Love in a Tin Roof Cottage

On Permanence (or lack of it)

On Permanence

The deepest print in ocean sand
melts swirling in the newborn tide.
These careful carvings of my hand
are no more than that sandy stride-
my footprint, nothing. Still, sewn land
retains my prints, while others, dried
can't bear an imprint of His brand.
But cost of peace is loss of pride
while footprints spin out in the tide.
It matters not. I still range wide.

copyright 2012 Elisabeth Snell

 

 

    I recently had a situation where years of ministry to young women within an organization (probably a thousand or more hours of work) were shown to be pointless and a waste of time.

     It was a heavy blow and so discouraging. I'm forced to remember my job is only to go where I should and speak truth where I should, remembering that the effect of this time investment isn't mine to decide, but God's. I must keep going.

 

"So shall my word be that goes forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it."  Isaiah 55:11

 

 

Babies, Rain and Gardens (minipoem)

 

 

I am thankful for life,
breathing-
for joys that wrap around me,
wreathing
all I hold,
my tender gold
in words of praiseful weaving.

Your elegances, God,
exquisite
lacelike web and rains
that visit,
softly there
on gardens fair
while babies dance and pivot!

 

copyright 2012 Elisabeth Snell

 

my meter is on vacation due to illness. You'll have to make do and pretend there's a beat somewhere. Oh and a rhyme on the last bit.

Missing Poetry and Broken Links

I apologize if you're here looking for a poem and it's vanished. 50 or so had to come down,  I learned that the public posting of the poetry can really mess with copyright when it comes to publication. The book is coming together and it seems to me paid writing is better than unpaid! :)

On the bright side, you'll be able to find some of the vanished poetry in the upcoming book- more on that once it grows a working title.

Elisabeth

 

 

Swords, juggling and goats

Of late I've been in a writing vortex, working on the book and new poetry. As long as I have the ability to write, I try to catch as many thoughts as possible and get them pinned down on paper.

Cliff's present to me for Christmas was a dress he sewed from a vintage pattern. This is part of what was done with the scrap lining:

Harbor had a tooth surgery, but they worked fast and were able to avoid the ventilator. He calls his silver crowns "jingle bell teeth."

Winterbourne got a red hat for Christmas, and loves it. He spends a lot of time popping it on and off again. He turned one last month, and is starting to totter around. He's very talky and sings well.

 

This is what I found my men reading early Christmas morning. The stockings were hung by the chimney with care... and then they sat down to read about organs. Living in a house full of males is different.

We cooked our own Thanksgiving meal for the second time ever. Tuk was away, but other than that it was perfect.

I went in to the boy's room one morning and found a couple of interesting characters- I think they think they're being train conductors.

The same two characters found some markers and did a little self-revision.

Harbor learned to shave.


Tuk got a new sword for Christmas, and a remote controlled flying balloon shark. No, this combination was probably not thought out well, but he did have an exciting holiday. And yes, my girly background does detract a bit from the Awesome Powa of the SWORD!!

44 became his grandfather with an orange peel beard and mustache combo.

I heard laughing in the nursery and found Papa juggling

We spent warm days at the park.

And the neighborhood goats came running whenever 44 passed the fence.

 

 

The Sad Truth About The Moon

 

My pretty Harbor, all too soon
you'll learn your much-loved smiling moon
doesn't smile.  Her windowed face
is only coldness lost in space,
reflecting light from burning gas;
she doesn't peer in through the glass,
or call you darling, as you pass.

And Ford, my brilliant wild-caught bird,
a day will come for learning words
like "graveyard"; and the tombstone's etch
will hold a loved one in its sketch.
For now, you say "a flower-place!"
and love the graveyard's flowered face-
the tombstones are, to you, a vase.

 

copyright 2012 Elisabeth Snell

The Hat of Great Importance

He is four years old,
and wears a fancy hat whenever leaving home,
because he never knows
who
he might meet.

He introduces himself to everyone that passes,
just in case they are a friend
he doesn't know,
and with his fancy hat
he becomes important enough
to talk to even Very Very Important People
like the deep voiced policemen,
and tall old ladies
with tremendous hair and too many rings.

He says
that one day he will be as big as Papa,
or the water heater.

 

copyright 2012  Elisabeth Snell

On Becoming a Tree

 

When I was ten,
old people were sturdy trees I played beside-
benevolent watchers with roughened bark;
part of the scenery,
full of stories and mysterious metal pictures.
They were a very different species, so gentle
and often, they embraced me.
They had been there always
and would always be there, like mountains.


When I was fifteen,
old people were a hindrance,
always in the way  of everything
I wanted to accomplish;
saying very slowly things no one wanted to know,
and speaking faith in yellow words
that pinched and were too sweet.
At fifteen, I was a woman with passion's eyes,
but they said, "too young, too young"
and pointed to the toys.


When I was twenty,
old people were a horror.
Strange creatures that tottered and smelled odd.
Every yellow wrinkle
spoke death
of crumpled, ruined humanity.
Rotted fruit, telling stories
of blossomtime, and laughing for joy
of love at the dawn of the world.
I couldn't believe it.
I wished they would stop pretending
they had once been young.
It was ridiculous, and embarrassed me.


When I was twenty-five,
old people were guides,
leading me deftly into the mysteries of womanhood
and wifely skill.
They smiled merrily on my (many) failed attempts
and encouraged me to spread my wings
just a little wider.
When the world starting raining,
and then hailing,
they were still the trees I ran to for shelter
and endless love.
When they offered faith in warm mugs
I drank it eagerly, grateful for the sweetness.


When I was thirty,
old people were my own,
and they were nightlights, extinguishing-
one by one... flickering, and then dying
in the winds of time,
and taking my warm hearth-fire with them.
Blown out, cold. Gone.
The world grew darker, and I was loved
less.


When I was thirty-five,
I saw whispers of creases
around my smile, and the happiness of my eyes
began to radiate at the corners.
Rare tinsel shimmered in sparkles
carefully stroked through my hair
by pain and horror's paintbrushes.
I saw
that impossibly, I, I (!)  youth and beauty
would certainly receive the etched lines and rough bark
of time and age,
and that one day I would become
the benevolent tree
the little ones play beside,
happy,
and the wise nightlight
that glimmers warmly
in the rain.

 

copyright 2012 Elisabeth Snell

 

On Spinning Roses into Thread

I'll pile the roses high and then
spin them out in satin thread.
Be still! The move from wheel to loom
can break this richly scented red,
and leave such heartbreak there instead.

The blue is spun of ocean swirls,
and lonely hillsides birthed the green,
The white is wishful gossamer
midnight gathered, then scrubbed clean.
(These fairy fabrics hold their sheen).

The yellow? It's a sunbeam spun-
the purple's rich with favorite wines,
the gold is simply gold, in fact-
it's brought up from my father's mines
and well worked through these shimmered lines.

The finished cloth is passion-steeped,
and smoothed with true love's gentle word,
then cut out in bold strokes to cloak
a naked, broken, wingless bird-
whose song may rise, as yet unheard.

 

copyright 2011 Elisabeth Snell

 

Winter's Hair

 

 


She always walks with her face turned up, waiting;
as though she expects an owl to land
on her shoulder.
Perhaps it will...
the animals are ever calm and still under her touch.

She nuzzles them sleepily
before she wraps them in her tresses
(but she fails to feed them, poor things).
It doesn't matter after a little while,
because they are tucked into her hair
so tightly, and are too tired to eat.

Her coat is drab, almost dovelike-
though she has a white one she keeps back for special occasions.
It shimmers. Sometimes when she slips it on,
I stand dazzled by her transformation.

Whenever she decides to come to my cottage
the songbirds know and leave-
and the people around me spend dark months
whispering about her...
that she's a killer,
that thousand upon thousand
have fallen victim to her cold heart
and endless hunger,
from babies at the breast to old, old men.

It all sounds shocking and dramatic
so I study her whenever she visits,
looking for signs of guilt
but all I can see in her eyes is hearthsides
and holidays...
her laughter
is like sleigh bells.

 

copyright 2011 Elisabeth Snell

 

 

 

 

From the outside, the windows always sparkle

I stood staring into his bubble
hypnotized
by the ventilator's whooshwhooshwhoosh
and the corresponding fall and rise
of his miniature chest.

The doctor looked at his chart, displeased.
She thought he was a bother. She was an ugly woman.
"If his lungs don't heal, he won't live,"
she said cheerfully. I hated her.

"Yes, you have a very, very sick little boy here.
I want to transport him to the larger hospital right away-
they have a (nightmare) machine that he needs."

I listened, numb at first,
and then angry. I thought,
"He wouldn't need it if you would
LISTEN TO ME
and stop turning down his oxygen so quickly.
You're just fascinated with that other hospital's terrible machine.
What, do you get a commission?"

I looked at the whiteboard listlessly, trying to decide,
and saw it was both the anniversary of my mother-in-law's death,
and my own mother's birthday.
The horror started to tickle around the edges.

Two bubbles away, the doctors
spoke in the same cheery tones
to a man who hovered beside his own bubble,
and its own treasured occupant.

I wondered how he was still standing
because I heard the knife-words
he'd just taken
from smooth-gloved hands.

"We could fix his facial issues,
and even repair his stomach,
but this baby
is missing pieces we cannot replace,
and his condition
is incompatible with life."

The man nodded, softly, and I wondered
how he would tell his wife.
For him, the world ended.

The cars outside still drove past
full of laughing people, singing to bright music,
smiling at the gleaming windows of the hospital
where one baby lay dying,
and another struggled to breathe,
surrounded by a transport team.
They loaded a rolling bubble into an ambulance,
which pulled out among the happy cars.

It was headed for a nightmare,
and maybe life.