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Blooms
Cholla cactus blossom, Yuma Conservation Garden, Yuma, Arizona
Only in the desert sands
Do cacti thrive and bloom,
Not on crowded city streets
Where there’s no breathing room.
If you find a place of sand,
Where human prints are few,
There the lowly cactus waits
To show its blooms to you.
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Ruby Tuesday Too
More Midweek Motif at Poets United: “A Grain of Sand”
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Reasons
Sand verbena, Yuma County, Arizona
A flower has no gender
As far as I can see;
But still I have some reasons
That blooms appeal to me:
I love them for their beauty,
Fragility, and scent—
And yet with sudden windstorms,
How quickly they are spent!
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Macro Monday 2
More Midweek Motif at Poets United: “Gender”
No One
Some of the first blossoms of 2017: sand verbena in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Southern California
No one’s looking back with longing
For the chilly winter day,
When no flowers graced the hillsides,
And the sky was only grey.
No one thinks with fond remembrance
Of the barren hills and slopes
Now that spring has come with blossoms
To renew our dreams and hopes.
Poem and photo © 2017 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More SkyWatch Friday
More Midweek Motif at Poets United: “Nostalgia”
Tricks
Wild asters, Apache County, Arizona
autumn afternoon—
the tricks my eyes play on me
in the aster field
Haiku © 2016 and photo © 2011 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Blue Monday
More Our World Tuesday
More Haiku Horizons: “Trick”
Searching
Dried and battered wildflowers, Northern Arizona
As I shuffle through the arroyo, I keep dropping to my knees. An onlooker might mistake me for a pilgrim making my way to Lourdes. But the healing I seek cannot be found at some distant holy shrine. It is here in the dust at my feet: cedar twigs snapped off by storms; summer’s leftover flowers; small stones trying in vain to fatten themselves on wisps of winter sun.
I aim my camera at a clump of wasted wildflowers, remembering words from a letter written long ago: “God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are…” (1 Corinthians 1:28, RSV).
Low and despised is nature’s detritus in the arroyo, but it heals my battered spirit as I kneel in awe and wonder before it.
I kneel in the dust,
searching for underground streams—
three crows bear witness.
Revised haibun © 2016 and photo © 2012 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Poetry Pantry #324 at Poets United
Perspectives
~~ 1 ~~
ten million poppies
carpeting the soldiers’ graves
near the killing fields
~~ 2 ~~
innocent blood spilled
in a backstreet of Baghdad—
news at six o’clock
~~ 3 ~~
The soldier’s widow—
how can she ever forget
his empty left sleeve?
~~ 4 ~~
coastal snow flurries
in the middle of summer—
those wanton moments
~~ 5 ~~
summer wildflowers—
no one remembers the name
of the yellow ones
~~ 6 ~~
three dandelions
clutched in the little boy’s hand—
his Mother’s Day gift
~~ 7 ~~
aflame with desire
for something just out of reach—
teacakes under glass
~~ 8 ~~
single grain of rice
gracing the monk’s dinner plate—
enough, for a change
~~ 9 ~~
the stallion’s nostrils
flaring with indignation
at bit and bridle
~~ 10 ~~
a spool of white thread
covered with dust on the shelf—
seamstress in mourning
~~ 11 ~~
giving the old chair
another coat of varnish—
summer’s first full moon
Haiku © 2016 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Poetry Pantry #308
More Sunday’s Whirligig #65
Wildflowers
Desert sand verbena, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Southern California
soon to be laid waste
by summer’s relentless heat—
wayside wildflowers
Text and photo © 2016 by Magical Mystical Teacher
Coaxing
Wildflowers at daybreak, Sonoran Desert, Southern Arizona
coaxing new music
from the tiniest blossoms—
an old shaman’s tongue
Haiku © 2016 and photo © 2015 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Macro Monday 2
Fishing
Lone sunflower, Northern Arizona
Although I don’t fish, I do love sunflowers, and so I am charmed by Richard Wright’s haiku:
Like a fishhook,
The sunflower’s long shadow
Hovers in the lake.
~~ ~~ ~~
In a sea of weeds
a lone sunflower fishes
for its lost shadow.
Haiku in bold and photo © 2015 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More SkyWatch Friday
More Shadow Shot Sunday 2
More Carpe Diem: “Utabukuro #5”
Bouquet
A tile mosaic in the courtyard at Rancho Los Alamitos, Long Beach, California
in a crimson vase
a bouquet of wildflowers
still holding their leaves
Text and photo © 2015 by Magical Mystical Teacher
More Blue Monday
More Ruby Tuesday Too
More Our World Tuesday
More Carpe Diem: “Leaves”
