What is the pot of truth to which we cleave? Friendship is the balm that gets us through life Soothes us when injured by all means of strife.
Whatever injury makes us now grieve – For upsets and perils are always rife What is the pot of truth to which we cleave? Friendship is the balm that gets us through life
So turn to your friends and never you grieve Be you troubled by husband, children, wife True friends cut through troubles like a sharp knife What is the pot of truth to which we cleave? Friendship is the balm that gets us through life Soothes us when injured by all means of strife.
usually 10 syllables per line as iambic pentameter
Postscript! – I wondered if there was a translator app. for Chaucerian (Middle) English and there is at https://openl.io/translate/middle-english Here is Friendship translated…
What is the pot of soth to which we cleven? Frendshipe is the baume that bringeth us thurgh lyf, It soothen us whan we ben hurt by alle manere of stryf.
What so ever harm maketh us now to grieven – For distresses and perils ben ever ryf, What is the pot of soth to which we cleven? Frendshipe is the baume that bringeth us thurgh lyf.
Therfore turn thee to thy frendes and never thee grieven, Be thou troubled by husbonde, children, or wyf, Trewe frendes sheren through wo as with sharp knyf. What is the pot of soth to which we cleven? Frendshipe is the baume that bringeth us thurgh lyf, It soothen us whan we ben hurt by alle manere of stryf.
I might even have dipped my toes In the water of surfing if I’d just stopped working sooner left more time to get to Knock airport if I’d chosen the main road instead of the back road if I had been travelling slower even though the road was dry if the farmer had trimmed the hedge on the blind bend if the tractor was not pulling a wide trailer if it hadn’t rained two days before if the drain under the road wasn’t blocked if I hadn’t braked just where the water flowed across the road if the van hadn’t skidded on the slick I wouldn’t have worn this splint for twenty-five years I might not have done some teaching I might not have become a draughtsman I might not have moved back to England I wouldn’t have opened that restaurant joined choirs, made frozen yoghurt made this house out of a stable lived this life beyond the bend…
There are two major blogging challenges that occupy my year, Te A to Z Challenge and PoPoFest and each year of each Challenge/Festival, I seem to heap ever higher expectations on my particpation, and this year has been no exception! For the postcards, I like to make my own and so in 2023, I used favourite photographs I had taken, in 2024, AI generated images that hadn’t made the final selection for particular projects but which were good in their own right, and for 2025, I decided to revive my very intermittent painting skills.
I have painted since my teenage years, which you can read about in this year’s A to Z here. However, whi;st I spent much of my life in applied arts, signwriting, graphic design and the like, pure painting languished – how many times did I take my paints on holiday only to bring them home unused – so making at least 31 postcard-sized paintings (in the end I did more for bonus cards sent to me on the International List) was a challenge. I produced about 4 on most weekends through July and August, sometimes working on 2 at a time as each dried. Many were watercolour, many acrylics, some mixed, and one pencil drawing.
I’ve decided to post them in a single Exhibition post (Exhibit if you’re American) together with their handwritten (excuse the writing, please) poems, which according to the aims of PoPoFest, are to spontaneously write an epistolary poem to a stranger, preferably one which references the image on the postcard. I blew up photographs from years past, which I had hoped would make paintings and in particular, pictures from Crete where we spent 6 months during lockdown in 2020 – enjoy…
The sky here is watercolour, the rest acrylic, but even in this scan, it’s possible to see the greater luminosity of watercolour…
Watercolour, which enables the “tunnel” to glow with reflected light
Watercolour
Watercolour – the subtelties of the sky didn’t scan well…
Watercolour and gouache on yellow, Elephant dung paper (I like its absorbency)…
Watercolour on buff, Elephant dung paper (this colour paper was a little too absorbent – too grabby)…
Watercolour with masking fluid. There should only have been 3 rails but I painted along the horizon line by mistake!
Watercolour
Pencil
Acrylic and watercolour on yellow, Elephant dung paper.
Acrylic and watercolour on yellow, Elephant dung paper.
Watercolour. The challenge here was to give the headland 3 3-dimensional form and not just make a flat cliff…
Watercolour
Watercolour
Acrylic
Watercolour
Acrylic
Watercolour
Pencil, Watercolour, Acrylic.
Watercolour
Acrylic
Watercolour
Watercolour
Acrylic. This allowed the nearly dry brush technique to create the reflections on the water.
Watercolour
Watercolour
Acrylic
Watercolour
This is the same subject as the previous painting but done in acrylic.
Top left is the photograph from which I made 3 different paintings…
20256 Received Poem Cento
This is a Cento poem made from lines found in all the Poetry Postcard poems I received in 2025…
I: Destruction
People are waking in the night, hearts racing, blood pounding dreams, fantasies, deceptions, escape The future is – unexplainable I try not to disturb them when I slowly reach my hand toward the culture that informed my values…
Cruel and crude, greedy old man — shouting, destroying the Bad King who demands from him, the Good Kingdom his world has become much smaller a pretty close second Puppets! Who is pulling the strings? Like my heart, they did not weep another missed connection, warped, failed shouting colour into gray streets where no one listens the beauty of the Badlands
We know so little – despite knowing so much Consumption society has chewed up spit out this vast and beautiful continent. transported in cardboard boxes to lockers at hub food discouraged now as our progress is torn down, a government being dismantled thinking then it can’t happen here. But it does I’m not sure there is enough of me today bobbing movement of nature you are missed daily somewhere unknown, another world away; it was there ….no more what if I told you still, I hope for forgiveness… the suggestion of brokenness the promise of wholeness we are all a part of everything – I can’t help hoping
II: Redemption if humans could fly, would we ever walk? around my imagination whatever you want’s okay! I close my eyes and breathe in fireweed your magic encapsulates me waiting for the perfect day that clear blue sky is here year round stairway to heaven sun drops sparkle air to reach, always, for the light someone is thinking of me remembering gratitude’s call to learn what was above and below today’s sun reluctantly begins to set…
Poets and lines:- Penelope Moffet 1-2, Jerrold Narland 3, Kerfe Roig 4, Susan Montgomery 5-6, Lawrence Pevec 7, Nancy R. Parr 8-9, Emily Bernhardt 10-11, Anon. 12, Grant Swados 13, Margie Ripperger 14, Anon. 15, Akua Lezli Hope 16, Jeannine Jordan 17-18, , Mary Mueller 19, Cassandra Bissel 20, Suzanne Harris 21-22, Karen Keltz 23-24, Ruth Vanklstine 25-26, Laura Gamache 27, Anon. 28, Lulu 29, Dava Wharton 30, Margaret Roncone 31-32, Rebecca 33-34, Muriel Karrr 35, Lisa Humphrey 36, Anon. 37-38, Nitya Prema 39, Karen Loeb 40, Amy Leonard 41-42, Donita Ries 43, Sandra Gadjewski 44, Diana Kolpak 45-46, Margaret Hill-Daniels 47, Cathy Wetter 48, Mary Skeen 49-50, Lynn Caldwell 51, Susan Vespoli 52, Julie Naslund 53, Angela Marie Ebba 54, Lula 55, P. O’Neill 56-58,Pence 59.
1 – After a pretty rainy week, Saturday morning dawned sunny…
2 – The reservoir above the village is now brim full, although the Yorkshire hosepipe ban is not yet lifted, it shouldn’t be long 9not that we need to water now lol)…
3 – I am always grateful to live in such a beautiful place and so, the sun out, I went up to “The Nab” to take a photo of Silsden village for you…
This is the reverse of the view from our house – The Nab is at top left…
And turning the camera round, here is the outcrop of Millstone Grit that forms The Nab. And yes, there is a quarry up there where agricultural workers with little to do in Winter, would carve millstones, water troughs and the like, out of the rock.
Whilst I was up there, a fog bank rolled in below me to the right…
And one more shot…
4 – Gratitude my daughter’s quite young Border Collie, Winnie, is sweet-tempered and settles down after initial excitement at greeting a visitor, quickly enough fo next weekend we shall be baby-sitting her at our house…
Winnie
5 – By dint of Harrisa pepper, Dragons teeth deployment of sticks and thorny rose clippings, I seem finally, to have deterred the nameless cat who has been scratching in my bulb containers…
6 – I finished the very last task of my Poetry Postcard Festival participation for this year – a Cento poem using lines from each of the 43 poems on a postcard I received during July and August this year – it’s the post before this one, here on the blog…
7 – My friend who runs Collaborature – an online journal for collaborative poems, and I, have now topped 1,000 lines of what is turning into a novella written in Pushkin or “Onegin” sonnets after his book Eugene Onegin. You can read our epic “Shipmates” here.
8 – I shall have a busy but different week at work since my bosses are opening a self-storage warehouse in an old office building and they want me to be there for the first week to help get it running.
9. My grandson Dillon and his girlfriend Izzy, will be living at home with their parents Bev and Don in the next village, Addingham for the next year, having spent the Summer touring in their small camper van. They have asked me to teach them how to paint which will be fun…
10. Grateful to have been inducted into The Hall of Hostinae of Ten Things Thankful and for all the lovely messages of welcome from you all…
Poetry Postcard Festival 2025 Received Postcard Cento
I: Destruction
People are waking in the night hearts racing, blood pounding dreams, fantasies, deceptions, escape The future is – unexplainable I try not to disturb them when I slowly reach my hand toward the culture that informed my values… Cruel and crude, greedy old man — shouting, destroying the Bad King who demands from him, the Good Kingdom his world has become much smaller a pretty close second Puppets! Who is pulling the strings? Like my heart, they did not weep another missed connection, warped, failed shouting colour into gray streets where no one listens the beauty of the Badlands
We know so little – despite knowing so much Consumption society has chewed up spit out this vast and beautiful continent. transported in cardboard boxes to lockers at Hub Food discouraged now as our progress is torn down, a government being dismantled thinking then it can’t happen here. But it does I’m not sure there is enough of me today bobbing movement of nature you are missed daily somewhere unknown, another world away; it was there ….no more what if I told you still, I hope for forgiveness… the suggestion of brokenness the promise of wholeness we are all a part of everything – I can’t help hoping
II: Redemption if humans could fly, would we ever walk? around my imagination whatever you want’s okay! I close my eyes and breathe in fireweed your magic encapsulates me waiting for the perfect day that clear blue sky is here year round stairway to heaven sun drops sparkle air to reach, always, for the light someone is thinking of me remembering gratitude’s call to learn what was above and below today’s sun reluctantly begins to set…
Poets and lines:- Penelope Moffet 1-2, Jerrold Narland 3, Kerfe Roig 4, Susan Montgomery 5-6, Lawrence Pevec 7, Nancy R. Parr 8-9, Emily Bernhardt 10-11, Anon. 12, Grant Swados 13, Margie Ripperger 14, Anon. 15, Akua Lezli Hope 16, Jeannine Jordan 17-18, , Mary Mueller 19, Cassandra Bissel 20, Suzanne Harris 21-22, Karen Keltz 23-24, Ruth Vanklstine 25-26, Laura Gamache 27, Anon. 28, Lulu 29, Dava Wharton 30, Margaret Roncone 31-32, Rebecca 33-34, Muriel Karrr 35, Lisa Humphrey 36, Anon. 37-38, Nitya Prema 39, Karen Loeb 40, Amy Leonard 41-42, Donita Ries 43, Sandra Gadjewski 44, Diana Kolpak 45-46, Margaret Hill-Daniels 47, Cathy Wetter 48, Mary Skeen 49-50, Lynn Caldwell 51, Susan Vespoli 52, Julie Naslund 53, Angela Marie Ebba 54, Lula 55, P. O’Neill 56-58,Pence 59.
This cento poem takes lines from all the postcard poems I received during the July-August Poetry Postcard Festival (POPoFest) run by Cascadia Poetics LAB out of Seattle, USA. Most of the participants are American but it seems that many want to send a postcard to poets elsewhere and so all the no-US poets are sent out on a separate list – so that I, as a UK resident, was lucky enough to receive 24 from my Group 4 list and 19 “bonus ” cards from the International list.
Taking a line from each, two poems emerged, which I have chosen to present as Parts 1 & 2 since the bleakness of the first needs amelioration by the optimism of the second…
Serendipitously, Björn’s optional prompt on this occasion was the writing of letters and the idea of the POPoFest, is to write Epistolary poems to the recipient that reference the image on the postcard, to write spontaneously without editing. I chose to reclaim my painting skills this year and sent 31 original paintings out, one of which is shown below…
You have done it on your own the craft of poetry garnering your words identifying your voice never mixing metaphors unless you mean to accenting with alliteration tackling subjects from waxing lyrical about nature to sounding the clarion calls to activism in a world gone mad…
Now, why not try the delights of collaboration… a dance á deux a menage á trois an orgy of poesie with multiple poets if you will bat stanzas back and forth ekphrast a painting or photograph by a friend why do it on your own when you can do it together become a collaborator…
Ten months ago, our very own Melissa Lemay, started an online journal of collaborative poetry, Collaborature so why not head over there and have a gander at all the exciting poems that have been submitted and then reach out to another poet to have a go at collaboration…
1 – I am grateful to my daughter for coming round and doing some housework for Barbara and I, which, as she said, is also a chance to spend some time together…
2 – I am glad that once a month I have to take samples to a microbiology lab for testing and the drive back takes me “over the tops” and include this beautiful view…
3 – I am grateful that my work gives me a subscription to Adobe Suite, including PhotoShop, which, amongst other things, I use for resizing the pictures for this website; however, I promised t0 show you what I use the various textures I have shown each week and I thought to use the initials of Ten Things of Thankful…
The top version has had the inner area of the letters coloured in with an orange gradient. The second version has four different textures, all of which you have seen – faded blue paint on wood, fallen Autumn leaves, a microfibre cloth and tree bark. In numbers three and four, the orange layer has been placed over the textrures and different ways of blending the two layers have been applied.
That’s the magic of PhotoShop…
4 – I bought this bunch of flowers to cheer up my patrner and they have lasted really well…
5 – Following the disruption of moving the garden round to accomodate the roofers, I got everything back where it needs to be – all the bulb containers are to the fore, ready for Spring and indeed some of them are jumping the gun… The strange patches of colour are chilli powder to educate a cat that these pots are not it’s toilet…
6 – I have agreed to start a new collaborative poem with a friend to be published in another friend’s online journal – Collaborature…
7 – I finished inputting all the fabrics in my spreadsheet in preparation for the A to Z Challenge (blogging) 2026 – I found 139 different fabrics and if you include fibres and processes 254 items which need to be sorted and grouped into just 26 alphabetical items – hence the spreadsheet – I love a good spreadsheet!
8 – My salary (1/2 time as I am) and my pension will both come into my account on the same day – tomorrow – Yayyy! (Pension precesses as it is every 28 days exactly)
9. I spoke to my Sister in Nova Scotia and to my Critique Partner in Minneapolis which two meetings take place every other Sunday, and both of which I enjoy immensely…
10 – I got through my TToT…
Ten Things of Thankful draws people from all over the world to share the best of their week – why don’t you join us…
Demonstrators gather during a “No Kings” protest against U.S. President Donald Trump’s policies in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 18, 2025.
A nation birthed by bold revolution now suffering a jumped-up would-be King despite the founders’ strong constitution how could their law be such a broken thing – poisoned so, by the cunning fascist’s sting… The tyrant can’t be broken using force – garnered a band of brutish thugs of course but being laughed at – one thing he can’t stand marching in fancy dress, one such recourse a steadfast, strong and democratic band!
1 – I have virtually finished the layout of all the new Gelato Production Unit at work (remember the mess of pipework I showed you last week?) which means I can now proceed to writing the SOP’s (Standard Operating Procedures) for the plant. This is vital as if you open the wrong valve or leave the wrong one open, a potential £6-7,00.00 could be lost – you don’t want cleaning acid in your gelato mix…
2 – I am grateful to live in such a beautiful (Go’s Own) county – Yorkshire and this is a view I had to stop and photograph with a view to a painting – Beamsley Beacon emphasised by strong shadows on a levely Autumn sunshiny day…
3 – On a smaller scale, no unused corner – in this case of a snicket (Passgeway) – fails to be colonised by nature – I think this is a Lavateria…
4 – The Olive tree in our yard continues to darken its tiny fruit though I fear there is not enough sun to develop them further before I have to wrap the tree in frost protection for the Winter – however – one fully formed Olive has made it and by the Spring, when I unwrap the tree again, will no doubt have attained black ripeness…
5 – The roofers returned to fix and relace a few slates on the extension roof and renew the render along the coping stones and they also painted (and cleaned) the small upstairs window, which is otherwise inaccessibe…
6 – More bounty from this year – some quinces in my daughter’s garden – not sure if they are edible or only ornamental? I love to make Membrillo!
7 – Across the road from the above, I encountered this tree spirit…
8 – More Autumn beauty – better on the ground than on my car…
9 – No Ten of Thankful complete without a little texture – so from the trunk of the tree that shed the leaves above – any graphic artists amongst you, feel free to use…
10 – Thankful to have found Ten Things of Thankful this week…
Ten Things of Thankful draws people from all over the world to share the best of their week – why don’t you join us…
I am one of the fortunate ones a member of the last cycle of breeding in the North American summer and as such I got to fly South past California – could have stopped there but by then I had the travel bug and I, and many of my cohort carried on to Mexico, not for the heat Oh no! We settled in the great pine forest in the mountains, where it was warm enough as long as we huddled together to survive the winter
We curtained the trees with our colour – the reason we are called monarchs allegedly – orange in honour of William the Third of England – William of Orange – so I guess we were named by the Brits before the proto-Republicans got their act together and kicked their oppressors out – anyway, the name stuck and no one thought fit to change it even now, when Americans are driven to hold “No Kings!” parades – we butterflies – the most numerous in North America retain our royal soubriquet and regal we were as we rose en masse from the Mexican trees to head North again for the summer and it’s not just for the food of course but for the perpetuation of the species
I would like to tell you of my life as a caterpillar and later a pupa but as I overheard a young teacher explaining to his class what happens inside the pupal case is so complete a transformation it’s as if we liquefy and alchemically transform into a completely new creature and with it, gone all memories of that earlier life – of course – we see them – the caterpillars our offspring munching their way through milkweed but I can’t imagine their lives ae very interesting – not compared to we adults, travelling thousands of miles seeing the sights, hanging out together and then becoming one of the sights ourselves – a wonder of nature!
That teacher also said that we are of the genus Danaus Which is perhaps the masculine of Danae upon whose great- great-grand daughter Zeus came as a shower of gold – and that is surely a fitting origin story for the naming of we Monarchs…
Over at dVerse Poets Pub, it is Open Link Night and lillian invites us to submit a poem of our own choice and if possible, to join on Saturday to read them out live…
This poem came out of my writing group, where, after reading The Promotion by James Tate, we were prompted to write the compressed life story of a previous life as an animal…
