I’ve been writing but haven’t had time to post. The poem for today’s prompt from Adele Kenny’s poetry blog is “The Hedgehog” by Paul Muldoon. I love his line breaks and how the last stanza takes the reader somewhere much more serious than the rest of the poem portends.
Reasons to Write Poetry, No. 427
Sometimes you start writing
a poem as it comes to you
line by line, and it turns
suddenly in a direction
you didn’t expect.
A line from Mary Oliver’s “Why I Wake Early” caught my ear, thanks to the prompt at Adele Kenny’s poetry blog: wake.
Not a morning person
(after M. Oliver)
even the miserable and the crotchety
must wake, however early or late,
to the sun’s relentless cheeriness
and radioactive optimism
The last couple days’ drafts have been, well, a bit too drafty to post.
But here is a derangement of Elizabeth Bishop’s “I Am in Need of Music,” inspired by a prompt at Adele Kenny’s poetry blog: Music.
Harmonic intervention
(after E. Bishop)
Sleep; the moon floats
forever still in the sea,
fading, sinking; deep
through the heart
of cool, quiet rest
breathes a spell
made of melody.
Limbs flush, glow
and quiver in dreams
of water, falling
dead-tired to rest
in the sway of some old
song, low and liquid.
Oh, for the healing!
Clear lips, trembling
melody, bitter fingers
feel the frets
of tainted music:
I am in need.
This is a very loose derangement of Yeats’ “When You Are Old,” inspired by a prompt at Adele Kenny’s poetry blog: Aging.
Time and sky
(after W.B. Yeats)
Stars cloud his face, hidden overhead
amid mountains that glow with the bend
and change of sorrow. The soul seeks
false love, true beauty, and grace
of moments deep in shadow. Soft eyes
dream of looks read slowly and taken
by fire, nodding and grey with sleep,
at once old and full.
Taking a cue from my September writing challenge success – and Adele Kenny’s Tip #4 – I may not post every day this month, but I will definitely draft a poem every day. Some drafts simply aren’t ready for public viewing. 😉
Today’s poem resulted from a prompt at Adele Kenny’s poetry blog: The color red.
The next morning
Very few notice
dried blood
on the sidewalk
as it no longer
appears red.
Welcome to National Poetry Writing Month (in the U.S. and Canada) and Global Poetry Writing Month (in the rest of the world)!
My first poem resulted from a prompt at Adele Kenny’s poetry blog: Remembrance.
Failure of memory
Year after year the magnolias bloom
too soon, and their thick creamy
petals liquefy in the late spring
freeze then drip from upturned branch
tips, hundreds of candles burnt
clear down to the socket.
On the cusp of National Poetry Month, I’m excited about focusing (a little more than usual) on poetry for the next 30 days!
I’m also sad because temperatures are expected to drop significantly below freezing the next three nights, and all the plants that have begun blooming and leafing out will be severely damaged. It may seem trivial, but the past twelve months have been difficult, and my capacity for resilience has dropped considerably.
Here are some pictures from my yard, while everything still looks beautiful and alive.
I did it! I wrote a poem every day during the month of September!
You’ll notice I didn’t post a poem for each day; in fact, I stopped posting after September 10. This was another success in that it led directly to the above-mentioned success. By letting go of posting, I freed myself from the double tyrannies of time and quality. More than once I crawled into bed and realized I hadn’t written that day, so I took a few moments to scrawl something in the back of my crossword book. This worked surprisingly well, because I found myself revising when I later transcribed those notes into my writing journal.
I didn’t produce much of great merit, but I learned valuable things about process. Many end-of-the-day scribbles captured poems that had formed in mind earlier and might otherwise have been lost. And because I periodically comb through my writing journal for inspiration, some of those phrases or ideas might yield something better down the road.
All in all, it was a good experience and one I plan to leverage come November, when I’ll piggy-back on the energy of NaNoWriMo to propel my own writing.
Happy October!
Posted in Poetry
Tagged 30-day writing challenge, poetry practice, September writing challenge
We’re a third of the way through September and I’ve managed to compose a poem every day so far. Those short poems have done a good job of keeping my head in the game when I don’t have much time to write.
(Sep 9)
Willow is the emo child
of the Deciduous family,
bangs forever hanging
across her face.
(Sep 10)
This was inspired by an event in early April and a post at Formidable Woman Sanctuary: https://formidablewoman.org/2020/07/14/wardrobe-escapee-what-happened/
The pandemic in two small items of clothing
While walking on my street –
a street that goes nowhere
and leads to nothing, just circles
around the neighborhood
and back on itself – I saw
a pair of crew socks in the road
like they’d fallen off the roof
of a car or been dropped.
Separated, slumped, bedraggled,
abandoned – I felt as lost
as they appeared and as full
of unanswered questions.
Yesterday’s poem deserves a post all its own. It was inspired by greeting designs printed by Egg Press, including one from a young woman I first met when she was a baby. To no one’s surprise, she continues to do amazing things. (Nia is also featured in a video on the press web site.)
Hear, now:/Here. Now.
(after Sonya Montenegro and Nia Musiba)
Listen. The sun is speaking
and we are dancing, hands
curved above us, swimming
in the star-washed air.
(https://www.eggpress.com/collections/press-for-change)
Posted in Poetry
Tagged Egg Press, Italian White Sunflower, Nia Musiba, Press for Change, Sonya Montenegro
The Daily Compost 