NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 18

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 18

MEOW!

“I’m cursed. I’m a tiger,” says Read Write Poem member Irene. She’s talking about the Year of the Tiger, and it’s the inspiration for her NaPoWriMo prompt:
The tiger is a creature known to create wildness and tumult. In Chinese superstition, it is not a year to marry or have children. The tiger is too aggressive. It stalks and preys.
Write a poem featuring the cat family, whether big or small.
There are many cat poems that may inspire you. The first poem that comes to mind, William Blake’s “The Tyger,” wonders why such a creature is created in the first place. Did such a creation come from the Devil himself? God will only create a lamb, right?
Ted Hughes wrote about the jaguar, a not-so-distant cousin. I think a jaguar looks even more fearsome. There’s a playful feline quality about the tiger. Not so with a jaguar! It is like black rage. I’ve seen a jaguar in a zoo, pacing endlessly in its cage. Here’s how Hughes wrote it, in “The Jaguar,” “He spins from the bars, but there’s no cage to him” and “his stride is wildernesses of freedom.”
Then there’s the pussy cat. In “Esther’s Tomcat,” also by Hughes, the cat becomes, in a figurative sense, the protagonist, the beleaguered husband. Hughes describes him as “an old rough mat” and reveals, “Continual wars and wives are what/ Have tattered his ears and battered his head.”
Is that enough to go on? Roar! Purr! (You choose.)

HERE'S MINE:

EH EYE OH MEOW

Katz dangle marmalade

doorsteps from upstairs

windows on fishing wire.

The backyard bees don’t

give a buzz, but the Kool

Katz still catch the odd wasp.

The city fox is sly, but the

alley cat is king of the cobbles.

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Y

Y

Y

WHY

Y

charcoal grey

lava clad sky

snow black peppery

that’s why

birds don’t fly

 bees are busy

wasps get dizzy

sneezey cheesey

that’s why

they buzz by

fix wing no fly

flap wing no fly

rotary helicopter okay

that’s why

they buzz by

shivery day

grey soupy sky

from geezer country

that’s why
birds don’t fly

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Day 18 2009

OTHER STUFF

NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 17

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 17

SOMETHING ELEMENTAL
Look at you! Writing past the half-way mark! Today, Neil Reid invites us to keep going by writing about the elements:
Let’s be elemental. Fire, earth, water, wind. They touch our lives every day. Choose one that interests you, then take a point of view that is not so much your usual. Observe what interaction you’ve known, or not known, with this element.
You might make it personal or take the element’s point of view (how might humans appear to you from that stance?) or wander where you may. Tell us something about your element that we don’t know.
You’re welcome to make your own rules, and as always, the most important point is simply to write and share, however it comes your way! Have fun!
HERE'S MINE:

-->
Written for my Great great great Grandma Mrs Butcher who ran the Turkish Baths

TIED TO THE KITCHEN SINK

Dehydrated looking for more planets

Planets with water is what they’re after

After all the plants on earth need it too

Too many people are dehydrated

Worlds apart living in the same city

Cities this side of Eden verses them

Them that have clean water and them that don’t

Don’t you know we live in different worlds

Jill complains when the kettle doesn’t boil

Boils a pan of water and makes some steam

Steams the envelope open reads Jacks news

News that he doesn’t need to know thinks Jill

Bathing there tethered by her apron strings

Strung to her mother and her grandmother

Grandmothers grandmother Misses Butcher

Butcher Baker who ran the Turkish bath

Mains water made the difference back then

Then more so than now H2O on tap

Tap the lead pipe and cold water showers

Showers through the home drilled rose from the mains

Half the third world are dying from the drought

Drought where only snakes rattle in the well

Well then who turned the water into wine

Whine all you like but don’t do things by half

Yeah she might be tied to the kitchen sink

Sink or swim a little the water’s wet

Wet behind the ears the dishwasher hums

Hums the hymns of Christendom humbug yeah

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Day 17 2009

OTHER STUFF

NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 16

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 16

WHAT'S THAT SMELL?
Read Write Poem member Julie Jordan Scott launches her NaPoWriMo prompt with a quote from Diane Ackerman: “Smells detonate softly in our memory like poignant land mines hidden under the weedy mass of years.” Julie reports having discovered in her own notes 17 pages on the subject! Here’s the prompt she culled from material she’s collected:
Practicing the art of writing from the sense of smell will open language in a different way than writing from a more “language friendly” sense, like the sense of sight or sound. Because of this, writing that uses a scent prompt evokes visceral, richly experienced poetry.
Scientific fact: Salmon smell their stream of birth from hundreds of miles away. The scent of this particular stream weaves its way to the salmon like a love-call. It rises and falls with the water, its essence calling the ancient connection. The salmon respond to this invitation and make their way back to their spawning ground.
Humans have primitive connections to the sense of smell, as well. It is our most primal sense, especially since the connections between the language centers and smell sensory centers are so few. Our sense of smell is tied to our most ancient selves. Another intriguing fact? Smell is connected closely to our memory centers even though it is distant from our language centers.
Somewhere near where you are sitting is something with a specific smell that will conjure a memory rich with images. Take a moment to find any such object and breathe the scent of it, deeply. It may be as simple as a strand of your hair, a ketchup bottle from the refrigerator, a potholder or a bottle of lotion.
Add to your breath the simple phrase, “I remember” and breathe the scent in again. “I remember.” Free write from “I remember” for at least five minutes, repeating the prompt “I remember” if your writing slows.
Use the seeds from your free writing to write today’s poem.

HERE'S MINE:

There's a rotten egg smell in the air this morning and a thin layer of dust on the ground, it's coming from the volcanic erruption in Iceland.

DINOSAUR 

                    EGGS 

                                   DON'T 

                                               HALF 

                          SMELL 

can't sniff up

technology sucks

rotten eggs

terminology

terminal decline

volcanic

geology cools

rocks hot up

technicality

volcano errupts

lava flow

sea level rises

ice explodes

air crews are grounded

robocop patrols

bionics

cross automatom

robotic

inspirational

regeneration

greenhouse whiff

geodisical

salvation

mechanisation

dinosaurs return

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Day 16 2009

OTHER STUFF

NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 15

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 15
CARRYING A TUNE
Do you have the courage to attempt today’s prompt, written by RWP member Dale? If you haven’t practiced being silly in a while, this is the perfect assignment for you: In a nice private place, pick out a stanza, or a few lines, that you like from a poem that you don’t otherwise feel was very successful. Say them over to yourself. Now hum them. See if you can find the tune. And now sing them aloud. (Who cares if you can sing? You’re in private. And this is poetry!) Throwing away the rest of the poem, write two more stanzas (stand-alone or connected) that go to the same tune. No fair doing it silently!

HERE'S MINE:

PLEASE PRETTY
I need somebody to love me
I need somebody new
I need somebody to love me
I need somebody true

Pretty Please Pretty
Pretty Pretty Please
Pretty Pretty Pretty
Please Pretty Please

I think she looks like Goldilocks
And she sure looks like you
Yeah you drive me crazy babe
I love you oh so true

Chorus

I need somebody to hug me
I need somebody blue
I need somebody to hold me
How I wish it was you

Chorus

I need somebody to love me
Tonight might be too late
I need somebody to love me
Please Pretty be my date

Repeat

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Day 15 2009

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NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 14

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 14
I was going to do Nicole Nicholson's prompt over at Read Write Poem, but when I went to have a look at the sample site for The Cleave my computer went crazy and it has taken all day to settle down. In the meantime I did the prompt at Three Word Wednesday on their super new site. And I wrote what I intended to be a fantastic poem, which in reality fizzled down into a simple Syllabic Cinquain, thank you Adelaide Crapsey.

HERE'S MY FANTASTIC POEM:

POETS
full of wonder
amaze you, inform you
create... stagger you, annoy you...
Astound!
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Day 14 2009

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NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 13

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 13
I'm going to give you something a little different today. I was thinking about time, and how you can stop the clock from ticking. You need to mix a little imagination with a little known fact to achieve this goal. Doktir Nairobi once told me that 'You are where you think you are' and I've always found this to be true. He also gave me a meditative mantra: 'Think about Month 60' .
MONTH 60
Now Month 60, can be used for many things, and in this application we're going to examine (briefly) how to time travel backwards. Okay, with your eyes closed, I want you to think about Month 60, in the background you can hear a clock ticking, I want you to de-tune and mentally stop that clock from ticking. Then I want you to imagine a clock face, it can be any clock face, and I want you to watch the minute hand.
MANTRA
With your eyes still closed, I want you to repeat the mantra, the minute hand on the clock face will now start moving at the speed of the second hand. The second hand remains stopped. (Don't worry if you can still hear the clock ticking. Just imagine the ticking as being the speed of sound.) Now as time speeds up, each minute becomes one hour, and very soon it begins to get dark, or light, depending on what time of day you are doing this. In just five minutes, you have travelled five hours back in time. You didn't even move, time moved on without you, and when you open your eyes, and blink, you'll be right back where you started.
MARKETING
Month 60 is sometimes called the sixty day month or cycle, and many business people use it as a secret marketing tool. They don't know why it works for them, it just does, and it never fails. You can test it yourself, if you have a company or charity newsletter to publish, don't go the monthly, bi-monthly, or quarterly route. Simply publish it every sixty days, you'll be amazed as your circulation explodes. The other application is to publish a daily, it could be a newspaper, or a news bulletin. Or just a poem or a blog entry - the trick is to publish exactly 24 hours between each one. When you stop the clock from ticking, Month 60 is exactly twenty four hours.
SELLING
If you're selling books, you can leave them on display for sixty days, and then refresh the stock. The people who do this, take them to non-bookshop outlets and leave them with retailers on a sale or return basis. They then go back with new stock on the sixtieth day, and collect 50% of the sales money. The sales pitch to the retailer is: Are you interested in 100% lines?
The books? They just sell themselves. Think of Month 60!
HERE'S MY POEM:

HOW TO

TIME TRAVEL

BACKWARDS

Mandy say’s, I can’t stop time.

Oh, but you can stop it ticking.

Not that anyone would want to.

They wouldn’t would they, why?

How about time travel backwards?

She didn’t know what to think!

I don’t think it’s possible, is it?

Xenophanes never mentioned it…

Think about Month 60, stop the clock.

You’re moving backwards, 24 hours.

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Day 13 2009

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Answer to yesterday's secret code..

NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 12

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 12
SECRET CODES
We are more than one-third through NaPoWriMo. If you feel like you’ve started to make things up (two parts desperation, one part coffee grinds), then Carolee Sherwood’s prompt for Day 12 will play into your hand. Make up a secret code. Begin by writing a few nonsense sentences, like “The raindrops tap out a cry for help” or “The dandelions are saying all at once, ‘You are overwhelmed.’” The formula is easy: come up with a message and assign it to something unlikely. Remember, of course, that inanimate objects can speak and that signs and symbols may be nonverbal. Once you have a few sentences, select the one that is most intriguing to you and use it to start a poem.

HERE'S MINE:
This prompt was right up my street! I love secret codes and messages and riddles and anagrams. I think I strayed from Carolee's prompt, but it was the prompt that got me to write this. So:

EATING DAFF'S
Emit the tin age man drank all the gin
ate all the food and then swallowed
the gate. In the garden the daffodils
in bloom are eating all the daisies
now the daisies are eating daff's for lunch.
Ganite, the food agent I met Monday
declared it an eating disorder,
and said: But don't get in a pickle
fret not or the eating daff's may
fear that they will be beaten
soon, how would you unscramble this?
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Day 12 2009

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NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 11

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY11
THE THING YOU DIDN'T CHOOSE
RWP member Angie Werren invites us to write about the choice we didn’t make: Everyday we make choices. Some are small: English breakfast or Lipton? the highway or back roads? Some are more significant: convertible or mini-van? farmhouse or condo? Some choices lead us straight into the life we’re living, but for this poem, think about one of the things in your life you didn’t choose. Be concrete. Pick an object — something tangible* — and write your poem directly to it, as if you were writing it a personal letter. Explain why you didn’t choose it. What could things have been like if you had? Talk about what your life has become without it. See where the “confession” takes you. *As an alternative, dig a little deeper and write your poem to a person you left behind.

HERE'S MINE:

NUMBER SIX

in the playground

you said you would

be my friend forever,

forty years ago,

the same day you

choked my mum to death

Hollywood and the

movie actors told me

you were cool too

I dreamed of passing

clouds of making a

lucky strike on TV

it took me thirty five

years to figure you out,

when you told me

I was dying for you,

you really should have

told me that you

were killing me little

by little forty times a

day and all that money

that went up in flames,

trusting you was my first

mistake I could have

lived longer, healthier,

taken a holiday, bought

myself a brand new car

or played a game of tennis

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Day 11 2009

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NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 10

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 10
CELEBRATE!
RWP member Pamela Sayers says, “I live in Mexico, and one of the things I love most about this country is that people here celebrate their family and friends to the utmost.” And it is in that spirit that Pamela asks us to write about any celebration we have been to recently.Write about a birthday party, a wedding, a baptism — any kind of celebration where you were with family or friends or both. Write about the colors you remember, the sounds (and how they made you feel) and the tastes you remember from any of those events. Did these things make you feel good? Did you experience any new foods? Did you meet any new people? Sometimes, beyond our control, festivities can take a turn for the worse. Maybe that happened to you or someone you know. Whatever happened, be it great or not so great, let’s write about it!
HERE'S MINE:
I thought about this one for a long time, and rejected several ideas. In the end this one came out, I had lots more to say, but the poem itself told me to end on 'hits the switch' I wanted to put something about her sitting on an electric chair, but she said no. Now I guess we'll never know what she wrote in her diary, phew!

CELEBRATION

she lies there under the blossom tree

looking up and trying to count the specks

mentally thanking the big bang (in theory)

for the warmth of spring and the coming summer

she writes something quickly in her diary

and hides it under the pile of washing

feeling guilty for taking even a short break

eventually she goes back to the house

it’s the twins birthday and it’s party time

in another hour the bib gang will be here

spilling jelly and choking on cup cakes

she loads the washing machine and hits the switch

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Day 10 2009

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NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 9

YOUR MISSION

RWP member Robert Peake has shared with us a prompt he used recently with one of his established writing groups:

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to:

• Use at least twelve words from this list: flap, winter, torch, pail, jug, strum, lever, massage, octopus, marionette, stow, pumice, rug, jam, limp, campfire, startle, wattle, bruise, chimney, tome, talon, fringe, walker;
• Include something that tastes terrible;
• Include some part (from a few words to several lines) of a previous poem that didn’t quite pan out; and
• Include a sound that makes you happy.

Write a poem!

HERE'S MINE:
I used eleven small words and one big word: rug, jam, jug, flap, pail, stow, limp, strum, torch, wattle, tome, and campfire. Seagull soup is the thing that tastes terrible. The puppy dog bit is from an old daft poem. And the Scream! is the sound that makes me happy. Don't you just love screaming?? In addition to this I threw in a bit of rhyming slang: hit 'n' miss, jam-jar, brown bread, and humpty dumpty. And just for good measure a couple of words spelt backwards: Krap and bog! Phew!!

SEAGULL SOUP
Camping with the Wattle Street Bunch
Twelve of us in a ten-man
went. Everything but the kitchen...
Drink a jug of Scrumpy, Humpty.
Dump tea in the back of the jam-jar.
Through the tent flap, torch in gob
to park in a pail of hit 'n' miss
propped up on a weighty tome
Shakespeare, limp back,
roll up the Afghan rug.
Down on the streets where
the puppy dogs meet and the
big dogs mate by the back alley
where Gordon met his fate,
that's where the rats come...
...flip, flap - flop!
The camp mother gave his banjo
a strum, waking us up from this. Scream!
Marzi (he forgot to stow the pan)
did when we got him back at brunch -
by dropping a brown bread seagull
in his oil drum of soup on the campfire.
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Day 9 2009

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NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 8

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 8
UNUSUAL LOVE CONNECTIONS
Valentine’s Day is long past, says RWP member Jill Crammond Wickham, but we poets must keep up our reputation as the world’s foremost experts on writing about love!
Today, think of your current love, your current obsession or the one who got away. Now come up with five or more unusual metaphors for the object of your affection/obsession: wool scarf, cough drop, puddle, half-empty bottle of red wine… Choose your favorite of the bunch and write a poem celebrating (or trashing) your love.
HERE'S MINE:
I wasn't sure which way to go with this one, in the end I chose half a dozen lines from some of my old 'love' poems. If you want to have a look at them, please feel free to do so.
I knew she was you by the way her hair blew, You are my lyric and my tune, Fancy a quick dance? Goodbye, I don't think so, Goodbye old boat race, Which way ever the wind blows.
After five or six revisions, I came up with this:

TUESDAY MOON

Last Tuesday moon wind

met Gale lost June

fine lyrics she blew

gust hurricane tune

rock dancin' single

'til next Tuesday moon.

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Day 8 2009

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Phew, thanks for reading this, I know you love me, but if you follow me, I'll LOVE YOU too!

NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 7

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 7
LOVE SUNNY SIDE UP
Today, Alan Summers wants us to write poems about “humor in love,” and he has a specific form in mind!
Write and capture humorous incidents related to love in a 5-line love poem called a tanka. (You may even decide to create your own tanka journal for love poems!) Here’s how to write one:

1. Describe in concrete terms one or two simple images (two or three lines) from your humorous love encounter, not just what you saw but also what you tasted, touched, smelled or heard.
2. What were you were thinking at the time this love encounter happened? Write that down, too, as two or three lines, so you have five lines in total for the poem.
3. Think about making the third line of your poem into a pivot line, so that it links to both the previous two lines and to the final two lines.
4. Test the tanka by dividing it into two parts so the third line acts both as the last line of the first part and as the first line of the second part. Does each section make sense separately, and then together?
5. Think about reducing — and even avoiding — capitalization and punctuation because a tanka needn’t be like a sentence or merely a flat statement.
6. HERE'S MINE:

LOVERS IN THE AIR

Up in a balloon

straw basket bangs sucking gas

lovers in the air

no haystack needles, I pray

or this baby's going down

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Day 7 2009

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NaPoWriMo 2010 Day 6

NAPOWRIMO 2010 DAY 6

Posted to Read Write Poem
and at my Proper Joe's blog.

I wrote a NaiSaiKu for The NaiSaiKu Challenge?
and a NanoAmerico^  for The American Sandwich game..

The Tuesday prompt was to write your own American Sentence and choose a Sandwich game to play:

My Sentence: When Dave told her that their pet robot would soon need a new memory.

Here's my NanoAmerico^

"She won't obey me," said Dawn.

When Dave told her that their pet robot would
soon need a new memory.

"Can she have a sex change too?" Dawn pleaded.

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Here's my NaiSaiKu :

Tuesday rain

wets my chewing gum

HAIKU CHEW

wets my chewing gum

Tuesday rain.

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Day 6 2009

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