Category: Home and Garden

BEWARE OF OWLS DISGUISED AS PARAKEETS OR SPARROWS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Ever seen a squirrel caught in a bramble?
A seeming escape leading nowhere?
He could tell you.

*   *   *

He could tell you
he’s lucky to still be alive.

*   *   *

There are those who insist love is nothing more
than a seasonal disorder, an allergy or a virus.
Makes sense when you’re speaking of Sick With Love.
But how do you cope dealing with females
happier with thorns than leaves and berries?
Or when confronted by some dog?

*   *   *

Running along a phone line, a squirrel
never falls over. To hell with gravity.
It’s the strength of those long, skinny toes
can reach around a stick. Hold tight.

Poem copyright 2015 by Jnana Hodson
To read the full set of squirrelly poems, click here.

 

GARDEN DIMENSIONS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

“They already were like gods
made in Yahweh’s own image
and didn’t even know it.”

“I could see the Woman would be easier
to convince. She appreciated color and
the bouquet, where the Man noticed
only the fruit’s heft and taste.”

Every snake has its own hole.
Sometimes a snake is just as snake,
Doctor Freud.

And the Serpent went on to make a fortune
developing shopping malls lined with retailers
promising to cover everyone’s nakedness.

* * *

God creates a Helper for the Man
and she helps him, all right:
helps him get into trouble,

helps him to the forbidden fruit,
helps him get ejected from Paradise.
Not only that, but I’d venture

she believed she was doing something
beneficial for him all along,
something for his own good.
(And it was very good)

* * *

Where has Eden gone? Maybe
it’s now ahead of us, down
the road, rather than behind
with its gates shut tight.

As for Original Sin,
life’s not fair.
Some parents gamble
away the mortgage,
their children’s
college tuition.
Others get to be boss
through the injustice
of genetic roulette.
But that’s not really
part of this story.

* * *

Where do the other people come from?
Maybe the question becomes, for us,
where do other people COME FROM?
You! My neighbors! My antagonist,
my friend, my spouse, my children?

Perhaps they come from that other couple
God created, in the first creation story,
just before Eden. Perhaps they, too,
are ejected from their own Eden.

Perhaps there were other gardens
that were also released –
the ones whose stories we’ve forgotten.

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
For more, click here.

GENESIS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Each seed, each root, each bud
unfurls on schedule. Melting
and rain come together.

In the daylight you open
so slowly you do not hear
their snap. Between pale tendril

and miniature leaves, we will gaze,
then, no longer doubting
our own inward spiraling galaxy.

Poem copyright 2015 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full Green Repose collection, click here.

SQUIRREL TAXI

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

who knows exactly when it happened
that he realized he held more in common
with squirrels than any of his colleagues?

he couldn’t quite fly, no matter how much
he admired birds, and had climbed
enough trees as a kid to nearly qualify

still, he had little taste for nuts, other than cashews,
unless you mean a strange people,
and he rarely raked fallen leaves

maybe it was all a matter of some vague sense
he didn’t exactly belong in this apartment or house,
except by clandestinely rearranging his peculiar insulation

maybe it was simply a nickname
for the way he rummaged frenziedly in search
of some missing item suddenly remembered

he would dash, then, in and out of the trap
in and out of the trap and, with a snap,
wonder where he was being carried

Poem copyright 2015 by Jnana Hodson
To read the full set of squirrelly poems, click here.

 

THIS MATTER OF HOME

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

Our Advent readings last year have had me reflecting on the concept of home and how deeply we, as humans, yearn for such a place. Or should I say state of comfort.

It also has me admitting how elusive it’s been for me. Our childhood home was never truly comfortable, physically or emotionally. And in the moves afterward, I often felt more that I’d established a suitable base camp while anticipating the next leap forward. Home, in other words, was always over the horizon.

The closest I’d felt was the craftsman-style house we bought in the Rust Belt, but I knew I wouldn’t be living there forever. I was still building my resume, as the phrase goes, working my way up the management ladder.

More than three decades later, I’ve settled into a community that feels right, though I’m very much an outsider. At least, as far as a career goes, I’ve survived into retirement. As for the house? It’s been my address longer than any other, but somehow it still feels not quite solid. No amount of renovation will ever make it quite right, not with its leaky cellar and foundation. But it’s what I have and where I work at what I love to do. The garden’s in place, and then there’s the loft in my barn.

And then there’s family, with the kids now grown and housed elsewhere. Could it be home, then, is wherever my wife’s cooking? At least that points in a state of awareness direction.

As well as an underlying unsettled element in my own psyche.

~*~

My poems on the challenges of renovations, repairs, and relating as a husband are collected as Home Maintenance, a free ebook at Thistle/Flinch editions.

MIND THE RIGHT LIGHTING

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

He says it’s one of his least favorite jobs as an electrician, this hanging new lighting fixtures. In an old house, there’s not much wire left in the ceiling to work with. Forget moving around on the ladder. And you’d rather not rip away any plaster if you can help it.

But the results can be so dramatic. Or should we say, illuminating?

~*~

My poems on the challenges of renovations, repairs, and relating as a husband are collected as Home Maintenance, a free ebook at Thistle/Flinch editions.