legislators. Write your legislators. Write your legislators. Vote. Vote. Vote. Talk to each other. Explain why his death was wrong. Read a book to learn why his death was wrong. Read a book about whiteness. Watch a webinar about anti-racism. Listen to a podcast about racism. Talk to each other. Write your legislators. Vote. Vote. Vote. I will too. 

There can be lessons in everything. 

Today my poem is about a goat. It's about a very precious and unique goat that we had for only a few years on the farm. He served no purpose other than being a pet. It was pointed out to me at work that it was a miss not to use the "GOAT" acronym (Greatest of All Time) in my poem. So I'll use it here. I hope this is the GOAT poem about a goat. 

I spent a large part of my day sitting at the side of an IT person as they "fixed" some issues with my technology. I was thankfully able to work on things at the same time. I thought about how "fixers" are so important. People willing to pull up their sleeves and stick on an issue until it's solved. In my work today, that means casting magic spells in software and applications, on the farm, it was spinning a wrench or wielding a hammer. So here's my poem today, a farm-kid poem, about fixing things around the farm with my dad. 

You had two options for poems tonight. One was me definitely giving into the negative side of the force in reaction to every trending hashtag on twitter today. The other is a simple nature poem that can be interpreted as you will. In an effort to spread love, not hate, I'm posting the nature poem. 

As I was about to fall to sleep last night, I had this vivid "lucid dream" as my friend, Meg, mentioned such dreams might be called, where I dreamt I was soon to die. I went through a myriad of emotion and ultimately settled on an "awshucks" reaction. Once I landed there, I was able to drift on into sleep. In the morning, I was thinking about poems about death. In 2018, my last poetry go-round, I hesitated to write many poems about deep, difficult, or sad type of poems. This year, I'm resolved to not shy away from real and difficult topics, even if they may be a downer. My intention is to be anchored in the human experience and avoid fluffing up the sharp bits. And with that intention, I give you the second poem of 2020: "Death Sits Behind My Eyelids". 

I'm trying real hard today and the second truth of Buddhism is feeling particularly true..."the root of all suffering is desire"...