Cats, Poetry, Kids, and the Great Outdoors!

My friend, Jodi Hiland, is the founder of a fantastic organization called Happy Trails Family Nature Club. Happy Trails is based in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area and is an informal, free nature club whose mission is to connect kids with the outdoors!

With a passionate heart, Jodi organizes activities that invite families to connect and enjoy nature together, which, in this day and age, is a rare and beautiful gift for many. Please, check out her site...especially you local peeps!

I was thrilled that Jodi included a poem I'd written in her latest newsletter.

Here I Am, My Friend
By Angie Bailey

I saw a young boy today,
Standing in the middle of the creek,
One pant leg rolled up to the knee,
The other soaked up to the knee.
Feet once thick with muck and mud from the day of play,
Now rinsed clean in the tinkle-tankle of the snaky stream.

I saw an old cat today,
Perched proudly on a craggy creekside rock,
One front paw batting at butterflies,
One back paw sometimes itching a scritch-scratch of a spot.
Coat once brilliantly burnished,
Now bristling with burrs from afternoon adventures.

I saw a young boy today,
Left hand waving wildly at the creekside.
Right hand plunged in his pocket,
A smooth stone, a splinty-split of a stick, a silver candy wrapper...
Ah! A chunk of cheese, in the sloppy shawl of a napkin, left over from lunch.
A smile reflected in the ripples, a sunny shout to the shore,
"Where have you been, my friend?"

I saw an old cat today,
Golden eyes glistening in the rays of the day,
Tattered tail poised in possibility,
A grivel-gravel greeting, a wispy-whiskered welcome.
Expectation echoed in the mew through a mouthful of missing teeth,
Memories of afternoon adventure carried across the quickening current,
"Here I am, my friend...I've missed you!"