3/6/25 – I’m still at doing a daily rhyme, but just haven’t gotten around to posting them. Yesterday it snowed and snowed and in to our feeders came a large flock of Pine Siskins, which hadn’t been around so far this winter. They are here again today. Today’s poem:

Siskins (Monotetra poem format)
Siskins scattered on the snow,
Flitting to and flitting fro.
Now they come and now they go.
Such a show. Such a show.
Their arrival yesterday,
Out of somewhere far away
Turned to brightness clouds of gray.
I hope they stay. I hope they stay.

2/18/25 – I am still writing at least one poem a day. The rhyme form that I have chosen for today (Rondeau Redouble) revolves around the first four, carefully chosen, rhyme lines that are in the first verse and reappear in a particular order in the remaining verses. The poem is in homage to our Alaskan husky mix dog, shown in the painting below.

1/31/25 – Forms of Rhymes

I have continued to write at least one rhyming poem a day this year. Recently I began to look through and actually read in a book that has been on our shelves for years, The Ode Less Travelled, by Stephen Fry. I am learning much that I never knew or even suspected, but the best part of the book begins about halfway through when he explains many of the different forms that rhyming poetry has taken over the years, primarily rhymes created in the English language. I am hoping to try writing some of them, although the rhyme patterns of some of them are probably way too complicated for me to figure out. Today I tried the “Rubai” and I am including my first Rubai below; I learned the other new vocabulary word recently from a daily “Wordsmith” email. For those who are into that kind of thing, the rhyme pattern in a Rubai verse is aaba. Simple enough.

1/18/25 – Rhyming Sort of Continues

I really have written a rhyme each day*, although I often have had little to say. The words are extruded and massaged into place. Out comes a rhyme to fill up the space.

*I’m just not including them all here.

1/16/25 – Owl Hunters at Sax-Zim Bog (MN)

Owl hunters, not with arrows or guns, but with cars creeping along icy roads, scanning intently each bush and each tree, far from our comfy heated abodes.

As we pass each other, our questioning eyes try to see if others have possibly found any view of an owl, or any bird at all. We wonder again – are there any around?

1/8/25 – Stairs

I no longer take two steps at a time. I’m slow going down and slower when I climb.

I still manage, however, to go up and down; though usually not smiling, there’s rarely a frown.

Stairs over elevators – always* my choice. I’m thankful for stairs. For stairs, I rejoice!

*I’m claustrophobic, but when there are many, many flights of stairs, I look for someone to accompany me and/or clutch my cell phone anxiously on the elevator .

1/6/25 – American Goldfinches:

Golden finchy drops, lit by winter sun, high up in the trees. Morning has begun.

Now they’re on the feeders. Now they’re on the ground. Now they’re in the air, flying all around.

Now they are all gone. Not a one I see. The sunlight that they brought has slipped behind a tree.

1/1/25 – While I don’t plan to put all my anticipated zillion rhymes of 2025 here, I thought I’d include the first one commemorating the first birding of 2025, entitled “Short-ears:”

12/29/24 – I am going to try to write a poem/rhyme every day, beginning January 1, 2025. Like many or most of my resolutions, this may not continue for long. We shall see.