Monday, December 31, 2012

Your Dream for 2015

Dream Big
Have a dream.
A dream, a hope.
A dream for going forward.
A dream for the new year.
Dare to dream.
Act for impact.
Have a dream.
Your dream for 2015.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

 

I think I just found my motto for 2013: “Dare to Dream. Act for Impact.”

At the end of each year I choose a motto for the new year.  The right motto usually just comes to me.  I was about to just continue with last year’s motto: Seek Truth, Create Beauty, Live Boldly  and then, voila—my new motto pops up.


12/31/14 Update :  I decided to update the poem by changing the date from 2013 to 2015.

Choosing an annual motto is a great way to start a new year.  Read how to do it here:  Motto for Life.  This year, I'm also using quotations in lieu of New Year's Resolutions. so far it is working really well. Read about it here: You Can Quote Me On That




Sunday, December 30, 2012

Citrus Parade

On a dreary rain soaked Saturday,
five fruit-filled floats
marching bands,
and civics groups
turned out for the annual Orlando Citrus Parade.

Rain pelted the parade route.

The citrus floats—
created using a hundred thousand
oranges, tangerines and grapefruits—
is an Orlando tradition.

Spectators
holding umbrellas,
wearing ponchos,
lined the streets.

A bit of rain wasn’t going to keep them away.

You can watch it, warm and dry, on TV on January 1st at 11am on WFTV Channel 9.

After the parade the fruit goes to local food banks.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.



Saturday, December 29, 2012

Grancy Greybeard

Tree in WinterGrancy Greybeard

Grancy Greybeard blooms in April,
but in winter, when bare of leaves,
it shows its splendid structure
and exquisite beauty.
 
Something magical is revealed in winter--
A rare piece of twisting art--
A garden masterpiece.

 

Ancient Trees Book© 2012 Catherine Giordano

In every season, in every place, Nature delights with splendid beauty. Its botanical name is chionanthus virginicus—chionanthus means “snow flower” in Greek.


 
CLICK HERE to look inside

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.






Friday, December 28, 2012

Kwanzaa


Kwanzaa:
A celebration of African heritage
A celebration of family, community, and culture.

The seven principles of Kwanzaa:
Unity
Self-determination
Responsibility
Cooperation
Purpose
Creativity
Faith

Kwanzaa
Building stronger communities
Building stronger families

Kwanzaa is an annual week-long celebration of African culture and tradition.  Each day is devoted to one of the seven principles. A different candle is lit each day. The seven days of Kwanzaa begin on December 26, 2012 and end on January 1, 2013.

Learn more about Kwanzaa at the official Kwanzaa website.    (http://www.officialkwanzaawebsite.org)

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.


The picture depicting a Kwanzaa celebration is from http://www.fabuloussavers.com


Thursday, December 27, 2012

Brave New Year

This picture of the top 10 New Years's resolutions
 is from http://www.studentrights.eku.edu/
January---
a clean slate.

Fill in
the resolutions
that will usher in
a brighter bolder
way of living.
 
Choose wisely.




I don’t usually do New Year resolutions.  Instead, I choose a new motto for the year.  However, this year I may just keep last year’s motto:  Seek Truth, Create Beauty, Live Boldly.
  
© 2012 Catherine Giordano


12/31/13 Update: I finally chose a new motto. My motto for 2013: Dare to Dream. Act for Impact.


12/29/14 Update: My motto for 2014:  Steady as She Goes 

12/29/14 Update: My Motto for 2015 is  "Live Fully"  Read It's Motto Time Again to see how I choose it. 

This year I'm also using quotes in lieu of resolutions. I printed them out yesterday and they have already started to work. Read You Can Quote Me OnThat to see how to do it and to see which quotes I choose.

Happy New Year
 

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

                                         Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.




Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Winter Break

This picture of a family at Christmas time is from tlc.howstuffworks.com

You’ve distributed
 the presents.

You’ve recycled
 the paper.

Now
enjoy
the real gift
of the season:

Time
to spend
with the people
you love.     


Think of it as an “after-party.”

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.
Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.



Tuesday, December 25, 2012

One Christmas Wish


You were given one Christmas wish
for our world, what would it be?

I wish no child should go without shelter
and food. Every child would have a home
with plenty of food to eat.

I wish for peace.  No war. War is bad
CLICK HERE
and many people die,  I want people
in different countries to be friends forever.

I wish everyone had good health. No cancer,
no disease. People should have fun together
and play and laugh a lot.

I wish for people to stop polluting our world. 
People pollute the water with litter. It is
important for the world to stay clean.

I wish people would do onto others
as they would have them do unto them
I wish everybody could be friends.
 

These wishes were given by children aged nine to eleven, but I couldn’t have said it better myself.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems. 

Monday, December 24, 2012

Christmas Mourning


Christmas is everywhere here.
Christmas is nowhere here.

The town Christmas tree
sparkling with light,
standing stoic,
standing beautiful;
facing a cemetery
dotted with new graves.

Keeping traditions from the past.
Needing Christmas more than ever.
Making sure Christmas lives on here

We want the town of Newtown
to remember this Christmas
for the thousand acts of kindness,
not for the singular act of madness.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.

Christmas this year is tinged with sadness as the nation mourns for Newtown.  Your brave determination to carry on traditions despite your personal grief is a tribute to the human spirit. 

This picture of the Newtown Christmas tree is from USAtoday.

Sunday, December 23, 2012

The Traveler


It’s always nice to go someplace new.
There are a lot of places I’d like to go to.
There’s a whole world out there.
I’ve only seen a small part of it.
I’d like to see what else is out there.

I once wanted to travel to every island in the world. Now I’m a homebody.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.


                                                                           This picture is from http://static.freepik.com/


Saturday, December 22, 2012

Christmas Morning


Christmas morning—
a Fraser fir tucked in the corner,
Grandma’s buttery cookies on the counter
stockings hung from the mantle.
I’m coming home for Christmas.

Flying home Christmas morning,
over the tip of the wing
I’ll catch that first glimpse
of the city I love.

On Christmas morning,
I’ll be scanning the landscape,
for that one particular dot;
even high is the sky,
I’ll now it is the place I call home.

There’s no place like home,
especially for Christmas.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.

This picture is from http://www.bettyschristmashouse.com/




Friday, December 21, 2012

Shen Yun


For the Chinese, the words evoke
a sense of wonder, magic,
and the divine. The grandeur
of the fantastically rich culture
of classical China brought to life;
brilliantly choreographed dance,
mesmerizing orchestral composition,
magnificently costumed dancers
moving in poetic arrangements
evoking pastoral beauty,
imperial drama, the glory
of an ancient civilization.
A magical revival
of Chinese culture, the exploration
of the connection
between humankind
and the higher universe.

More than an art,
a way of being.

Shen Yun is a 5,000 year-old Chinese art involving dance, music, elaborate costumes, and story-telling.  For the performers, it is a way of life, even a form of worship.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.




This picture is from wikipedia.

World Ends Today

This picture of the Mayan calendar is from http://knoe.com/i

The world will end today.
    Or maybe not.

Let’s say the Mayans are right—
    the world does end today.

Bummer.

If the world ends,
    what will you miss most
        if we all go bye-bye?



Comment quickly—
    Time may be running out.
There’s a place to comment below.  I’ll get it started.

P.S.  The Mayans did not predict the end of time, only the end and start of a new cycle (b'ak'tun). And even if they did predict the end of the world, why would anyone believe the Mayans, who made their prediction 5,125 years ago, were right.


12/21/14: We'll all still here..

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.



Thursday, December 20, 2012

The Weather Report

The official start of winter,
6:12 Friday morning,
ushers in the coldest air
of the dry season so far.

Frost and freeze potential
Saturday morning,
Sunday morning.

Today:
High 83,
partly cloudy,
warmer.

Friday:
High 63,
early morning rain
colder.

Forecasts provided by
AccuWeather.

I lived in New York most of my life.  It is still hard to believe that it is the middle of December and I’m wearing shorts and a tee-shirt outside.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.

This picture of a typical day in December in Central Florida is from http://www.wildflorida.com

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Ticked Off

Can someone tell me
    why they wax the cucumber?
One cannot scrub it off.
My stomach does not like wax.

The newspaper runs a column called “Ticked Off.” People write in with the most ridiculous complaints.  However, I found myself agreeing with this one.

Also there was absolutely nothing in the paper today that I could use for a poem.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.



This picture of cucumbers is from http://www.lovemysalad.com




Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Books on Beds

 
CLICK HERE
Scurrying around
trying to find the perfect gift?

The best gifts are traditions
    with meaning
        and memories.

A Book on Every Bed.
Take a book.
Wrap it.
Leave the book where Santa can find it.
Santa places the book on a child’s bed.

Children awaken to a gift
outlasting any toy—
Literacy
    and the universe of imagination.


My son loved Six by Seusss, when he was little.

I still like hardcover books, but I know kids today have tablets. If your child is getting a Kindle or other tablet for Christmas, why not preload it with some books? Click on the amazon shopping cart (top left) to order e-books or paper books, or even a tablet.

The good thing about kindle books, for kids or for everyone on your shopping list--is that they arrive immediately—you’ll be sure to have it in time for Christmas.  No shipping fees either.
 


For more information about “A Book on Every Bed” project go to familyreading.org.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.

This picture of a book on a bed is from http://examiner.com

Monday, December 17, 2012

Consoling Families, Town, Nation


We bear a responsibility for every child.
Our first task is caring for our children.
If we don’t get that right,
we don’t get anything right.

Newton,
We have wept with you.
Newtown,
You are not alone.

This is from the speech Obama gave at the Newtown memorial Service on Sunday night.  There’s nothing more I can say, except bring back the ban on assault rifles.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.


This picture of Newtown angels is from http://timesofnews.co/

Sunday, December 16, 2012

Sally Forth


I like holiday crowds.
I like seeing everyone out and celebrating.
I like seeing everyone getting
      into the spirit of the season.
It’s exciting—
All the hustle and bustle.

I knew I needed a happy poem today. I found one, where else, in the comics section.  The comic strip is named “Sally Forth”. Sally Forth is the lead character in the strip, but the words “sally forth” also mean “saunter out.”  The pun was cheering.  And I do like find the crowds at the mall during the holidays cheering as long as I don’t have a lot of shopping to do.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing" on google circles.

Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.


This picture of a happy Christmas shopper is from www.forbes.com

Saturday, December 15, 2012

A Teary Obama

Click Here to Look Inside
We've endured too many
of these tragedies
in the past few years.

Each time I react not as a president,
but as anybody else would—

And that was especially true today.
I know there's not a parent in America
who doesn't feel the same overwhelming grief.

The majority of those who died
were children—
beautiful, little kids.

They had their entire lives ahead of them —
birthdays, graduations,
weddings, kids of their own.

Among the fallen were teachers,
men and women who devoted their lives
to helping our children fulfill their dreams."

So our hearts are broken today
for the parents and grandparents,
for the sisters and brothers
for the families of those who were lost."

Our hearts are broken today
for the parents of the survivors,
blessed as they are
to have their children home tonight.

They know that their children's innocence
has been torn away from them too early
and there are no words
that will ease their pain."

As a country,
we have been through this too many times.
an elementary school in Newtown,
a shopping mall in Oregon,
a temple in Wisconsin,
a movie theater in Aurora,
r a street corner in Chicago.

These neighborhoods
are our neighborhoods;
these children are our children.

We’ll hug our children a little tighter,
we'll tell them that we love them,
we'll remind each other how deeply
we love one another.

May God bless
the memory of the victims
and heal the brokenhearted
and bind up their wounds.

I took the text of Obama’s speech to the nation about the massacre in Connecticut and condensed it a little and inserted line breaks to achieve this poem. It was a very poetic and beautiful speech.

My thoughts kept returning to two things.  In the Orlando Sentinel yesterday, printed before the shooting happened, the paper printed a tweet from Andy Borowitz: “Maybe I’m a dreamer, but I wish mental health care was as easy to get as say, a gun.”

The other thought was about the Christmas presents the families of these slain children probably had hidden in their closets, all wrapped and ready for Christmas morning, the parents imagining the joy on their children’s faces when they opened these presents, these presents that these children will now never receive.

© 2012 Catherine Giordano

Please share this poem by tweeting, "liking" on facebook, and "+1 ing"
Please "follow" so you don't miss any of my poems.

The picture of President Obama speaking to the nation
 about the Connecticut shooting is from
http://bigstory.ap.org