Snow falls in a
driving wind.
If the roads become
too awful, I will
celebrate Christmas
alone.
An awful experience?
No.
Beauty lies outside the windows and
in my heart.
Heat radiates from the fire.
Food fills my refrigerator.
Music bursts from CDs’.
Joy!!
Christmas always brings delight and
reflection.
You do not have to be a Christian to
feel the meaning:
Kindness
Tolerance
Empathy
Giving
Receiving
Accepting
Families
Friends
Love
Joy!!
Author: Juliana Lightle
The Land in Love with Guns
Barbara Lightle’s Potato Soup
Recent cold nights brought childhood memories of Mom’s cooking, particularly the one and only soup I recall her ever making, potato soup. Then memories of Dad and how much he loved Mom and her cooking rushed in. Long after Mom’s death on one of my visits home, Dad asked me to cook all the ingredients for Mom’s potato soup except for the milk. He wanted enough to last a while so he could add the milk bit by bit on occasions when he wanted soup. On a cold night this past week, I duplicated Mom’s soup like on that visit home long ago. I even made extra.
Barbara Lightle’s Potato Soup
1 onion, chopped finely
Several stalks celery, chopped finely
Potatoes, chopped finely–enough so that the ratio of potatoes to onion and celery is 2:1
Enough melted butter to saute all the above until done
Finally, add milk and salt to taste, depending on how salty and thick you like your soup.
Mom made it plain like this. I used olive oil instead of butter and also added a few chopped portabella mushrooms. It later occurred to me that adding green chilies or poblano peppers with some cumin would make a nice soup. Or use coconut milk and curry for Asia style.
The Encounter Poems-Three
Portland
It never snows here.
Now it is snowing.
The hotel bar is crowded.
No one’s on the streets.
He says,
“Come with me to my ship.”
He’s a freighter captain.
On board, he begs,
“Spend the night!”
On a freighter?
He takes me out to breakfast.
We wander in the snow.
Back home, my friend asks,
“Did you get laid?”
I laugh.
The Encounter Poems–Poem Two
Earlier this week I mentioned I would post a group of poems that describe various “encounters” I have experienced with individuals at different times in my life, some recent, some many years ago. This is the second of that series of poems.
At the Mandala Center in New Mexico
A lady walks up to me,
“You look like you belong here.”
I sit writing,
listening to the wind,
the eternal driving wind.
It makes you stand firm,
rooted, strong.
This is no place for fragile people.
The Encounter Poems
Throughout my life, I seem to experience what I call encounters: meeting people I never saw before and having some type of connection with them. Various things occur under these circumstances. Sometimes I keep in contact for at least a while with these people and sometimes not. This week I am going to post several of these poems. Here is the first one.
In Line at a Fast Food Restaurant
Caramel eyes
glowing in a brown face
Panama hat
Intricately carved silver cross
Crisp, snowy linen shirt
No collar
Slacks loose.
He’s lost weight.
I think,
“Gorgeous brown man.”
He says,
“In case no one has told you lately,
you’re gorgeous!”
He walks off to meet
the pregnant woman in the corner.
The canyon edge looms out my bedroom windows,
pale adobe, stark.
Fall to death or serious injury!
I will not fall; I love living on the edge.
Rain brings a one hundred foot deluge,
a roar of water, cascading, screaming.
Someone said my house is pink; it is not pink!
It is the color of the canyon, the worldwide color,
Moroccan, pueblo, Saudi, Mali, Navaho, Timbuktu,
Desert, alive and lovely.
Three bucks watch me through my bedroom windows.
They see me move; they stare.
Isabella stands rigid, watching.
I kneel to her level; follow her eyes.
The bobcat casually climbs the canyon wall, impervious.
He marks the cedar tree, walks a deer path, disappears.
He is a secret, rarely seen.
The huge hoot owl’s voice echoes down the canyon,
drifting through my dreams.
A young road runner calls, scratchy,
running across the patio–on the edge.
In the spring the mocking…
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Stones
"Each hurt swallowed is a stone." Rita Dove
By the end of last year
I had vomited up all the
stones
and piled them on the garden wall.
Except one.
Rim Rider
I ride the rim on Rosie,
writing stories in my mind.
The neighbor’s husky howls.
Rosie listens, watches,
moves away from the canyon rim.
I write of long lost lovers,
names forgotten,
smiling brown faces,
drifting through my dreams.
I ride the rim on Rosie,
writing stories in my mind.
The bobcat climbs the canyon wall.
Rosie’s ears move,
her body tenses.
I write of childhood memories,
places loved and lost,
of family joys and sorrows,
Mom’s singing while she worked,
Dad’s napping on the blue linoleum floor.
I ride the rim on Rosie,
writing stories in my mind.
Isabella runs past, bunny hunting, barking.
Rosie wants to run, to race, is held.
I write of fragrant fields of saffron,
endless Thai seas of blue and green,
of lands I’ve loved , the Navaho Nation, the Llano Estacado.
I ride the rim on Rosie,
writing stories in my mind.
Aging
“Rage, Rage, against the dying of the light.” Dylan Thomas
Custom says, “Age gracefully.”
Are they crazy, dumb!
Who wants to look
old
wrinkled
grey?
They lie!
All of them.
Who wants a broken mind
confused
unfocused
lost?
Shoot me!
Burn my bones.
Scatter them
in the desert sands
to feed
desert willow where
rattlesnakes lie
searching for shade.
