Poet a Day Blog

In Friday’s Washington Post Lifestyle section, writer Lauren Wilcox asks the rather dramatic question, “Is poetry dead? Or, in the age of the Internet, does it offer us what nothing else can?” You won’t find an answer to the question — or even, really, any mention of the Internet — but you will find some interesting observations about poetry in Washington D.C. and the intersection of academic poetry with middle school students. Wilcox manages to essentially dismiss the entire resurgence of poetry in everyday life — from spoken word and poetry slams to poetry in the subways — as a sort of detour that had little to do with “real” poetry, which is never clearly defined. It’s worth reading, though, if only for the description of a public appearance by poet laureate W.S. Merwin and the tidbits of poems written by children in a public school poetry program.

If you’ve looking for inspiration for your 30 days of writing, head on over to Book of Kells, where Keili has posted 30 prompts to help get you through the month. Here’s a sample:

16. Make a list of ten images of things you have seen in the last 24 hours. Use all of them in a poem.

And if those aren’t enough, here are some other places you can find poetry prompts to keep you writing when your own inspiration fails.

PoeWar’s 4 years of poetry prompts
Find My Muse
Writing Forward
Poetry Instigator
Totally Optional Prompts

A special treat for anyone who loves reading and writing in poetic forms, Sarah’s Sestinas is one poet’s attempt to write 100 sestinas in 100 days. The Sestina is about my favorite form of all because its twisty rules challenge the mind to work within a tight framework — six words that must end each line in each stanza in a prescribed order, and a final envoi that uses all of the six. For a glimpse of just how eerily lovely the form can be, here’s the envoi of Sestina Day 22: Eden:

Although it’s queer, life’s tasty, just like ginger.
And death’s like clay. More grey than bright chartreuse.
Do not fear failure. Have a laugh. Be forthright.

 

Now go read the rest of the sestina — which is today’s entry for NaPoWriMo, and then keep reading to fall in love with the sestina form.

NaPoWriMo Day 6 has arrived before I managed to post a Day 5 selection, so I’m making it up by posting two today. The first, Carolee Sherwood, tickles my imagination with her reality. With her poetry, she posts her thoughts and what led her to write and how she changed it and made a leap from here to poem. And that, to me, is a lovely thing. Her poems stand on their own, as a good poem always does, but the peek into her life and her mind makes the poet more accessible, more real. Every poem entry feels like a short visit, a conversation with Carolee. You should drop by her place and read, and marvel at her facility with words and the agile way her mind twists a license plate into:

There are two important
details that fill the vast space
between kissed and killed.
Can you understand now

why I cringe when you ask me
to keep still? How easily
the still become stiffs!
I am too clumsy to balance
on those narrow skis.

Go read. There’s lots more there to savor.
Technorati Tags: NaPoWriMo

My second Day 6 pick is On and Off the Page, the journal where writer Lynn Fisher jots her poetry and thoughts when she’s not writing for a publication. Each of Fisher’s poems is accompanied by a photo that brings a new dimension to her words. The format is slick and glossy, and the words slip like beads along a string — before you know it, you’ve read a poem, and the whole is so much more than the sum of the lines. Her writing is as delicious as her photos. Go enjoy.Technorati Tags: napowrimo

I am enchanted by poetry that turns on simple language and prose about the tiny things in life that hold an entire poem. Wendy at Inner Graffiti writes such poetry, where simple words come together to form exquisite lines like:

…                 I’m sure Spring

is tucked somewhere out here

 

past the city limits signs. Bless its softness.

 

Bless the sometimes disappearance of snowflakes.

 

Bless the impressionistic tracks

 

and the roads still closed to traffic

that doesn’t exist.
- Meditation on Brown

There’s more — a wonderful musing about a square-dancing mother that tells as much about the daughter as it does about the subject of the poem and a memoir that starts at a radio and ends at a belt and holds an entire remembered life between — just n the front page. If you love poetry that is like a winding road, that takes twists and turns you didn’t expect and brings you to a destination that is as unforeseeable as it is inevitably, Inner Grafitti is a must-read.Technorati Tags: NaPoWriMo

Today’s Poem-A-Day pied-a-terre — Shed Ink. The poet has a cat named Van Gogh, crochets stuff, and once worked at Long John Silvers in spite of being allergic to fish. Any one of those could be a subject for a poem, but her NaPoWriMo Day 2 poem shows her painting and music background — it’s a lovely little piece about trying to play a song of hope on a harp made from strings of silver lining. I don’t do it justice. Go read it. Really.Technorati Tags: napowrimo

Lykaios, the poet behind Raining Fairy Lights, completed 30 poems for NaPoWriMo last year and is trying again this year. Whether she finishes or not, she’s already got some beautiful pieces up. Witness the opening of her day 1 poem, Glass Alchemy:

When I was small and believed in magic,

my father showed me how to make little glass coins

from the white beaches collected in my wellies.

In the mornings, I watched him gather light bulbs

of glowing honey onto a dipper, and shape them

into harvest moons

Drop by and lend some encouragement via a comment to keep her writing so she can make her goal again this year.Technorati Tags: NaPoWriMo