Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: The End of the Road

the end of the road

I leave it all behind me

in joy and sorrow

~Cie~

Notes:

This Senryu was partly inspired by the image and partly by the song "In Joy and Sorrow", which was written by my fellow black dog attendant, Ville Valo.

Some people with mood disorders take medications.

Those of us who don't respond well to medications write bleak a.f. poetry.

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Trail of Saints, Krakow, Poland

Church of Our Lady of the Snows

I stop at the graves

along the trail of the saints

take tea with each one

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Pilgrimage of the Relics, Maastricht (The Netherlands)

Saint Servatius

my fascination

with relics may be gruesome

or is it divine?

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: A Green Boat Ride

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taking a boat ride

I would spend several hours

experiencing

the torments of the seasick

from the rocking of the waves

~Cie~

Notes:

Today's pilgrimage inspiration features a very beautiful place. However, with my messed-up inner ears, all you have to say is "boat ride," and I start feeling queasy. I would either spend much of my time nauseated, or I would spend it high and goofy from the motion sickness pills. I am not a good water traveler.

It doesn't matter if the water is calm. One of my worst experiences of water sickness happened while on a rowboat on a calm lake. My inner ear picks up on very subtle rocking motions. I was sick for hours after the fact.

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Señor de Huanca

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visit El Señor

high above sacred valley

will he welcome you?

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: St. Mary MacKillop

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I truly believe

that every caring teacher

embodies sainthood

~Cie~

Note:

The aspect of the St. Mary MacKillop story that stood out for me was the fact that she was a teacher.

Teachers can truly make or break their students.

I've had a few wonderful teachers and a few truly horrible ones.

Most of my elementary school teachers were decent. My sixth-grade teacher, however, probably got nominated for some sort of award in the hell that he's likely returned to by now. This man literally traumatized me so much when it came to the use of outlines for writing stories that I have actual PTSD reactions if someone suggests that I work with an outline. My throat starts clenching up and I start having trouble breathing. I can use outlines for boring-ass non-fiction college paper type stuff, but never for any work that I really care about.

You see, my sixth-grade teacher insisted that we write an outline for our story projects, which is something I never did. We were to follow the outline closely and not deviate from it significantly, but if the outline and the story matched exactly, he would know we had written the story first and would give us a failing grade. Which is what happened to me, because I can't write like that.

I was prone to catching every illness that came down the pike when I was a kid, and one time I missed three weeks of school. When I returned, this man marched up to my seat, slammed the attendance book down on the desk, and demanded to know what I was trying to pull.

I looked him dead in the eye and informed him that I had been sick.

I was freaking eleven years old and was something of a nervous wreck. I wasn't trying to pull anything. But after that, I pulled pranks on him, such as locking his file cabinet and hiding the key. I'd never been the sort of kid to do that sort of thing to a teacher previously.

Anyway, good teachers are worth everything and teachers like my sixth-grade teacher should choose a profession where they never encounter another living being. This man would have traumatized e. coli bacteria.

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: St. Francis

Image by LaterJay Photography from Pixabay

Saint Francis statue

still in my parents' garden

old and weathered now

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Nottinghamshire Pilgrimage

Our Lady of Doncaster

in Nottinghamshire

would I find cures for ills

or only stained glass?

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Shikoku Pilgrimage

Click to learn more about this pilgrimage

in a month or two

they visit every temple

walking many miles

~Cie~

Note:

I'm not a nit-picker, but I'm aware that the label "Haiku" for this poem is not quite correct. It lacks the irony, snark, and/or melancholy of a Senryu. It is simply an observation, but not of nature or the seasons. For lack of a better term, I'm just calling it a Haiku-like poem. 

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Kumb Melah

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you may join us here

and wash away the troubles

which keep you bound

repeating the same mistakes

wanting a chance to be free

~Cie~

Notes:

Visit the Artist

Visit the Artist

Ghost Town Grover Sez: 

Ain't nothin' like a good ole shindig at the ole swimmin' hole! 

Cactus Clem loves swim parties even though he don't swim too good. He just wades out an' drinks his fill!

But I didn't come here to talk about Cactus Clem an' his weird drinkin' habits.

I came here to tell y'all that the Ornery Old Lady and her son made their official move to the ole Grover Hotel today an' they bought a special pal with 'em. 

Click the link to c'mon by and hear all about it!

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Nothing to See Here

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walk over the bridge

to the shrine of mystery

I asked to come in

they just told me to go home

"nothing to see here," they said

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Lourdes

Copyright Dennis Jarvis

would I be washed clean

of the stain of my mistakes

if I bathed in Lourdes?

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Mecca

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majestic temple

shining like heavenly dreams

stands solid on earth

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Santiago de Compostela

follow the road sign

with the bright yellow sunshine

where will it lead you?

~Cie~

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Directional Sign

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on a lonesome road

in the middle of nowhere

where the hell am I?

~Cie~

Notes:

The story of the place pictured at the top of the post is interesting, and you can learn it by clicking on the Carpe Diem logo just above the notes. Admissibly, t'was the picture that inspired me.

My most-often-asked questions in this life are:

1. Where the hell am I?

2. What the hell am I doing here?

3. Why the hell am I doing this?

4. What the hell possessed me to think this was a good idea?

5. What the eff is this crap?

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: St. Cuthbert's Way

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approaching the end

of my time in this same place

I feel a bit lost

what awaits me at the end?

am I doomed to fail again?

~Cie~

Notes:

Wanna just enjoy the poem without more claptrap from me? 

Cool! Your bus stops here.

For those of you who want to read into it a bit deeper, let's keep on truckin!

Here is a poem created by my pal, Ghost Town Grover.

Visit the Artist

When folks think of Colorado

They think of Aspen and Vail and Boulder

They ain't thinking about the prairie

Or places like Ault and Grover

Well, you know that where you find Grover, Cactus Clem must be nearby, and he has a few lines to share too.

Visit the Artist

Y'all, when folks think about Colorado

They think of marijuana and not clover

It's true that clover won't get you high

But I love the Lone Prairie, and you oughta come over!

Thank you, Grover and Clem. That was, as the barista on Open Mic Night at the Buttniks Coffee House said, organic.

Honestly, though, the picture above reminded me of a scene like this one from the Colorado Lifestyle blog.

Colorado's Soapstone Prairie

For me, the drive along the highway through the seemingly endless prairie is far from boring.

Soon I'll be living there.

The big stuff gets moved Friday.

Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion: Camina de Fatima

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little disciple

faith strong in a childlike heart

may it bring you joy

~Cie~

Notes:

I may be a misanthropic agnostic at this point in my life, but it wasn't always that way. As a child growing up in New Mexico, I was a devout Catholic. 

Two things pushed me away from the church: dogma and holier-than-thou blind-faith believers who dared neither question nor explore and condemned anyone who did.

About Cie Monday + Inspire Me Monday #241+ Promote Yourself Monday + Carpe Diem Acts of Devotion 2019: Adam's Peak

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I can only dream

of walking up Adam's Peak

body compromised

~Cie~

Notes:

Once we are fully moved into our new home, I would like to begin practicing remote viewing again. I will also be taking daily walks to the park and hope to increase my endurance enough to be able to walk from one end of the main street to the other. Grover is a very small town, so I don't want you-all thinking: "Wow, Cie, impressive goal walking twenty miles!" 

I would also like to rehabilitate myself to the point where I can walk up a set of stairs without having to pull myself up using the banister or to lean against an opposite wall to support myself. However, one thing I need to avoid is making this a shame-based goal, i.e. calling myself a loser because I need to support myself to climb stairs. We are taught from the time we are very young that it is shameful to be in a lesser state of physical ability than a competition class athlete, and I'm not being particularly hyperbolic when I say this. It's horrible.

Your physical abilities and disabilities are not a marker of success or worthiness. They are simply conditions that exist.

With physical therapy, I was able to bring my left arm back to a state of functionality where I'm not in constant debilitating pain. I still don't have the full range of motion in the arm. I am not a better person for having an arm that functions reasonably well than I was when I had an arm that I could barely use, and having an arm that was fully functional and had normal sensations would not make me a better person than I am now.

Physical ability is not a hallmark of greater worth, and physical disability is not something that people should be punished for.

Visit us at www.goodstufffromgrover.com. We're nearly there! The moving truck comes Friday!