1157 - Did I hear the corn jar shake?

Feeding the chickens.

One of life's small mysteries:

How do they smell corn?

.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2017

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1156 - Harvest

Sunday Whirl (Wordle #321) presents a list of words

that we must incorporate in a writing piece.  

The words this week are:

possible, pretense, individual, light, challenge, teeming,

route, drug, shock, jump, bulk, dearth

Harvest.

There's no dearth of kindness

In this world of ours;

Only in our blindness

We gather thorns for flowers.

- Gerald Massey

Some individuals prickle,

Spikey and aggressive.

They seem to enjoy it—

As if it is a drug of sorts—

Enjoy the challenge

To get under our skin,

To shock,

To hurt,

Too often.

But on reflection,

Offence is taken,

Not given.

In a day teeming with words

The bulk of them fly past.

Why is it possible 

For some to make us jump

While others go almost unnoticed?

Perhaps the route to a happy life

Is to let them all go past.

But what if it is all pretense?

Paraphrasing Gibran—

If thorns are all they have to give

Then is giving them

Generosity

On their part?

.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2017

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1155 - The Starless Night

Sunday Whirl (Wordle #320) presents a list of words

that we must incorporate in a writing piece.  

The words this week are:

road, lift, charge, star, swirl, mystery, 

struggle, fringe, list, sigh, storm, power

The Starless Night

“It is hard for a free fish to understand

what is happening to a hooked one.”

― Karl A. Menninger

Not every road

Is smooth,

Downhill

And awash 

With the warm tones

Of early morning sunlight.

Some struggle on paths

That are littered

With a fearsome list of obstacles,

Strewn with rocks and pits.

They walk on,

Battered by wild storms,

Some of their making,

Others, mysteriously, not so.

Storms that swirl

With oppressive power

Crackle with charged menace

And ominous rumblings.

They seem to attract them.

These are the night dwellers

The fringe dwellers,

Where life has no dawn.

Where living, 

Generously interpreted,

Has no stars.

Even Vincent had stars.

With nothing to lift the eyes,

Or the spirits,

They trudge on,

Stopping occasionally

To sigh.

.

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© J Cosmo Newbery 2017

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