Surroundings

Take the time to listen.
Watch the sunshine glisten.
Hear the beautiful breeze
As it flows through the trees.
Watch the flowers as they bloom
They tell you summer is coming soon.
Hear the frog as it croaks
Hello to its blokes.
Watch the sparrow as it soars
On its sunny day tour.
Hear the wind as it blows
Season scents to your nose.
Take a look around; see what’s going on
Because before you know it, it’ll all be gone.

Jig of the Morning in Music (aka Weekly Writing Challenge: The Sound of Blogging)

This is a poem pulled from a post last year. As soon as I read the challenge, I knew this poem was the PERFECT thing to do for sound. It was originally written to music, so an updated version put to music is exactly what this challenge is about.

To hear the poem, press play on the video and follow along below with the voice. You can also watch the video first. It will recite the poem with music and give you a visual of these flowery dancers.

The lyrics/words are below.

Urban Flowers (aka Weekly Photo Challenge: Urban)

This was a hard post to find a photo for. I don’t live in an urban area (Walmart and subdivisions are not urban to me), so I’ve pulled one of my pictures from a few years ago when I was living in Wales. My friends and I took a day trip to London on our day off. We did the ride the bus tour. We did the walk for forever tour. We did the take pictures everywhere thing too. The amazing thing about our one day in London was the weather. The temperature was a tad warm, but that’s to be expected in late July. The sky though was breathtaking. Blue, blue, and more blue with little white puffy clouds. GORGEOUS!! I couldn’t ask for a prettier (or more conducive to photography) day than the one we received.

The reason I picked the picture above for the challenge is because urban doesn’t mean concrete and metal to me. My favorite urban places are fully of color and vibrancy. All over London were walls of flowers. Walls of them!! So much green, pink, purple, white, blue and red everywhere. I suppose the people putting up these flowers were compensating for the gray rain that usually surrounds London. And if the flowers combined with the blue sky weren’t enough, we passed countless walls with bright graffiti on them, colorful banners hanging from the sky, and posters of bright adverts. All together, they made a very colorful urban area.

Here are some of my favorite London pictures:

Jig of the Morning

Dawn awoke on a quiet May morn.
Lavender, azure, a mist draped dawn.
Silence dances intimately with flowers and trees
While the star of the morning greets the wood.
The flowers that slept are gently awakened
To the motion of silence preparing for song.
Foxglove and Primrose have joined in motion
Bluebells and Snowdrops have intertwined in this dawn.
They meet in a clearing as directed by silence
Greeting one another with sweetness and smiles.
Quiet.
Silence.
All is stilled.
Then their stalks tingle with anticipation
Their roots and their petals yearn for the song
The moment, the movement, the music has spoken
Their hearts are all racing, the jig has begun.

Around the house, swaying in sixes, every petal pulsing to the count of eight.
Primrose to Foxglove, Snowdrop to Bluebell, partnered together to wheel at their home.
Their motion and damhsa creating the music, the souls of each flower directed by song.
Advancing to center, pairs step in the tightness, sharing the sweetness of dancing in May.
Retiring to home, cutting in sixes, the ceili enchants the wood draped in dawn.
Swirling as one, yet part of the greater, the couples themselves house to their home.
A new figure begins, a garland of flowers, the partners now chained go round to their home.
They turn to their partner, yet wheel all alone now, taking the moment to move with the mist.
Then together they’re off, intertwined with the music, housing the figure of eight back to home.
The gates are then lifted, arching up to the trees, lilac light pouring down, gently brushing their faces
The Foxglove and Primrose, Bluebells and Snowdrop glide through the gates, together in motion
Then clasping their partner, they flow through once more.
Home is still waiting as they house round the wood now, waiting to wheel as they reach it in time.
Foxglove and Bluebells shall step for their honor:
High cut, stamp, shuffle, hop, stamp, point, point, batter, hop back.
High cut, stamp, shuffle, hop, stamp, point, point, batter, hop back.
High cut, stamp, shuffle, hop, stamp, point, point, batter, hop back.
High cut, stamp, shuffle, hop, stamp, point, point, batter, hop back.
Primrose and Snowdrop look on with pride as their partners step the words of their souls.
The pairs back together, grasp at each other, preparing to house around the last time.
Eyes shining, smiles gleaming, the air is alive with the motion.
Hearts racing, souls bursting, the air is alive with the music.
The dance intertwined with the song.
Home.

Silence.

The flowers disperse for the star has now risen
The amethyst aura, now condensed by the set,
Becomes buttery shafts that pour through the trees.
The ceili of dawn churned a glorious morning.
The sweetness of May can be felt on the breeze.
The silence surges backward, breathless for a moment,
For the Foxglove and Primrose, Bluebells and Snowdrop,
Their likes never again shall be seen.

 

– This was written in response to the dance “Aoibhneas na Bealtaine,” which is Irish for “The Sweets of May,” an adapted version of an Irish figure dance collected and published by The Irish Dance Commission in 1969. My professor, Jean Denney Grotewhol, adapted it.