She entered the coffee shop across from Concordia University. They met here the first time five years ago. Some lectures pushed her buttons. Many fled to Psychology hoping “book smart” would make better therapists, muttering, “Enough of this learning by doing crap!”
“Work out your own shit”, most of her professors said, “Be aware of your red flags! You could do more harm than good.” The same group of mature students met here after each class. Together they formed a community of resources, compassion and knowledge.
she dreaded endings, late arrival was more her style …just couldn’t say goodbye.
When I saw this photo taken by Georgia at Basket and Sekhmet’s Library, I had to smile. I had taken a phto of 2 pay phones in the Métro last Spring. The fact that these are near such a lovely green space stirred contradictions…beauty, ugliness, pleasure and pain and this is what my muse came up with for Bastet’s Shadorma Prompt at MindLoveMiserysMenagerie.
(shadorma)
Assaults lurk In the dead of night behind trees far from phones cyclists never heard her screams would have dialed for help.
(senryû)
predators always study their territory and their prey.
(shadorma)
phones by parks gives false illusions of safety late at night listen up! one`s never safe when monsters still breathe
Now to make this fun a little and give me more of a challenge, I am adding my photos of these phones in the Métro. Having looked at them, my muse seems fixated on sad affairs.
Better late then never, I say with this interesting photo prompt. Photo challenge #20 Time Goes by like a train, at Mind Love Misery’s Menagerie awakened my memories of living by the train tracks near my grandmother’s home. I used to run across as the gate was just coming down, bells ringing and the man in the tower shouting at me to stop but a few times, I still took a chance. How lucky I was not to end up like this though I just wrote…
railway crossing yesteryear’s tragic loss her ghost still walks
But this prompt’s title also inspires thoughts about time and we have had several haiku prompts from a few different blogs on “time” in the past weeks. This is what the photo with the title inspired…
summer days crawl forlorn, waits for her lover but time has stopped
Thank you, Yves, for this interesting photo challenge! I am slowly transferring all my short form poetry under the nom de plume, Tournesol @ Tournesol dans un jardin.
Yesterday marked one week that a friend and colleague died, Sunday morning, July 20th. I wrote a series of haiku/senryû, last week with the vivid image of Bruno when I last saw him mid May of this year. He had been battling pancreatic cancer for well over a year at that time and still accepted that I visit him and he posed for a book that was being compiled to give to another colleague who is battling breast cancer. Bruno believed in thinking positive at ALL times. He believed in the fight and never gave up, nor did he stop encouraging our friend who is still under treatment and we KNOW she will rise above this insidious disease. She is the loving and most generous person (much like Bruno) who phoned me to give me the sad news that our friend had passed. I feel so blessed to have heard from you, Leslie, you have no idea how much it meant to me.
Here is the series I wrote the day I learned of his passing…
Care Bear Hugs
I’ll miss that smile soothing presence like balm Care Bear hugs. * those innuendos making me feel young and sexy twinkle in your {lie} eye * they’ll all split their wings you’ll have them laughing so hard angels in heaven
Today it is raining. It is grey and my mood is morose. I called in sick today as my body would not respond and seemed to be listening to my soul…I feel as if I am 99 today…a time to rest. In the shower I weep tears of grief and let the water wash them away. I have written in another post how I asked, “Why not take me? I am older, my family is raised, even my grandson is older than Bruno’s son. Why not take me?” The world is a mystery and the Great Spirit acts in mysterious ways. What do I know? Who am I in this vast sea of souls? But I do know that Bruno was a mind, heart, soul and body of pure essence filled with compassion and love. Anyone who has had the chance to meet him even if briefly, is blessed having been touched by an angel.
Reading Bruno’s orbituary in the Montreal Gazette, minutes ago, here at Second Cup, I am sad and yet could not help but smile when I read that his blood type was B Positive! Of course, what else could it have been? This reading along with Chèvrefeuille’s prompt on writing with the theme “A departed Soul”, has stirred up the following lines…
Departed Soul
dawn smiled
clouds made way
an angel
*
an angel
soars over sad hearts
begging for smiles
*
begging for smiles
his loud roar thundered
B positive
*
B positive
his lifetime message
gift
Tournesol dans un Jardin 