Thursday, August 29, 2024

Hello, hello, hello! Labor Day Weekend '24

 Hello, hello, hello!

Mixed media collage. Linda Mitchell August, 2024

How are you? I've missed you, Poetry Friday people. Summer has been great--let's catch up!

When I left in May for a summer hiatus I was unsure of some things: Would I stop writing? Would creativity leave me in the dust? Would summer be enough time to sort out unfinished projects, new projects and learning opportunities? I have this wonderful and terrible habit of impossibly trying to do all the good things! 

Now that I am fully back to work with teachers and students in the building, I can happily report that I have continued to write. Creativity did not leave me in the dust. I have grown as a creative person and I have sorted some projects and project priorities. Although, if I'm honest, I'd love a bit more summertime.

Look! An honorable mention in the Lyrical Language Lab Free Verse Contest '24. I wrote this poem after seeing the contest announcement--as opposed to digging through my files to see if I had written something already that might fit the criteria.  Woot!  If you think you might want to take a poetry course, the LLL is a good one. It's not easy but it really works your poetic heart, mind and soul. You will be a better writer after taking the course (and doing the work, of course).



I had fun playing with clunker lines you all gave me in May. I'd love to see any clunker re-writes you've worked on. 

Here are two lines I from the comments of that post turned into poems: 





I have more poems from shared former clunkers. I'll share more in future posts.

See this beautiful Summer Poem Swap gift to me from Denise Krebs? It's such thoughtful art and sentiment. Many thanks to our Tabatha for organizing poetry swaps that make my snail-mailbox a happy place to visit.


A little more art from Jone who gave me some joy too. Mixed media artists sometimes swap Artist Trading Cards aka ATCs (think baseball cards but for artists). She designed this pretty ATC and sent it in one of her gorgeous raven notecards. 

ATC from Jone McCulloch. Summer 2024

There's more from this summer. I don't want to overwhelm you in my first post back. Thank you, Susan @Chicken Spaghetti for hosting our Poetry Friday round-up today. I'm hopping over to see all the poetry goodies you have collected for us.