Dear Friends of Literature and Nature,

Today I leave here a poem to remember our Friend: the Poetess Janine Canan, now dead victim of cancer…

A Goddess of literature

Semi-Goddess of the letters,

Prayer of the hidden landscapes of Human feelings.

Please, tell me if is it worth to know somebody and then suffer?

I remember when a wave is made of moon’s color…

and I vanish as if a spell contains a secret;

a mystery question, without answer: logicless.

Please, now that you are with our Goddess,

please tell her something about me.

Cause, at the moment,

all my blood is pitch black,

and I wonder if I can ever again

feel alone, after being part

of your life: a living shore,

Once occupied by a thoughtful spirit as you are.

Now that all the green mountains have fallen,

Leaving a gap in this friend’s heart,

Let you know I will (we will) miss you

Until we get together again,

 in a,

deep blue ocean created by our Goddess of Love.

17 July 2021, by Rui M.

"One" a music by Jesse Cook.

We know she would like.

See you soon.

Dear Friends,

Literature and nature bring us together. A few years ago, Darwin studied gravitropism, i.e., a growth response, of plants, to gravity. He removed surgically the caps of roots and then verified how they would grow. To his surprise the roots started to grow without the influence of gravity. This is to stress that nature contains mysteries and influences our imagination… Poetry seams to follow the same principals. This is the case of the poem that won the 2^nd place. Congratulations to Jill Hall.

“A Quarantine Visitor” by Jill G. Hall (USA)

In the quiet summer sun

on my San Diego patio

a plump lizard basks.

“Hello,” I whisper. Her

smile sly, eyes button-beads,

skin resembling grandma’s purse.

Prolific in our childhood garden

my brother Sandy saved them

in shoeboxes, fed them flies.

Sometimes he’d pick one up,

snigger as its tail fell off, 

wiggled about. He’d chase

me with the terrible    

Tyrannosaurus Rexes

in his outstretched hands.

Terrified I’d cry, run away

until the day I grit my teeth,

stood my ground, patted its

crusty head. After that

he stopped pestering me.

At least not with reptiles.

He often kissed them until

one bit him on the lower lip

and like mom would say he

screamed bloody murder.

I think he still has a scar.

I feared those dears had

become extinct long ago.

It’s interesting what a coronavirus

can do to shift the balance back.

Enjoy.