NaPo/GloWriMo - Day 29

April 29, 2024 - write your own two-part poem that focuses on a food or type of meal. 

Blueberries

My fingers are sticky
and stained blue
The basket is nearly full
and we begin the long trek back

The best ones
are always the furthest
he tells me
people don't want to walk that far
preferring a lower
effort to reward ratio

Their berries are small and shiny
skins splitting
his are powdery and plump,
juicy with a tart sweetness
you can't find
in the bland supermarket berries

I always sneak a handful
(quality assurance I tell him)
but he knows just by looking
that they will be perfect

Back home they're cleaned
and we laugh at how the discards
are what most people's first picking
looks like
nothing but the best he beams
...the standards are high

"We make the best pie!"
they seem to say
Pies that would fetch a fortune
at a roadside stand
if they ever made it that far

NaPo/GloWriMo - Day 28

 April 28, 2024 - write your own index poem. You could start with found language from an actual index, or you could invent an index. (* I found a couple index entries on trees from different books and mixed them in together to create this poem)

Trees

Trees
and ancients
as friends
wise and strong
gifts for our souls

Roots reach to the earth
creating a passageway to mystic worlds

Branches soar to the sky
where consciousness meets
spiritual heights

Giving us life
    knowledge 
        and purification
regardless how
undeserving as we are

NaPo/GloWriMo - Day 27

 April 27, 2023 - write your own poem titled “The ________ of ________,” where the first blank is a very particular kind of plant or animal, and the second blank is an abstract noun. The poem should contain at least one simile that plays on double meanings or otherwise doesn’t quite make “sense,” and describe things or beings from very different times or places as co-existing in the same space.

The Red Squirrels of Ruin

They lie in wait
anticipating,
watching,
as I carefully 
tend tomatoes,
care for cucumbers 
and plant sweet red peppers

I can almost imagine them
fiendishly rubbing their tiny little paws together
with unabashed glee
as if conspiring with
the dodos of destruction
or manatees of mutiliation

The garden is a lost cause
but each spring
I strive to create a space
where we all can subsist

The squirrels are cheeky
and ask for a corn row as well
They say "Nuts" and I tell them
I'm not planting those either...

I fear the end result
is a built in buffet
for those forest creatures
who have bested me
or beasted me
once again

NaPo/GloWriMo - Day 26

 April 26, 2023 - write a portrait poem that focuses on or plays with the meaning of the subject’s name. This could be a self-portrait, a portrait of a family member or close friend, or even a portrait of a famous or historical person.

***************** PLACEHOLDER*******************

NaPo/GloWriMo - Day 25

 April 25, 2023 - write a love poem, one that names at least one flower, contains one parenthetical statement, and in which at least some lines break in unusual places.

Yet

It's too early
I cannot be in love - yet

We have not travelled
to an exotic destination 
together - yet

We have not
cooked a favourite meal 
in a cramped kitchen
using whatever we can find
in the fridge - yet

We have not 
spent the entire night
staying awake (or trying to)
marveling at the moonlight
creeping across the crumpled bed sheets - yet

We have not bared 
every single
heartwrenching past hurt
and vowed never to do it again - yet

We have not
stared deeply 
into each other's eyes
seeing ourselves there - yet

We have not 
plucked Daisy petals off
one by one
loving you - loving you not - yet

Yet...
there is something
I cannot explain
cannot put into mere words
or even glances
a force
that will not be ignored
Something that just...

is...

Yet... maybe it is love 

NaPo/GloWriMo - Day 24

 April 24, 2023 - write a poem in the form of a review. But not a review of a book or a movie or a restaurant. Instead, I challenge you to write a poetic review of something that isn’t normally reviewed.

The Garden

Not too large
not too small
Just enough grass
to sink your toes into

Colourful bergamot and salvia and lavender
surround the lush lawn
their flowers laden with honeybees
drunk on nectar
and legs heavy with pollen

Gauzy gazebo curtains
billow with spring breezes
a book and a blanket 
and a cozy fire table
await the reader

Ripe baby tomatoes
grow next to Italian basil
and sweet cucumbers
a ready made snack
to be plucked
by those walking past

Glowing garden lights
blink on as the warm sun sets

over the Boxelder maple tree

its keys swirling down

to land silently on the stone patio

10 out of 10
would go again

NaPo/GloWriMo - Day 23

 April 23, 2023 write a poem of your own that has multiple numbered sections. Attempt to have each section be in dialogue with the others, like a song where a different person sings each verse, giving a different point of view. Set the poem in a specific place that you used to spend a lot of time in, but don’t spend time in anymore.

I
The clock ticked

it's even 
thrumming beat
strangely comforting
in the now nearly empty kitchen

II
Across the room
the cat
sits in the window
tail swaying 
with each pulse 
of the ancient timepiece
waiting for her turn
in the moving van

III
It was as if
everything paused
for a brief yet interminable moment
where the last 100 years
flew by
in a blur
of cracked vinyl chairs
the smell of rye bread
and cigarettes
and chewing tobacco

IV
Broken now
by the chime of the clock
"It is time..."
it seems to say
but it is time
that we have run out of

V
Empty rooms
dust motes slowly floating down
small feline footprints in the dust
and a clean spot on the shelf
where the matriarch 
of the family
once sat