Goldfinches twitter
Enjoy warm sunshine and seeds
New feathers for spring
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Photos: Dwight L. Roth
Frank Tassone’s Haikai prompt recognizes the return of birds and their twittering sounds as the sun warms the Northern Hemisphere!
Month: March 2019
Survivor
If the rings on this turtle’s shell are connected to its age, it must be very old. He was probably two and a half feet long and probably twenty inches across. A man with a van had him and a couple of other smaller turtles in a grassy area next to a parking lot. He was collecting money to help buy food for them. The details in this beautiful creature are astounding. I took some photos and gave the man a little to help him on his way.
Magnificent rings
reveal years of this ancient
survivor’s journey
Hard shell protects body parts
A place he feels right at home
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Photo: Dwight L. Roth
Towhee Spring Fashion
Towhees are one of the most beautiful birds that come to my feeder. They walk up and down my rail eating seeds, all the time aware of everything that is going on around them. Their orange and black feathers rival anything on a New York Runway!
Spring brings bright colors
Towhees strut in orange and black
Red eyes add accent
Photos: Dwight L. Roth
Summer’s Coming!
Can’t wait for summer
Tell this rainy cold weather
“Go Jump in the Lake”
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Photo: Dwight L. Roth
Have a Seat!
At the Habitat for Humanity Restore where I volunteer, we get all kinds of things donated for resale. This large high heeled shoe chair was one of those things. I don’t think the sign with the playroom rules came with it! Amazingly almost everything that come in gets sold in a very short time. I try to imagine the person who owned this chair. Would you like this one for your bedroom?
There comes a time when everything gets sold or tossed. Option number three is donating it for resale. Habitat for Humanity is one of a few places that are happy to get your donations. In 2018 our Restore took in enough money to help build ten new houses for families in need. They did a large number of rehab projects as well.
Donations come in
Interesting things flow through
New homes for families
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Photo: Dwight L. Roth
Monongahela
The Monongahela with its moonshine run
Snakes through West Virginia mountains
Past Morgantown, home of the Mountaineers,
Gathering girth and depth as it rolls relentlessly
Under the Masontown Bridge on its way
To Pittsburgh and intercourse with the Allegheny…
Spawning the Ohio // carving Kentucky’s border
As it races on to join the muddy Mississippi.
Once polluted with sulfur and coal wash;
Not fit for man nor beast, it bled red
Leaving rust stained river stones all along its banks
Times have changed // now the river runs clean
Majestic and beautiful for people to enjoy.
Photos: Dwight L. Roth
I grew up in Southwestern Pennsylvania not far from the Monongahela River. The river has always intrigued me. A young man I knew drowned while trying to swim across the river. We loved to ride the ferry that carried our car across the river. Barges traveled up and down the river hauling coal from the mines nearby.
Today at d’Verse Alias Ha asked us to write a poem that included some aspect of geography. I chose to write about the river of my childhood.
Join us at: https://dversepoets.com
This is a picture of the Masontown Bridge from my Childhood. The photos above are as it looks today!
“Who’s that tripping…”
This is a picture of the Little Golden Book that was read to me in the early 1950s! The story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff has stayed with me all these years. The old grouchy Troll who lived under the bridge was outsmarted by the three billy goats.
Today at d’Verse, Frank asked us to write a Quadrille of 44 words using the word Troll. I immediately thought of this story from my childhood. It is one I remember enjoying over and over again, when I was four or five years old.
“Who’s tripping over my bridge,” said the Troll.
Childhood memories conjured up with great fondness
Courage and confidence displayed by small and large
Do the trolls in your life intimidate you…
Or, do you, with others, stand your ground?
Put Trolls in their place!
Book Cover Photo: downunderstories.com
Join us at: https://dversepoets.com
If you would like to hear the story of the Three Billy Goats Gruff, click on the link below:
Living Above the Pain
Joints dissolve and swell
Aging inevitable
Warm tea feels soothing
She seldom complains of pain
Doesn’t let pain slow her down
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Photo: Dwight L. Roth
Cliff Swallows
Just off the Blue Ridge Parkway in Virginia, there is a walking bridge across the James River. The cliff swallows have taken residence in the tall concrete columns. Attaching their mud nests to the ceiling, they lay their eggs and hatch out their young as people come and go below.
Red mud nests hold young
Voracious appetites keep
Cliff Swallows feeding
Photos: Dwight L. Roth
Frank Tassone’s Haikai challenge for today is to include the Swallow. We saw these amazing birds feeding as we walked across the James River one Mother’s Day. Somehow it seemed appropriate to be watching mother feeding their babies high overhead.
Come join us at: https://frankjtassone.com/2019/03/23/haikai-challenge-78-3-23-19-swallow-tsubame-haiku-senryu-haibun-tanka-haiga-renga/
If you are over sixty, you might remember Pat Boone’s song: “When the swallows come back to Capistrano…” !
Anchors
On Grandfather Mountain in North Carolina, there is a mile high metal bridge. It leads to the base of the rocks that make up the head of the old man of the mountain. Engineers designed the bridge to flex with the hurricane wind extremes that occur during the winter months. Steel anchors are embedded in the rocks and hold the bridge in place. Some are fixed and some have springs that allow the bridge to move in place. Strong cables act as guywires for the bridge.
Buildings, bridges, and trees all need solid anchors to survive. We also need anchors in our life to survive. No matter how strong we think we are, without an anchor we are in for a fall. Those steel anchors are useless, unless they are embedded in solid rock. What or who is the solid rock that anchors your life when the storms come.
Strong anchors bring strength
Stability for life’s storms
Winter winds blow hard
Photos: Dwight L. Roth
Roth Poetry 