Good evening, dVersifiers, and welcome to the bar! Tonight, let’s think about what makes us happy!

But first!

***Announcement***
REMINDER! Two chances to join OLN LIVE this month!
Thursday, June 22 from 3 to 4 PM EST
AND Saturday, June 24 from 10 to 11 AM EST.
You may still link one poem as usual for OLN (Open Link Night) even if you do not attend a live session.

Back to tonight!

Do you remember lockdown? You remember lockdown. For a little while, we thought the world had changed for good. In some ways, it had, but in other ways – well, it’s hard to imagine that we spent those months restricted and disconnected. The world shrank. I know lots of people took on projects – sourdough bread, anyone? – I wonder how many people have kept those up?

One of the things I wanted to keep hold of was taking pleasure in small things. We had a regular walk, and it was a real pleasure to watch the gradual change in nature over the season. We still do that walk sometimes, and I feel I know it in a way that I don’t know other walks. I feel that that taking pleasure in small things is easy to lose sight of, now that the world has expanded again, and there’s so much to do and think about and keep track of.

I recently picked up a book by Jen Feroze. I guess, in a way, it was her lockdown project. She asked a number of friends to tell her three things that made them happy – and then wove them into poems. It’s a joyful book – full of happiness and hope. It’s been a pleasure to read, and an inspiration for this prompt.

That’s what I want you to do: think of three things that make you happy. Don’t overthink it. They don’t have to be the things that make you happiest, they don’t have to be the only things that make you happy, they don’t have to be particularly special. Jen gives some examples:

“…a longing for nature and freedom, time spent with family…Fleetwood Mac songs, baking scones, detective novels and ceilidh dancing”.

To really inspire you, here’s

For Sally

Late June and the sky
is languidly, lazily blue.
Today, we’re hunters,
Lillyanna and I.
In sundresses and sandals,
our toes painted pink
as the heart of a seashell,
we head for the rose garden
for colours to catch.
This is my favourite place
to make rainbows.
Lillyanna is off like a sunbeam,
or a fairy tornado. Running
through bowers and arches
in search of the searing hot pinks.
I take my time through creamy whites,
whispery blushes, deep sensuous reds.
Breathing in the perfume of the flowers:
Turkish delight and long baths
and daydreams of exotic markets,
where spices stand like  bright mountains.
I find her transfixed by petals
the colour of melted butter.
When she holds them to her face,
it seems to glow.

And this is

For Jo

I hope the new normal is malleable,
a future we can shape in our hands:
wet clay and moth-wing gold.

I hope that our tomorrows are salt-splashed,
echoing with whoops and the happy shock of cold,
wild swimming, when we bob like a family of gulls.

That we move forward craving
months of umami; no longer seek to spin truths
or half-truths from strands of sugar.

Give us a winter with the red bite of kimchi,
a January that stings our lips
with salt and chilli oil. I hope we pen

the last chapters of the novel,
leave the brooding detective open-mouthed
and stuttering. Leave no loose ends, no skeletons.

Not a thing with feathers,
but the loping velvet shadow of a greyhound,
and a sunset as ripe as a cider apple.

If you like Jen’s work, you can find her on Twitter as @jenlareine and on Instagram as @the_colourofhope. And here:  https://linktr.ee/the_colourofhope.

So, poets assemble! Your mission is:

Choose three things that make you happy. Or, if there’s somebody else around, ask them for three things that make them happy, and write them a poem as a gift – giving to others makes us happy!

Write a poem, weaving in those three things. You can tell us what they are, or leave us to guess, that’s up to you.

Add a link to this post, and link up to Mr Linky.

Read and comment on the other poems you find there. Those interactions make us all happy.

Have fun!