FREE VERSE FRIDAY #8 AUGUST - VACATION

I'm joining Beverly A Baird, Linda Schueler and others in a "year long poetry practice – on the first Friday of each Month," when they, and anyone else who joins, will be writing a poem based on the theme of the month and a photo taken relating to that theme.

You can find out more about this here.

I'm in the middle of a family reunion, so I forgot to post on Friday. The good thing about being the earliest one up is that I can clean up the house a bit and it stays that way for a little while, and two, I get a bit of time just for myself, and catching up on things I missed, like this. 

For me, retirement is mostly a never ending vacation punctuated by volunteering and the occasional day of paid work. Getting away from home is the closest to a holiday/vacation that exists for me. I scribbled this one just after we returned from the Vancouver Island Music Festival. 

Tom Wilson of Blackie and the Rodeo Kings

hanging out
at a music festival
is liberation
from ordinary life

letting ourselves get
lost in a montage
of marvels

of reverberations 

of sensation

of raconteurs spinning stories
from words and melody

of applause and cheering,
punctuated by
intoxicating silence
as one voice
ushers us across 

time and place
into sacred space

of hot sun
hot rhythms
hot bodies

of dancing our hearts out
amid a throng of similar souls

of grooving to tunes
rendered on an acoustic guitar
by a fifteen year old blues prodigy,
who’s picking those strings
like he’s in a contest with the devil himself

Horizon over main stage at Vancouver Island MusicFest

Here's the website of the young blues prodigy referenced in the poem. 

The first time I participated, I didn't get the photograph first bit. I let the theme percolate throughout the month before posting and the poem more or less wrote itself. When I realized my mistake, I sent a half decent draft of it to my partner, Randy Rotheisler, and a friend, Ron Peace, both gifted photographers, asking for images to accompany it. We have continued this process.

In case you are interested, both these photographs can be purchased from the photographers. Let me know if you want their contact information.