Category: Words

Landscape by Patrick JenningsJul 11, 20169:55 pm

Dustbowl Jalopy, Between Adrian and Vega, Texas, United States of America

The Mother Road

01:39 Windmill RV Park; McLean, Texas :: 17 SEP 97

John Steinbeck devoted a full chapter of his epic roadtrip, The Grapes of Wrath, to Route 66. Five words of that chapter — three words, really — captured everyone’s imagination. Three words.

The Mother Road

“66 is the mother road,” wrote Steinbeck. Poetry. Evocation.

Poetry by Patrick JenningsJul 10, 20167:20 pm

Cafe Sign, Mid-point Route 66, Adrian, Texas, United States of America

Markers

Markers
One erected
One abandoned

I leave a trail
I follow one

I leave a mark
I seek one

I know my place
Where I am
Where I’ve been
Where I’m going
By the markers

Poetry by Patrick JenningsJul 10, 20167:15 am

Outer Wall, Wat Pho, Grand Palace, Bangkok, Thailand

Walls ~ Pic and a Word Challenge #45

Sometimes
I sense a world
Beyond a wall
I cannot see
Cannot breach

Something
Tantalizingly near
Excruciatingly remote
Intangibly real
Exquisitely beautiful

A mote
In the corner of one eye
Visible only
In the periphery
Invisible looking straight on

Landscape by Patrick JenningsJul 9, 20165:46 pm

Coloured Sand, Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, United States of America

Finger Painting

The canyon walls were a run of colours, as if, in a fit of whimsy, Mother Nature had just kept going with the finger paint, like the kindergarten child whose teacher didn’t know when to take the paper away.

Poetry by Patrick JenningsJul 9, 20162:55 pm

Solid Rock, Zion National Park, Utah, United States of America

Stolid or Fluid

Hard
Solid
Stolid
Resolute

All such admirable
Qualities of stone
Though I prefer

Soft
Supple
Flowing
Fluid

Poetry by Patrick JenningsJul 8, 20169:47 am

Spires

I look up
Up up up
Into the clouds
Into the heavens

And I wonder
At how we build so high
When we worship our gods

Or when we think
We have become them

Poetry by Patrick JenningsJul 8, 20167:57 am

Vapour in the Sky, Black Sand Basin, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, United States of America

Steam

Deep inside the Earth
Fire and water converge
Vapour in the sky

Poetry by Patrick JenningsJul 7, 20166:50 am

Mineral Spring, Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, United States of America

Life Springs

I learn to let life flow where it must
Knowing, like water, it can only go
Where the landscape allows it

Water will not run uphill
It will not run fast across a plain
It will not run at all
Where no rain falls

Poetry by Patrick JenningsJul 6, 201611:06 pm

Mineral Spring, Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone, National Park, Wyoming, Unites States of America

Comfortable Paths

Sometimes
It takes a lot of exploring
To find the comfortable path

But the comfortable path
Is not always the best path
Or the true path
So I try to remember
Keep exploring

Poetry by Patrick JenningsJul 6, 20165:16 pm

Patrick Jennings, Twin Falls, Kakadu National Park, Northern Territory, Australia

Learning Humility

I walked through the world
With a mighty swagger
Until humiliation
Taught me humility
Until poverty
Taught me what to value
Until failure
Taught me grace

Now I walk with a gentle deference
Listen, when I might have spoken
Forgive, when I might have challenged
Let go, when I might have held on