Sayonara, September

cleaning the closet
in an Easy Spirit shoebox
our mother's keepsakes
~
donating
to a station never watched
she gets a free mug
~
State Poet Laureate
Late, she
swept in and waved
like Queen Elizabeth,
missing my speech on 'poetic
techniques.'
~
leaving the deck chair
to raise the umbrella
red wasp takes my seat
~
first day of autumn
blowing snow and icy roads
close the interstate
~
one persimmon falls
then two more ... clumsy squirrel
or over-ripe fruit?
~
crisp autumn morning~
white umbrella mushroom
in the dried, cut grass
~
"You're out!"
the newly-fired umpire's
last call
~
cool temp and a breeze
foretell the changing season
bee at the seed stalk

c 2010 lovepat press, Pat Laster
author, A Journey of Choice

Impending birth of A Journey of Choice

Two and 1/2 more weeks, she said, and my first novel, A Journey of Choice, should be ready to order at iUniverse.com. In two more weeks, it should be available at Amazon.com and Barnes&Noble.
The writing part took long enough--from 1998 to 2010--that's the "art," someone said.
The publication--the "business" part--from the day I submitted the manuscript, June 24 of this year till the day I hold the finished book in my hand will have taken a little over three months. And close to $2,000, counting the reading fees I willingly gave two of my friends.
Oh, iUniverse set the prices for the books, not me.
A friend who heard me read two chapters to her study club told me it reminded her of "...that Portis guy, what's his name?" Great praise, comparing my book to Charles Portis of True Grit fame.
We'll see.
Pat Laster, Benton AR USA

As a 70-something, I participated in my first church mission trip

Nine-and-a-half hours in a 15-passenger church van with eight other missioners on a hot September Sunday took us through the south half of Arkansas into Louisiana, thence to the southern town of Baldwin,which was close to Morgan City, New Iberia, Patterson, and Franklin.
Our point of departure was Salem United Methodist Church north of Benton, AR, and our destination was the Sager Brown campus of UMCOR, a United Methodist Committee on Relief depot. Here, volunteers sort through hundreds of health and school kits that had been put together in churches all over the nation and shipped to the warehouse. Flood or cleaning buckets also needed packing--all of these for use in any disaster anywhere in the world where they were asked for.
In future posts, I will be more specific about the week's experience. Till then....

Sanguine September

TANKA
the station asks
for a money donation
I ask for a mug
(ugly, baby-poop yellow
made in China)
~
SENRYU
three huge projects loom
yet she sits outside and reads
the morning paper
~
FOUND CINQUAIN
Asleep,
lying face down,
flat in the road, squirrel slow
to stir in August's heat. He rolls
over. (from Ron Wolfe, ADG)
~
HAIKU
bluejay and starling
face off for the fallen seeds
late summer shower
~
SENRYU
Mom...gone these four years
still, she gets address labels
from Feed the Children
~
HAIK-SEN
I'm still outside
but outside, it's not still
welcome summer breeze
~
SENRYU
WEATHER GUARD business
not resting on Labor Day~
breeze through the windchimes
~
SEN-NEWS
combat forces gone
but two US servicemen
killed walking to talks
~
HAIKU
on the porch swing
driven inside
by blowing rain
~
c September 10 2010 lovepat press
Pat Laster

Learning more about blogging at WCCW conference

Geez! Guess I'll have to rename my blog--and make other changes. That is, if I listen to Linda Fulkerson, Blog Coach and Internet Marketing Advisor, (see http://onbloggingwell.com/) who spoke at the White County Creative Writers (Searcy, Arkansas) conference yesterday.
From notes I took as she barreled through her allotted time with hardly a breath, I learned that:
(1) My (anyone's) blog should contain "excellent content about solutions to a specific problem the public has or on subjects the public is interested in. A blog should be relevant, authoritative.
(2). A blog should foster activity. Ask a question at the end of your posts. Host guest posts. This is another way to "network."
(3) Linking: Swap links. Your blog is your face to the general public, she said. Get your name out there as much as possible.
(4) Blog at least twice a week. Oops! for sure, that's a change.
~~~ Pat Laster, author of the forthcoming novel, A Journey of Choice.