Cooking Up Good Things
june vacation recipe
—a real humdinger!
1930’s camp,
maine pond, new friends next door,
nine days, warm temps—serves 2
—dotty seiter
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~6.75 x 7.5″; watercolor, pencil, and collage on paper
temporary assemblage of all paper-tile units from a living work in progress
2026
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Notes about poem and art:
• I didn’t notice until several weeks after I wrote “june vacation recipe” that, except for its first “word”—which is actually in numerical form—it is made up entirely of one-syllable words, truly a humdinger of a recipe! While this haiku holds the traditional 17 syllables, I tweaked the recipe—as all good chefs do—in this case with lines of 5, 6, 6 instead of 5, 7, 5.
• I have loved inventing a free-form recipe and cooking up Hail, Hail, improvising and adjusting seasonings en route. The title of the collective piece has a double significance: first, all the pieces found their way back to being in one place together and, second, that reunion took place at camp where the welcome song ends with the words, Hail, hail, the gang’s all here while you’re at Takodah Camp!
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7 responses to “Cooking Up Good Things”
Didn’t quite the 1930’s bit….. When I read your poems or others as well I try to get the feel, not the rules…. so tweak on as much as you want. It’s probably the same process when looking at a painting.
I find all ingredients of a pleasant 9 days: a lake,good weather,new encounters, and the closeness of 2
What a gang! Are they stuck down… maybe mixing them up a bit…
Funny how sometimes the blog remembers me and sometimes I have to sign in… temperamental! today I am signed in, my avatar showing!
I read/listen to poetry to get the feeling also. When I write poetry, I like to consider “the rules” to see how or if they’ll collaborate in finding the best possible expression, and when writing notes to my followers, I often like to share details about form/rules as a way to elucidate process. All very engaging to me! Loved your saying “tweak on as much as you want”—that’s what I do!!
That “gang” in the photo is not stuck down, but I wanted a photo of them with the color squares in the same positions as they were before I cut the work as a whole into tiles and began embellishing. I did mix them up in a variety of ways for fun before sending them off one by one to Caroline in no particular “order.”
Sign-ins at various blogs are indeed temperamental—I run into that all the time and have no idea what leads to the vagaries. Glad all was on the up and up for you today!
Love your one syllable recipe! It IS a humdinger!
And oh how I love seeing the gang all together again. The whole is as beautiful as its parts!I’ve enjoyed the front row seat
to the poet’s ear and a teacher’s know-how.
You’re always in a growing season yet still know you have room to grow.
You keep myself challenged with your experience and energy
and it’s a popular belief that you are a real humdinger!
oh gosh I love the syncopated power of single syllable poetry! This one STUNS – I had to read it aloud just to savor the percussiveness!
”Hail! Hail!” Is so fantastic – seeing it all put together and then enjoying the full completeness of each separate component is deeply satisfying. Thank you so much for this grand finale!
Oh! “syncopated power”—love that characterization!
Happy to deliver with a grand finale, seeing all the pieces put back together as their upgraded selves. Such a simple undertaking from start to finish but so much satisfaction, grounding, and engagement over time.
Thanks for enjoying the step by step, Lola!
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