lonita

[lonita]

Federal electoral reps can get fucked (except for Mike Morrice, who's a righteous dude)

I'm too angry to write a poem today Too angry to find something decent to say I watched a debate for disability concerns And was again reminded of how little ableds have learned about disability, about need about accessibility, voices, and how to pay heed about inclusion, dismissal about frustration, and poverty, and equity and, in the end, that we're people

Global Poetry-Writing Month

[lonita]

Gaza

One of the worst thing I've heard out of the mouth of someone I know was that it couldn't have been that bad in Gaza because ... they have universities there. I haven't spoken to them since.

April Blogging from A to Z Challenge

[lonita]

Mistaken identity

I thought they were grapes but they were cherries I can still be merry about cherries Sometimes things appear to the vision impaired as other things like the trays of cheese or was it melon? on the buffet lunch table It was orange and square sitting there If you like both, you're golden Or, one is delicious and the other is melon Global Poetry-Writing Month

[lonita]

Food bank

Every Monday, I volunteer at a food bank. I hadn't wanted to be front-facing, because seeing people hungry makes me crazy. I've seen people cry. I didn't want to cope with that, but I still wanted to be helpful. However, when I signed up, the front desk is where they needed me, so that's where I am. We have a shelf at the front desk where we put random things that people can choose an item or two from along with their regular parcel. Sometimes those shelves at food banks contain the most odd things - which today was a tin of mackerel. I'm from the east coast of Canada, so I'm genetically predisposed to the enjoyment of fish, but I'll never understand the appeal of mackerel. I think the oddest thing I've ever seen on the random shelf is a tin of snails. Snails. That's an even harder pass than the mackerel. It's been nearly a year, and while I still don't like to see people hungry, some of the people have been so lovely. There's a gentleman that sometimes plays the piano while he waits, and every once in a while one of the clients will become a volunteer. It's a wonderfully multicultural place, with people from countries across the globe. I've learned about languages I never knew existed, and learned to make use of the translation app on my phone - except for that time I wasn't paying attention and kept showing a lady my text in Arabic when what she needed was Persian. D'oh. Also, if you're one of those people with an offensively large collection of reusable grocery bags that you're not sure what to do with, donate them to a food bank. They can always use them.

April Blogging from A to Z Challenge

[lonita]

Going

I don't know that I understand why or when or how or what I don't know that I will understand why even after I have sought and looked and held touched, tasted, and smelled and felt, and heard, and thought

Global Poetry-Writing Month

[lonita]

Experiences

While I enjoy Things as much as the next person who enjoys them, I've long since come to a stage of life where I prefer experiences. Things are lovely, but I like doing, sharing, making, creating, enjoying much more. Besides, I don't have to dust my experiences.

April Blogging from A to Z Challenge

[lonita]

Seen

We are all driven by reward A thing, a feeling, a medal, a paper for the wall People talk about love languages How they give, what they need to receive My reward is not material It's attention, knowing that I am seen that I matter

Global Poetry-Writing Month

[lonita]

What am I?

I can see you, touch you, taste you, smell, You sink my soul, my heart will swell. I can hear you, feel you, write and erase you, Sing you, dance you, run from and chase you. I can find every truth, and every lie. I can say hello, and cry goodbye. You can come and go, and move with stillness, You can heal the simple and complex illness. You are the worst and the best, The answer to every test. You are every direction, and nowhere at once, You are the intellect and the dunce, The up for down, and in for out, The silent scream, and quiet shout. You are digital and analogue, The bird, the fish, the cat, and dog. You are nations, and notions, and itching, and lotions, You are faithless, and prayerful, full of devotions. You're an atheist, an angel, a demon, a priest, Who eats the bread without the yeast. You make promises that you break, You're a vegetarian eating steak. You're the highest mountain, and valley low, You're everything that no one knows, And nothing no one understands, And when I hold you in my hands,      I get cramps. So, what am I?

Global Poetry-Writing Month

[lonita]

Disability debate

The federal election approaches apace. As part of the campaigning efforts, a leaders debate regarding disability is forthcoming. Attendees are invited to submit a question for the candidates, though there is no guarantee these will be used. This is the question I submitted: While financial supports are certainly paramount regarding disabled Canadians, and I want to know what each party is going to do regarding the Canada Disability Benefit and future supports, I also want to know how each would address the future-building of our country with disability as a focus, as default. Our society is built for the general comfort of fully-able people, and treats disability like a side quest. However, disability is the one condition that will impact almost every human - whether through birth defect, congenital conditions, illness, injury, or age - and does not care about skin colour, political affiliation, religion, economic status, nor anything else. If it wants you, it'll come for you. What will each do to change our societal focus such that we build social and physical infrastructure that addresses this shared situation future, and makes our country a more comfortable place for the disabled and, in turn, everyone else?

April Blogging from A to Z Challenge

[lonita]

A verse

Averse Avers Aver Ave Global Poetry-Writing Month

[lonita]

Childhood

Growing up, there was a family with three girls around my age that had moved to Ontario from Cape Breton at about the same time my family did. They lived in the same apartment building, but that became an issue for their growing family, and moved to a house some years after.

The father was a handyman of sorts, and did a number of renovations on that house over the years. But one of the first was installing speakers in the bathroom. This was the late '70s/early '80s, so it was the height of modernisation to us.

We lost no opportunity in waiting till any adult would go to use the washroom, in putting on the record they had that explained the birds and bees to young people, particularly at the point where insertion was explained.

I don't think we got away with that nearly enough times before they finally took the record away from us.

April Blogging from A to Z Challenge

[lonita]

Challenge

On July 15th, 2005 I smoked my last cigarette.

Quite by chance, July 15th, 2015 I took my first Iaido class.

I've had years to work up something momentous to do on July 15th 2025, but nothing's coming to me, and it's getting down to the wire.

Quitting smoking wasn't planned. It happened in the moment, and I haven't looked back.

Iaido wasn't planned either. I was in my first class three days after I'd even found out it existed.

I'm hoping something comes to me. Something good. Something interesting. Something momentous. Something small. Something challenging.

April Blogging from A to Z Challenge

[lonita]

Dojo

Sometimes the safest place in my universe       is a room full of people waving swords       and the camaraderie that comes with the other rewards Global Poetry-Writing Month

[lonita]

Beauty

I think we've been cultured to see beauty only in the large scale - and it is there, like the colours of a Zhang Yimou film. But there's beauty in simple things that we miss, in the every day, in the common. Like the efforts so many of us put into writing and sharing online, in telling our stories, even when our stories are just the everyday of the grocery store, the walk to work, or the single flower finally popping its spring-time out of the muddy greys of winter. Maybe that's a little too obvious a thing, but even winter, a time so many of us don't spend much thought on the beauties of because we're waiting anxiously for it to be over, has its beauties. My favourite is a nighttime walk after a deep snowfall, when the snow is still fresh and the world is silent, muffled, and soft.

April Blogging from A to Z Challenge

[lonita]

Anger

Anger is a common feeling for me of late - anger at the overarching capitalism that's eating us all apart, that drives a wedge between us when it doesn't need to be there, that devalues knowledge, and at the centrism and its followers that contribute to its continuance by prioritising their comfort over the collective good. Maybe it's a petty thing to think about, to consider, but it bothers me when people won't even consider a moment of self-inconvenience in order to support another, in order to protest.

Centrism is not some kind of happy middle ground - centrism supports the status quo, the oppressor. It does nothing for marginalised people, but instead fuels their continued harm. Sometimes it looks like progressiveness, but it never is. It - in the form of liberalism - merely, as Manning Marable said, "uses the radical's language to achieve the conservative's aim."

April Blogging from A to Z Challenge

[lonita]

Fruit

Sometimes I crave sweet Sometimes salty But my body now craves the fresh The taste of apples, oranges, and plums And the dream of peach season As summer's heat melts its last And September's in the offing Global Poetry-Writing Month