Trinkets from my former days
Collected through the years
Remind me of the friends I’ve known
The laughter and the tears
Elephants for wisdom
My wise grandma gave to me
Silver relics from Tibet
Remind of tyranny
Kwan Yin for compassion
Yin and Yang are hard to be
Somehow balance comes askew
When life’s in front of me
Orchids then for Beauty’s grace
Around me every day
In every single thing I see
Her magic light will play
The cloth once wrapped the head of she
Who made the thing by hand
Dyed and blocked in fruits she grew
In India’s native land
The whole thing sits upon a frame
An instrument to play
The harpsichord my father built
In distant younger days
I’ve many altars through the house
I pass throughout the day
My heart and soul, my family
For whom I love and pray
And I, romantic soul I am
With reminiscent mind
Am wrapped in love from all of them
Who treated me so kind
***
Collected through the years
Remind me of the friends I’ve known
The laughter and the tears
Elephants for wisdom
My wise grandma gave to me
Silver relics from Tibet
Remind of tyranny
Kwan Yin for compassion
Yin and Yang are hard to be
Somehow balance comes askew
When life’s in front of me
Orchids then for Beauty’s grace
Around me every day
In every single thing I see
Her magic light will play
The cloth once wrapped the head of she
Who made the thing by hand
Dyed and blocked in fruits she grew
In India’s native land
The whole thing sits upon a frame
An instrument to play
The harpsichord my father built
In distant younger days
I’ve many altars through the house
I pass throughout the day
My heart and soul, my family
For whom I love and pray
And I, romantic soul I am
With reminiscent mind
Am wrapped in love from all of them
Who treated me so kind
***
Hi folks, I'm still on a break because my kids are visiting and I'm still deeply steeped in Jason's contest. I hope you enjoy this sentimental tribute to my family and friends. It's not quite the dark and mysterious poetry I usually write, and I'm not apologizing by any means! But I'm just feeling the love and wanted to share. I hope you are all enjoying summer.
24 comments:
Oh I feel the love in this piece.
Good feelings are all over it.
Oh this is lovely! My house is full of altars, too. My whole history is there.
Oh, I love your altar and your poem. My altar is in my kitchen window: Buddha, Jesus, fish bones that look like a crucifix, a glass blue bird, some rocks, herbs and flowers.
I can totally understand and feel the love you want to share Cat.
A lovely tribute to your family and friends.
Enjoy the days with your kids - every day is worth treasuring.
If this is what you do when on a break, I wonder what you do when you're working??? LOL
Lovely altar and poem and spirit that makes you think of such things.
I can imagine this quite well, frankly. Nicely written!
these are beautiful trickets, their meaning, your thoughts. a beautiful poem it is! enjoy your family!
The memories spurred by trinkets are well worth the space they consume. Lives should all be filled with such.
We should always show some love once in while. You did just that in the best way you express yourself. :)
I don't have an altar. All I care is in my laptop and would fit in a 1 gb flash drive.
Sad, right? I guess I still have time to make amends.
Yes, I agree...beautiful thoughts. I wish I could see all those trinkets. I love this stanza:
"The cloth once wrapped the head of she
Who made the thing by hand
Dyed and blocked in fruits she grew
In India’s native land".
Have a great visit with your sons!
Deeply steeped? There's only 158 stories to read for Clarity of Night. Ooops! Make that 157 stories to read. How bad can it be?
I'm combing through the entries again, trying to make some difficult decisions. I've narrowed my list down to twenty, and unlike Jason's criteria - I look for story first, narrative voice second, and writing style third. If I went with writing style first, then stories heavily steeped in dialogue would suffer.
Incidentally, you story's still on my list.
"your"
Man do I hate typos.
This is gorgeous Sis! ~ The poem the tribute, the altar, it's all lovely and inspired. We feel the love and send some right back to you.
enjoy those kids!
hugs~
~Calli (sis)
I love alters cat, and this was such a lovely one... :)
i'm sorry i've been away too long. i missed jason's contest.
It's so easy to feel the humanity in this piece. And I absolutely love the photo. Come back soon, Cat!
Catherine, I'm a few days late, but just wanted you to know I am here also with you, and I dived into this new-style poem, head first. Still swimming and enjoying.
Great photo, it says so much, to you, and to me also.
Love your alter one of many in your abode. Interesting to look at each piece and imagine the history. I have only two in my place but my main one is quite a collection too with photos of Dali Lama, Thich Nhat Hanh and Thomas Merton and Kwan Yin, the Buddha I made in a special clay I found while living in London because I couldn't find one I wanted which I love though it's still grey and has my dna all over it, pebbles from Santa Barbara beach where your mom and I went on a retreat with TNH. Each piece a memory and aren't those memories that which make up an alter. I recently found a small white peacock feather from the "albino" peacock at City of Ten Thousand Buddhas which is a treasure. Oh, and I dearly love your poem. Treasured and meaningful words from your soul. Thanks for sharing.
What a perfect poem! :) Thanks for sharing it!
This is a beautiful tribute! Im glad I stopped in.
your father built a harpsichord? that is the coolest thing i've heard in a long time.
it's funny - i used to have so many bits and pieces, altars - but have very few now - right for me, but your poem made me smile remembering them - and i love a house where everything has a story.
and i love the rhyme here - nothing lends itself to love like music!
Ooo, a stimulating alter. And
the poem is perfect. Have fun!
Thank you for sharing this, Cat! I love seeing another side of your writing. I feel such love from this piece.
such a sweet glimpse into your heart! i have a place like this too & it means so much. thank you for sharing this bit of you
This is the second time I come to read this piece it's so beautiful. Your altar is beautiful and this time I couldn't help but notice how healthy and big your bamboo plant is! Tell me, do you have the shoots in water alone? Because I have bamboo plants (in rocks and water) and they look nowhere as green and as healthy as yours! I wonder if that's where I'm going wrong. - Rebecca
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