Poets United Midweek Motif ~ Picnic(s)

A book of verse beneath the bough,
A loaf of bread, a jug of wine, and thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness –
Ah, wilderness were paradise enow!

— Omar Khayyam

"The countryside — usually a village by a river or ringed by hills — 
scores well as the family picnic destination."
 Photo: V Raju in "For the love of picnics" by Anjana Basu 

"A picnic may well be a metaphor for life. The essentials for happiness are the right company, moderate if sanguine expectations and a reasonable standard of physical sustenance and comfort, the whole being bedeviled by the belief that there is always something better to be had if only one presses on." ~ P. D. James

Midweek Motif ~ Picnic(s)

"It's no picnic!" is an English idiom meaning "It's difficult."  I've had some difficult picnics, too, what with bugs, wild things, and forgotten bottle openers ~ but the basic idea is to get away from normalcy with very good food, drink and company. Sometimes for me, the company has been a very good book.

What are your fondest picnic experiences? the funniest? the most unexpected?

Your Challenge:  Using sense images, bring a picnic to life in a new poem. 

Hungarian: Majális (1873) Picnic in May

Knoxville Tennessee

by Nikki Giovanni

 I always like summer
Best
you can eat fresh corn
From daddy's garden
And okra
And greens
And cabbage
And lots of
Barbeque
And buttermilk
And homemade ice-cream
At the church picnic
And listen to
Gospel music
Outside
At the church
Homecoming
And go to the mountains with
Your grandmother
And go barefooted
And be warm
All the time
Not only when you go to bed
And sleep

The Shadow Voice

by Margaret Atwood

 My shadow said to me: 
what is the matter

Isn't the moon warm
enough for you
why do you need
the blanket of another body

Whose kiss is moss

Around the picnic tables
The bright pink hands held sandwiches
crumbled by distance.
 Flies crawl
over the sweet instant

You know what is in these blankets

The trees outside are bending with
children shooting guns.
 Leave
them alone.
 They are playing
games of their own.

I give water, I give clean crusts

Aren't there enough words
flowing in your veins
to keep you going.

Grape sherbet

by Rita Dove 

The day? Memorial.
After the grill
Dad appears with his masterpiece–
swirled snow, gelled light.
We cheer. The recipe's
a secret and he fights
a smile, his cap turned up
so the bib resembles a duck.

That morning we galloped
through the grassed-over mounds
and named each stone
for a lost milk tooth. Each dollop
of sherbet, later,
is a miracle,
like salt on a melon that makes it sweeter.

Everyone agrees– it's wonderful!
It's just how we imagined lavender
would taste. The diabetic grandmother
stares from the porch,
a torch
of pure refusal.

We thought no one was lying
there under our feet,
we thought it
was a joke. I've been trying
to remember the taste,
but it doesn't exist.
Now I see why
you bothered,
father.

*****

Please share your new poem using Mr. Linky below and visit others in the spirit of the community—

              (Next week Sumana’s Midweek Motif will be ~ Light )