Air with a Wild Side

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

A rainy morning,
a pottery mug,
steam rising, barely visible,
the aroma of toasty coffee.
I hold this cup of comfort,
admire the steam-drift
as liquid shape-shifts into cloud,
the aliveness of it
diffusing in a dance
undulating upward,
thinning until it vanishes
into the coolness of the room.
Even then its dance goes on,
for it’s the air around this fairy wisp
that directs the dance,
the always-moving air
that shifts it,
swirls it,
twirls it,
the same air with a wild side
that gusts and roars,
whirls and stirs
dust devils, hurricanes, tornadoes.
Through the window,
I watch today’s weather,
wind rocking branches,
scattering raindrops,
loosening autumn leaves,
and I realize it’s the wind I listen for,
the wind I want to feel,
the wind I want to befriend.
This morning it’s a tiny breath,
a whisper of breeze,
a hushed brush of wind
waltzing with the steam
that rises from my coffee
to calmly, quietly
start my day.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Late Afternoon in Tuscany

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

I’ve just returned from two wonderful weeks in Italy. So for a few weeks, my poems will bring you snippets of that trip.

The sun drifts slowly lower
in a lazy haze of clouds.
Soft, easy waves of wind
ruffle the leaves of the trees
and gently rock the tops
of tall, thin cypress,
the stately stewards of Tuscan hills.
Harvest is a few weeks away,
and the olive trees sparkle
as if they were edged in ice.
But that’s a trick of sun on silver leaves,
for it is still summer and fire hot,
by the calendar almost autumn
but not yet.
Ruddy tiled roofs angle here and there
down the hillside,
serene and sure of themselves,
watching over stone walls
with windows open-shuttered
to let in the easy breeze dancing
through open doors and arches,
up stone stairways,
across tiled floors,
cooling day-warmed bedrooms
waiting for sleepy heads,
kitchens waiting for cooks,
bathrooms waiting for bodies
to disrobe and yield to the kind,
cleansing rain of the shower.
Into one window and out another,
the wind journeys on
past tiled roofs,
over silver-green olives and stately cypress,
across a distant, evening-blue river
up sloping green hills
around darker, dimmer hills beyond
to a distant volcanic mountain on the horizon,
an ancient sacred site
now fading in a hush of blue.
Time seems to wait,
the moment unfolding in silence
interrupted only by the occasional buzz
of a passing fly
and the ruffled, muffled whisper
of a wandering wind
as the sun drifts slowly lower
and disappears
in a lazy haze of clouds.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

The Wonder of Waiting

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

As I wait for my grandson
in the school pickup line,
a breeze meets me,
and I turn my face to fully feel it.
Summer-green hills doze in the distance.
Thin, feathered clouds float in a lazy drift.
The afternoon sun warms my arm.
I sip toasty-sweet, cooling coffee,
listen to the call of birds
and the footsteps of one of the
after-school cleaning crew.
She checks her watch
as she make her way between cars
to the school building.
The woman in the next car
gathers her hair,
smooths and gathers,
smooths and gathers,
and at last decides it’s good enough
to twist a scrunchie around it,
her phone in selfie mode as a mirror.
Then she goes back to scrolling.
Everyone seems to be bent over
their phones, which is exactly
what I would be doing
if I hadn’t accidentally left my phone at home.
I am untethered to technology,
drifting along with the day,
soothed by the sights and scents and sounds
of the real, here-and-now world.
I inhale its richness and revel in the wonder
of waiting.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week (look closely—can you find the goldfinch?):

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Volcanic Vibes

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

The last days of summer stretch ahead
like a lava flow
halfway down a mountain
having burned and buried
the past weeks
on the way to burning and burying
the next few.
Hydrate, I remind myself.
The red-hot glow of summer
swims in sweltering waves
broken by brief breezes,
wisps of half-hearted wind
drifting away to elsewhere,
anywhere
cool.
It might help to hydrate,
I whisper to them,
hoping for rain.
I grew up in the dry summers
of West Texas,
where we saw mirages
on the highway,
and someone was always ready
to prove you could really and truly
fry an egg on the sidewalk.
One hot afternoon,
I left my baby doll, Connie, outside
on the concrete patio
in the mid-day midsummer sun.
She really and truly melted.
I wonder now,
in this overheated summer:
how hot do these volcanic vibes
have to be
before I melt too?
I grab my glass of water,
toast the veil-thin clouds and coax them,
Hydrate.
Fill yourselves
then spill yourselves.
Cool us and quench us
and hydrate us too.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Sensing Autumn

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

I know Autumn is still weeks away
and Summer still has lots of dance in her,
but my heart has begun to turn toward Fall.
Maybe it’s because one day this week,
as I poured sunflower seeds
into the bird feeder,
a hint of coolness breezed in.
Just a hint.
At that moment,
Summer paused,
looked over her shoulder,
and nodded.
This is the way of seasons,
Autumn giving notice to Summer,
even though Summer will swelter
for a few more weeks.
But children return to school next week,
which seems an Autumn thing to do.
(Here I must pause,
being of a certain age,
obliged to remind readers
that when I was school-age,
we never went back to class
until September.
So it will forever feel unnatural
to start in August.)
Yes, although school starts next week,
our part of the world
will still
wear summer
for a while yet.
But Autumn has given us a heads-up.
She is on her way with the wonders of Fall.
My sun-baked garden senses it.
Squirrels and chipmunks do too, I think,
and the birds as well.
Now that this bit of breeze
has cooled me,
I sense Autumn too.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

Inside a Dusky Moment

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

As I take out the trash this evening,
a cool breeze whispers,
Wait.
Wait.
Wait.
I pause in the shadow-darkened dusk
and find myself
inside a majestic moment of time
that usually slips past unnoticed,
that moment when,
like a silent waterfall,
evening slides over the edge of day
into the deep pool of night.
Wait.
Wait.
Overhead two pinpoints of light
sail the sea of dark space.
One is a plane skimming the sky,
the other lies at anchor, steady and still,
a planet, first to appear
among the stars tonight.
Wait.
Wait.
Other lights, smaller,
more down-to-earth
begin to blink,
fireflies starting their slow dance
among the pines and English ivy.
One firefly glides an invisible path
in front of me,
winking a slow welcome.
Another hovers nearby
flashing a pot of pink petunias.
Then both slide away quietly, easily
through the darkness.
Night bugs sing their silvery song,
and the cool night breeze whispers,
Peace.
I tiptoe down the porch steps.
The trash goes into the bin.
I don’t think I have ever been grateful
for the chore of taking out the trash.
But tonight,
tonight,
I am.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

For the Price of a Pause

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

Spring tiptoed in during the night.
I didn’t expect her so soon.
Winter may yet wave
a final icy farewell,
but today the air hums with Spring,
and I have paused my plans
to revel in her return,
to wonder at the newborn world.
Daffodils dance in a drowsy flowerbed.
Tiny purple blooms run wild in the grass.
Pear trees show off snowy white blossoms.
Lenten roses raise their faces, blushing.
Above in barely budding trees,
birds chatter and cheer and
sing welcome
as if they’ve been secretly saving,
all winter long,
this exact song
for this exact moment.
The breeze, mild and gusty,
flirts with the flowers,
ruffles the robin’s feathers,
whispers to the bluebird
a hint of rain to come.
I marvel at Nature’s generosity.
For the simple price of a pause,
she pours out to me more than I can hold—
seasonal symphonies of sound and song,
an ever-changing gallery of shifting colors,
shapes and shadows
coming and going and coming again,
all mine to see, to hear,
to hold in my heart,
all for the price of a pause.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.
Text and photos © Karyn Henley 2026. All rights reserved.

Tangled in a Tree

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

There’s a balloon
caught high in a neighbor’s tree.
I’ve been keeping an eye on it for weeks.
At first it looked like a grand butterfly
flapping oversized wings
as the wind tried to blow it down.
It never dropped but day by day
shrank until it dangled,
entangled and trapped in twiggy tentacles.
Each breath of the breeze
makes it wave like a flag,
flapping and flashing gold-red in the sun.
My mind wants to make something natural of it—
perhaps it’s a precariously perched hawk
or a squirrel out on a limb,
maybe a clump of mistletoe
or an angel trumpet bloom,
maybe one last giant red autumn leaf
clinging to this leafless winter tree.
But this metallic dangling thing is not natural,
probably poses a danger
to birds,
to squirrels,
to buds that will come in the spring.
I once untangled a robin caught in a string
that was, in turn, snagged in a bush.
I once freed a sparrow
whose foot was trapped
in the bars of a feeder.
I remember how helpless they were,
weighing almost nothing
but fighting with every ounce to get free.
So I hope that before a bird is tangled
in this saggy baggy balloon,
the ribbon will wear thin,
the mylar will tear,
and the danger will fall from the tree
to be tossed into someone’s trash can.
But for now, there’s a deflated balloon
dangling high in a neighbor’s tree.
I’ll enjoy the magic of its changing colors
as the sun comes and goes,
the surprise of its shifting shapes
as the wind sighs and blows.
I’ll keep an eye on it.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

The Changing Weather of Peace

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

Peace and stillness—
sometimes they go together,
sometimes they don’t.
Like wind,
peace can breeze in softly,
but it can also whistle sparkling cold
through cracks in closed hearts.
Wake up, it says, all will be well.
There’s a pensive peace
that watches the sky for storm clouds.
There’s peace that sighs in relief
when trouble skims past,
simply rocking branches, teasing leaves.
Then there’s peace that weathers the storm
like a boulder unmoved,
the tree left standing.
And there’s a festive peace,
noisy and fresh as a sudden spring shower,
full of laughter, lifted glasses, shared stories.
This holiday season held that peace for me—
a flowing, swirling, rushing peace
of listening and watching the joy of family,
the gratitude of gathering,
the hope of health and happiness to come.
Now that family has left
and I sit alone in my family room,
the stillness returns.
Peace drifts down like silent snow,
and I know that peace
is the weather
of the healing heart.
-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.

A Game of War I Don’t Want to Play

Posted by karynhenleyauthor

He’s being cranky again, my young grandson,

corralling me into a game of war

I do not want to play,

the swingset the villain’s lair.

I don’t like war, I tell him.

I don’t like fighting.

I like peace.

He says, “First you fight the monsters,

and then you go to your place of peace.”

I look up,

up to the treetops,

take a deep breath.

I don’t tell him that I have some experience

in fighting monsters who were not quite

as imaginary as his.

Or were they?

I also don’t tell him

that I don’t always win.

The treetops sway,

the breeze whispers peace.

I look back at my grandson.

“Okay,” I say.

“I will fight your monsters.”

And my heart breaks a little.

Because I know that I will.

-kh-

Nurture peace, cultivate kindness, and carry the calm.

Nature of the week:

Shadow of the Week:

If you want me to send these thoughts to your email each Sunday, simply sign up on the right.