Finding What You Love (A Poem)

Welcome to my first post for the 2014 April PAD Challenge: Day One. Today's prompt is as follows (copied from the Poetic Asides blog):

1. Write a beginning poem. Today is the beginning of this challenge. It’s also the beginning of April. But there are so many other beginnings: Beginning of a relationship, beginning of school, beginning of the rest of your life, and so on. Pick a beginning to write about.
2. Write an ending poem. Often, though not always, beginnings come as the result of an ending. Sometimes endings are cause for disappointment, heartbreak, or numbness. Other times, endings are celebrated. Capture an ending today.

Baseball Meditation

End of His Game

I beg innings of each baseball
game to go smoothly for that eleven-
year-old dancer in the outfield,
remembering when he smiled
and hip-hopped across a sleek
spot-lit stage. Later he dives
for second base, skins his knee,
off in the distance sirens ring out
over the oohs and aahs of spectators
sucking and spitting out his bliss
with their sunflower seed shells. 

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Always Learn From Nature

Birds Helping Birds

November came and with it, six

Birds of Paradise who peeked

out from solstice lull, beaks

pointed towards sunless sky

and winked at me as humming-

birds dipped and dived

inside for an autumn drink, made

me thankful nature's beings care

for each other when man

isn’t looking.

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I've been so focused on my NaNoWriMo work-in-progress that I've been limping along with the PAD Chapbook Challenge at Poetic Asides. I managed to squeak the above poem out for the Day 20 prompt though: 

"For today’s prompt, take the phrase “Always (blank),” replace the blank with a new word or phrase, make the new phrase the title of your poem, and then, write your poem. Possible titles include: “Always on My Mind,” “Always Wrong,” “Always Writing Poems That Don’t Sound as Good the Next Day,” etc."

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People in Trees by Mikola Gnisyuk

Mikola Gnisyuk, “People in Trees” (via Baibakov Art Projects)

Stranger than Strangers

Perched on birch tree
limbs, they posed like squirrels 
resting, nibbling acorn meat, on high
alert for anything
out of the ordinary, mainly natives
beneath them
creating footsteps
in winter’s first dusting. 

*****

Written for the Day 11 PAD Challenge prompt: 

For today’s prompt, we’re going to write ekphrastic poetry–or poetry based off another piece of art. In the past, I’ve provided paintings, but today, I’m picking photographs (for something a little different). You may use one of the images below or choose your own.

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Why Bother Writing Poetry?

The past couple of days have been productive for me. I participated in the NaNoWriMo writing sprints and overcame the stuck place I was in on the book I'm writing. I'm moving right along in my class, have been selecting works for the January issue of Mouse Tales Press, and I'm also watching 2013 pass me by. 

How is it November already?

I need to catch up on the November PAD Challenge. The poem below is not part of the challenge. It's just something I've been thinking about for a while. If nobody reads your work, does writing matter?

The Empty Forest Lives On

Silence in My Penned Forest

My words are a birch
tree, fallen in autumn wind-
storm, no one around to hear.

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The Last Time I Was Stumped

Yes, I skipped Day Two (for now). This was written for the Day Three PAD Challenge prompt: 

"For today’s prompt, write a “the last time I was here” poem. Imagine you’re returning to a spot (physical, emotional, psychological, etc.): Is it a good thing? Bad thing? What did you leave behind (if anything)? What’s there to welcome you back (again, if anything)?"

 

Hopefully the Last Stump

The last time I was here,
resting on a stump, splintered
by word overload, alphabet
soup stewing in my brain,
trying to contain misplaced
energy, rope it, wrangle it,
pull it back in until frayed ends
meet-and-greet new beginnings
at restless fingertips,
keyboard, or unsharpened
tongue. I wish I could say the last
time I was here was the last
time, and words lived
happily ever after, but last
times always circle back around
to first times, rolling
like a stump, bumping
and jumping over earth’s
word(l)y imperfections. 

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