Monthly Archives: January 2015

Verse for a bad day

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cold rain

constant drizzle
just above freezing
gray day stay inside
drive with friends
cancelled
snow at least
would have been white

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, Jan. 3, 2015 – published Jan. 4.

Steve Shoemaker in his favorite chair with Blazer, his collie by his side, his iPhone, book, and newspaper. Kite soaring outside the window

Steve Shoemaker in his favorite chair with Blazer, his collie by his side, his iPhone, book, and newspaper. Kite soaring outside the window

 

Picture of Steve in his favorite chair with book, iPhone, newspaper, collie Blazer, and blue kite taken this morning by Kay Stewart in the Shoemaker home in Urbana. Later we did have snow.

 

Verse – Words with Enemies

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Words with Enemies

You smile, and I’ll smile
and all the while we’ll
talk behind each other’s back
(but just to those we know
will have OUR back).

Then you will use a word
with just that tone, a word
that tears the skin from my back
(flaying piece by piece
and leaving bloody flesh.)

The words that I will then say
in return will burn and scar
and pierce you front to back
(I know it should be peace I seek,
but I won’t turn the other cheek.)

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, January 4, 2015

 

A Man and His Dog

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Barclay and Gordon

Barclay and Gordon

Few bonds are as close as a man and his dog. I sorely miss Barclay, the soccer dog, who’s living with his “sister” Kristin while Kay and I are “somewhere else” for a long time.

Kristin reports he’s doing well, eating all his food, taking his medicine, and happily playing goalie with his ball.

I wonder if Robert Frost had a dog. After writing “Mending Wall,” – Something there is that doesn’t love a wall….”, he might have thought, “Something there is that loves…a dog.”

 

 

Limerick

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Mops waiting for guests to use at the Shoemaker residence.

Mops waiting for guests to use at the Shoemaker residence.

INTRO TO LIMERICK: Driving to Steve and Nadja Shoemaker’s this morning, we texted Steve revising the estimated time of arrival. Steve responded with this limerick and photo from his iPhone:

We love to have guests who show up
When they told us that they would turn up.
But please don’t come early
Or we will be surly,
It’s then that we start to clean up!

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, January 2, 2014.

2014 in review

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Thanks to all of you who visited Views from the Edge in 2014: about 20,000 visits from 126 countries.

Here’s an excerpt from WordPress’s year end report:

The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. Views from the Edge was viewed about 20,000 times in 2014. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 7 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Steve and I thank each of you who visited, and we are grateful to WordPress for its great hosting for the likes of us. Happy New Year and best wishes in 2015.

Gordon

Verse for New Year’s Day 2015

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ghost kites

ghost kites

 

Old Year, New Year: Old Kite, New Kite

A large blue Delta from Oregon
with two wide trailing tails
mice-eaten, torn by storms,
but still flying. The line knotted,
re-tied after “Hands up, don’t shoot”
and “I can’t breath” and cops killed.

ISIS and drones, beheadings and bombs,
spying on all, torture for some,
my country bought by corporations,
yet Vivaldi still sung, crops harvested,
children born and hugged and taught.
Last year’s kite crashed many times.

A large red Delta for Christmas
with a new line, new tails.
So far blue skies and a steady breeze,
but storms are predicted, injustices
multiply like mice, discord does not die.
This year’s kite, too, is fragile, vulnerable.

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, January 1, 1015