the wisdom of flowers
Lovely and cheerful
seeks cracks in the hard, and blooms.
So can we. Let’s bloom.
(c) Marie Elena Good 2026
pictured words
a simple pairing of pictures and poetry
Tag: Life
June 10, 2026
September 14, 2025
THEY
They come
from distant lands,
escaping war,
famine, natural disaster,
unlivable conditions, persecution,
economic instability, etc.
They arrive
carrying whatever they can.
Perhaps a photo or two.
A key to a house
that may no longer exist.
Only the clothes on their backs.
One very dear Syrian friend had to leave
suddenly. Flee.
Her family,
in the middle of a meal,
left pots and plates of food
years ago.
Ukrainian friends we now consider family
arrived with one school-type backpack
for their family of four.
Yes, you read that correctly.
Some aren’t even that lucky.
Dowla chose one item to bring:
A wooden pole, balanced on her shoulders,
with which to carry
her six children
when they tired of the 10-day walk from Sudan
to a refugee camp in South Sudan.
Aboubacar fled Mali on a donkey cart
with his wife and two children.
The one item he chose to bring?
His goat.
“The goat brings me hope, joy, and a sense
that things can change for the better.”
After dealing with several months of air raids,
Magboola and her three children finally left Sudan
the night soldiers came and opened fire.
The most important item she chose to carry:
a small cooking pot.
It could be easily carried,
and used to feed her children.
102-year-old Omar is blind.
His item of choice was his lati
(his walking stick).
“If I hadn’t had my lati,
I would have crawled to Bangladesh.”
The situation in the village he loved,
yet had to flee,
was dire.
The journey,
unimaginably hard.
A quote I relish from him is this:
“If you laugh, others will laugh with you.
And if you stop laughing, you will die.”
Elizabeth fled war in Angola.
52 years later, she still struggles
with the feeling of not having a real home.
The one item she still has with her
is her Bible.
“In this world, bad things happen,
but in the Bible you can find words which help you.”
The stories
are endless
unimaginable
heartbreaking
staggering
awe-inspiring.
The people
are strong
courageous
thankful
giving
hopeful,
in spite of it all.
It is my honor and great blessing
to look into the eyes of those
I am privileged to personally know.
To hear their stories.
See their smiling eyes.
Feel their arms around me.
Their kisses on my cheeks.
To taste their food.
Receive their time
and their love.
THEY
are life-enriching.
© Marie Elena Good 2025
(Stories of those I don’t personally know are from UNHRC. The photo I chose is from Pexels.com.)
August 8, 2025
In the Midst of Crisis
Perrysburg Mercy Health
Thursday July 29, 2025
Keith experienced
classic heart attack symptoms.
Said, “Call 911.”
Very unlike Keith,
and so he didn’t have to
tell me more than once.
A look and some tests
showed no sign of heart attack.
Phew! But what happened?
July 31, 2025
Back in the E.R.
for STAT echo with contrast.
This, our new St. Luke’s?
Medical Test Findings:
He is well nourished.
His reproductive organs?
* Unremarkable.
August 2, 2025
Gallbadder all along?
Back in the E.R.
More tests have resulted in
admission. Thankful.
August 3, 2025
6:46 a.m.
Spoke with Keith’s nighttime
nurse. He slept well. Still no word
on surgery time.
Afternoon
No surgery yet.
First will come more heart tests, then
gallbladder comes out.
August 4, 2025
9:30 a.m.
Nuclear stress test
(a four-hour test) followed by
an echo-something
8:00 p.m.
A 30-minute
gallbladder removal turns
into two hours.
Anterior wall
is the only thing removed.
The remainder is
too attached to the
liver. Apparently they’re
inseparable.
August 5, 2025
11:30 a.m.
After not eating
since 5 p.m. August 3,
Keith is transported
to St. Charle’s to have
surgery 2 in two days –
needs a bile duct stent:
another 30-
minute procedure that took
about two hours. Ugh …
5:00 p.m.
Keith is returned to
his first hospital in far
worse shape than he left.
Suffice it to say,
two surgeries in two days:
zero of ten stars.
After forty-eight
hours of no food or water,
and overheated,
there was ice water
for his throat, behind his neck,
on his head, and chest.
But other than that,
he didn’t want to be touched
not even by me.
He was beyond hot
(take that in every way)
and who could blame him?
August 6, 2025
Now his pancreas
has become enraged. Numbers
have skyrocketed:
Lipase, which should be
between zilch and one sixty
is at three thousand.
Other lab numbers
are also out-of-whack. So,
no discharge today.
Clear liquid diet
is better than nothing, right?
“Nothing” went too long.
August 7, 2025
FINALLY some FOOD!
He had flat, unseasoned eggs
that he loved, loved, loved!
Improving numbers
bring hope again for discharge.
Nope. Safer to stay.
August 8, 2025
Finally discharged!
Though he is still battling pain
and unwell feelings:
He paused at the door
and sighed deeply as he stepped
inside the kitchen,
slowly walked each room,
taking in the sight and scent
and feeling of home –
mentioning details,
like the way the sun glistens
on the wooden floors,
and the beauty of
the hydrangea tree that
graces our window.
We both recognize
how grateful we should be in
the midst of hardship.
We have access to
a clean, modern hospital
filled with good people
who take pride in what
they do – from the surgeons, to
the NPs, RNs,
doctors, LPNs,
those who prepare the food, and
those who bring the trays,
the housekeeping staff,
the various technicians,
and those we don’t see.
The warm smiles and waves.
The patience for their patients.
The words of comfort.
None of these details
went unnoticed, and all were
appreciated.
(c) Marie Elena Good 2025
* Keith laughed hysterically over this aspect of his test results report! HA!
This, not really poetic, is an accounting of this event in the lives of my husband and me. I like to write 5/7/5-syllable poems, statements, observations, or feelings that express my day. This is the collection from what began July 29 with classic heart attack symptoms that ended up being a gallbladder attack.
Just for the record: The long, involved surgeries mentioned were through no fault of the surgeons. Keith’s was just a very complicated case.
I may add more to this as the days of recovery continue. This is my way of recording.
April 2, 2025
Life’s View from My Recliner
Life’s View from My Recliner
The chair Mom rocked me in when I was a baby,
and when I wasn’t ready for her to stop.
The chair from which Grandma would flash that playful grin at me,
holding out the adorable ceramic kitten she would let me hold,
as long as I was in her lap. (That kitten is now mine.)
Decorative pillows Deanna brought home from Nepal for me
that now enjoy both my mom’s and my grandma’s touch.
The Tiffany-style lamp Dad turned from gas to electric,
and that now throws rainbows across my floor and onto my walls
and that sits atop the chess table he made
and the box that holds the wooden chess pieces.
The African violets started by my father-in-law.
They received the best upbringing, as he stroked and spoke to them.
Large windows that let in sun’s cheer, even as the scenes change
outside them. Visitors that grace those scenes …
colorful, talkative birds; various kinds of squirrels; chipmunks; deer;
delivery trucks that had halted during the pandemic;
moms and dads and grandparents pushing strollers or walking dogs;
children riding bikes;
the love of my life cleaning the gutters before tonight’s expected storm.
© Marie Elena Good 2025
Robert Lee Brewer’s April 2025 PAD
Day 2 prompt: From where I sit
February 16, 2025
New Neighbors
New Neighbors
It’s dark. I see the lit porchlight across the street. A glow shines from inside the home. For several years, there were no lights. It seemed no one lived there, but I knew better. The house used to be graced with a family. Then, only the man remained. He seldom came and went. When darkness fell, the house disappeared.
There’s something about
how the light warms the snow, and
how love warms the house.
© Marie Elena Good, 2025
February 2, 2025
Call Me Home
Call Me Home
She’s lived with me twenty-four years now.
She loves me.
She appreciates how cheerful I am,
no matter what is happening in her life.
Even those who visit us feel my sunny spirit.
No matter her day,
I know how to make her relax.
Her gait has slowed
more than she likely realizes.
I hear and feel her shuffle
across my hardwood floors.
Sometimes she seems to catch herself, and
picks up her feet a while.
The shuffle returns.
It always returns.
More and more, I hear
pauses
as she searchers for a lost word.
She often discovers the first letter,
but can’t retrieve the remainder.
Then sometimes I’ll hear, “All gone.”
Just like her mother used to say.
My post stands at the bottom
of the steps leading to the basement.
It bears my weight,
and the weight of her worry.
Might she or someone she loves
fall and hit their head on my post?
What are the chances of survival?
I hear her and her husband
as they contemplate their future with me.
Perhaps make my guest bedroom
a half-bath and laundry —
eliminate the need for stairs.
But it’s a part of me she admires
just as I am.
She’s lived with me twenty-four years now,
and hopes for twenty-four more.
Maybe her husband and I can make that happen.
I know he’d be on board with it.
She and I are a good team,
making him more cheerful and relaxed, too.
© Marie Elena Good, 2025
May 5, 2024
DETACHED and EMERGING (2 in Sijo)
Painting by Deanna Marie Metts
DETACHED (sijo)
Member of Mensa Foundation. Former business owner,
Now mindful only that this actual moment in time
Is dreadfully not as real as yesterday’s tomorrows.
© Marie Elena Good 2014
EMERGING (sijo)
Weeding worry stubbornly seized in depths of clay soil perdition.
Bleeding time. Believing her beseeching isn’t reaching the Ear.
Then, breakthroughs and dream-come-trues. Not of fantasy, but of being.
© Marie Elena Good 2024
I wrote Detached in 2014 about my mentally ill daughter. Emerging, written now exactly ten years later. Though she still struggles, the difference is immense. There is so much for which to be thankful!
April 7, 2024
MIDWEST
Photo by Keith R. Good
You may not have guessed, but I can attest that the Midwest is blessed. And might I suggest your quest be to test if I jest in what I’ve expressed, lest your life be suppressed and you end up depressed for your lack of Midwest nest. I’m from the Midwest, and sincerely request that you come be my guest.
And yes, I’m obsessed.
© Marie Elena Good, 2024
June 26, 2022
LIFE
Sometimes we don’t see
past the beauty in focus.
Sometimes life holds life.
#seventeenintwentytwo
February 20, 2022
LIFE, COMPOSED IN THREE PARTS
Part 1. LEGATO Since love and laughter sang the notes to her childhood, she tuned in to life. She felt melodic, harmonious, and ready to embrace her song. Part 2. ARPEGGIO A child bride’s ballad, meant to mirror her childhood, ends in broken chords. A sharp turn taken, her imposed solo becomes a balanced duet as her new partner discards the shards, and the two play in consonance. Her children (her heart), born improvisers, still long to dance their own dance. Part 3. CODA Moons rose and set. Her parents grew sickly; her song became elegy. Still, her partner hums his strength, and her Composer breathes psalms in her lungs. © Marie Elena Good, 2022
pictured words 