Category Archives: Reflections

Beautiful Eau Sauvage…

08 Wednesday Jul 2026

Posted by in Aging, beautiful, Father, Poetry, Reflections

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© Joan Currie – My father’s aftershave


Eau Sauvage by Joan Currie

On a trip to Paris,
after a college year abroad,
I bought my father
a bottle of
Eau Sauvage aftershave.

I don’t know why.
Perhaps I was seduced by the
elegant Christian Dior
fragrance counter.
Or was it a friend’s urging?

He wasn’t a man
who wore cologne.

But after receiving that gift,
he wore its fresh lemon scent
for the rest of his life.

Even in hospice,
after my brother handed me
my father’s shaving kit,
a daily ritual
became a final sacrament.

I drew the razor
across his three-day stubble.

He always said
I had healing hands.

I ran tepid water
into a stainless steel bowl,
rinsed his face clean,
and dried it gently
with his well-worn terry-cloth towel.

The final act
was pouring a few drops
of Eau Sauvage
into my palms

and patting his smooth cheeks
just as he had done
a thousand times before.

I felt he knew
I was there,

in communion with him

one last time.

Amen.

Beautiful Blue Velvet Ribbons…

30 Tuesday Jun 2026

Posted by in Art, Drawing, Painting, Reflections, watercolor

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© Joan Currie – Art from my camp truck.


Blue Velvet Ribbons by Joan Currie

I came across
my old summer camp trunk
in the attic.

Inside were thick folders,
tied with sky-blue velvet ribbons.

I knew what lay within:

pencil crayon drawings
of my blond cocker spaniel,
seagulls at the beach,
ducks on the pond,
and my younger brother
in his Mountie costume.

But my favorites
were the paper doll fashions–

wedding gowns
painted in soft watercolor,
headdresses
with sunbursts and roses,
crowns and tiaras,
and Della Robbia wreaths
laden with flowers and fruit.

I made them
on rainy Sunday afternoons.

They were shown
to no one.

I wasn’t waiting
for praise or advice.

The making
was enough.

Each dress
belonged to an imagined life
I carried quietly,
as tenderly
as a child carries
a small secret.

Years later
I showed them
to my daughters.

Already,
they were better artists
than I had ever been.

They smiled,
admired them,
but declined
to add another dress
to the collection.

Perhaps,
one day,
a grandchild
will untie
the blue ribbons,

lift out the folders,

and begin again.

Not so Beautiful Bastard Cabbages…

12 Friday Jun 2026

Posted by in Flowers, Garden, Poetry, Reflections

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© Joan Currie – Daisies at sunrise.


Bastard Cabbages by Joan Currie

I pulled out the last of them
with the point of a
rock climbing pick.

The dirt was hard–
their stems thick as rhubarb.

Then it rained
for five days straight.

Bastard Cabbages returned,
invading my sweet garden,

their leaves spreading wide
like skirts of French court gowns.

But such extravagance
left little room
for daisies, snapdragons, and
sweet peas
started from seed.

I carved out a space
around the tiny flowers.
They, too, needed
light and air.

Could I keep
such a place?

Beautiful Nana…

30 Saturday May 2026

Posted by in Aging, Art, beautiful, Fashion, Flowers, Poetry, Reflections, Relationships

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© Joan Currie – My Nana’s pearls and flower power dress fabric.

My Nana – by Joan Currie

I adored my paternal grandmother,
Nana.

She looked very much
like the Queen Mother–
not only in her coloring
but in the way she dressed.

Heavy silk dresses,
a string of pearls,
a brooch pinned neatly below her neckline.

She was always prim and proper,
her expression composed,
though it softened into a lovely smile
when we sang “Happy Birthday,”
when she beat me at checkers,
and especially when she offered
a slice of lemon meringue
or apple pie,
still warm from the oven.

One day she wore a dress
my mother had sewn for her
from fabric covered
in flowers the color of
those in the flower power
advertisements.

I looked at her in wonder.

“Wild flowers!” I declared.

She giggled then–
a light, girlish sound
I had never heard before.

For an instant,
I caught sight of someone
other than my dutiful Nana:

a young woman
bright with life,
still there beneath
the silk dresses and pearls.

It was enchanting!

The following passage was in a note Nana once wrote to me:

Maiden, that read’st this simple rhyme,
Enjoy thy youth, it will not stay;
Enjoy the fragrance of thy prime,
For O! it is not always May!

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
It is Not Always May

Beautiful Mother’s Day Tulips…

08 Friday May 2026

Posted by in beautiful, Flowers, Love, Mother, Mother-Child, Poetry, Reflections, Relationships

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© Joan Currie – Watercolor of pale pink tulips in my mother’s Delft vase.


Mother’s Tulips by Joan Currie

My mother loved flowers–
tulips most of all.

I never asked why.
It was in her Dutch blood,
her Calvinistic sense of simplicity–
upright, unadorned.

On Mother’s Day
there were always tulips:
pale pink,
set in her Delft vase,
its blue-and-white surfaces
catching the light,
holding it quietly
beneath the stems.

I tried, sometimes,
to improve upon them–
those lavish arrangements–
variegated tulips,
blue hydrangea, white roses,
small bright globes of yellow–
but she would only smile,
as if to say:
not this.

She wanted the tulips alone.

Now, after many years
and other flowers–
peonies, lilies, anemones,
even the careful making
of paper petals–

I pass a market stall
and stop.

I bring home tulips,
pale pink,
and set them in her vase.

In the quiet of the room
they open,
and she is there.


For my mother.

Happy Mother’s Day to all mothers!

Beautiful Puzzling 2…

14 Tuesday Apr 2026

Posted by in Lauren DiMarco, Photography, Poetry, Reflections

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© Lauren DiMarco – My daughter, Lauren, arranging the puzzle pieces.


Puzzling 2 by Joan Currie

I brought home
a thousand-piece puzzle
from the library sale.

I sorted the pieces
by color, by edge,
and began.

A sail,
a spaniel,
a clock tower,
a child.

Then I saw
what was missing:

The sail’s belly,
the spaniel’s tail,
the clock,
the child’s upturned face.

I turned each piece
in my hand,
looking.

I felt a small anger–
that it had been given away
like this.

Still, I went on,
knowing
it would not be whole.

Each piece placed
meant fewer left.

And then–
they were there.

Not missing.
Only overlooked.

I sat with that
a long while–
how quickly
I had doubted.

How beautiful to discover the missing pieces!

Camont Puzzle by Rifle Paper Co. I just finished this one – high quality 500 pieces.

Please check out my Puzzling Post (1).

Beautiful Easter Dinner…

04 Saturday Apr 2026

Posted by in Art, Baking, beautiful, Easter, Family, Poetry, Reflections

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Pieter Claesz – Dutch Breakfast Still Life (17th c.)


Easter Dinner by Joan Currie

I think of Easter dinner
when my mother was alive.

The sideboard bowed
under its burden.

We came to the table,
hungry from Lent,
and ate.

Ham glazed with maple,
potatoes in cream,
asparagus with Hollandaise,
eggs split and filled,
ambrosia–too sweet,
with coconut.

There was lemon pie
with its high, wavering crown,
carrot cake thick
with frosting,
and the small bright candies
we carried away in our pockets.

I am grateful
for that appetite,
for the unthinking plenty.

Now my guests call ahead–
no sugar, no dairy,
no this, no that.

I pause at the counter,
hand on the phone,

and say,
perhaps we’ll go out.

Wishing you a very Happy Easter!

Beautiful One Small Light…

03 Friday Apr 2026

Posted by in Art, Poetry, Reflections, Writing

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By Tom Thomson – Sunset, Canoe Lake, Autumn 1915. The artist drowned here in 1917. I know this lake well and have felt his presence.


“The light will leave– and you must reckon with what follows.” Tom Thomson


When Darkness Falls by Joan Currie

The pale rose of dusk
lingered longer than I expected.
I knew there would be a parting–
a lover’s touch
I wished might go on,
but wouldn’t.

I left the path
to find a higher place,
hoping to hold
the last of the light.

But darkness came at once–
a dull closing,
as if a door had been shut
behind me.

I was off the trail,
caught in the undergrowth,
turning this way and that,
not knowing.

For a long time
I did not move.
Branches shifted.
The woods held their breath.
Something unseen
pressed close.

Then I saw it–
a faint light
threaded through the trees.

I went toward it,
careful now,

thinking
how little it takes–
one small light–
to be led out.

Have you ever followed a light in the dark?

Beautiful First Iris, too…

26 Thursday Feb 2026

Posted by in Art, beautiful, Flowers, Garden, Nature, Poetry, Reflections, watercolor

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Bearded Iris by A.M.S. Merian that I colorized to match my dark purple one.


The First Iris by Joan Currie

You rose before the others
and seized the light entire.

Brazen in purple,
you flung your velvet wide
and drank the sun in reckless drafts
as though it had been poured
for you alone.

Such extravagance is brief.

Already the hem of your robe
thins into air;
already the proud throat slackens,
gold dimming in its beard.

You, who would not share the morning,
shall be first brought low–
first to stain the earth
with the wreckage of your splendor.

And they–
patient, indistinct–
will rise in measured turn
and keep their modest light
long after yours is spent.

Irises by Vincent van Gogh. A Fine Art Jigsaw Puzzle. I just completed this puzzle featuring clusters of blue irises.

Beautiful First Mover…

19 Thursday Feb 2026

Posted by in Art, Garden, Nature, Poetry, Reflections, watercolor

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Mourning Iris by E.D. Ehret that I colorized to match the dark purple iris from my garden.


First Mover by Joan Currie

When the weather is right–
not warm, not cold,
but something the earth understands–
a single iris
pushes through the soil.

No announcement.
Just the lifted stem, urgent with bloom,
certain of itself,
taking the light
as if it had been called.

Soon the hyacinths,
the daffodils, the crocuses,
will follow.

But for now
it stands alone-

and I wonder
about the others
still folded in darkness,
waiting for their hour.

© Joan Currie – My continuous line drawing of the iris.