Writing Exercises After Reading Linda Gregg by the Bell Tower

Writing Exercise After Reading Linda Gregg on a Day in Spring

By Rachel Brown

The quintessential spring day cannot be this perfect, I think to myself. The perfect temperature, three fluffy white clouds perfectly placed in the sky; even the squirrels are in better moods today. As I look around I see the fountain central to the pond. I watch the droplets surge from the bottom of the fountain to their peak and sprinkle outwards towards the surface of the water. These droplets go through such an evolution from together as one, to individual beads to together as one once more. The beauty is at the peak; the droplets almost pause as if to relish in the moment of being so high in the air before they fall back down to the rest of the water. I wish the droplets could stay up there. I wish I could stay up there, forever paused.

Bell Tower Ants

By Rachael Franks

                  Low rumbles of water echo with bird songs. White drops of fountain water fall into the murky brown rippled pond. Half heart iron fences cast shadows in cohesion with the trees and in equal spaces are sphere bulbs with a grey scale of green mold slowly overtaking them. Against the grey cracked cement are silky soft pink shoes slowly inching away from the goose. His long black neck cocked in arrogance, tiny webbed feet firmly planted, calling at the intruder to leave. The cement stairs glow pink, as she obliges. One tree stretches its branches above the rest, twisting up into the blue, but bottom rooted by a heavy industrial box, the fountain power source. In the most natural part, natural remains unnatural. Sitting on the bell tower stairs, being plagued by ants, I think the feeling between us is mutual.

Baron Flowers

By Rachael Franks

            Turning the handle seems unfamiliar.  What is on the other side of the stark white door is still a continual surprise.  The house is empty of chairs, picture frames, and memories.  The walls lack warmth; the sunshine only casts shadows, illuminating what does not exist.  The kitchen knobs do not glisten but rather reflect a sterile grey shine onto the black countertop.  Stained cardboard boxes overwhelm every room, yet never make them feel full.  The oak flooring feels cold on my soles and the oak tree, rooted deeply in the yard of my childhood home, does not appear out the window.  That tree, taller than our house, barricaded by a wooden box no one remembers building, marking the very center of our yard, was never a tree.  It was home base in freeze tag, the jungle gym my father never built.  It was the failed concealer of Easter eggs, the post my brother leaned his ladder against to retrieve my frightened kitten and calm my equally frightened heart.  It was the place we used to flick ants and squirt bees’ nests with water guns from below, the last thing I saw before I hit the ground, breaking my fingers.  When I stand in this new house, in this empty room, peering out the windows, all I see are brown grass seedlings for acres and a for sale sign laying on its side, along with trash bags and empty boxes, all waiting the same dumpster fate.  Things have changed.

                 

Poem Inspired by Nature and Linda Gregg

By Ashley Albertz

Leaves on a tree branch flickered in the wind

Large ripples hit a boulder sitting on the shore of the pond where I sat.

The concrete was lined with shadows from a fencepost.

Two geese block my only exist.  My fear for them is great.

Thick ivy coats the trees, rich with age.

An artificial fountain breaks the serenity.

Clouds attempt to cover the light blue sky

People often hide among the shadows, allow themselves to hide,

Being covered with ivy, stuck with their fear.

Flicker in the wind, or let the water ripple.

Be yourself.

Gregg/ Nature Poems in Class: March 22, 2012

By Natalia Welch

I.

The shine has disappeared.

Blotchy grey metal box

Sitting in the woods,

Completely removed from nature.

Awkward in a forest of wood.

II.

Elongated shadows.

My mind wanting to complete

A heart shape.

Molded iron representing a barrier

Between water and land.

Life and death.

Does completing the heart bring us closer to the end?

III.

A single strand,

Ivy attached to its host.

The burden of growing

And attaching.

Powerful green taking on the form of envy.

Envious of the tree’s power,

Wanting to be seen first.

Attention seeking, yet mundane.

IV.

I am orange in a sheet of green.

I beg to break off and

Drift into the dirt path.

My support system will not allow this.

When is it my turn to depart?

I am a sore thumb on the palm of a healthy hand.

To do away with me

Would burden no one.