Linda Mitchell (@A Word Edgewise) gave the Inklings our challenge this month. She charged us with writing “a poem that includes the idea of percentage or percent. Percentages are all around us in recipes, prices, assessments, statistics. Include the idea of percentage in your poem in some way.”
My poem was born during the drive home from Vermont. Our day in St. Albans and along the coast of Lake Champlain at Hathaway Point was fresh in my mind. As we burned up the miles through the Adirondacks, I wrote, looking up every few lines to take in the beauty of the fall foliage.
Here’s how the rest of the Inklings interpreted Linda’s challenge:
Linda@A Word Edgewise
Heidi @my juicy little universe
Molly@Nix the Comfort Zone
Catherine@Reading to the Core
Margaret@Reflections on the Teche
And here’s what the rest of the Poetry Friday Community is up to this week!
Last reminder! Tomorrow is the deadline to join in the Winter Poem Swap!
A(nother) Year of Reading 
Beautiful poem — so many stunning images, felt I was right there with you. There’s a 100% chance all the PF peeps will love it too. 🙂 Thanks so much for hosting this week.
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What a gorgeous poem, and I’m especially moved by these two lines,
“through stands of white-bark birches
and flutter-of-orange maples
Beautiful painting filled with sound-emitting images you’ve given us! Sounds like a fabulous trip, and that rain did come… Thanks for hosting the roundup Mary Lee!
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Aha! It’s no longer partly cloudy when they get to percentages! I remain intrigued by how they figure these things. All week long we’ve hovered between “Nah, it won’t rain,” and that twenty percent, and occasionally the mosaic of clouds becomes a solid cover, and we’re all surprised as it showers down. I love the many ins and outs of this poem, the movement from here to there – both of the skyscapes and of the hikers. What a beautiful poem.
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I just love this take on the prompt. The first stanza pulled me in and then you continued to wow me with your imagery throughout. The “flutter-of-orange maples”, the “mosaic”, etc. Thanks for taking us along on your hike and also for hosting today.
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I bask in the beauty of your adventure, Mary Lee, and love the percentage lens you took based on weather. The vivid description allows me to visualize the wonder of nature in fall. I followed your trip on FB and now get to reflect on what you saw through your poetic format.
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Ah, beautiful, Mary Lee. I can picture the sky mosaic now.
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So gorgeous, Mary Lee. I’m glad you took us on this part of your wonderful trip, perhaps about five percent of it? And I’m 100 percent happy that Linda gave this challenge and you created such beauty with it! Thanks for hosting!
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Oh. How gorgeous. I love this, Mary Lee. And I’m really looking forward to seeing what I can only imagine will be a wide interpretation of the theme. I loved the build in your poem, and that subtle shade of humour. But I hadn’t expected the ranger’s hut! How fortunate (spoilt!) you were. And those geese – just the perfect finish to a cloudburst.
Eeep! I for sure want to sign up for the Winter Poem Swap. If I get distracted between here and the sign-up, please add my name!!
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All good! I didn’t get distracted.🙃
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I still can’t believe you were visiting my former hometown, St. Albans, VT! That’s where I moved to when I graduated college in Castleton, VT and began my life of working in the real world, at the radio station that was right in downtown…and I lived there for a good 11-12 years! I love your poem because it brings back wonderful memories like Hathaway Point and the lake, Aldis Hill, and the entire area. Thanks for sharing this, and for hosting!
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I love how the storm approaches, enters, and leaves your poem with the geese at the end. I felt nostalgic for a to New England and a view of Lake Champlain. Well done. You made percentages truly poetic!
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Your poem sits at the intersection of poetry and mathematics. Love the probability that conjures up. Poetic percentages indeed- what are the chances? All interwoven with strong imagery. Well done Mary Lee. Thank you for hosting also.
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Oh, I, too, was a passenger in that car with you, ML! My sister lived up in that area, and this took me back. What spot-on imagery, and your poem reminds me of the importance of taking notes. So many details, remembered and woven carefully, have a 100% chance of bringing a reader right along, right along. Thank ou for hosting. xo
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Thank you for hosting today, Mary Lee, and for taking us on this breathtaking hike with you. I love the way you pair the chances of rain with verbs, not quite personifying them, but still bringing them to life. Well done!
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I’m 98% sure this poem is pure awesome, Mary Lee. The other 3% is me doing the math… 😉
Thanks for hosting.
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Thanks for hosting, Mary Lee (and do feel free to remove my first link–Jama beat me to being first while I was typing!). Of course this is a travel poem, a little journey we can all enjoy alongside you–such billowing, streaking, fluttering images!–but your instinct about the addition of the percentages is spot on. Everything becomes *more* when we remember to wonder “what are the chances?” It becomes a poem of greater gratitude.
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I love how your poem takes me on the hike with you with such wonderful specific images.
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You have birches in your poem! Yay! I love that first line especially. 🙂 I have birches today, too. Thank you! xo
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I 100% love this poem. I really love the second stanza — what I see, feel, and hear as I read it. Thanks for hosting this week, Mary Lee!
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100% beautiful, Mary Lee! Thanks for hosting today.
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I felt I was right there with you, Mary Lee. I especially like the end and how you could see and hear the rain coming across the lake. Wonderful how you can take a prompt that asks you to write about percentage and make something so lovely from it. (I have to admit to being a weather checker due to our many travels, I weigh those percentages and wonder about how accurate they will be, especially chance of ice, snow and winds as we travel during the winter. )
I love the way your ending stanza shows us the rainfalling drops.
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Your poem is beautiful Mary Lee and instructive to me. I need to sit and let my recent trip memories wash over me more – recounting my journey is a poem of more detail and length. I love the idea of including percents as well. My youngest son, now an artist, was adept at math. In fourth grade, he said, “Mom, math is everywhere!” And, so it is – even in poetry! Thanks for hosting and sharing your recent work!
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This poem is a painting with words. Beautiful, Mary Lee.
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Also, thank you for hosting Poetry Friday.
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Mary Lee, what a beautiful description of your rainy hike this poem gives us. We’re right there with you. I love some of those images: “hung low and purple / over the shoulders of mountains splashed with…autumn color” and the v of the geese pointing south. Wow! Lovely way to put it. Thank you for hosting Poetry Friday today.
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1What fun to tag along on your hike So glad you had a place to shelter. I’m 100% happy reading your words. Rain %s are the bain of my existence since I’m always trying to outwit the rain.
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Wow! Oh, wow…that phrase we hear all the time as background noise on the car radio, on our phone…20% chance of rain is never anything important until it is. And, in this poem, as that 20% grows and falls and fades to drips pointing south, I have been on a hike with you. I feel refreshed and ready for another! Well done.
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This lovely Mary Lee – what a clever way to incorporate a percentage into your poem. I love how we got to experience your hike with you, in all its varying percentages of rain.
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Thank you for sharing your wonderful hike with us! And for hosting this week. ❤ Ruth, thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown.blogspot.com
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