It’s Day 27 of our month-long daily writing project.

This year’s theme is FOUND OBJECTS. For those of you who are new to the project, please read my introductory post. You’ll find more information and all of the Week 4 FOUND OBJECTS at this post.

Now that we are down to the final three days, I’d like to see how pleased and amazed I am by everyone’s enthusiasm this year. I haven’t put together the numbers yet, but I know many more people participated and contributed poems this year. It’s been wonderful to share our early drafts in a supportive community.

I have family visiting today, so I’m only adding Day 27’s poems. If you’ve left a poem for another day, I’ll post it later.

FOUND: ARCHITECTURAL RUINS

While I didn’t make a separate category for antiques, we did have several prompts that one might find in an antique shop. Buffy Silverman’s contribution for today takes “functional object,” “antique,” and “art” and blends them together in an intriguing landscape.

Will we see some characters taking the poetic stage before this backdrop?

Here is a lovely metaphor poem from Jessica Bigi.

Poetry
By Jessica Bigi

Ivory sentences framing
Walls of pages
Rich mossy words
Turning under fingertips
Bookmark memories
Sipping tea we sit reading
In life’s library

***

Carol Varsalona has another digital composition at her blog. These have been really fun, so I hope you’ll visit Carol to take a look: http://beyondliteracylink.blogspot.com/2016/02/celebrating-writing.html.

Moss-covered ruins,
aching with age,
tumble through time.
Architects wonder.
Designers plan,
Writers clear paths
with their words.

©Carol Varsalona, 2016

***

Today’s found object reminded me of my visit to Italy last June. I took some notes on my phone while we were visiting the ruins at Paestum and “found” an incident I’d forgotten about.

Ruins: Paestum

By Laura Shovan

A dry dirt road spooled
between the ruins
and the tourist shops,
restaurant, museum.
“Did you hear that?”
I asked the friends
I’d traveled with by train.
They shook their heads.
I took it as a sign.
No one else heard
the peacock’s scream.
It called to me only.
The bird is sacred
to Hera, a symbol
of her beautiful, large eyes.
Near the columns
of Paestum’s great temple —
dedicated to Hera as wife —
I said a prayer, imagined
coming home to you,
dressed in blue feathers.

***

Diane Mayr is thinking about the timelessness of ancient architecture.

Granite Speaks of Eternity
By Diane Mayr

We thought we were given our
own eternity by quarrymen who
released us from mountains
that held us prisoner.

Builders hauled and lifted
and fit us into works
of architectural magnificence
decorated by masters of art.

Surely, we would honor man and
ourselves by lasting forever.
Then along came the Bryophytes
reducing our dreams to dust.

***

I found Mary Lee Hahn’s haiku for today to be heartbreaking — and in such a small space.

every life
(hopefully softened by moss)
becomes rubble

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2015

***

Today’s object has many of us thinking about time. Molly Hogan’s contribution is a short poem on this theme.

Ruins
By Molly Hogan

Within an eternity of arches
Moss masses
on tumbled marble
and time marches on
***

So many poets today are highlighting the moss growing on the ruins. One symbolic of life, the other symbolic of …? I like the way Linda Baie’s poem draws our attention to the dual meaning of “ruin.”

the word ‘ruin’
softened by moss –
spring deceit

Linda Baie ©All Rights Reserved
***

Donna Smith says, “Couldn’t resist a bit of London Bridges falling at stanzas’ ends…”

Marble Arches

What once was lofty white and pure
That all thought would so long endure
Became eroded and unsure
This ostentatious entryway
Became just ruins in the way;
In days gone by they stood above
Each block fitting like a glove
To house many a city dove
City dove
City dove
House many a city dove
Marble arches

In paths they lie upon the ground
As if in hunt they had been downed
Becoming stilled, no echoed sound
Wearing hides of green and brown
Those marble arches fallen down
Would that we could just recrown
Just recrown
Just recrown
Would that we could just recrown
Marble arches.

©2016, Donna JT Smith, all rights reserved
***

Buffy Silverman reveals a little bit more about the photograph in her poem. Thanks, Buffy!

In Antigua

Earthy scents rise
from crumbled ruins,
roots reclaim the glories
of civilization,
brought from an old world
imposed on a new world.
Moss cares not about conqueror
or conquered,
religion or culture,
order or plan.
It spills over columns
and stones,
churches and temples,
liberating all.

©Buffy Silverman

***

It’s good to see Margaret Simon back. She says, “Today I am happy to be back with a poem of hope.”

In the graveyard of buildings
stone becomes mulch
for grass and weeds.

Nature does what it does best–
continues to grow
renew relive.

I walk among the fallen stone
peek behind the bolder
see a hidden nest.

Yes, there is new life
everywhere.
Just look!

by Margaret Simon

***

Charles Waters’ poem has me thinking about what this building might have been.

Morning’s Promise
By Charles Waters

Sunlight shimmies
into cathedrals.
Beams of luminescent
blessings slide through
stained glass into
the consciousness
of each remarkable,
flawed parishioner
on this holy day
of rest.

***

Reminder: Tomorrow we will be back at Jan Godown Annino’s blog, BOOKSEED STUDIO, for Day 28.

We’ll return here for Leap Day and the final prompt.

Interested in what we’ve written so far? Here are links to this week’s poems (I will update this list soon — apologies to those I missed):

Sunday, February 21
FOUND OBJECT: Antique Sewing Machine
Poems by: Diane Mayr, Linda Baie, Jone Rush MacCulloch, Jessica Bigi, Matt Forrest Esenwine, Donna Smith, Carol Varsalona, Charles Waters.

Note: You will find links to all of  the Week 1, 2, and 3 poems at this post.

Monday, February 22
FOUND OBJECT: Stick Insect
Poems by: Mary Lee Hahn, Donna Smith, Carol Varsalona, Jessica Bigi, Charles Watesr, Jone Rush MacCulloch, Linda Baie, Diane Mayr.

Tuesday, February 23 at BOOKSEED STUDIO
FOUND OBJECT: Library of Congress Cart
Poems by: Jan Godown Annino, Jessica Bigi, Donna Smith, Linda Baie, Laura Shovan, Carol Varsalona, Diane Mayr, Mary Lee Hahn, Charles Waters, Jone Rush MacCulloch, Heidi Mordhorst.

Wednesday, February 24
FOUND OBJECT: Phoebe Nest
Poems by: Jessica Bigi, Diane Mayr, Heidi Mordhorst, Mary Lee Hahn, Matt Forrest Esenwine, Linda Baie, Laura Shovan, Charles Waters, Donna Smith, Carol Varsalona.

Thursday, February 25
FOUND OBJECT: Pearl Harbor Keys

Friday, February 26 at Michael Ratcliffe’s Poetry
FOUND OBJECT: Sun Sign