No matter the weather,

inside or out,

I mostly feel better

if I work out.

                                                           JDG

I’ve learned once more

to pick something I can do,

find the conditions

which make it likely I will do it,

and then, day after day,

 follow through.

When the student is ready,

the way will come.

                                                                           JDG

I’m not speaking as a proud grandmother

when I say last night’s performance

blew me away. I also want to  say

any resemblance between Alice Beneke

(with her propensity for making things worse

by turning them into maudlin verse) and me

is one hundred percent coincidental.

                                                                                                              JDG

Restlessness turned me

toward the kitchen, but

mindfulness turned me aside

toward exercise.

After working out

I was more than satisfied.

                                                                          JDG

To walk the poet’s path

is to see the beauty

in the narrow and in the broad,

 in the fall of one leaf

amid a forest of

Autumn trees,

in the tear within the heart-felt smile,

in the ant struggling to flee 

a burning yule log.

To walk the poet’s

path is to try to give words

to the wordless wonder that surrounds.

                                                                               JDG

I didn’t wait for

the morning mist to clear. 

I cleared it myself

with exercise and started the day

more balanced and calm.

                                                                                      JDG

Resisted the lure

of taking a break.

The day was rainy

and my knee ached.

Exercised anyway

just for my sake. 

                                                    JDG