there are angels living among us with years of education, clinical training, decades of fixing, managing, restoring… all tossed to the wind to attend to a soul, to quiet the angry flesh that binds it, gently redirecting faltering hearts to embrace mortality with grace, to enter the unknown known… ER urgency, ICU diligence, code blue, crash carts, extreme, experimental, extraordinary measures dismissed, while convincing their charges to join them having broken free themselves from all that their worldly title implies, their mission now simply, compassion, comfort, communication… they have learned how let go control with purposeful intention, to escort souls in transition some people call them nurses, but I am convinced they are angels it takes an angel who knows the way to direct us safely through the darkness to the other side toward the light
~kat
Na/GloWriPoMo 2026 Day 3 prompt: write a poem in which a profession or vocation is described differently than it typically is considered to be.
Today’s glimmer is my crow friend. He comes by sometimes just to watch. He knows I see him. I know he sees me watching him. There is something extraordinary about being acknowledged by another living soul who makes its presence known with intention. We do this, we two, my crow friend and me, together. I see you seeing me, seeing you, and I choose to pause in your presence for a few magical moments.
We don’t actually speak, but we both know. And that is enough, and everything!
Much love, peace, and glimmering presence to you. I see you!
The Doe’s Motel circa 1955….photos by the current owner on yelp in 2026
the doe’s motel
twelve is that awkward age in the best of times, sweaty, smelly prepubescence with a touch of self-consciousness, breast nubs, and pimples, no matter where home happens to be, in a tidy cul de sac with a mailbox at the end of a paved driveway, edged by a meticulously coifed lawn with a lavender phlox border or at the Doe’s Motel on Route 45 in Libertyville, home to a family of eight kids who shared three rooms, the oldest boy, a paraplegic who could swim like a fish in the kidney-shaped swimming pool and us, my dad, mom, sister and me, third kitchenette unit from the end, the only room with a colored TV, bought by my dad, with special permission from the reservation office, to make it feel more like home… normal is just a setting on a washing machine
I don’t know why it pops into my head all these years later, I don’t need remembering now with a steady roof, a proper address, a mailbox, cupboards always stocked, categorized, alphabetically, in tidy, unsettling rows, labels facing out, and a mortgage paid on time, the first bill paid every month year after decades before groceries, before anything, with a steady 9 to 5, give or take, to sustain it all, I’ve come a long way from the Doe’s Motel…I have…
imagine my surprise to discover it still stands, an RV stop these days, reminding me how fragile life is for survivors… that kidney-shaped pool is paved over now, but the ghosts of us swimming like fishes that summer of 1968… I remember us swimming all too well
~kat
Na/GloWriPoMo 2026 Day 2 prompt: write your own poem in which you recount a childhood memory. Try to incorporate a sense of how that experience indicated to you, even then, something about the person you’d grow up to be.
Time for a glimmer…in the midst of a deluge of storms yesterday afternoon well into the night we had a brief glimmer of sky and the setting sun at dusk. Proof that even in the midst of a storm…there are glimmers to be found!
Much love, peace, and glimmers in the storm to you!
how are you? . fine every thing’s fine yep I’m fine…it’s all fine, fine, unless, of course, you consider our prez is bat-shit crazy…that, and realizing world war three’s a heartbeat away . our cities are frozen by ice while a gold, bunkered ballroom rises to entertain oligarchs there’ll be no cake nor crumbs for children no healthcare for the ailing, no help from spineless sycophants drunk with power their blood-thirst quenched by hate . prisons… let’s not go there…really let’s just say that nobody no body should go there…except perhaps…well.. I’m sorry, you asked? I woke up this morning…yay! that’s good, right? If only more were woke
~kat
Another pi-sequence poem (syllable count per line: 3.1415926535 8979323846. 2643383279) that I accidentally erased, and had to rewrite. That is how my day went today. Is there a planet in retrograde somewhere? Anyhow. Today’s sunset came to the rescue once again. Sorry if all these sunsets are becoming boring to you. As for me, I cherish every single one.
these lengthening days warmed by the afternoon sun set the sky ablaze
~kat
It’s been a while. I’ve been passing mindlessly, from one day to the next, barely breathing. Well, I exaggerate. Obviously I am breathing. But I can’t catch my breath. Everyday another terrible bit of news spews from the spineless, malevolent fools in government. Every day, choosing ways to manage rising basic living costs by deciding what we can do without. Living with some sense of comfort in these times takes great effort and diligence. I’m bone tired.
My saving grace…my glimmer…the moments I actually pause from work, is at sunset. A brief few moments of watching the sky transform before launching into my night-time chores. Honestly, it is something I need desperately.
And there is writing…my love of words. I am planning to enter another NaPoWriMo exercise in a few days. It’s been a hard winter. Time for spring in every sense!
tell the bees . I understand now how important they are not only because they are master keepers of all life in balance but as sages of great wisdom. consider the hive… . a bustling community of workers, drones, and one queen, each of whom has a vital role to play in the health, safety, and prosperity of the whole where the swarm protects at all cost the matriarch, the very heart. it’s not honey that drives them, it is she… . ancient feminine energy hidden away just buzzing to be known by humanity gone astray honey drunk, where drones have taken over the hive… they forgot, the workers are legion
~kat
The poem is a pi-sequenced offering based on three sections: 3.1415926535.8979323846. 2643383279, determining the syllable count for each line. Happy 3/14!
Wisdom from the Bees
There are three vital roles played out by very distinct players in the life of a hive. It’s not about the honey. While it is a sweet byproduct of the harmony of a healthy brood of bees, it is not the heart.
That would be the queen. A single fertile female who holds everything together. Bee queens live 2-3 years laying up to 3000 eggs a day. She is literally the mother of all bees, the quintessential life giver of the colony as well as the anchor that keeps the hive humming.
The queen is sustained by worker bees (also female). These busy bees tend the hive, clean and feed the queen royal jelly, a special food reserved only for queens, and provide for her every need so that she can spend her short productive reign reproducing. Worker bees are born from the fertilized eggs of the queen. Given the fertile reproductive qualities of a heathy queen, workers are legion. Throughout their relatively short lifespan (in the summer two to six weeks, and in winter, up to 20 weeks because they don’t venture out of the hive during colder months) worker bees do it all! After 21 days, honey bee larvae emerge fully grown and the work begins with cleaning the cells (days 1-3), feeding the worker and drone larvae (days 3-7), and attending exclusively to the queen (days 7-11). Around days 13 – 18 the workers use wax from four glands in their abdomen’s to build and restore the cells of the hive. On days 18 – 21 when their stinger has matured, they move on to guard duty protecting the hive, and finally, in the last sweet stage of life these busy workers emerge from the hive to scout and forage for water, pollen, and nectar. A foraging bee will make 9-10 hour-long trips to and from the hive in a single day. There are other tasks which worker bees do such as maintaining the temperature of the hive and mortuary duty (removing dead and non viable eggs from the hive). I’m figuring out where the term “busy as a bee” comes from.
Which brings us to the drones. These guys (the male component in the life of bee colonies) are born from the unfertilized eggs of the queen. She basically creates these fellows for herself, as they have one vital role to play. They do not have stingers (an important fact to ponder), they do not feed themselves (worker bees provide them royal jelly for a few days, then a steady diet of honey), they do not scout or forage or protect the hive (remember…no stingers). When a queen emerges from her nest, she takes a maiden flight solely for the purpose of mating with several drones. This act will fertilize all the eggs she will ever lay in her lifetime, so once the deed is done, each drone dies.
I could go on and on…there are so many details i could share regarding the masterpiece that is a bee colony. And there are a few analogies as well that I could indulge, but I won’t. I’ll let you fill in the rest of the story. Suffice to say, is it any wonder that compassion, kindness, peace, community, conservation, nurturing, the arts and wisdom are making a bold resurgence in these times we find ourselves living through? And what can we learn from the bees? I’ll just leave all of this here for you to ponder. 🤔😉 😊
Much love, peace, compassion, and honeybee wisdom glimmers to you.
So it is easier for you to find all the parts/chapters of my ongoing fiction series, I created a new page that lists all the links. You can check it out HERE!
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