National Poetry Month

PAD Challenge – Day 5

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I was able to weave two prompts together today: the Poetic Asides two-for-Tuesday assignment to write about experience/inexperience, and the NaPoWriMo prompt to find inspiration in the names of heirloom vegetables. I had tomatoes on the brain, as well as memories of my Mom.

Tomato Aspirations

 

I dream of a garden of nightshade delights, edible wonders, plump and luscious

painting a triptych of wooden garden boxes every hue of red, orange and yellow.

I dream of my Mom’s tomato plants, wending through the white boards

of our backyard fence, or pressed into their metal cages, like buxom women

chastened by corsets.  In August, they’d lean and bow, ready for the curtain to fall,

ready for rebirth in her crock pot and jars, in salsa and sauce, relish and paste.

 

I turn to the catalogue for advice. The names alone sow seeds of imagination:

the stately Principe Borghese, at its best basking and baking in the sun.

The mighty Neptune and Martian Giant —tomatoes bold enough to grow

where no tomato’s grown before. There’s the extravagant Marglobe VF,

with a moniker like a sports car and  priced six times higher than every other plant.

Picture it staked  on a plot all its own, Esq. etched at the end of its custom gold nameplate.

 

But who am I kidding? I’m a greenhorn, not a green thumb. I live on the Prairies.

I need hardy, pragmatic plants, not opulent show-offs. I need the Glacier tomato, cold

weather ready with its thick skin and ruddy face. I need the no-nonsense  Large Red Tomato,

frank but fruitful. Straight shooter of the soil . Give me produce, not pretense, baby.

Give me enough sun, rain and patience to see me through the season.

Give me just one juicy globe, that I can hold up high, as I brag to the sky,

Mom! Look what I made!

 

I did like the prompt suggested by the folks at This Is Not A Literary Journal to harvest words from the signs you see, and will certainly try that another day. The mention of the word “signs” reminded me of the superb There Were No Signs by Irving Layton, which you can listen to here.

PAD Challenge – Day 4

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I love odes. I suppose most poets or poetry lovers do, but I confess I have never been very good at writing them. An ode to something indulgent is the prompt over at This Is Not A Poetry Journal today, and though I wish I could indulge, the ode-thoughts just aren’t coming at the moment. I was reminded of poet Elizabeth Zetlin’s ode to that loved and hated mark of punctuation: the apostrophe.

The NaPoWriMo prompt gives a nod to the famous Eliot line about April being the cruelest month, but I already covered my thoughts on that a few days ago. However, I do have a month that I view as the cruelest: February. Last year, at the start of March I wrote a rally against February, and a praise of March (almost an ode?), which you can read here, if you’re so inclined.

Finally, the Poetic Asides prompt to write about “distance” had me thinking micro-sized again, so here are my small words for a large space:

 

wishing on stars

distant train whistle

brings us down  to earth

 

 

PAD Challenge – Day 3

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poplar hoar frost

I’ve got a prompt meld going on today between the Poetic Asides suggestion to write a Three _____ poem, and the This Is Not A Literary Journal challenge to “write what the trees know,”  Here’s what grew:

Three Things Our Poplar Tree Knows

 

That when hoar frost swaddles

its bald branches, the day will be

defined by silence. Words we’ve used

so often to sting, turn soft and

crystalline on our tongues.

 

That the damp cloak of decayed leaves

still draped on the grass at the start of

spring, will smell both fetid and fresh.

The contrast and symmetry that used

to define us.

 

That its softening middle, the spongy

bend of boughs once strong and rigid,

are not reasons to mourn. Heart rot,

a harsh name for the feeling inside:

change. Touch the caramel-coloured

conks embellishing its trunk.

Listen when it tells us

the great  beauty of loss

is clarity.

 

The tree prompt made me think of Trees by Bliss Carman. I, too, am in praise of “goodly trees in the springing sod.”

Lastly, the NaPoWriMo site suggests a fan letter poem to a celebrity. I’ve composed many gushing letters in my brain to Trent Reznor, but never attempted to put them to paper. Perhaps a project for this afternoon….whilst listening to NIN, of course.

 

Poem-a-day (PAD) Challenge – Day 2

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I’ve got three prompts going for the second day of NaPoWriMo, and all it’s amounted to so far is one micro-poem, but there are other ideas whirring around.

The prompt over at the Poetic Asides blog was to write a “he or she said” poem. There’s a an active community of talented and encouraging poets who frequent this blog, so it always a good destination — especially mid-April when the energy and inspiration reserves maybe getting low.  For this I did complete a micro-something that may grow into something more:

Clear

He said there was

a storm in his head

as long as he

could remember, but

the first time

he kissed her

the sky cleared

and stayed that way

as long as she

was his.

 

I’m hoping something interesting will come of the This Is Not A Literary Journal Prompt to “write the lie you used to believe.” Perhaps something fun, or witty.

Today, April 2, also would’ve been my Mom’s 73rd birthday, so the NaPoWriMo.net prompt to write a “family portrait” poem is quite fitting. Before my Mom’s death, and certainly since, I’ve written much about family and her specifically. I don’t know if this is a well that will ever run dry, and for that I’m grateful.

Lastly, I’d like to invite any willing readers to check out this link to one of my favourite poems by one of my favourite poets: Lorna Crozier’s Fear of Snakes. I love everything about this poem, but each time I read it, it’s the opening line that gets me. The imagery and rhythm are just stunning.

Get poeming, peeps

/ mannixk / Leave a comment

It’s April! National Poetry Month in North America, and I say WOOT! to that.

Normally I spend the month in idle appreciation. Reading poetry. Thinking about poems. Thinking about why it is that most people are so darn daunted at the idea of poems. But this year I decided to get active. I’m doing the PAD (poem-a-day) Challenge through Poetic Asides at the Writer’s Market site.

One week in, three more to go. Some days have been easier than others, which is to say some prompts pluck at my grey matter a little easier to get the ideas churning. But I think there’s something  just as worthy in the poems that have to be coaxed out, as there is in the ones that explode into being. I like to think I can stick it out for another three weeks, so I can say I did it, and have 30 new poems to show for it.

You will never convince me that poetry is dead, but maybe it can do with a little CPR to keep it going. Everyone can read a poem. Read a poem this month. Or better yet, read one every day. You don’t have to delve into an epic or stumble through something surrealist. You don’t have to “get it” or analyze it or memorize it. Just read one and try to feel. Check out one of my favourite sites, Rattle, to get you started. Click on the “random” tab and see what comes up. Or search the names of poets in your own city and see what they have to say. My own city is chock-a-block with spectacular scribes.

Everyone can write a poem too, though I know many people think they can’t. Go on and pen your own little poem this month. You don’t have to show it to anyone, but you might even want to. Post it in my comments and I will send you “super extra happy yay you did it!” vibes.

Happy NaPoWriMo!