Tag Archives: Leslie Schultz photography and poetry

April 28, 2025 Context for Poem “Fashioning” & Some Highlights from “Art in Bloom” at the Minneapolis Institute of Art

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The influence on today’s poem that I knew at once was my visit yesterday with Tim and my sister, Karla, to the Minneapolis Institute of Art to see the annual extravaganza that is Art in Bloom. Previous posts have featured past years’ intersections between the art in the museum’s permanent collections and the creativity of the area’s floral artists.

The influence I only realized as I was preparing this post was my love of a poem by William Butler Yeats called “A Coat.” If you don’t know it, or if you want to reread it now, it is available on the Poetry Foundation website HERE.

Now I am intrigued by “Miss Lily Place.” “Prodigious shopper in the Suq”! Really, one cannot make these things–even these names–up!

People watching is as much fun–maybe more fun–than seeing the permanent art and the ephemeral floral creations inspired by it. My favorite image is the penultimate one!

Why not flaunt your style today!

April 27, 2025 Context for Poem “Noli Me Tangere”

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Today’s poem is a straight-forward seasonal inspiration from the garden. I always cheer to see these tiny, luminous spring ephemerals. Sometimes the timing of their blooming has coincided with Memorial Day and I have included them in bouquets I have made to place on the graves of Corrine and Elvin Heiberg in nearby Oak Lawn Cemetary. Now, researching them for this morning’s poem, I am aware not only of the power of their beauty but of their powerful poisons–not sure I will pick them again. If I do, it will be with caution and even more reverence.

Wishing you a day of discoveries without dangers!

April 25, 2025 Context for Poem “Common Yarrow”

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Yarrow by Rollstein (Pixabay)

Again, I am filling in the gap left by Rosendahl (no entries for “Y” in his otherwise extensive glossary.) I think yarrow, a member of the aster family, is very beautiful, and I am drawn to its pungent scent. I also love that it can, warrior-like, hold its own against the juglone secreted by our black walnuts. Today’s poem, “Common Yarrow,” rises out of my explorations into the botanical name for common yarrow (Achillea millefolium) and the plant’s presence in human history in Europe and Asia. Thinking about the different histories and uses of this familiar garden flower helped me to get to know it a little better. I will be tucking a little more yarrow into our garden in the coming weeks!

April 24, 2025 Context for Poem “California Flipbook”

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Red Hot Pokers in Point Arena, California
Headland, Point Arena Lighthouse
Mount Shasta

Lacking a Rosendahl entry for the Letter “X,” I decided to use the term “xeric,” which means “dry” or “arid.” That term brought back recent memories of my trip with Tim to the California coast last August. The poem, “California Flipbook,” draws on these memories and images taken late last summer, when the air was smoky from wild fires was ablaze near Chico, and the natural world was at once fragrant and beautiful but also demonstrably stressed and fragile.

Wishing you blue skies, wherever you go today, LESLIE

California Poppies at Home in Minnesota

April 22, 2025 Happy Earth Day! & Context for Poem “Earth Day, 2025”

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Full Rainbow Outside of Northfield, Minnesota
Afternoon Rainbow on Our Kitchen Floor

I associate outdoor light and shine with Earth Day, and I have every since I was sitting on our porch swing on Earth Day in 2000, with a nine-month-old Julia on my lap. The light rainfall ceased and a double rainbow appeared across the street. “Julia, Julia!” I said, “The Earth loves us back!”

Today’s poem, “Earth Day, 2025,” echoes that emotion for me.

These photos of sedums in our front garden were taken yesterday. They are “glazed with rainwater” in a way that I think that William Carlos Williams would appreciate, and we are thrilled that these robust, low-lying plants are coming up again, vernicose and welcome.

The prompt word that I chose today from Rosendahl’s glossary, “vernicose,” was not known to me before. I was quite taken with its definition, “shiny, as though varnished,” especially when applied to growing plants. As I sought to learn more online, I was questioned repeatedly about the spelling–did I not mean “varicose”?–no, I did not! I conclude that vernicose is not a commonly used word. I did, however, learn that vernicose leaves, especially in houseplants, are a sign of radiant health.

Wishing you a day of brightness and brilliant health, and the same to our beloved planet, Earth! LESLIE