2024 World Peace Poetry Postcard Month

World Peace Poets annual Poetry Postcard Month begins February 1st and is open to participants worldwide. You don’t need to identify as a poet, but simply be willing to write thoughts about peace as short poems on a postcard. Each day during the month of February you’ll mail a postcard to one of the 29 people on your list. They don’t need to rhyme or have a particular form. They are simply your thoughts sent out to others who look forward to receiving them. The best thing is that you will get postcards from 29 people sending you their ideas about peace. There’s no registration fee – instructions to sign up are on their Facebook page linked above.

Below is an example of a poem sent in 2020.

August Postcard Poetry Fest – a 2014 look back with 2021 on the horizon…

You almost want to cry. Almost. Milk splatters, expletives fly, but the joy of Pony Boy in the midst of his unexpected windfall creates a new context for spilled milk.

This one landed in British Columbia: 

THE LESSON OF SPILLED MILK.

No use crying.

Call in the cats.

Their pink tongues

will make sense of this

sideways turn of events

and ask you to consider

the unexpected luxury

of cold white milk

on blue linoleum.

Meanwhile… out on the wily, windy moors…

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You travel the heath

sheathed in cashmere,

shoulders draped in mink.

Your lips wear a warm shade of night

that wraps your words in style.

Clouds like ink threaten

to rewrite the story.

What falls from windswept skies

is as dark as what rises from the moor.

Come back, come back,

to the castle’s arms.

(It’s no Motel 6, but we’ll leave the light on for you.)

Meanwhile, at the 5 & dime…

Your cards are on the table. The world is turning, she says.  The moon looms large in a landscape of cups. You turn to the window and wonder what lies in the blue hills beyond the tree tops.

Marie at Woolworth’s ’63

You’ll never catch Marie

in rollers at the 5 and dime –

other mothers, maybe.

No, you’ll find her,

lipstick in place,

dressed in a cool yellow shift

and Jean Naté.

She wears summer well.

Back at the counter,

if she finds you down on your luck,

or hungry for company,

she’ll eat lunch with you –

her treat.

She’s that kind.

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2018 can be beautiful…

Painting by Albert Anker: Schoolgirl with Her Slate

In 2018, let’s ease up.

Let’s stop being jerks, and see the abundant goodness in people.

Let’s lay down our swords and shields. Every slight doesn’t have to be matched. Everyone different isn’t stupid or evil. Let’s form opinions from facts, and work for our beliefs with diplomacy. Let’s be kind, even when there seems zero payback. In the end, we’re empowered by the good we do. Let’s do better.

Remember,

goodness surrounds you.

So much is subtle, so much understated.

Let your heart be keen to mercy

and you’ll hear its call,  in flight, above rough seas.

Toss your own kindnesses to the waves-

they’re lifelines to those around you

who flounder.

~ Rosanne Braslow

 

A Winter’s Day – oil painting by Marie Martine, 2011

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stop! Look! A poem can be the big brass band…

Geez, Louise!  When your world is on parade, that bass drum can give you a headache. Hang in there. Around the corner, you can set down your tuba. There’s a girl offering water to thirsty musicians.

(This is one of the poems that never made its destination. Oh, wayward poem! Do you hang by a magnet on the mailman’s refridgerator?)

 

Sit a spell

Someone else can beat the drum

The time has come 

to let your marching feet rest

Look. Here comes

Miss Something-or-other

sashed in satin 

perched on a powder blue Lincoln

all the while dreaming

she’s with the band

~RTB

 

When it’s time to wager, put your money on poetry…

Put your money on black, or put your money on red. Some say it’s chance, some say fate. Whatever it is, make sure you’re in the game.

With the 2017 August Post Card Poetry Festival concluded, I’m nostalgic for last year’s work. Here are 2016’s poems and their post cards… consider it an August in review. If you missed this year’s fest and would like a postcard, let me know. I’ll send one and it doesn’t even need to be August… 

How’d you get so lucky?

Your desires were a tall stack of chips

that got played

till your pockets were empty

So good to know 

you were in the game all along

and not marching by

weighed down with fists

full of plastic

 

It is coincidental that today’s postcard is next in line… that being said, I ask you to consider these questions: What will it take for our representatives in Washington to tighten up the gun control laws and make military-style weapons illegal? At what point does an individual’s right to bear arms infringe upon the rights of their neighbors to live in safety and freedom?


When life feels like a table for one, let poetry be your candelabra…

It’s just you tonight. Lay the table with your good dishes. Choose the wine glass with the graceful stem, the china glazed with parakeets.  There are only so many days to live your life. 

With the 2017 August Post Card Poetry Festival concluded, I’m nostalgic for last year’s work. Here are 2016’s poems and their post cards… consider it an August in review. If you missed this year’s fest and would like a postcard, let me know. I’ll send one and it doesn’t even need to be August… 

What are you saving them for?

The lipstick, flamingo pink, is true.

That delicate cologne is the perfect shade of you.

The plums, cold and yielding,

Grandma glasses frosted blue,

and your fragile heart-

What good are they if not used,

maybe used up,

at risk of breaking?