Candice James, the Poet Laureate of New Westminster, does the Grind Writers free-write challenge

by the Poet Laureate of New Westminster, Candice James

Not the same picture Candice
wrote to, but a similar landscape.

Same photographer: Warren Gordon

a 15 min. free-write done to a prompt: a photograph of a lone person fishing on the Margaree River in Cape Breton on a magnificently sunny summer day not unlike the one we were experiencing at the Summer Dreams Literary Arts festival where this challenge was offered up.

 ___________________________

Footsteps sinking into silk

Wet flow of nature’s milk

The sustenance to which were drawn

In surreal world of peace and calm

The shine of sunlight on the fields

Unmeasured dreams and brilliant yields
The essence of the whispering wind

and secrets of the past begin

To unwind in the wind of the river

As it flows round my body like a shiver

And I pull my mind around my heart

Like a blanket, tattered, torn apart

The trees stand in jurious solitude

Against a sky opaque and nude

And life is shadowed in between

The river, stream and pastoral scene

Where we wander like wolves and sheep

Leaving this realm with nothing to keep

Save our sanctimonious souls

As - the thunder rolls.

 © Aug2011 Candice James (the poem not the photo)