napowrimo # 30, thanks for all the prompts and goodbye!

Free write today. After 29 prompts, I was actually stymied. Whatever shall I write about?



Lessons Learned from NaPoWriMo


Procrastination is futile.

Also learned
I don’t need to be in my favorite place
using my favorite pen and journal
my favorite music in the background
with a glass of my favorite merlot,
I can write without a comfy setting,
under the strangest of conditions.

Spontaneity often counts more
than relentless effort .

Though poetry darts by on gauzy wings,
often missed in so much noise,
I learned the silence needed
comes from within.

Thank you ReadWritePoem
for the challenges,
for the good community of poets,
and for much, much more.
It's been extraordinary.

                         Wanda McCollar

napowrimo # 29

The prompt - take several headlines from today's newspapers, select words from them and make a new headline. Write your poem about that.



Asteroid Poisoned Earth’s Origin


It’s clear a mistake has been made
the learned scientists said.
When the earth was forming
a huge poisoned glob
of an exploded planet
fell into our mix and altered
our nucleotide chaining.
To make the story shorter,
we are shorter
than we are supposed to be
in the Universe scale of things.
Of course we built our houses,
machine guns, tanks, accordingly.
Stephen Hawking says
stop advertising our presence
we only have to look at ourselves
to know what we should fear
from aliens, and he’s right, except
for one factor -
they are also much, much larger.
All of them.
Have a pleasant day!

                       Wanda McCollar

napowrimo # 28

The prompt calls for another "aha" moment.  This really happened to me, I'm not making it up.  I  changed the personna of the narrator, so that it would be more feasible.  But this happened to me - I have no TV, in my defense.



Golden Sex


For an old gal I’m pretty hep
not fazed by terms like transvestite,
transgender, genderqueer, two spirit
or any androgyne. I keep in step.
Live and let live I always say.
Nope, genders don’t bother me
grammatical , sexual, or third,
neutered nouns, or splat pronouns,
if you get my meaning.
But driving to work the other day
I heard a new one on the radio.
What in the heck is golden sex?
They were really negative, angry.
The Senate put golden sex on display
(mercy me!) and the government
banned the practice, media’s bashing it.
How dirty can it be?
My imagination gets the best of me.
Glad I didn’t work up the courage to ask
before I saw that article this morning
– about Goldman Sachs.

                       Wanda McCollar

napowrimo # 27

Carolee proposed an acrostic for this prompt - a word that relates to oneself.  Fun!


Acrostic Me



Pondering palpable pulchritude, preternatural palaver, posing prestidigitation, possibly
Opposing obstreperous obloquies, obvious oxymoron, obnoxious ordinariness, otherwise
Enthusiastic, even ebullient every enjambment, evocative elision, elegantly eviscerated elegy,
Tantalizing tercet, timbered tone, trochee true to theme, terribly tempting tall tale tellingly told.

                                                                               Wanda McCollar

napowrimo # 26

The 26th prompt is to take an abandoned poem, and rework it.   For some reason unknown to me, I'm compelled to keep coming back to this poem.  This gives me a chance to look at at again.  After today's revision, is it now a finished poem?  Maybe, or maybe not - there's still something about it...


Goodbye to Elephants


Down the road in single file,
dust blurring our sorrow,
slow plodding round feet on planks
into a boxcar leaving forever,
and the band plays on unaware.

Drum, calliope, creak of cage,
stubby parade and lift of tents
defined spring. Then, offhand,
they weren’t coming back;
how could it ever be summer again?

We’d connected with elephants,
with their still eyes following us,
with surprises of sloshed water,
with musk, straw, slow litanies
of rumbles, trumpets, snorts,
huge swaying to ancient rhythms -
(we thought they were pleased to
be in the circus)
  

perhaps we knew even then
we’d look for elephants
the rest of our lives.

              Wanda McCollar

napowrimo # 25

The 25th prompt is to write a poem inspired by the first word or phrase one hears after reading the prompt. After I read the prompt, I drove to Heidelberg to watch the annual half-marathon . In Starbucks, waiting for the lead runners, a guy at the next table was telling his friends he dreamed he ran in the marathon today. One apparently asked if he crossed the finish line. The dreamer said he didn’t know – he woke up. The conversation was in German of course, and I wasn’t paying attention, but tuned in on his statement about not knowing if he passed the finish line. And I wondered...




To Sleep, perchance

to drive a cliff-hugging road
with aplomb or to fly by
willing my body to rise –
a simple process I’ve always known,
or to lecture with uncanny
wisdom to all applause. But
what was that remedy – and
what was the cause?

I’ve other skills morning disavows
or memory artfully denies.

So, where does it all go –
those actions abruptly cut short
by waking? The precious words,
the clever deeds, the ideas that will
save us – abruptly snuffed
by something circadian.

Perhaps
they sit around our hippocampus,
weaving puzzles to perplex us,
or screwing with our memories,
or creating metaphors
for our poems.

                   Wanda Mccollar

napowrimo # 24

For April 24 - select a phrase from Shakespeare, the Bible, or other sources and let it inspire a poem.  I chose "We have seen better times" from Timon of Athens  by William Shakespeare.  The form I used is an Elizabethan sonnet, which seemed appropriate.


We Have Seen Better Times

This growing old would get the best of you,
if you didn’t know it’s nature’s cunning play
for each body part in turn to bid adieu.
Could be your hearing’s first to sneak away,
poor fool, you’ll miss the gist but never know.
Your eyesight’s maybe next to go astray,
what’s written BIG is rarely apropos.
Joints’ cries then quite naughtily surprise
for pain, with knee, or neck it’s quid pro quo,
and muscles, well – fallen dough doesn’t rise
but no harm, you’re too pooped to miss the fun.
If you’re lucky your mind is the last that flies,
if not, these problems’ll bother you none.
So, watch it go, and laugh it up until it’s done.

                            Wanda McCollar