Your Daily Poem accepts Carroll Taylor's Poem

Today I am happy for my friend and volunteer PC assistant, Carroll Taylor, whose poem was recently published in an online journal, Your Daily Poem. Click on the link below to read this short poem.

http://yourdailypoem.com/

Jayne Jaudon Ferrer is owner and editor of Your Daily Poem. She and I have been friends for many years. Jayne is also a poet. I enjoy reading and giving copies of Jayne's books as gifts. They are hard copy, traditionally published books. You can find them on her website.

Jayne Jaudon Ferrer

She began this online journal so that people who  had to read poetry in school and found it boring and complicated can see that poetry can be fun, touching and inspiring, She makes sure the poetry on her site makes you feel something. She does not want readers to be left wondering what the poet was trying to say.

Jayne says this about Your Daily Poem.

"This site exists for one purpose only: to help dispel the ugly myth that poetry is boring. Granted, a lot of poetry is boring, but you won't find it here. At Your Daily Poem, you'll find poetry that is touching, funny, provocative, inspiring, and surprising. It may punch you in the gut, it may bring tears to your eyes, it may make you laugh out loud, but it most assuredly will not bore you."

I and other poets from my region have poems published on the site. Go to the Authors list and put in the name of a published poet and see if he/she is in Your Daily Poem Archives. I am proud to be there.

Will the younger generation change our food industry in the United States? We can only hope!

I read a post by Jayne Jaudon Ferrer tonight and I like her subject matter. Her three grown sons have actually made changes in the way Jayne eats. She is amazed that her kids, who were raised on Pop Tarts and sugary cereal, now eat organic foods and buy from people they know instead of shopping from the big name stores. Her thirty-something young men are health conscious.

http://commagoddess.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-return-of-generation-gapin-grocery.html

I related to much of this article, but I don't have children who influence my eating habits. I learned from my mother to eat natural fresh foods, so I cook. Tonight I cooked squash that I will have tomorrow and later this week. 

Rarely do I eat processed foods. I shop the perimeter of the store for the most part, but I do have to purchase coffee. I was happy to read this week that a couple of cups of coffee each day is good for me.

I can't eat red meat now without suffering for it. So, I eat chicken, fish, beans and eggs, lots of eggs. I cook Brussel sprouts and asparagus which I did not eat when I was young.

Sadly the food we grow now is not good because of the depleted minerals in the ground. Every day I learn more about the disaster we have in this country regarding our food. And, I am more thankful that I grew up on a farm with good food every single day.

The only cereal we ate growing up on the farm was grits which we ate with eggs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Mark Hyman, The Doctor's Farmacy podcast, is on a crusade to make our government, as well as all of us, aware of how we are killing ourselves with the unhealthy food available to us.

I was shocked to hear him say that we throw away 40 percent of the food we purchase. Imagine bringing in your groceries and throwing forty percent into the garbage. People in other countries do so much better with food waste. In some countries there are machines that change food waste into products that farmers use. They don't have landfills heaped with all the spoiled food we throw out. As you know, food in the landfills create methane gas that helps create the warming of the atmosphere. Climate Change!

When I hear Dr. Hyman talk about what we Americans do that is so harmful to ourselves and our earth, I want to call him and say How can I help? Give me a job!

Perhaps what upsets me most is hearing Dr. Hyman talk about the research he has done and found our own representatives in Congress hamper the FDA and other departments that were designed to protect us, the American taxpayers. 

The big food manufacturers hold our government hostage with their lobbyists. When the manufacturers donate huge sums of money to the politicians, our elected men and women tell FDA they will cut funding if any programs reflect badly on those large corporations. 

Think about the cereal makers. The sugar industry is an example. You won't see any government banning of any sugar products or putting warnings on products with sugar because the sugar industry is so strong and so rich, they buy our representatives off. No matter that children of today are being diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes at an alarming rate. 

I hope my readers will listen to the interview with Dr. Hyman by Dr. Peter Attia. It is eye-opening and it makes me angry.

Greed is the cause of most of the illness our country. Greed by people who could make a difference if they truly cared. Ignorance is also the problem. Those in Washington don't bother to read or listen to people like Mark Hyman, M.D., director of the Cleveland Clinic Center for Functional Medicine. He is working on that, thank goodness.

If you watch or listen to the interview, please let me know what you think. Leave a comment or send an email: gcbmountaingirl@gmail.com


 
 

A Very Old Photograph to be re-run March 26

I heard from Jayne Ferrer today. On www.YourDailyPoem.com, to celebrate her first five years of the online poetry magazine, she is posting poems from her first year online. She has re-posted some of my poems already, and will publish another on March 26. This is what she said today:

“As the first year retrospective continues, "A Very Old Photograph" will run on March 26, just as it did in 2010.

It's been a fun trip down Memory Lane, and I've loved bringing those first poems to a wider audience, but I'm looking forward to sharing new work and seeing what Year 6 brings to YDP!”

Jayne Jaudon Ferrer, Editor
http://www.YourDailyPoem.com

She has accepted three of my new poems that will reach her large number of subscribers in the coming year. Thanks, Jayne.

My Mother

Poetry Month - Get Your Daily Poem

During Poetry Month, April, Jayne Jaudon Ferrer, of your daily poem, sends a poem a day through email. I will receive a poem, usually one I really enjoy, because Jayne chooses poems that are accessible but interesting, touching and thought-provoking.

If you'd like to receive a poem each day in your inbox, click on Jayne's site, http://www.yourdailypoem.com/ and put in your email address which is not shared with anyone. You will enjoy the poems during the poetry month of April.

Blogs I recommend today

When I have time, as I did today, I try to read my favorite bloggers. I have many so I don't often get to all of them.
Today I was impressed with the post on Jayne Jaudon Ferrer's blog,
http://www.jaynejaudonferrer.com/index.jsp
I agree with every word she says.

Another blog that I enjoy reading is A Good Blog is Hard To Find.
The blog features various writers and today I liked this post.
http://southernauthors.blogspot.com/2011/04/on-nature-and-nurturing-your-inner.htm


Do you have a blog you'd recommend to us? If so, give it to us in a comment or email me.

This poem has special meaning to me.

This poem was sent to me from Jayne Jaudon Ferrer's Your Daily Poem, and I wanted to share it with any of you who have not yet subscribed to have a poem a day sent to your Inbox.
Jayne Jaudon Ferrer is the author of four books and the host of www.YourDailyPoem.com. She lives in Greenville, SC. Visit her website at www.JayneJaudonFerrer.com and her blog at http://commagoddess.blogspot.com.



Sing to Me
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Sing to me! Something of sunlight and bloom,
I am so compassed with sorrow and gloom,
I am so sick with the world’s noise and strife,
Sing of the beauty and brightness of life—
Sing to me, sing to me!

Sing to me! Something that’s jubilant, glad!
I am so weary, my soul so sad.
All my earth riches are covered with rust,
All my bright dreams are but ashes and dust.
Sing to me, sing to me!

Sing of the blossoms that open in spring,
How the sweet flowers blow, and the long lichens cling,
Say, though the winter is round about me,
There are bright summers and springs yet to be.
Sing to me, sing to me!

Sing me a song full of hope and of truth,
Brimming with all the sweet fancies of youth!
Say, though my sorrow I may not forget,
I have not quite done with happiness yet.
Sing to me, sing to me!

Lay your soft fingers just here, on my cheek;
Turn the light lower—there—no, do not speak,
But sing! My heart thrills at your beautiful voice;
Sing till I turn from my grief and rejoice
Sing to me, sing to me!

This poem is in the public domain


Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) was a popular and prolific poet. Published and lauded before she even graduated from high school, Ella preferred to write happy, upbeat poetry and was much beloved for it. More than a dozen of her poems are included in the book, Best Loved Poems of the American People (Doubleday, 2008). The familiar saying, "Laugh and the world laughs with you, weep, and you weep alone. . ." comes from her best-known poem, "Solitude." A morally strong and spiritual person, Ella believed that her purpose on earth was to practice kindness and service.

2010 classes for JCCFS have been published on their website.

I took this photo behind Orchard House where our writing classes are held.

The John C. Campbell Folk School has published classes for next year, 2010, on their website and in their new catalog.
See the sidebar of this post to find my classes for 2010. I will teach in February and again in December of 2010. We are nearing the end of 2009.
Register for 2010 classes.

Nancy Simpson, Jayne Jaudon Ferrer, Dana Wildsmith, and many other good writers and poets will be teaching at JCCFS next year. If you haven't taken a class at the Folk School in Brasstown, NC, you are missing a wonderful experience.

Fabulous Blog Award

Writing Life Stories has been given the Fabulous Blog Award by Nancy Simpson of Living Above the Frost Line. Thank you, Nancy. Your blog is also Fabulous. Now I can pass this award on to others. I chose four blogs I follow, but there are others who also deserve this honor. Hope to get to them another time.
Here are the ones chosen for the Fabulous Blog Award.
http://www.nancysimpson.blogspot.com/
http://www.georgiafarmwoman.blogspot.com/
http://tapestry13.blogspot.com/
http://tendergraces.blogspot.com/ http://www.http//commagoddess.blogspot.com/


The rules (not mine, they came with the award): You must pass it on to 5 other Fabulous Bloggers in a post. You may find their email addresses on their Profile page or, if not available, post as a "Comment" to their latest post.You must include the person that gave you the award, and link it back to them. You must list 5 of your Fabulous addictions in the post.
You must copy and paste these rules in the post. Right click the award icon (you can go to my blog to do this) & save to your computer then post with your own awards.
This is not only a nice tribute, it widens the reading audience.
Five of my Fabulous Addictions: writing memoir, teaching, poetry, reading, living chemical free.