Penny Candy (Poem)

After the over-the-threshold
The Red Hots
And meltaways
Are yours
Forever

So bring your empty handfuls

©Expressions by Christine 4/2/09

Her Deadliest Catch (Poem)

I wanted to search a different angle
After the line was tangled
And things were hopelessly
Dead.

Things should be
So much more upscale
And tasteful
Than this

Maybe even
Swimming in clear seas
Beside virgin yachts
And millionaires

Avoiding my net worth
By the fishmonger
And the diners
With the gold-lined plates

And worrying about
Which fork he'll use
After the four-star restaurant

©Expressions by Christine 2010

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They say two things smell like fish....

And one of them is fish....

Plucking Delicious (Poem)

Leaning ladders for carnal climb
To seize the fruit that’s most divine
This sweetness teased from honeyed peach
Plumpness dangles beyond our reach

Balanced in precarious stoop
To snatch a taste of juicy drupe
Open-mouthed and yearning dribble
Archbacked for a meager nibble

Til handfuls plucked with frenzied glee
Hoarded from our laden tree
Are mingled for a spinning fusion
Twirled on tongues in swirled delusion

Licking flesh and smacking lips
Wasting not a wanton drip
Yesses hiss in guilty pleasure
Mouthed ear to ear for sated measure

©Expressions By Christine 8/20/08

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I'm going back through some of my old poetry and posting with my photos from my Flickr set. :o)

These Sunday Mornings (Poem)

These Sunday mornings
Are perfection
With you

Being in your arms
Burying my nose
In your neck

Breathing you deeply
And letting you go
Again and again

Whispered words
And finding poetry
And motion and rhythm

Until waiting
For the next Sunday
Seems such a long thing to do

©Expressions by Christine 2010

The Fav'ring Gale (Prose)

Standing on the shoreline she stared straight out at the jetty with number 45 painted on one of the rocks. Was this oblong pile a cairn or a talisman? Or perhaps it was an omen of a watery grave?  Above her the fast moving and foreboding skies pushed ashore parallel and equal to the brunt of the black waves at her feet. She was at the crux of a life-changing event. Safety was always on solid ground, but she was the adventurous type and the undercurrent tugged at her toes and pulled her towards the untried and unknown.

She momentarily closed her eyes and let the swell of the sea and its surroundings carry her away. Stands of hair lapped at her face in rhythm with her gauzy white dress as seagulls circled and cried above her. The riggings were tight, the sails were at full mast and when everything was harmonious she could momentarily feel the beacon from the lighthouse pass behind her and like a sailor’s shanty urge her on. “Swiftly blows the fav’ring gale”* it prompted. And yes, she would obey its edict.

©Expressions by Christine 2010

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* From the Sea Shanty "Homeward Bound" by Lesley Nelson-Burns

Our anchor we'll weigh,
And our sails we will set.
Goodbye, fare-ye-well,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well.
The friends we are leaving,
We leave with regret,
Hurrah, my boys, we're homeward bound.

We're homeward bound,
Oh joyful sound!
Goodbye, fare-ye-well,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well.
Come rally the capstan,
And run quick around.
Hurrah, my boys, we're homeward bound.

We're homeward bound
We'd have you know
Goodbye, fare-ye-well,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well.
And over the water
To England must go,
Hurrah, my boys, we're homeward bound.

Heave with a will,
And heave long and strong,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well.
Sing a good chorus
For 'tis a good song.
Hurrah, my boys, we're homeward bound.

Hurrah! that good run
Brought the anchor a-weigh,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well.
She's up to the hawse,
Sing before we belay.
Hurrah, my boys, we're homeward bound.

'We're homeward bound,'
You've heard us say,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well,
Goodbye, fare-ye-well.
Hook on the cat fall then,
And rut her away.
Hurrah, my boys, we're homeward bound.

Self-Image (Poem)

I used to be skin
And bones
And people would say,
"You look like skin and bones"
"You need to gain weight"
"If there was a nuclear war,
You would be the first to die
Because you have no meat
On your bones"
Just skin
Skin and bones.

They accused me
Of being anorexic-
I must have an eating disorder
With those skin and bones

I was 5'6" and 103 lbs.

Then I had babies.

After babies one and two
I went back
To skin and bones

After baby three
I weighed 116 lbs.
No one ever said,
"Wow, you look
Mah-velous,
Where are your skin and bones?"

I didn't matter
I just ate cookies
Like I always had before
And watched Sesame Street
All the while
Eating more cookies

Two babies later
Still eating cookies
126 lbs

More cookies
135 lbs

Not a kind word
About how my cookie hips
Have paid off
And laid to rest
Those skin and bones

By 150 lbs
I think maybe I crossed a line
Somewhere........back there......

And none of those well-intentioned souls
Ever told me
That I had cookie thighs
A cookie butt
And a big cookie head

And now
I have to find my way back
To skin and bones

And the gurus tell me
The way is....
To eat skinny little green things

And wait

In the meantime
Maybe I will dodge a bullet
During that nuclear war.

©Expressions by Christine 2010

Migraine (Poem)

The pretty little love songs
Jumble and jangle in my brain
And sound like nightmarish caterwauling

I would like nothing more
Than a clean vacuum
Noiseless
Dark
Void

No more memories
No more recall
Just amnesia
And a Midol.

©Expressions by Christine 2010

She Paints (Poem)

She started with zwieback
and took advances courses
In cookie

Watching milk dribble
From her sippy cup
Drip
By
Drip...

On each sweet confection
And dabbing her chubby fingers
On her highchair palette
Of strawberry pinks,
Lemon yellows,
And chocolate browns

Until off to naptime
To awaken tomorrow
And start her second year off
In cake smearing

©Expressions by Christine 2010

She's Pink Now (Poem)

Life has its strangers
That robbed her beauty

But
I can relax
Because she's pink now
And vulnerable again

And smiling cheeks are good
And she's good

But
I still want
To punch that guy in the nose.

©Expressions by Christine 2010

Watermarked

I realized this morning how easy it is to steal images on this site. For that reason I will be watermarking my photos somewhere near their center. While I have always found that to be distracting, it's a necessary evil. 

I also realized that sometimes I will find the need to scatter prose throughout my blog. Sometimes the first paragraph of an imagined short story will pop into my head and that might be fun to share as well. Still....my challenge for now will be to mesh my photos to my words because what I see in one I will struggle to communicate in the other!

I guess it needs to be said here and now. If it has a copyright it belongs to me.Stealing is wrong. My brother has done work in cyber crime. Nuff said.

This photo was taken ooh ooh ooh lookin out my front door yesterday morning!

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog! A brief introduction: I am a woman at the crux of  new growth and new seasons and finding a new identity through my expressions- my loves of photography and poetry. I love nature. Sometimes I am a log cabin girl and sometimes I love the opulence of a castle. I eat Raisinettes at the movies, long to pull off sexy high heels with hem-up-the-back black stockings, sing Lady Gaga songs at the top of my lungs while I drive, and wish I had kept up those piano lessons I started when I was a teenager. My photos can be melancholy and dark, mysterious and moody, or a view at the simple beauties that surround me. Between poetry and photography I feel my strongest point is my photography, but I hope to successfully mesh the two here. Thank you for sharing a few moments of your day with me.