L’ete

The veil between my beloved summer and autumn has once again descended. Like last year, it has tumbled earlier than in the past. I’ve learned to find delights in each season but summer is where my heart sings. The quotes below, for me, reflect that sentiment. 

 

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned  that within me there lay an invincible summer.”  –  Albert Camus

“In summer, the song sings itself.”   –  William Carlos Williams

“And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.”   –  F. Scott Fitzgerald

 

 

L’ete

Slowing down my mind

Halt the eternal quest

For tomorrow, next week

Or a favorite holiday

Even before summer’s

Waning begins, the

Yearning for it starts

Anew

*

Learning to delight in

Nuances of each season

Colors of gold, red, yellow

Then brown splashes

Across the vineyards to

Les arbres

Soups simmer once again

A late squash-corn chowder,

Black bean or hearty vegetable

Avec pois chiche

*

Le Printemps donne l’espoir

Les fleurs,

Vibrant green leaves

Sur le vigne

Life cycle

Reaffirms herself

Mother Nature bestows her gifts

*

Most difficult

Pour moi

Making peace

Avec l’hiver

Taking my breath away

Lodging its chill

Deep in my bones

Even when sunlight bounces

Across a rare snow

Longing takes over

Summer feels so far away

*

Bisous,

Léa

Procrastination

“Time passes irrevocably.”   – Virgil

 

“Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone.”

• – Pablo Picasso

 

“Procrastination is like masturbation. At first it feels good, but in the end you’re only screwing yourself.” – Author unknown, possibly from Monty Python?

 *

Procrastination

 

It can wait until

Tomorrow – that idea

Spinning around in my head

I just have to run these errands

I shall write that poem

Later – sometime next week

I shall have plenty of time

Once this season has ended

There will be no excuses

For getting back to the project

Long awaited novel – I will

Get to it soon – have you

Ever noticed how swiftly

Time dissipates? There is

Never enough of it to

Accomplish what I want

No, that will have to wait

Perhaps I can get to it

Next week, or better yet

After the New Year?

And once again I’ve

Lost another opportunity

When does it end?

C’est fini avec moi!

*

Bisous,

Léa

knowing dark

“Every moment of light and dark is a miracle.”   –  Walt Whitman

 

“In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost.”   –  Dante Alighieri

 

“Roll on, deep and dark blue ocean, roll. Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain. Man marks the earth with ruin, but is control stops with the shore.”   –  Lord Byron

*

knowing dark

 

were you aware

that both darkness

and light

possess specific scents, music and texture?

the odor of darkness cannot be

fully appreciated by inexperienced senses

years spent where light was restricted

refine the senses educate them

intimacy with every shade of night

each nuance

feeling my way

making the most of a unique gift

over time

senses heighten

evocative

mnemonic

tranquillité

now

sunshine

reveals

a new world

Léa

mon voisin aime me taquiner / my neighbour likes to tease me

“For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbors and laugh at them in our turn.”   –  Jane Austen

 

“Listen, you only tease the ones you love.”   –  John Boehner

 

“I have an intense dislike for artificial society. In France, one could lead a free life – to do what one wanted to do without interference or criticism from one’s neighbors.”   –   Robert W. Service

 

Symbol d’Occitan

 

mon voisin aime me taquiner / my neighbour likes to tease me

jean est taquiner moi

he delights in telling

le monde

says i am a spy

for obama

the twinkling

dans ses yeux,

illuminating smile

gives him away

everytime

the hard rods of

steel

he shapes into

gates, railings,

le croix de Cathar

or the symbol of the

pays d’ Occitan

the flames of the

forge

a mask

outside

l’ atelier

le masque

tombe

*

bisous,

léa

Chasse au trésor

“Time passes irrevocably.”   –  Virgil

 

“Time passes, and little by little everything that we have spoken in falsehood becomes true.”   –  Marcel Proust

 

“If you want an interesting party sometime, combine cocktails and a fresh box of crayons for everyone.”   –  Robert Fulghum

 

 

Chasse au trésor

There is no map to guide

This treasure hunt

Intuition – my trusted

And only compass

De nombreux cadeaux attendent

My discovery

Each New Year

Filled with possibilities,

Challenges, opportunities

Each day precious

Slipping through my hands

I cannot hang on to them

Nor save in a vault

Moments fly away

Sable dans le vent

*

Bisous,

Léa

Un jour parfait

 

“The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself.”   –  Anna Quindlen

 

“To me, every hour of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle.”  

–  Walt Whitman

 

“I wanted a perfect ending. Now I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle and end.”  

– Gilda Radner

 

 * 

 

Un jour parfait

 

J’adore

Chocolat noir

And red wine

Woodsmoke on

A frosty morning

The abundance of

Sourires et baisers

Dans mon environnement

Chestnuts roasting

Warm wooly hats and scarves

Un tasse de café

Warming icy hands

That simmering cauldron of soup

Which beckons me

As a day at the easel

Takes its toll

J’adore

Mozart and moonlight

Filtering throught

Ma fenêtre

Glistening reflections

On canvas

Un jour – bien utilisé

*

Bisous,

Léa

It’s in the air

“In small towns people scent the wind with noses of uncommon keenness.”  –  Stephen King

 

“The scent of wine, oh how much more agreeable, laughing, praying, celestial and delicious it is than that of oil!”   –  Francois Rabelais

It’s in the air

Les pins

Sentinels

Watching over

Mon village

Old enough

To know all

Our secrets

Wise enough

To keep them

Le vent

Scatters leaves

Blending

Avec lavande

Romaire et

Autre fleures de saison

Intoxicating fragrance

New wine

Unique the perfume

Permeates

Les corbières

Lingers in my

Clothing

Scents my bedding

And my dreams

*

Bisous,

Léa

Mademoiselle

“We worry about what a child will become tomorrow, yet we forget that he is someone today.”  –  Stacia Tauscher

“Kids: they dance before they learn there is anything that isn’t music.”  –  William Stafford

Mademoiselle Ambre

Ambre une poupée vivante

Squeals with delight

Throwing her mother’s phone

Across the café’s floor

Shouts of glee

Declarations of discovery

Of the world around her

The range of her voice

Sometimes startling herself

Temporarily

Trapped in a stroller

Escape is inevitable

Audre’s days of sitting

Dans la café

Visite avec des amies

Disappear with a curious

Toddler’s appetite

“Ma ma ma ma ma ma ma!”

*

Bisous,

Léa

Le berre de rivière (The river Berre)

“Look deep into nature, and you will understand everything better.”   –  Albert Einestein

“One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.”   –  William Shakespeare

“There are always flowers for those who want to see them.”   –  Henri Matisse

Le berre de rivière  (The river Berre)

Tables and chairs

Against an ancient

Stone wall

Across from le

Café

Si vous êtes chanceux

A seat can be yours

Pageant of color

Paints the sky

As the sun disappears

West

Beneath lies

La berre

Dried up

Fish to dust

Few remaining puddles

Disappear rapidly

To be reborn with

November rains

Un verre de vin rouge

For now

A book

As I wait

Stars

Take center

Stage

A show that takes

Ma soufflé loin

*

 Bisous,

Léa

Re-post: Finding voice

This is a re-post of the first one to appear on this blog 11 December, 2011. My apologies to those who have already seen it.

“If you hear a voice within you say ‘you cannot paint,’ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.”   –  Vincent Van Gogh

“Never give up. And most importantly, be true to yourself. Write from your heart, in your own voice, and about what you believe in.”   –  Louise Brown

“I write for those women who do not speak, for those who do not have a voice because they were so terrified, because we are taught to respect fear more than ourselves. We’ve been taught that silence would save us, but it won’t.”  

–  Audre Lorde

 

Finding voice…

Be tells me to keep writing

Cait tells me to just write

My past tells me I can’t write

Fear writes for me

Anger writes the loudest, and is most prolific

Joy is silent, nearly invisible

Sadness drones on and on

Pain is sharp, isolated, and intense

Journals are scattered about my home

Tossed into the recesses of the car

They harbor numerous attempts of binge/purge

When moving I will devalue their loyalty

As I shove them through the shredder

The ghosts of childhood critique every effort

They silence me with threats to expose my failure

Deep inside the struggle

To break through the barriers

Quakes with revelatory thunder

Bisous,

Léa