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Listen to Ellen reciting poetry.
Jam Today
“The rule is, jam tomorrow and jam yesterday – but never jam today.” White Queen to Alice, Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There, by Lewis Carroll.
Last season’s
peach and gooseberry
sweet-tart on the tongue
spread on toast, muffins,
bagel with raisins
and cinnamon –
spice of the sabbath
now her body is jamming
itself, cells stuck and clogged
blocking the vital
spring again
flowers jam in the garden,
jazz musicians gone wild,
cacophony of tulips
trill of daffodil
violin tones of violets
and weeping redbud,
one gooseberry bush
bursting into flower
soft fruit
longing
to be picked.
Ellen S. Jaffe, 2016
for Sharon H. Nelson (2 January 1948 – 12 June 2016)
published in Persimmon Tree, Summer 2017
http://www.persimmontree.org/v2/summer-2017/international-poets/-
Recent Posts
- Written on the Body #31, Feb. 17, 2021: Hope and Uncertainty
- Written on the Body, #30: January 18, 2021, The Winter of Discontent
- Written on the Body, #29: December 24, 2020: Light Returns
- Written On the Body, #28, November 24, 2020: November Highs and Lows
- Written On the Body #27, October 28, 2020 — The Uncertainty Principle
Recent Comments
- Lauren Burke on Written on the Body #23 August 10, 2020: The Incredible Shrinking….
- Joanne Traum Raffel on Biography
- Ruth Zilkha on Written On the Body 13, Nov. 24, 2019: Beautiful British Columbia
- Ruth Zilkha on Written On the Body 13, Nov. 24, 2019: Beautiful British Columbia
- Suzanne Foreman on Written on the Body, #15: January 12, 2020 — Welcome to the New Decade
Author Archives: Ellen
Written on the Body #31, Feb. 17, 2021: Hope and Uncertainty
Hello. sorry it has been a while since I wrote. As a friend of mine once remarked, “things have been moving at the speed of darkness.”
February is a short month, but with many holidays. February 2 is “groundhog day,” … continue reading
Written on the Body, #30: January 18, 2021, The Winter of Discontent
Welcome to the New Year! Or is this just 2020 continued?
A friend who follows my blog asked why I hadn’t written a comment right after the insurrection attempt in Washington D.C. on January 6. Or were we all left … continue reading
Written on the Body, #29: December 24, 2020: Light Returns
So it is Christmas Eve, just past Winter Solstice, Chanukah has come and gone (Dec. 10-17), and the new year is coming.
Beginning again — I started this on Christmas Eve, then got a case of fatigue — surprising, since … continue reading
Written On the Body, #28, November 24, 2020: November Highs and Lows
As Thomas Hood wrote in an often-quoted poem,
| No sun — no moon! No morn — no noon — No dawn — no dusk — no proper time of day. No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease, No comfortable feel in any member — No shade, no shine, no |
Written On the Body #27, October 28, 2020 — The Uncertainty Principle
In physics, the uncertainty principle — articulated by Werner Heisenberg — states that we can know how fast something is going OR its exact location now, but NOT both at the same time. mataphorically, the uncertainty principle applies to all … continue reading
Written on the Body, #26, October 6, 2020 — Another Poem
I’m writing this soon after the previous post, but I want to share a wonderful reason to be thankful this (Canadian) Thanksgiving. I saw my oncologist this morning, and he is very pleased with the progress I am making with … continue reading
Written on the Body #25, October 2, 2020 — Poem for the Times
We have passed Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, and two harvest festivals are approaching: Sukkot, the Jewish festival, on Oct. 2-4, and Thanksgiving in Canada on Oct. 12. With the planet in such chaos from wildfires, hurricanes, extinctions of … continue reading
Written on the Body, #24 — September 10, 2020: Anniversaries and Changes
September already! The summer has “hurried slowly” (in Margaret Laurence’s words) past.
But I want to talk about anniversaries of events that happened right at the end of August — August 31 — and a few other times throughout the … continue reading
Written on the Body #23 August 10, 2020: The Incredible Shrinking….
A few weeks ago, I might have said this phrase applies to me: “The incredible shrinking woman.” Despite eating well, I was losing a few pounds that I didn’t want to lose, and, as I noted, was dealing with some … continue reading
Written on the Body #22, July 18, 2020 — Corona Blues and Chemo-Therapy
The last post took a while to write because of so much happening in the world. This took a while because of internal events and changes.
First of all, today is my father’s birthday: born in 1907, he would have … continue reading