GRIZZLY PEAR

written snapshots

Category: Penny Delights

  • He kept irrigating the kale even though she never came to harvest.


    Watering blue skies,
    Showering umbrellas,
    Floating diamonds,
    Dancing on the lawn.


    ䷥䷿

    skip chase
    stray horse
    shall return

  • Adventure got his name from the pattern of ships sailing into the high seas on his shirt.

    Bear Bear and Adventure are going to school!
    Sister made tiny books with scraps of paper

    Studied at small cardboard tables,
    Homemade easels by Mama, tilted flat.

    Pored over their assignments,
    Sitting on yoga block chairs.

    Bear Bear did her homework,
    She got to watch us play in the sandbox.

    Adventure wouldn’t pay attention,
    He had to stay in their bedroom school.

    Study Harder!
    Study Harder!

    ䷿䷏

    Fun feast,
    Dry head.
    Wet mind,
    Truth spilled.

  • After reading on the toilet, my leg fell asleep; she said “Good! Unless you like that feeling.”

    He saw the turtle sandbox,
    Two years dormant.
    Mama removed the green cover —
    Aired it out,
    Moistened the sand.

    Apple and strawberry sand pies.
    Big sand jellies!
    They made sand smoothies —
    Large or small?
    Flat, round, square, or twirly top?

    I was the sand customer,
    Again and again.
    I played the plastic ukulele, badly —
    Neglected practice,
    Long fingernails.

    She showered first.
    We made more sand goodies.
    He sprayed the hose —
    Peed in his pants.
    In twilight he kept playing.

    When Mama came out,
    He ran up to her,
    Suddenly started sobbing —
    我不要姐姐先进去!
    (I don’t want Sister to go in first!)

    ䷶䷲

    abundance
    midday foam
    broken arm
    no blame

  • It took a long process to earn an evening’s read.

    We borrowed them Saturday;
    Mama wanted to wait for a week.

    Six days later;
    Is Friday close enough?

    I spread out the books on the patio;
    Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

    The sun set;
    Bring them in tomorrow.

    Mama wants to flip them over;
    Wipe them down.

    Saturday we visited to Costco;
    The kids hugged stuffies while shopping.

    The sun set;
    A full week gone.

    We went back to the library;
    Sunday Taiko drum concert!

    Got more books;
    Shopped for groceries.

    The sun set;
    Another day.

    Monday breakfast came with wailing;
    Way past a week!

    Mama flipped them over;
    Wiped them down.

    The sun set;
    I brought them in.

    Two kids, sprawled out;
    Reading in their room.

    ䷟

    wait
    no blame
    push on
    gain

  • In music, he wandered — sometimes he dreamt, sometimes he poemed.

    Standing between opposite rivers
    Toothpicks holding high four discs
    Lighting the freeway
    Snaking into the busy desert

    Turning west
    Facing the setting sun
    One orange button seering my eyes
    Sliding behind our serrated valley rim

    Asphalt blending into the sky,
    Early golden hour.
    Twenty minutes further,
    The hills blending into the road.

    ䷃䷆

    a fool
    assaults
    a bandit
    agony

  • We sat at the edge of the bed and jump-bounced on the mattress with extreme giggling.

    “Spaceship Walk!”
    I squatted and he climbed onto my back.

    “Swing!”
    I grabbed his arms and swung him between my legs

    “Jump!”
    I loosely cradled him in my arms and hopped a few times

    “Roll over!”
    I stood over the bed and dropped him onto a pile of blankets.

    “Should I tell Mama about the fun we’re having?”
    “Never!”

    ䷳䷁

    don’t move
    real self
    best luck

  • Don’t be a prince, be noble.

    不事王侯，高尚其事。
    I Ching 18, line 6

    The footnote to my “Penny Delights” are an extremely idiosyncratic rendition of the I Ching. This is how I normally write them up.

    • Perform a quick reading (Russell Cottrell has a great yarrow stalk program)
    • Pick out the predominant line (using the method described by SJ Marshall)
    • Copy the original Chinese from Project Gutenberg.
    • Paste it into Google Translate (often unintelligible),
    • Reference a couple translations (on Russell Cottrell’s download)
    • Freelance wildly to create a little doggerel that may — or may not — have anything to do with the original.


    Today’s reading was a first. Google translate both made sense and actually aligned with the proper translations. So I passed it along untouched.

    Great life advice to boot!

  • Mama yelled at them for mopping the floor with blankets as shields from the grout lasers.

    She’s into Obby’s.
    (Obstacle courses on Roblox).

    Plays with her friends, chatting on facetime.
    (Her brother watches over her shoulder.)

    But only one hour on the iPad.
    (What else to do?)

    Staged a piano recital for the stuffies.
    (They quickly got bored of mashing keys.)

    He pulled out their fort building kit.
    (From my sister, last Christmas.)

    He started with a strange shape,
    (Not the usual cube with a gabled roof.)

    She saw immediately — a laser room!
    (She added checkpoints, throwing scarves onto the floor.)

    The lines in the tile are lasers too!
    (Protect yourself with baby blanket shields!)

    He nests a plastic carrot in a toilet paper tube.
    “The Golden Carrot!”

    ䷑䷎

    Don’t be a prince,
    不事王侯，
    Bù shì wánghóu,

    be noble.
    高尚其事。
    gāoshàng qí shì.

  • Without words clogging the box of glass and steel, he saw details buried in the blatant mundanity of his daily commute.

    Tractor trailer,
    A box of silver reflections,
    grey, blue, brown,
    The road, the sky, the me.

    Sun setting below a sign,
    Orange tints green and yellow,
    Buffalo Drive
    EXIT ONLY

    ䷳䷕

    mountain toes,
    betwixt glass and rock,
    grace and stillness,
    no body,

  • The desert rats were unprepared for the simulacrum of moisture in the atom-sphere.

    A man jogs
    Blonde mane,
    Just shorts,
    Stars and stripes.

    Five lights repeating thrice
    The sign blinks
    >>>
    (merge right, merge right, merge right)

    A sun rises
    through clouds
    past skyscrapers
    down Russell.

    ䷁䷇

    yellow skirt
    perfect fortune
    no flag