I cannot believe we have nearly reached the halfway point. This is usually where we experience the dip. I am now struggling with the fact that my NaPo poems are meaningless and not well written, with the challenge of some of the forms in the limited time I have set aside for the creation of the poems, also that nagging feeling of catch up.
So I start this morning with taking my own advice.
- Forgive
- Move On
- Write
This challenge never presents 30 excellent poems by the end of April. I do not think that is the point, it is meant to fuel your writing. Maybe in August I will write a poem that would never be penned with NaPo 2017.
The frustration is in wanting to write well, (I don’t think any of us ever want to write badly, unless we’re entering an Anti-slam or something)!
I am packing my frustration away today and catching up on the writing from Day 13. In an attempt to write in meaning, my companion today is my carry around notebook, which I opened randomly and chose a line from as an initial thought.
I managed several attempts at a Ghazal, all of which need more work.
… like routes on a torn Tube map,
My poem on Carrie’s prompt ended in some research, which may result in an additional poem at some point. I think it may be the shortest prose poem in existence!
… the unforgiving silence of sin.
And now – forward, onto Day 14.
Our featured participant today is Clairvetica, where the ghazal for Day 13 is a mixed-emotions ode to London.
Today’s interview is with Troy Jollimore. A poet whose work often has a philosophical bent, he won the National Book Critics Circle award for his first book, Tom Thomson in Purgatory. You can find three of Jollimore’s poems here and four more here.
Last but not least, our prompt! Because it’s Friday, let’s keep it light and silly today, with a clerihew. This is a four line poem biographical poem that satirizes a famous person. Here’s one I just made up:
Emily Dickinson
wasn’t a fickle one.
Having settled in Amherst,
she wouldn’t be dispersed.
Is it going to win a Pulitzer prize? Nope – but it was fun to write!
I wrote a clerihew about our Prime Minister – I think it will stay in my notebook!
Carrie Etter’s prompt was to write a list poem, as an actual list. I have written it but my example doesn’t really feel like a poem. Maybe that is the nature of the form. I may go for this again, once I have some solid anchors to hook a list on.
Jo Bell http://www.jobell.org.uk/ English Breakfast by Paul Summers, the title mainly reminded me that it is lunchtime and I haven’t eaten mine yet.
An interesting discussion about judgement and prejudice.
The Poetry School
Day 14: What if…?
How many stories, films and poems can be summarised with that question? Look at Jose Saramago’s novel Blindness, which asks the question: What if blindness was contagious?
Today’s task is to ask yourself a ‘what if’ question — and to answer it. It might help to start off your poem with ‘What if…’ though you may decide to delete that part later on. It can be a personal ‘what if’ addressing what might have happened, or a hypothetical, scientific ‘what if’, but whatever you choose, the key to this task is to commit. You must follow the logic through wherever it goes, even – no, especially – if it goes somewhere unexpected.
For inspiration, have a look at Mark Waldron’s ‘Lion’, the second poem featured here: https://daysofroses.wordpress.com/2011/06/27/three-poems-from-mark-waldrons-the-itchy-sea/
awritersfountain 