A Ten Word Poem #15 of 30

Siren Call

siren call

of

warm sun

pulls me

from winter’s cave

Haiku

Reverence

Reach down then pull up
If you have more then give more
This will heal the world

Haiku Poem #12 of 30

On Samm’s birthday❤

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First Child

You were not and then
You were – all fire, sound and light
Blazing through this bright life

Poem #11 of 30

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Up The Ante

I’ll put in one beating heart
Dreams of a future together
A faithful stand by your side
More colorful wonder
than one life can handle
And raise you the capability
To make it all happen-

Your turn
Ante up
Then
let’s see your hand

Someone asked me, in a very captious fashion, why I had decided to call this blog Word Ninja Girl, instead of Word Ninja Woman.

She thought it infantilized women, especially when it was a female doing the naming. I’m so glad she asked why. And I do think she needs to take a giant chill pill if this got her knickers in a knot.

So-explanation…

Many years ago, I attended a Women & Power conference at the Omega Institute Rhinebeck, NY campus. The speakers list was a dream come true. Maya Angelou, Eve Ensler, Wangari Maathai, Elizabeth Lesser, Jane Fonda, Sally Field, Anita Diamant and Carol Gilligan among many others. How I wish someone would have videotaped that three days of talks and workshops and wandering around campus, chatting with Eve and the other speakers on the stone pathway on our way to the cafeteria. There weren’t any divas or ego tripping people there. Just a bunch of people talking. It was a paradigm shifting, mind opening experience.

Carol Gilligan is the author of the 1982, Harvard Press’s, In A Different Voice; a book that has guided women’s studies at universities for decades. She talked about how the book came to be, the battles to support her theories and the ongoing conversation about moral development in females (caring) and males (justice) and how those two points of view lead to different outcomes.

She also talked about the raw courage and wonder of girls. She said that same girl who would plow out onto the ice and into a neighborhood hockey game without hesitation at age 11, would stop and reconsider a few years later as things change in her world.

We lose some fire in our raw courage reservoir after the breasts arrive and the bleeding begins. And even if we find our sea legs after all the hormones settle, we are never again as uninhibited and authentic as we were in our “girl” years; except when we are in the flow of creativity.

Pen to paper, hands to clay, eyes to the microscope, brush to the canvas, voice to the microphone; those moments reach back through time and fuel us with that “girl-power” those crazy Spice Girls infected us with in the 90s.

That’s where I go when I write, I paint, I photograph, I cook, I build or I face something difficult; right back into the warehouse of courage I had at 11 years old. When I reach for it, that kid says, “What do you need right now? I’ve got a crapload of everything, just for you.”

So the blog title is my own homage to that 11 year old Mimi, who was a mouthy, brave little ninja as quick to hand you a flower as to lay down the line, even to the boys, if some dodgy shit was going down. She’s still there.

That’s my girl. That’s my woman. That’s why Word Ninja Girl instead of Word Ninja Woman.

NaPoWriMo Poem #10 of 30

Changes

It changes you-
when someone
takes your full heart
far, far away-
on a ride
down a distant road
to see the stars
and leaves you there
to walk all the way back
to reality by yourself
It changes you.

#9 of 30 poems in 30 days

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Good With Weird

Actually,

I’m good with weird

Weird finds me

wherever I go

It follows me

like a stray cat

And brings me presents

from the hunt

Weird calls to ask

if I can do

something

I’ve never done before

And I say.

Yeah. Sure. Why not?

Weird asks me to give a talk

on some weird thing I’m doing

because someone else

wants to know

how it works.

And sometimes weird

hands me a ticket

to somewhere

I didn’t even know

I wanted to go

and when I get there,

it’s exactly where I needed to be.

You see,

If you don’t second guess weird

when it comes looking for you

You will find yourself somewhere wonderful

You will find yourself somewhere

You will find yourself

I am good with weird

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