Ellie Marie Johnson 🍁
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elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Ellie Marie Johnson 🍁
@elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
270 followers 600 following 72 posts
#poetry #pnw #poems

I enjoy poetry, design, illustration, and the outdoors. I love sharing haiku, tanka, and other forms of micropoetry with you. 🌸
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elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
dog leaps—
scrubs off sand fleas
saves sticks from the sea's bite
kicks against swells of cold comforts
courage.

🌊 #cinquain (follows a 2-4-6-8-2 syllable pattern) #poetry #dogs #originalpoetry #nature #photography #blueskypoetry #ocean #PNW
Photo of a cloudy beach with a line of golden sun over the Olympic mountains. A dog paddles in the bright ocean near the sandy shore, with a few passersby.
November 23, 2025 at 1:14 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
blushing red mushrooms
grant fairytales in freckles—
beauty in moon spots.

#haiku #micropoetry #writing #originalpoetry #photography #nature #mushroom #flyagaric #shroomscroll #night #mushroommonday #fairytale #poetry
A red fly agaric mushroom from the side at night among bright green leaves. A few dead leaves lay scattered in the surrounding grass.
November 17, 2025 at 5:51 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
On this day in history, Ruby Bridges integrated a previously all-white school. I wanted to share a powerful poem by 16-year-old Joyce Brown, a teacher at a bombed freedom school in 1964: www.crmvet.org/poetry/pbrow...
"But I'll do my work if I have to do it on the ground"

#poetry #reading #history
Ruby Bridges walking down steps with U.S. Marshals in 1960. She had to be escorted to and from William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans.
November 14, 2025 at 8:15 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Even if the shutdown ends, many in the U.S. will still be recovering and struggling after losing SNAP. Even a small amount can help: www.givedirectly.org
🍎 More tips: bsky.app/profile/elli...
#haiku #SNAP #shutdown #poetry #drawing #blueskypoets #originalpoetry #poetrycommunity #writing #aid #poem
Drawing of a cross-hatched falling apple in light grey on a cream white background. Above is the haiku: no more honeycrisps fall from late autumn branches bare shelves at food banks.
November 12, 2025 at 7:53 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Today, this poem about jump boots reminded me of my great grandfather - also a WW2 vet. I'm so grateful I can still connect to him through his letters, photos and belongings, as well as family stories.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpwU...
#veterans #veteran'sday #poetry #poetrycommunity #history #ww2
He Wrote This Poem To Deal With The Horrors Of War // WWII Veteran Clinton Riddle
YouTube video by Best Defense Foundation
www.youtube.com
November 12, 2025 at 4:04 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
cloud front
tore off sky's edge
winds in convergence zone
gold leaf sun past the Olympics—
resolve.

🌊 #cinquain (follows a 2-4-6-8-2 syllable pattern) #poetry #originalpoetry #blueskypoetry #micropoetry #blueskypoets #writing #nature #photography #ocean #PNW
The Puget Sound, with a dark grey encroaching cloud front forming a line near the edge of the sky—as if a ripped photo. The exposed sky is a soft cream color. Driftwood rests on the sandy shore mixed with a cobble beach and seaweed. Above the bright ocean waves lies the Olympic mountain range in the distance, with a gold lining of sun.
November 10, 2025 at 8:17 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
A few resources in hard times 💙

Directory for Local Food Banks: www.feedingamerica.org
Formula Exchange: freeformula.exchange/home
Find a Local Backpack Program (Meals for Schoolkids): www.feedingamerica.org/our-work/hun...

#snap #food #mutualaid #snapbenefits #foodstamps #shutdown #hunger #aid
A graphic with the title "How to Help One Another - Tips for Fighting Food Insecurity." Colored icons show a credit card, a red aid hat, a baby bottle, and a plate of pasta. Suggestions: Cash donations are most effective because food banks buy in bulk at a discount. Donate to a food bank and find out if your employer will match it. Volunteer with food banks or mutual aid groups, and ask what help they need. Consider getting a grocery buddy, and assist your neighbors. Fund or give children and baby’s items, like formula. 39 percent of SNAP recipients are children. See if your local school may have a backpack meal program. Contact local businesses and restaurants to ask how they can help—such as with food drives, free and discounted meals, donations, or other alternatives.
November 8, 2025 at 1:45 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
New York poet Adelaide Crapsey invented a cinquain, which follows a 2-4-6-8-2 syllable structure.

November Night

Listen…
With faint dry sound,
Like steps of passing ghosts,
The leaves, frost-crisp'd, break from the trees
And fall.

#cinquain #poetry #poetrycommunity #readingcommunity
Black and white portrait photo of Adelaide Crapsey sitting with her hands on her lap, wearing a long sleeve top embroidered with leaves.
November 6, 2025 at 12:43 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
I loved publishing an autumn collection on Medium! 🍁 I've provided context for pre-existing poems and mythology references, and names for each haiku and tanka.

Check it out here, thanks to Women Write: medium.com/women-write/...

#poetry #photography #poetrycommunity #autumnleaves #writing #pnw
Autumn in Short Poems: 13 Haiku and Tanka to Inspire Reflection on Change
A Collection from the Pacific Northwest
medium.com
November 3, 2025 at 9:11 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
...The loud is to help us not think,
To make us confuse the day and our feelings with happiness.

Because, you know, if we do think about our dead,
Wherever they are, we’ll get sad, and begin to look across at each other.

–Alberto Ríos

shorturl.at/VLktW

#dayofthedead #poetrycommunity #reading
November 3, 2025 at 7:14 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
On All Hallows' Eve,
tea lights flare from pumpkin teeth;
ward off Stingy Jack.

🎃 #haiku #Halloween #pumpkin #photography #nature #poetry #writing #poem #poetrycommunity #originalpoetry
Two Jack O'Lanterns smiling and glowing side-by-side in the darkness, lit by tea light candles.
November 1, 2025 at 4:02 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Gold stipples green trees,
our changes in pointillism;
brown iris — life's brush . . .
Let time layer us with light;
this series of autumn walks . . .

#tanka #poetry #micropoetry #poem #nature #autumnleaves #fallcolors #trees #photography #originalpoetry #blueskypoetry
Vibrant layers of gold and green leaves seen from below, with sunlight shining through.
October 30, 2025 at 1:21 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Fate flips the faucet
on bikes without bumbershoots —
gloves of yellow leaves
keep us dry —scrubbing away
gloom despite squeaks of thunder.

#poetry #poem #pnw #trail #forest #TreeTuesday #river #photography #nature #originalpoetry #blueskypoetry #autumn #fall #tanka #micropoetry #landscape
Autumn day at Burke-Gilman under storm clouds. Yellow-green leaves overhang the Sammamish River and the trail.
October 28, 2025 at 11:11 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Teardrops cling to twigs,
begging not to slide, falling
into blue freedom.

#haiku #poetry #autumnleaves #photography #micropoetry #maplemonday #poems #nature #writing #originalpoetry #blueskypoetry
Red maple leaves against a blue sky and an evergreen tree, with droplets of dew dangling on bright crimson twigs.
October 27, 2025 at 7:00 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Wild mushrooms burnish
tables—gathering despite
decay; their lives capped.

#haiku #poetry #micropoetry #shroomscroll #fungifriday #fungi #writing #autumn #fungifriends #photography #poetrycommunity #nature #poem #blueskypoetry
Mushrooms with glossy brown surfaces on wet grass and clover. A small mushroom is decaying beside a larger shroom.
October 25, 2025 at 12:09 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Books and poems save lives—but tens of thousands are banned in U.S. prisons. Literature programs can cut recidivism from 45% to 19% after a year: shorturl.at/C9xC4
If you can, please share—or consider a donation.📚
#reading #bannedbooks #freedomtoread #readingcommunity #booksky #books
bookstoprisoners.bsky.social Books to Prisoners (Seattle) @bookstoprisoners.bsky.social · Oct 19
Today is the 1st day of Prison Banned Books Week, a week examining the catastrophic impact of censorship on information access in carceral facilities. Go to prisonbannedbooksweek.org for updates & actions this week, and SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL BOOKS TO PEOPLE IN PRISONS GROUP via books, $, volunteering!
Promotional graphic for Prison Banned Books Week 2025. The background is olive green. At the top left corner is the black and transparent logo for PBBW (a bird flying over four stacked rectangles reading PRISON BANNED BOOKS WEEK. At the top right corner in charcoal gray scribbled font: OCTOBER 19-25. Spanning the middle is a photograph of a rejected package of books from Books to Prisoners. Scrawled on the shiny wrapping material, in thick black Sharpie: USED BOOKS NOT ALLOWED. At the bottom, inside a drawing of a black and transparent wavy banner, in black scribbled font: BOOKS NOT BANS.
October 22, 2025 at 2:40 AM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
We shriveled for you . . .
We know you longed for dark notes —
thorns took reaching arms.
We give late fall—stained glass leaves,
pipe organs of cricket song.

#micropoetry #tanka #poetry #poetrycommunity #reading #photography #nature #forest #fall #autumn #blueskypoetry @blueskypoetry.bsky.social
A bundle of wrinkled, withered blackberries on a bush with a few curled dead leaves. The background is full of fresh green leaves.
October 21, 2025 at 5:08 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
I love "Diwali" by Vikram Seth. 🕯️This fascinating epic is full of history and incredible detail:
poetryarchive.org/poem/diwali/

More on Vikram Seth's prolific poetry, novels, activism, and awards:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vikram_...
#Diwali #VikramSeth #poetry #candle #FestivalofLights #reading #epic
Two diyas sharing a flame in the dark. Image credit: Sonika Agarwal.
October 20, 2025 at 5:30 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
When Mórrígan's crow
perches on power—no lines
of least resistance.

#poetrycommunity #haiku #resistance #courage #resist #poetry #blueskypoetry #photography
A crow cawing from power lines against dark clouds, with a streak of light above. Crow's feet do not offer a path of least resistance for electricity to travel through, thus avoiding an electric shock.
October 18, 2025 at 6:23 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Black Locust lures bats . . .
Invasive, laced finger roots
snare Persephone —
tiny words trap wings, a slow
death in pomegranate seeds.

#poetry #poem #tanka #mythology #autumn #fall #poetrycommunity #reading #unhealthyrelationships #mentalhealth #photography #forests #ForestFriday #blueskypoetry
Twisted roots of a Black Locust tree on a trail at a local park. The tree's bark and leaves are poisonous to animals and humans. Bats (often a symbol of the Underworld and Persephone) will sometimes make homes in Black Locusts.
October 17, 2025 at 11:07 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
A little Poe on this autumn morning. ☕
www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4t2...
#poetrycommunity #poetry #edgarallenpoe #halloween #listening #calm #reading
The Raven | Edgar Allan Poe | Read by Geoff Castellucci
"The Raven" was written by Edgar Allen Poe Video footage and music by http://StoryBlocks.com Narration by Geoff Castellucci More Narrations: https://gphr3y.me/story 😃 PATREON:…
www.youtube.com
October 17, 2025 at 3:13 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Iridescent leaves
scatter from prisms—we quit
our old, storm-swatch house . . .
past grief, an opal fractured—
palette split from clouds, revealed.

#autumnleaves #fall #tanka #micropoetry #poetry #poem #moving #poetrycommunity #reading #pnw #photography #blueskypoetry @blueskypoetry.bsky.social
A rainbow of maple leaf branches against a cloudy, autumn sky. I took this photo in the Seattle area on a walk after our move.
October 16, 2025 at 9:40 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
Poets act as "Dream Keepers" according to Langston Hughes, 1926.

Bring me all of your dreams,
You dreamers.
Bring me all of your
Heart melodies
That I may wrap them
In a blue cloud-cloth
Away from the too rough fingers
Of the world.

#poetry #reading #poetrycommunity #readingcommunity
A black and white photo of Langston Hughes in a suit from 1923. He would write "Dream Keepers" in two years, and it would be published in "The Weary Blues" in 1926.
October 16, 2025 at 3:07 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
If you can, take a moment to appreciate Heather Cahoon's poetry from her collection Horsefly Dress: tinyurl.com/37bm8359
I love her meaningful and vivid imagery - an interview where she shares her process and perspective: tinyurl.com/5x6yd59c
#poetry #poetrycommunity #reading #indigenouspeoplesday
Five Poems | Poetry Northwest
The most difficult death is forgiveness
www.poetrynw.org
October 13, 2025 at 7:35 PM
elliemariejohnson.bsky.social
A than-bauk (also သံပေါက် or thanbauk) is a Burmese poem that tends to be witty in nature – it contains three lines with four syllables each. The As are rhyming syllables.

xxxA
xxAx
xAxx

#poetry #micropoetry #blueskypoetry #writingcommunity #poetrycommunity #writingprompt #prompt #poetryprompt
Three hot air balloons in pale orange sky over pagodas in Burma/Myanmar. Image credit: roman raizen.
October 13, 2025 at 5:36 PM