Loose Leaf Notes

1. The Little River Poetry Festival is the poetry version of Floydfest. For one long weekend I get pulled from my daily life and am in a different universe.

2. A Driving Inspiration: Moon in high gear / with one headlight out / Moon is the muse / that drives me

3. One of the highlights of Sunday at the poetry festival was the ensemble reading, “Everything is Possible,” curated by festival co-founder Jack Callan. Music accompaniment for the ensemble was provided by Jim Best and Brian Magill. Gina says, “Brian can play every instrument you never heard of.” He had a digeridoo solo. Believe it or not, Gina’s signature poem is a “Poop Poem.” She, a dedicated mom of young children who wears a “Poetry Matters” t-shirt, gets asked to read it every year. More HERE.

4. I did a workshop on writing our own eulogies at the festival and began by reading my Self-Portrait in Eulogy and using it as a loose template. The next day I posted about the festival on Facebook and a friend that didn’t attend in person wrote her own eulogy and posted it as a comment.

5. Also, as I drove out of the site festival Sunday afternoon, I saw the host of the land we were on. I rolled down my window to say goodbye and said, “Maybe next year,” meaning maybe he’ll read a poem at an open mic at next year’s festival. He pulled out two poems from his pocket and read them to me. It was an honor to hear them.

6. My grandson Liam and I hid a gecko geiko puppet on each other for years. At some point the ritual fell away when one of us was stumped and never could find it. Yesterday I texted him with the above picture and said ‘I finally found the gieko.”

7. For most of that time I thought gieko was the name of the lizard and only recently learned it was a gecko.

8. “THIS psychedelic-eyed gecko isn’t what we thought it was Researchers in Australia have discovered a new species of gecko with beautiful psychedelic eyes. The stunning lizards evaded detection for decades due to their similarities with a closely related species.” Live Science

9. Gardening question: Hoe’s in back or Hose in back?

10. THIS Garden French Manicure helps me know that I’m not alone.

11. My sister in law won’t fly and would rather drive long distances. I won’t drive and would rather fly.

12. Speaking of driving, check THIS out. A man and his pot won’t be driven apart.

13. Years ago, I decided that I liked referring to myself as a poet because it explained a lot about me and gave me a “poetic license:” “freedom taken by a poet, prose writer, or other artist in deviating from rule, conventional form, logic, or fact, in order to produce a desired effect.” Dictionary.com.

_____Thirteen Thursday