the_vulture

This is today's freebie. It was inspired by a prompt from gs_silva. It also fills the "Ambiguous Situation" square in my 6-1-26 card for the Hazbin Hotel Fest. This poem belongs to the series Schrodinger's Heroes.

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Starting now, the Poetry Fishbowl is open! Today's theme is "Don't add to the casualty list in an emergency." I will be checking this page periodically throughout the day. When people make suggestions, I'll pick some and weave them together into a poem ... and then another ... and so on. I'm hoping to get a lot of ideas and a lot of poems.

I picked this theme for today from the selected list of themes, because of the violent storms that swept through central Illinois in late June. Here's my post about Tornado Alley moving from the Great Plains through the Midwest to the Southeast.

Among my previous poems that mention tornadoes or other violent storms are "A Tornado of Thought," "Windswept," "Know What You Stand For," "Better to Meet Danger," "In Growth, Reform, and Change," and "Nature's Great Masterpiece," and "The Pequot War."

Established settings in Tornado Alley: Omaha Reservation and Omaha and Lincoln, Nebraska (Polychrome Heroics), Stillwater, Oklahoma (Polychrome Heroics), Waxahachie, Texas (Schrodinger's Heroes), River City and Ava and Bluehill, Missouri (Polychrome Heroics), Onion City and Urbanburg, Illinois (Polychrome Heroics), Easy City, Louisiana (Polychrome Heroics), Ninovan, Tennessee (Daughters of the Apocalypse), Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Center
for Elephant Conservation in Florida (Daughters of the Apocalypse).


I'll be soliciting ideas for first responders, troubleshooters, activists, rebels, Women Who Run with the Saberteeth, explorers, refugees, runaway youth, housemates, siblings, parents, teachers, clergy, police, soldiers, leaders, superheroes, supervillains, teammates, failure analysts, ethicists, other people who get into dire situations, running into a fire while others are running out of it, rescuing people, protesting, rebelling, planning, panicking, throwing in the towel, escaping, running like you stole something, adventuring, divorcing, teaching, leaving your comfort zone, discovering things, conducting experiments, observation changing experiments, troubleshooting, improvising, adapting, cleaning up messes, cooperating, taking over in an emergency, saving the day, discovering yourself, studying others, testing boundaries, coming of age, learning what you can (and can't) do, sharing, preparing for the worst, expecting the unexpected, fixing what's broke, upsetting the status quo, changing the world, accomplishing the impossible, recovering from setbacks, returning home, war zones, disaster areas, wastelands, trails, sailing ships, distant lands, the forest primeval, prehistory, liminal zones, schools, homeless shelters, prisons, hotels, churches, sharehouses, campfires, laboratories, supervillain lairs, makerspaces, nonhuman accommodations and adaptations, stores, farmer's markets, starships, alien planets, magical lands, foreign dimensions, other places where disasters happen, cataclysms, natural disasters, climate change, the end of the world, S-risks and X-risks, unhappy relationships, PACE your planning, protest rallies, travel mishaps, sudden surprises, the buck stops here, trial and error, supplements that turn out to be mutagenic, intercultural entanglements, asking for help and getting it, enemies to friends/lovers, interdimensional travel, lab conditions are not field conditions, superpower manifestation, the end of where your framework actually applies, ethics, innovation, problems that can't be solved by hitting, teamwork, found family, complementary strengths and weaknesses, personal growth, and poetic forms in particular.

Currently eligible bingo card(s) for donors wishing to sponsor a square:

Hazbin Hotel Fest Bingo Card 6-1-26

Winterfest in July Bingo Card 7-1-26


Among my more relevant series for the main theme:

An Army of One has some serious challenges between the Galactic Arms.

The Bear Tunnels introduces modern principles to people in the past, in hopes of preventing genocide.

A Conflagration of Dragons features the Six Races struggling to survive as the dragons take over more and more territory.

Crystal Wood is about how the mass death of trees can wreck civilization.

The Daughters of the Apocalypse has people trying to find enough resources to survive, when former cities are unsafe.

The Moon Door explores a women's chronic pain group and lycanthropy.

Not Quite Kansas deals with demons, magic, and other mayhem.

One God's Story of Mid-Life Crisis follows Shaeth as he works on becoming the God of Drunks after quitting as the God of Evil. Addiction always has the potential for disaster.

Path of the Paladins includes some really awful situations due to divine politics and mortal foolishness.

Peculiar Obligations deals with Quakers, pirates, and organized crime.

Polychrome Heroics has ordinary humans, supernaries, blue-plate specials, superheroes, supervillains, primal and animal soups all trying to get along and figure out how to make a functional society. Among the more relevant threads are Berettaflies, the Big One, Dr. Infanta, Iron Horses, Officer Pink, Shiv, and Trichromatic Attachments.

Schrodinger's Heroes has a lot of situations that can destroy things, up to and including whole dimensions.

The Wandering is a series about fantasy time travel where people loop back within their own lifespan.

Or you can ask for something new.

Linkbacks reveal a verse of any open linkback poem.

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100 STRING ACOUSTIC GUITAR SOLO

Such amazing sound. <3

Wildflower meadow returned without planting a single seed

A patch of farmland left to its own devices for over a decade has quietly transformed into a thriving wildflower meadow. It didn’t take expensive seed mixes or heavy machinery. Recovery required only patience, a yearly hay cut, and letting nature do what it does. The find could reshape how governments approach one of conservation’s biggest and most expensive challenges.


This is worth trying anywhere that has at least some seedbank left (that is, the topsoil hasn't been killed or hauled away) and where you have a large amount of land to cover (which can make other options cost-prohibitive). In places that used to be scrub or forest or something other than grassland, it needs mowing at least once a year. Otherwise succession will take over and turn it back into whatever it was. Ideally, mow late enough that nesting creatures have finished and decamped, but early enough to permit regrowth before fall, so there will be winter cover for wildlife and erosion protection for the soil.

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Today we went out to Mattoon so I could attend a permaculture club meeting at Douglas-Hart Nature Center.

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Today is mostly cloudy and warm.

I fed the birds. I've seen a few sparrows and house finches.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I watered the new picnic table garden. I picked the first tomatoes, 2 red cherries and 1 yellow pear.

I saw a tiger swallowtail butterfly. :D

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I watered the telephone pole garden.

I've seen a male cardinal and a starling in the forest garden.

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I watered plants in the house yard.

I've seen a mourning dove in the forest garden.

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I went out to a local permaculture club meeting, which was lots of fun. :D

On the way home, we saw a heron at the drainage ditch. There were puddles in the road, so we got at least a little rain. That's means I don't need to water plants tomorrow during the Poetry Fishbowl. \o/

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I cracked open a bunch of cherry pits to expose the seeds.

EDIT 7/6/26 -- I bagged up the black cherry seeds in damp sand to cold-stratify in the refrigerator. I think the ones that had been air-drying longer were smaller than the plump ones from today's batch. I'll have to try cracking more sooner and see if that holds true.

Fireflies are coming out. I've seen at least one bat above the house yard.

As it is getting dark, I am done for the night.

"The one who hurt you doesn't get a say in how you choose to protect yourself from it happening again."
-- Ehowton


Periodically I encounter people who feel conflicted about obligations and safety. Frequently it's because an abusive parent or spouse has become incapacitated or is heading in that direction. I've often said that you don't owe an abuser anything. The above quote makes it clear why. Acts of neglect or abuse remove any obligation the victim may have had to the abuser. Cast off, expended, gone. You are completely free to protect yourself by ignoring the abuser's wants or needs, walking away, and never seeing them again. You may deny them all your resources -- time, energy, money, attention, everything. They made their choices and now get to live with the consequences.

Remember this if someone pressures you to harm yourself by taking care of an abuser. That person is trying to use and harm you also. Classify them as another threat to your safety.

The Reflector That Started a Conversation

Andy realized he couldn’t reconstruct a dangerous road himself. But he could start a conversation. That insight led to a simple idea: a small reflector that could be handed to pedestrians and cyclists throughout the community. The reflector features a uniquely Fort Smith logo: a footprint shaped from the letters “FS,” making it both a practical safety tool and a symbol of local pride.


This is an example of incremental change, doing the next smallest thing to improve a situation. It's replicable anywhere that pedestrian and/or biker safety in low light is a concern.

Ideally, people should build safe roads, but that takes time and lots of money. Walkers and bikers should wear high-visibility clothing, but that is expensive and often uncomfortable. A small reflector is cheap, portable, fast and easy to deploy. It's better than nothing -- and it does get people talking.

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The first primates may have evolved in the cold, not the tropics

A surprising new study suggests the earliest primates didn't originate in tropical forests but in cold, dry parts of North America. Some may have even survived seasonal Arctic conditions by slowing their metabolism or hibernating. Researchers found that dramatic climate shifts, rather than warmth, played a major role in driving primate evolution and expansion. The discovery reshapes our understanding of how our own lineage began.


<3 snow monkeys.

Today is cloudy, humid, and not but not quite as bad as yesterday.

I fed the birds.  I've seen a mixed flock of sparrows and house finches.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

I've heard bobwhite quail calls.  :D

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I started work on a repair job outdoors.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I did more work on a repair job outdoors.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I did more work on a repair job outdoors.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I did more work on a repair job outdoors.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I did more work on a repair job outdoors.

I've seen a male cardinal and a robin in the forest garden.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I did more work on a repair job outdoors.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I did more work on a repair job outdoors.

EDIT 7/5/26 -- I finished the repair job outdoors.  *goflopnow*

Fireflies are coming out.  Cicadas are singing.

As it is getting dark, I am done for the night.