Navigating Reality: Touch of Hope

Photographer: March-Olivier Jodoin at Unsplash

"Today...I open my heart's hand to allow the touch of hope.”

Julia Cameron

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I feel the sorrow of loss and grief

Wondering if flowers feel the same

While wilting in the heat?

Summer heat reminds me that

Your hand no longer gently holds mine

But there is hope waiting

Beyond my spinning dreams. 

Today under an azure sky, nature

Splendidly welcomed morning's peace.

I opened my bleeding heart to life and

Felt the warmth of nature's healing

Peeking through the slats on the shades.

I accept the invitation to indulge in life

Because where there is an open heart

Possibilities open as well!

CVarsalona, draft, 2025

I shall carry this thought throughout the day with hope for peace to settle in.

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This month, the Poetry Sisters, Tanita at{fiction, instead of lies}, Laura at Laura Purdie Salas, Tricia at The Miss Ruphius Effect, Sara at Read Write Believe, Mary Lee Hahn at Another Year of Reading, and Liz at Liz Garton Scanlon, invited  writers to write a couple of couplets and make a raccontino. I am glad they explained the format that I have never tried before. A raccontino is a form that follows these rules: composed of couplets (any number) even-numbered lines that share the same end rhyme, the title and last words of the odd-numbered lines tell a story. I must admit that I struggled with this poetic format.

Silent Disease

Would I have known

What the future planned

When my heart was full of sorrow

And there were multiple demands?

Caregiver was the title given

But I could not withstand

The extent of sorrow

Nor could I understand.

There was a trip to take,

A birthday treat that was grand

To a place of ease

A beach filled with sand,

Summering during winter's end,

Yet you could not fully stand.

Life withered over our last days

Until what was left was in God's hands.

draft ©CVarsalona, 2025

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A Special Thank You To:

Jama Rattigan for lifting my heart and helping me navigate my reality with a special gift, Healing After Loss by Martha W. Hickman. This book inspires me to write about my journey with a touch of hope that summer will open my heart to joy.

🩷

A new poetry friend, Shirley Thacker, shared a lovely poetry swap filled with poetic goodness. She sent me her book, Wind Beneath the Pines, that provides various types of poems which she wrote. This book is special because it comes from the heart. Shirley's husband urged her to "write the stories-the tales about life" and so she did. I am thrilled that Shirley shared her love of poetry with me in such a special way. You can read more about Shirley at Jone Rush MacCulloch's blog. Click here to read Jone's Interview with Shirley. I enjoyed Shirley's poems especially Grandchildren. Her six-word  poems shared her wisdom.

Courage each

Day, walking

Life's road

©Shirley Thacker

🩷

I have lingered a long time trying to make sense of life while piecing the raccontino poem together. I gardened outside with the sun's warmth. Hope touched me, yet I still am unsure how to navigate reality. Healing after loss is a process. I am determined to continue this journey with stride. I thank family, friends, and the poetry community for their support. 

Now I turn my attention to the Poetry Friday Roundup that is hosted this week by one of the Poetry Sisters, Tanita Davis. This week she penned two poems and provided her process. I look forward to reading the contributions of all those who are adding their poems to the Roundup but I go at a slow pace these days.

In ending, I decided to take Shirley Thacker's 6 word poem 

Courage each

Day, walking

Life's road

and write Golden Shovel as inspiration to be present in life daily.

Finding courage

is not easy on each

summer day

perhaps walking

will provide life's

journey a new road

©CVarsalona, 2025

Traveling Progressive Poem

The Progressive Poem has traveled for 13 days this month. It is my turn to add lines to the community poem that is a journey of courage. Reading through Days 1 through 13, I am reminded of a poignant story told by one of my elementary students years ago. Amid civil unrest in El Salvador, the child and his siblings left their homeland to move to Long Island. 

Join me as I integrate the student's story into my lines for Day 14. I also added the art of Juan Lopez-Bautista's Border Stories presented at the Sella-Granata Art Gallery, Woods Hall, UA campus (October-November 2021). Be sure to click here and here to view the full exhibition that touched my heart. 

cradled in stars, our planet sleeps,
clinging to tender dreams of peace
sister moon watches from afar,
 singing lunar lullabies of hope.

almost dawn, I walk with others,
keeping close, my little brother.
hand in hand, we carry courage
escaping closer to the border.

My feet are lightning;
My heart is thunder.
Our pace draws us closer
to a new land of wonder.

I hum my own little song
like ripples in a stream
Humming Mami's lullaby 
reminds me I have her letter

My fingers linger on well-worn creases,
shielding an address, a name, a promise-
Sister Moon will find always us
surrounding us with beams of kindness

But last night, as we rested in the dusty field,
worries crept in about matters back home.

Day 14
I huddled close to my brother. Tears revealed
the no-choice need to escape. I feel grown. 

s

Juan Baptiste Lopez from "Border Stores"

at the Sella-Granata Art Gallery

I pass on the torch of writing to Rose Cappelli at Imagine the Possibilities.

The Kidlithosphere Progressive Poem was started in 2012 by Irene Latham as a way to celebrate National Poetry Month as a community of writers. In 2020, Margaret Simon became the organizer of the Progressive Poem. Margaret created the above gorgeous graphic for the 2024 Progressive Poem .

Meet the writing team creators of the community Progressive Poem 2024. 

April 1 Patricia Franz at Reverie
April 2 JJone MacCulloch
April 3 Janice Scully at Salt City Vers
April 4 Leigh Anne Eck at A Day in the Life
April 5 Irene at Live Your Poem
April 6 Margaret at Reflections on the Techee
April 7 Marcie Atkins
April 8 Ruth at There is No Such Thing as a God Forsaken Town
April 9 Karen Eastlund
April 10 Linda Baie at Teacher Dance
April 11 Buffy Silverman
April 12 Linda Mitchell at A Word Edgewise
April 13 Denise Krebs at Dare to Care
April 14 Carol Varsalona at Beyond LiteracyLink
April 15 Rose Cappelli at Imagine the Possibilities
April 16 Sarah Grace Tuttle
April 17 Heidi Mordhorst at my juicy little universe
April 18 Tabatha at Opposite of Indifference
April 19 Catherine Flynn at Reading to the Core
April 20 Tricia Stohr-Hunt at The Miss Rumphius Effect
April 21 Janet, hosted here at Reflections on the Teche
April 22 Mary Lee Hahn at A(nother) Year of Reading
April 23 Tanita Davis at (fiction, instead of lies)
April 24 Molly Hogan at Nix the Comfort Zone
April 25 Joanne Emery at Word Dancer
April 26 Karin Fisher-Golton at Still in Awe
April 27 Donna Smith at Mainely Write
April 28 Dave at Leap of Dave
April 29 Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge
April 30 Michelle Kogan at More Art for All

INVITATION

I hope more of my poetry friends, plus writers, bloggers, artists, photographers, and friends join in the Poetry Parade. The Poetry Parade Padlet is available for your artistic expressions. Laura Purdie Salas and Denise Krebs added their image poems to the gallery.