Squirrel Thanksgiving

Life continues. Keep looking.

The squirrels mine the pumpkins,

Fill up on seeds

Before the snow

Sure to come.

The metal can with birdseed

In back

Remains impenetrable.

The pumpkins offer

A feast in the front planters,

Thanksgiving left over

From Halloween.

The next sedge of cranes

Flies south.

Autumn life

Continues on

Even in December.

Passing pumpkins

When we don't do one thing, we're doing another. It's always a choice. The pumpkin unloading Saturday is the same Saturday as Wheaton Homecoming. I will be there filling lawns, one pumpkin at a time, one town over. 

Instead of unloading pumpkins

Joining the long line

Passing pumpkins,

I will be

Somewhere else.

I will find new people

In lines of their own

Passing pumpkins

Person to person

To make a bigger picture

In the end.

We will fill lawns and lawns

With pumpkins,

Sell them

One at a time.

Instead of unloading pumpkins,

Instead of passing pumpkins,

I will be the next town over

Communing

With a different sort

Of pumpkin

One at a time.

I consider Advent

 There is no point in unearthing the Advent wreath.  There is no place to put it. We will have to mark Advent in a different way this year.  

I consider Advent

With four juncos

On the back patio.

They sit

On the leftover kitchen tile.

No snow.

I consider Advent:

No place to put a wreath

This year,

The newly arrived kitchen sink

In a box

In the hallway.

No room in the inn

For decorations.

Today we will remove the pumpkins

From the planters

Out front,

Put them next to the creek

For squirrel food.

Today I consider Advent

Mary jostling along

Pregnant

On a donkey,

Wondering what on earth

Comes next.

Please tell me (she whispers)

No more angels

Announcing strange and stranger things.

No more cries in the wilderness

Prepare

Prepare

Prepare.

I consider Advent

No room in the inn

For decorations;

Pumpkins for the squirrels

Out back;

Juncos waiting for snow;

Kitchen sink

In the hallway.

Please tell me

No more angels

For now.

Halloween rescue

It seems that rescue is a way of life.  I had a friend years ago who said, in an evaluation, that I would find the good in any scumbag.  This was good, she said, often.  But sometimes there is no good.  I still disagree with her, over 27 years later.  

We bought a pumpkin on Saturday,

It needed a home.

We call it

A plotz pumpkin,

Affectionately

Of course.

It looks partially

Melted

In a pumpkin kind of way.

No way it can stand up straight.

No way to carve it.

We scoured the patch

To find

A pumpkin with character.

This one fit the bill.

We do this every year.

This year we have a plotz pumpkin

With character

And a companion pumpkin

Full of warts.

Thank God we have an artificial Christmas tree.

We cart it up from the basement

Every year.

Years ago we got it on discount.

It was the going model

From two years before.

Who knew they had models?

At least we don*t have needles

All over the carpet;

We are attracted to real trees

With character.

At least with the model from 14 years ago,

There is a place to hang

Years and years worth

Of ornaments.

The cat we got from the animal shelter

Is still going strong.