I’ve seen humans climb mountains higher than they can breathe,
I’ve seen flowers grow in the cracks of deadened leaves,
I’ve seen seas with strength hidden underneath,
and I think, maybe, just maybe that can be you and me.
Maybe
Challenge
NaPoWriMo – The Day After
I suppose it is time to acknowledge the end of my first time participating in National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo)! I am SO HAPPY I decided to take this challenge on and write 30 poems in 30 days (I can’t believe I actually kept up with it!). I definitely had difficulty posting poems every day, especially when I felt they were really rough drafts. However, the challenge forced me not to overthink and overedit my poems, but rather just let the words be and open myself up more. I have never written so regularly in my life, and perhaps because of that, for the first time I felt like a legit writer. I am forever grateful for all of the other writers I connected with over the course of this challenge. Although the daily prompts got me writing, the community kept me going. You all inspired me with your creativity and general awesomeness. Thank you so much for all the support, encouragement, and kind words!
Soo now I am not sure what to do next or what to write without prompts guiding me haha. I have a few loose ideas in my head on a series of poems I want to do, but nothing solid yet. What goals do you all have next for your writing? How will you stay inspired and accountable? What did you think of NaPoWriMo 2018?
For now, I figured I’d do a bit of a highlights reel, so here are my top five ‘most-liked’ poems from NaPoWriMo:
NaPoWriMo – Day 30 (Fascinating Fact)
NaPoWriMo – Day 22 (Impossible)
I’d like to honorably mention these because I feel like the prompts got me most out of my comfort zone, which is fun:
NaPoWriMo – Day 6 (Line Breaks)
Lastly, I want to highlight some of the blogs I followed during NaPoWriMo:
NaPoWriMo – Day 30 (Fascinating Fact)
Today’s National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) prompt is: Write a poem that engages with a strange and fascinating fact.
I’m in denial that today is the last day of the NaPoWriMo challenge, so maybe tomorrow I will acknowledge that fact. For now, below is my poem about viruses. It draws from the fact that “eight percent of the human genome consists of viruses.” It’s also influenced by Gerald Callahan’s essay, Chimera.
Some of our DNA
are relics of viruses
from past infections
so scientists say.
Envelope viruses like the flu,
carry lipids, protein,
and the stuff of genes,
from the hosts they travel through.
I like to think,
this means:
After years of sharing a home,
and conceivably the flu,
I’ve collected pieces of you,
stored in my chromosomes and genome.
You are not lost, you see,
You make up parts of me, literally,
saved in my “immunological memory.”
NaPoWriMo – Day 28 (Postcard)
Today’s National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) prompt is: We challenge you to draft a prose poem in the form/style of a postcard.
Busted out two responses for this prompt.
1.
I still feel the sting on my face where you tried to put me in my place. I lost my words against the hurt. I already knew, I’d leave you. What kind of man does all that he can to bring a woman down? I spent months crawling on your egg-shelled ground. What kind of woman loves this kind of man? I did all that I can to raise you up, with my love, but it’s not enough.
I’m stronger than you think. I’ve got a voice and I want to speak. By the time you get this letter, I will be somewhere better and the only eggs breaking are for the sunny-side up I’m making.
2.
When I get where I am going, I will say a little prayer, that you get there too.
NaPoWriMo – Day 27 (Tarot)
Today’s National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) prompt is: We challenge you to pick a card (any card) from this online guide to the tarot, and then to write a poem inspired either by the card or by the images or ideas that are associated with it.
Running out of time today, so for this prompt, I reworked a previous piece. I do like the idea of using tarot cards as inspiration for writing so I hope to write more poems later using other cards.
If you want me to,
I will love you.
If you let me,
I will be,
the one you love too.
I would say I do. I do. I do.
If you ever asked me to.
NaPoWriMo – Day 26 (Senses)
Today’s National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) prompt is: Write a poem that includes images that engage all five senses.
Springling
I don’t want to feel the sun against my face,
offering its warm embrace.
I don’t want to hear the kids outside playing patty cake,
slapping their hands rhythmically,
rabbits purring, or birds chirping happily.
I don’t want to smell the sweet smoke of the first barbecue,
meat patties sizzling, spring’s perfume.
I don’t want to taste the soft serve ice cream,
from the neighborhood Dairy Queen.
I don’t want to see the world turn green,
or clotheslines replacing drying machines.
All that these signs of spring do,
is show that life continues without you.
NaPoWriMo – Day 25 (Warning)
Today’s National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) prompt is: We challenge you to write a poem that takes the form of a warning label . . . for yourself!
WARNING
Be careful what you say or do,
Or my next poem may be about you.
Leave me mad, sad, or broken-hearted,
I’ll finish what you started
with a few quick key strokes,
I’ll hang you by a metaphorical rope.
NaPoWriMo – Day 24 (Elegy)
Today’s National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) prompt is: We’d like to challenge you to write an elegy – a poem typically written in honor or memory of someone dead. But we’d like to challenge you to write an elegy that has a hopefulness to it.
I decided to write a mostly fictional elegy for the purpose of this prompt and to have hopefulness!
You always kissed me goodbye,
no matter how early, or late, or angry.
You didn’t only give the shirt off your back,
you opened your wallet, you home, your everything,
to everyone.
“It’s the right thing to do.”
You didn’t complicate things.
You kept your moral compass with you, always.
It guided you in every action you took,
and in every word you spoke.
You spoke numbers like words,
adding complex numbers in your head
as easily as saying, “I love you.”
I loved the way you laughed at your own jokes,
far longer than acceptable,
and yet I couldn’t help but laugh with you,
even if we looked crazy together.
And that crazy hair of yours,
how it stood straight up,
always at attention, just like you.
It didn’t matter how many years we got together,
it was never going to be enough.
I still see you though,
in her,
in the times she floods my cheeks with kisses,
in how she says hi to everyone, offering her smile,
and nothing but the truth,
in the math tests she aces without studying,
in the way her nose scrunches when she laughs,
and in her musket-brown, wild hair.
You live on still.
You bubble through her veins.
She inherited your goodness,
your life,
and sometimes that seems like enough.
Photo by
NaPoWriMo – Day 23 (Sound)
Today’s National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) prompt is: Write a poem based in sound.
I am way swamped with work today, so dropping a few lines quickly!
Creeaaak, Crackle, Groan, Snap,
“What was that!?”
I look out the window and see,
Our tree,
split in two,
just like me,
and you.
NaPoWriMo – Day 22 (Impossible)
Today’s National Writing Poetry Month (NaPoWriMo) prompt is: Take one of the following statements of something impossible, and then write a poem in which the impossible thing happens.
I read this prompt first thing this morning so I could ponder it all day and brainstorm an idea by nightfall. But alas, nothing has come to my mind yet so I am winging it! I chose the “The stars cannot rearrange themselves in the sky” statement.
I always saw the stars as scrambled in the sky,
until I saw them through your keen eyes.
You pointed out Orion,
with his belt of three stars in a row,
and the Big and Little Dippers,
with their handles and bowls,
and The Twins, two stick figures,
with their arms stretched far,
and The Bull with his v-shaped face,
found first by locating the large red star.
It seems stars can rearrange themselves,
I’ve seen it so myself,
I wonder now, what else I’ve missed as remarkable,
because of what I thought impossible.
unwrithings 