Shawn L. Bird

Original poetry, commentary, and fiction. All copyrights reserved.

poem-tending roses March 3, 2014

Filed under: Poetry — Shawn L. Bird @ 10:30 am
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I should have

warned you about our bud.

She’s thorny

but she’s precious.

Touch her brusquely

and you’ll bleed from flesh

torn by her thorns. 

They are sharp, but they protect

a precious bud.

Some day, if we tend her well

she will blossom into a glorious rose,

for now she is a thorny stalk

with a tentative bud,

doubtful of blooming.

She will need to be coaxed,

but someday, her unique beauty

will amaze you.

She will show the world

talent, insight, and vision.

She’ll be a complexity of

colour, scent, tenacity.

For now, she is a thorny stalk,

but we have faith

the guarded bud

will bloom

 

 

 

poem- snow falling March 2, 2014

Filed under: Poetry — Shawn L. Bird @ 12:38 pm
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Snow falling

a white world

Pure motives

clean character

Love calling

to warm bed

longing

laughing

falling.

.

.

(This is my 1300th blog post!  Hurrah!)

 

 

quote-John Green on love March 1, 2014

Filed under: Poetry — Shawn L. Bird @ 9:04 pm
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I believe in true love, you know?  I don’t believe that everybody gets to keep their eyes or not get sick or whatever, but everybody should have true love, and it should last at least as long as your life does.

~John Green The Fault in our Stars p. 75

I’m completely with John on this one.   I know that most people don’t have that experience, but should is an optimistic word.  Loyalty to someone is a beautiful thing.  It’s powerful when it’s reciprocated.

 

 

 

analysis- Olympic per capita medal count February 28, 2014

Filed under: Commentary — Shawn L. Bird @ 7:16 pm

To my mind, the real winners of the Sochi Olympics were Norway, Slovenia, and Austria.

Why?

According to the “official data” The Sochi Olympic winners were Russia first with 33 medals, Norway second with 26, and Canada third with 25.  Twenty-six nations medalled.  While I’m delighted that Canada did so well, I got pondering what the results would be like if we looked at medals per capita for each country.  

How can 8 medals from a population of 127 million (Japan) or 60 million (Italy)  be compared with 8 medals from a population of just 2 million? (Slovenia).  I don’t think they can.  So I did the math.

I found population data on Wikipedia and divided it by the medals earned to determine the numbers of medals earned per capita.   Sadly, my method drops Canada to tenth and Russia  to fourteenth place, but it’s a method that is more fair.

Here are the  results.  The per capita number shows how many people in the nation there are for each medal (gold, silver, or bronze) at the Sochi 2014 Olympics.

country                  population                 medals                 per capita

  1. Norway                       5,109,056                    26                    196,502  WOW!
  2. Slovenia                      2,061,721                    8                      257,715   IMPRESSIVE!
  3. Austria                        8,501,502                    17                    500,088
  4. Latvia                          2,005,200                    4                      501,300
  5. Sweden                       9,644,864                    15                    642,991
  6. Netherlands             16,839,100                  24                    701,629
  7. Switzerland                 8,112,200                    11                    737,473
  8. Finland                        5,450,614                    5                      1,090,123
  9. CzechRepublic         10,513,800                  8                      1,314,225
  10. Canada                      35,295,770                  25                    1,411,831
  11. Belarus                        9,468,100                    6                      1,578,017
  12. Germany                  80,619,000                  19                    4,243,105
  13. Croatia                          4,290,612                    1                      4,290,612
  14. Russia                      145,700,000                33                    4,354,545
  15. France                         65,820,916                  15                    4,388,061
  16. Slovakia                        5,415,459                    1                      5,415,459
  17. South Korea               50,219,669                  8                      6,277,459
  18. Poland                         38,502,396                  6                      6,417,066
  19. Italy                              59,943,933                  8                      7,492,992
  20. Australia                     23,390,492                  3                      7,796,831
  21. USA                            317,581,000                28                    11,342,179
  22. Japan                           127,180,000                8                      15,897,500
  23. Great Britain             63,705,000                  4                      15,926,250
  24. Kazakhstan                 17,165,000                  1                      17,165,000
  25. Ukraine                       45,426,200                  2                      22,713,100
  26. China                         1,360,720,000             9                      151,191,111
 

poem- bird bouquet February 26, 2014

Filed under: Poetry — Shawn L. Bird @ 11:40 pm
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Usually too territorial to rest together,

twenty Red winged blackbirds,

tremble upon the tips.  

One bush, in early spring,

a yellow, red and black bird bouquet.

.

.

Such a strange sight as I was driving home from Vernon last weekend!  And hey!  Red winged blackbirds are the first sign of spring!  YAY!

 

 

poem-learning to listen February 25, 2014

Filed under: Poetry — Shawn L. Bird @ 8:47 pm
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A roomful

of opinions

opinions

opinions

everyone shouting

no one hears.

I think!

I believe!

I!

I!

I!

Wait!

Sit.

Listen.

Ask a question.

Listen to the answer.

Really listen.

Hear.

Think.

Learn.

Grow.

.

.

.

Another poem for the very inspiring Robin with whom I teach.   So honoured to work in a school full of such amazing masters.  So wonderful to watch kids learn how diverse our world is, how full of shades of grey, how their opinions aren’t the only ones in the world.  🙂

 

quote- John Green on swings February 24, 2014

Filed under: Quotations — Shawn L. Bird @ 8:14 pm
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Another quote from John Green’s The Fault in our Stars.  An ad for Craigslist:

Desperately Lonely Swing Set Needs Loving Home

One swing set, well structurally sound, seeks new home.  Make memories with your kid or kids so that someday he or she or they will look into the backyard and feel the ache of sentimentality as desperately as I did this afternoon.  It’s all fragile and fleeting, dear reader, but with this swing set, your child(ren) will be introduced to the ups and downs of human life gently and safely, and may also learn the most important lesson of all: No matter how hard you kick, no matter how high you get, you can’t go all the way around.  (p. 124)

 

poem-Newton’s first law of writing

Filed under: Poetry,Writing — Shawn L. Bird @ 10:30 am
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It’s not about writer’s block

It’s about writer’s inertia

An object at rest, stays at rest;

A writer not writing, remains not writing.

Something must get it moving.

An object in motion, stays in motion;

A writer writing, remains writing,

Unless an outside force acts upon it.

Seek the energy to start the motion

And stay in motion

So the book gets written.

.

.

Diana Gabaldon once said that she tries to write every day, because if she doesn’t,  an inertia develops and it’s hard to get to it.  I have found this true!  Since the frenzy of drafting two novels in November, it’s been hard to do more than outline recently.  I know that if I just get into the rhythm of the writing, it will propel itself, but the novel writing rhythm is proving elusive these days.   I’ve been having no trouble keeping up the blog though, providing a poem for your daily reading.  That’s better than nothing!

 

quote- from The Fault in Our Stars February 23, 2014

Filed under: Quotations,Reading — Shawn L. Bird @ 1:01 am
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Sometimes you read a book and it fills you with this weird evangelical zeal, and you become convinced that the shattered world will never be put back together unless and until all living humans read the book.  And then there are the books…which you can’t tell people about, books so special and rare and yours that advertising your affection feels like a betrayal.

(John Green, The Fault In Our Stars p. 33)

Obviously for me Outlander is the book series that fills me with evangelical zeal.  I’ve been trying to think what the special and rare book is for me, that I’d not want to share with anyone.  I can’t think of one.  Then again, I’m not a very private person, and as a librarian, I’m kind of into the whole sharing books, though I try to match the book to the right person, of course.  How about you?  Do you have a rare and special book that you hold close to your heart?

PS.  If you haven’t read the amazing book I’m quoting from above, you really should check it out.  I think it was one of the best books I’ve read in the last year (and I read over a hundred books in the last year).

 

poem-reading at the Cracked Pot February 22, 2014

Filed under: Poetry — Shawn L. Bird @ 6:53 pm
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At The Cracked Pot

three crack pots,

(story pouring

word winders)

read.

Audience fights

coffee makers,

straining ears

to hear,

relaxes with smiles

at trials below amid the coal,

at parking problems,

at teen trouble.

The writers who read have only words

with which to weave a moment

to give a gift, to share

with those gracious ears

filling the chairs.

.

.

Allusion to The Cracked Pot Coffee Emporium in Vernon, which hosted writers Patricia Donahue, Howard Brown, and me this afternoon.  A packed house strained their ears, and it was a lovely time!