vast winter landscape
the blinding glare of the sun
snow goggles or masks
[senryu.] Copyright © 2022-01-24, by Lizl Bennefeld.
Photo by Daniel Lincoln on UnsplashRonovan Writes #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge 394 GLARE and Mask.
weekend gatherings
the heel-and-toe line dances
measured polka stepspotluck meals and visiting
neighbors sharing cares and joys
Copyright © 2021/08/30 by Lizl Bennefeld.
Ronovan Writes #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge 373 LINE and Toe
mix of dark and light
lines lend themselves to nature’s
ever-shifting art
Copyright © 24 May 2021, by Liz Bennefeld.
Ronovan Writes #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge 359 LINES and Mix.
Ronovan Writes #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge 342 Rough and Season
rough chop the fixings
melt some butter in the pan
season eggs to tasteserve fancy meals to your guests
when you’re alone, please yourself
Copyright © 2021-01-26, by Lizl Bennefeld.
Last night (Wednesday), I participated in a Poetry Heals workshop (via Zoom). The free workshop sessions are held weekly, at least through September. It’s sponsored by Poetry Heals: bringing therapeutic writing to difficult lives. in Colorado. Link to the post on their site: Poetry Heals launches Caring for Caregivers
All of us who are not totally alone have become caregivers (and care-receivers?) for one another. That can be a burden. It was interesting, identifying my emotions, writing funny bits and/or poems, and writing with others what my current emotions feel like. And sharing what was written with other members of the group.
This morning, during the Lunchtime Write-in I participate in, I tried a less rough, rough draft summarizing my thoughts, written as a poem, for the final exercise.
I know what I write
I write what I see
I feel what is outside
and inside of meI cannot change the past
I wouldn’t know what change to make
I cannot guide the future
I can only live todays
I trust all to God’s handsGod forgives and understands
So I know that all is always well
I rest in my choices and rejoice
in God’s peace and grace
Copyright © 2020-09-02, by Liz Bennefeld. (Rev. 2020-09-03).
On a brighter note, the “funny haiku” that I wrote in response to the photograph of a pair of bullfrogs sitting side by side, quite satisfied expressions on their faces:
Bull and his friend, Frog,
shared a swarm of tasty flies
your turn, now, to eat
(Copyright © 2020-09-02, by Liz Bennefeld.)
Tone it down, there!
Pitch-and-Toss ain’t meant to be
a bloody shouting match!
A senryu, copyright © 2019-04-15, by Lizl Bennefeld.
RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #249 Pitch&Tone
RonovanWrites #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge #229 Win&Lose
I have lost and won
but looking back, I can’t tell
losses from the winsroads that turn and twist can change
the balance of a life
Copyright © 2018-11-28, by Liz Bennefeld.
As with theartofdisorder dot net, I am also discontinuing my Personal plan at WordPress for quiltedpoetry dot net and reverting to the free plan with fewer amenities. More of my writing is personal and on paper, these days, and I find myself wanting more time and attention available for other concerns.
I am continuing with my writing and increasingly, my photography. While I enjoy (crave?) interaction with people on a personal basis, engagement has decreased on the Internet over the decades. At the same time, my motivations and goals are changing.
I am not going away. However, I am reallocating resources.
Liz
the wind rests quiet on the land
faint sunlight shrinks behind
tree branches and blue clouds
pasted on a blue-grey skybirds sing summonings
then nestle into nests
for warmth throughout
a night with which the cold
returns too sooncling to the cold, a shield
against the warming days
Copyright © 2018-05-11, by Lizl Bennefeld.
nahaiwrimo:April 26 LEARN
Real life-long learning doesn’t have to be profound or deep or even long-lasting. Doing so keeps us young! While in Boston this last weekend, I learned that I love lobster rolls. I also learned that I love the warm welcoming people I met. Learning something new blesses us all in one way or another and perhaps only in hindsight. Onward!
a water pail
moist dirt between my toes
sunlight’s warmth
after a lingering winter
it’s time to plant flowers
Copyright © 2018-04-26, by Elizabeth Bennefeld.
Prompt for the day, Cayahoga library: List all the jobs you have had, including volunteer work and other unpaid jobs. Turn the list into a list poem by rearranging, repeating or just titling it. /Or/ write a poem about one of them.
I thought I’d stick to the jobs during grade school and high school, leaving out the gardening chores, since that really was free labor for the common good.
“It’s good for you”
My first jobs, tedious but
character- and muscle-building
picking rocks at springtime
in farmers’ fields
kids’ time is cheaper than repairsFather rented us out by the day
The second summer job lasted
much shorter than it seemed
which was always and forever
clipping grass around stones
mowing the cemetery grounds
setting traps for ground squirrels
who spoiled painstaking work—
lugging pails of well water
to drown the pests or
drive them outShould have stuck with the rock picking
The best job of my childhood
was selling door to door
in a small town every household
finds the need for more stationery
cards for none or all occasions
so their children find buyers, tooPay-off was a week or two
each August far away from home
for private and group lessons,
ensemble, band and choir rehearsalsBrass ensemble work cost extra…
Worth the miles walked to get there
Copyright © 2018-04-24, by Elizabeth Bennefeld.
Prompt from #RonovanWrites #Haiku – Original post with more photos.
sunlight on his wings
iridescent dragonfly
the joy of his dance
Copyright © 2018-04-17, by Elizabeth W. Bennefeld.
I decided to go back to April 9, to the Pilgrimage prompt, and wander a bit through the family tree. My mother was a genealogist, among other things, and we kids got to do research, each in our turn.
Who We Were
[still a rough draft]Our people came from Iowa
by way of the Norman invasion,
Mayflower I and II, the Winthrop Fleet
by way of rivers on diverse craft
neighbors with neighbors
towns moving togetherThey arrived in the Firelands
then settled in Iowa and
opened South Dakota—farms
were lost behind the dam, so
back to small-town IowaPenneys went into retail, catalog sales
A connection of “our” Bennetts sent
Stanley to find Livingston
the Deans made sausage, and the
Gallops (Kolopp, from Alsace) took pollsThe grocery store owner in
South Dakota patented a plow
the Carters served in India
as Methodist missionaries
Evangeline Ink wrote an exposé
novel about TB camp swindlesMy generation and the next have been
lawyers, executives, freelancers, clerks
writing and publishing books,
poetry. textbooks, and many stories
nurses caring for the injured and elderly,
builders, handcrafters, quilters,
artists, musiciansMyself, I grow wild flax
in the backyard garden, take naps
with the puppy dogs, make up recipes
and do the laundry, play piano, and
hold my husband close to my heartI read only as many books in a week
as I write poems, a photo for most
no children, but a library
gathered over a lifetime
determined to leave no book unread…
always buying moreThere’s always time to write a poem…
time to read a book
Copyright © 2018-04-10, by Elizabeth W. “Lizl” Bennefeld.
I find it interesting, how different the topics are for my online journal from the paper journal that I have returned to since the first of 2018. Things that I would only post, if at all, on my Patchwork Prose site, which still suffers little to no traffic in any given month. (I have not brought myself to write there much.)
I suspect that I am more secretive than I’d thought. Or, more accurately, how much a “private person” I’ve turned out to be, simply because I do not talk much about externals. Because I don’t live in the externals.
Often, a “thing” or “experience” seems not objectively real until I write it down somewhere. Or relive it to myself in words so that it will stick. I have found it interesting that I can go back through memory and reimage, should other events overtake me, and so file a happening in words in my mind or on paper afterwards. Not always, but sometimes. Enough.
When I look back through the written journals before I shred them (I have journaled since my high school years), I find that a lot of what I have puzzled over/pondered, surprises me. Looks unfamiliar. The same is true of my online journals. Excepting, perhaps, the poems that I write.
Elizabeth
the ticking clock
restless sounds of puppy dreams…
one unread chaptercurtains closed against the dark
stars above adorn the night
Copyright © 2017-12-18, by Lizl Bennefeld. All rights reserved.
Brewer: For today’s prompt, write a response poem. The poem can be a response to anything–a piece of news, some art, a famous (or not so famous) quotation, or whatever. However, I thought it might be a cool opportunity to respond to a poem that you’ve written this month. If both poems work, it could make an interesting dynamic to have two (or more) poems that interact with each other.
leaves on edge
dance to autumn’s wind
jeté…temps levé
Elizabeth Bennefeld, haiku: Autumn Dance, Copyright © 2017-10-18
yesterday, leaves fell
today they spiral upwards
reaching for the sky
as nature strives for balance
who falls down, must rise again
Elizabeth Bennefeld, tanka, Copyright © 2017-11-29
Quilted Poetry 