tkbrown.writer ~~ Site Map ~~

Menu Selection Now Available – 22 September 2019

Thank you so much for connecting to my page. I hope you enjoy. Click on menu to see the dropdown which includes all of my posts to this site. These pages are a work in progress. I am learning as I go. So, if you see some pages that do not fit with the rest, please ignore. I will have my own domain soon, but this learning curve has been necessary growth on my part – before launching that site. Thank you for bearing with my beginner tech skills through the process.

If you enjoy reading what I have written, please, let me know what you like – and what you dislike, in the ‘Reply’ box at the bottom of each post. Please ‘Follow’ to let the web know that you approve of what you see. Thank You!

by tkbrown

~~ aka: TKB, Treva Kay Brown and Treva Brown ~~

Give of yourself . . .

~~ by tkbrown ~~

I have shown you in every way, “by laboring like this, that you must support the weak. And remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.‘”‘ ~~ Acts 20:35 (NKJV)

Give a little of yourself, get something in return . . . 
Love someone in purest form, you may not be loved back
but, by giving of that purest love within
you learn to love yourself -- simply because of the giving.
In learning to love more of yourself
you become more intuitive, to your own needs --
and to those of others.
What greater blessing can He bestow -- but
to mold us into a tool to aid another along the journey . . . ?
Photo by: bingngu93
at pixabay.com

Life is Bittersweet . . .

~~ by tkbrown
Life is bittersweet . . .
With everything you gain, you lose something . . .
With everything you lose, you gain something . . .
Until this is learned, life is fraught with unnecessary pain.
Only in learning to accept the losses in life
will we ever truly experience the blessings that we gain.
Photo by: Google.com.

Cooling Our Fall . . .

Photo by: jplenio at pixabay.com

— a haiku septet by tkbrown

Nights are cooler now,
the days unbearably hot.
Fall will be here soon.

Cooler nights begin
to cool both ends of the days --
morning and evening.

Then the midday temp
brings forth a welcome relief -
color's bright array!

Hills and vales display
bright colors on God's palette -
Fiery, vibrant view!

Apples and pumpkins,
with acorn and butternut -
paint the food display.

Everywhere colors
show mellowing with the age -
quaintly beautiful!

Paving a path with love
as the end appears ahead -
a transitioning!

Hurricane

~~ a haiku ~~

~~ by tkbrown
The hurricane blows,
a big limb spikes through the roof --
squirrel babes need home

~~~~~~~~~~

Haiku The traditional Japanese haiku is a three-line poem with seventeen syllables, written in a 5/7/5 syllable count format The haiku often focuses on images from nature. It emphasizes simplicity, intensity and directness of expression.

Haiku began in thirteenth-century Japan as the opening phrase of ‘Renga’, an oral poem which generally was one hundred stanzas in length — also composed syllabically. The much shorter haiku broke away from the renga in the sixteenth century. It was mastered a century later by Matsuo Basho, who wrote the following classic haiku:

An old pond!
A frog jumps in.
The sound of water.

As the haiku form has evolved, many rules have been broken. However, the philosophy of haiku has been preserved: the focus on a brief moment in time, a use of provocative, colorful images, an ability to be read in one breath; and a sense of sudden enlightenment and illumination.

The haiku philosophy influenced poet Ezra Pound, who noted the power of its brevity and juxtaposed images. He wrote, “The image itself is speech. The image is the world beyond formulated language (The Academy of American Poets).

Source: The Academy of American Poets. (29 February 2016). “Haiku: Poetic Form.” (10 September 2019). https://poets.org/text/haiku-poetic-form.

~~~~~~~~~~

Photo Above: by skeeze @ pixabay.com.
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Lead: paint and other things II

~~ a Quindecim ~~

~~ by tkbrown
It took four years to devise a plan,
ten more to set it in place.
Anti-corrosive coating coursed through the pipes
for they hoped to at least save face.
A sample testing every six months
until they reached the target space.
That small random sample, selected how?
The plan did not ever specify that.
So, do they pick the few known to be safe?
Or, do they were devil's advocate hat
and pick some of both groups of ordinance plats --
then celebrate with both keg and vat?
Why then, test only every three years,
and why does it seem they allay their fears
by doing testing themselves instead of contracting 'all clears'?

~~~~~~~~~~

Quindecim: A Poetic Form that has developed rather naturally as I have written much regarding political and daily living events. The fifteen line stanza seems to work wonderfully by allowing twelve lines to describe the developing arena. Then the last three present some new development that throws a ‘curve ball’ into the mix. There is no specific syllabic or metric count. It is, however, rhymed with no set pattern. The patterns used should recur in a later quindecim when the poem consists of several stanzas. There is no set pattern for the recurrence.

~~~~~~~~~~

Photo Above: by Dhito 10 @ pixabay.com.
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Lead: paint and other things

~~ a Quindecim ~~
~~ by tkbrown
Lead paint was said to harm our babes;
we must scrape it all away.
'Twas taken to heart, and most did in spade
abide that law with dread array
of the fate to come their way
if 'twas not done as law did say.
So, homes were scraped inside and out,
then scrubbed with bleach for brand new paint.
The child of those who did sulk and pout,
'twas removed until parents' mood did abate.
Toys with lead, stores removed on that date,
but now WE learn of quite a spate.
That government did make those laws
but did not remove it from those claws
before they fed them with 'those paws.'

~~~~~~~~~~

Quindecim: A Poetic Form that has developed rather naturally as I have written much regarding political and daily living events. The fifteen line stanza seems to work wonderfully by allowing twelve lines to describe the developing arena. Then the last three present some new development that throws a ‘curve ball’ into the mix. There is no specific syllabic or metric count. It is, however, rhymed with no set pattern. The patterns used should recur in a later quindecim when the poem consists of several stanzas. There is no set pattern for the recurrence.

~~~~~~~~~~

Photo Above: by Dhito 10 @ pixabay.com.

~~~~~~~~~~

Lead Pipes . . .

~~ an Essay ~~

~~ by tkbrown

According to the Associated Press (Porter and Catalini), lead pipes — in cities across America — are poisoning our children . . . and us . . . via the water that is piped into our homes. Tainted water in Washington D.C. was just the beginning. Then came the Flint, Michigan water scandal . . . and now Newark, New Jersey.

The human body, our domestic animals . . . we must have water to live. What an irony that the very pipes bringing that water into our homes are also poisoning that water with lead. This water, in turn, poisons all who drink it.

Porter and Catalini cite the 1986 Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ban of lead in water pipes. The reason for the ban, cited by the EPA, was “lead’s harmful effects on children’s nervous systems.” In 1991, water systems across the nation were required by federal mandate to monitor lead levels in drinking water with a limit established of 15 parts per billion.

The 1991 mandate was twenty-eight years ago. This means that every town, village, community and city in this nation should have, on record, the levels of lead in the servicing water system(s). How much lead are YOU drinking daily? How much lead is your beloved dog or cat drinking daily? Even more importantly, how much are our children — who have no protection if not by us — drinking daily?

Are WE killing our children in America, because we have omitted following up on these mandates? Are WE causing the neurological damage that our children suffer because we have blindly trusted the system to correct the problem?

It is time for US to stop allowing our children to be poisoned by the very people who create the laws for us to live by! It is time for us to stop putting the children of other nations ahead of our own children’s health, education and welfare!

It is time for US — ALL OF US — to inundate our local, state and federal government representatives with demands to purify our water systems. Is the anti-corrosive coating inside many of these lead pipes actually preventing that lead from leaching through into the water? We had better be finding out — for our children’s sake — for our grandchildren’s sake!

Passing out bottled water is not sufficient! That bottled water in no way covers all of the water ingested by our children. Food is washed and cooked from tap water, as a rule. That means the very food we are serving our children may be poisoning them. Where can our children turn for protection if we, their parents and grandparents, are not protecting them?

~~~~~~~~~~

Sources: Porter, David and Catalini, Mike. (13 September 2019). “Lead pipes that tainted Newark’s water are found across US.” (Accessed 13 September 2019). Associated Press (AP) on msn news. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/lead-pipes-that-tainted-newarks-water-are-found-across-us/ar-AAHfXiB?ocid=spartanntp.

Mayo Clinic. (6 December 2016). “Patient Care and Health Information – Diseases and Conditions: Lead Poisoning.” (Accessed 13 September 2019). Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research (MFMER) https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/lead-poisoning/symptoms-causes/syc-20354717.

~~~~~~~~~~

Photo Above: by Epcor.com.

~~~~~~~~~~

Love . . .

by tkbrown

Love is like
the petals of a rose
soft and sweet
against your nose
with drops of dew
that actually glow.

So very slowly
the feeling grows
until you’re sure
that everyone knows
the love you feel
deep in your heart
for the one with whom
you never will part.

Written 1968 – First Love