“I want to see thirst
In the syllables,
Tough fire
In the sound;
Feel through the dark
For the scream.”
― Pablo Neruda
It’s a wrap. Last day of NaPoWriMo 2022, aka National Poetry Writing Month 2022, the annual project that brings poets together to write a poem each and every day for the month of April. Congratulations for all the writing you did this month. May your habit continue. Scribble… away each and every day! It’s empowering to be creative and sometimes to have something worth polishing up and showing off to others. Yes.
The last Saturday in April is also Independent Bookstore Day in many communities and cities? The Seattle, Washington version this year is an exciting 10 day celebration. My bookstore, BookTree is one of 24 indie bookstores in Western Washington State officially celebrating independent bookstores. There are some others who jump in and celebrate too….make no mistake ALL indie bookstores count. Support the one or two near you! Click here for more info on SIBD!!!
I run a bookstore called BookTree in Kirkland Wa. (at 609 Market St Facebook site is here). It keeps me very busy which is why my postings were done in a group. I absolutely make it a practice to write almost every single day (a lot of scribbling that doesn’t amount to anything… except in reality they do… good with the bad, bad with the good). During poetry month I write every day without fail and usually to the prompts I suggest. Sometimes (perhaps like many of you reading this) I have only 15 or 20 minutes to devote to writing… some days I have more time. I figure out a way to make some time to write. Running a small business is very challenging and consuming. So I don’t have much time for posting on this blog. The poems I post have been quickly composed and need additional editing and polishing. A few are pretty damn good…. most… well… they keep me very very humble.
 BookTreeBookTree. 1,370 likes · 31 talking about this · 270 were here. BookTree is one of the few remaining independent … |
Prompt for Saturday April 30th, 2022 — LAST OFFICIAL NAPOWRIMO PROMPT.
It’s Independent Bookstore Day (IBD) for many cities and communities around the country. Celebrate independent bookstores. In Seattle, IBD, is a 10 day celebration and challenge. See link about it above. Today’s Prompt – write a poem honoring your favorite independent bookstore or stores… if it is still in business… do include a note at the end of where the wonderful store is located. Have FUN!
Here’s my hot off the press poem….for today’s prompt.
A Bookstore Day Poem!
by Christopher J. Jarmick
Independent Bookstores should be embraced
as the best place to heal. . .
maybe your friend, your neighbor,
a stranger or two
but definitely yourself.
Independent Bookstores are a good place
to dance with the beats of words
languish in the music of the imagination
or the syncopation of history
perhaps absorb the theories of philosophy
and breathe in the charismatic chemistry chorus of science.
Independent Bookstores are a good place
to get touchy feely with portable stories,
essays, poetry, and teachings.
No batteries, recharging needed.
Open one, feel its texture,
smell its age.
Independent Bookstores are portals
into alternate universes, where yesterday
teaches its lessons anew and at the same time
tomorrow is getting ready to fade into a dream
you had, and then you see your former neighbor
or meet a brand new person and everything
seems somehow just right in the world.
I’m thinking of several bookstores as I wrote this. Mine is BookTree 609 Market St. Kirkland, WA 98033…. and all those gone but not forgotten bookstores like Take Another Look Books, Bookworm Exchange in the Columbia City neighborhood of Seattle (both once homes to my PIE readings); and of course Park Place Books in Kirkland; not to mention: Cinema Books on Roosevelt a few blocks from Scarecrow, David Ishii, Bookseller and Seattle Mystery Bookshop in the Pioneer Square neighborhood, Wit’s End Bookstore in Freemont (once home to Poets West readings), the Book Kennel, Inner Chapters, Abraxus Books, Balderdash Books, Baily/Coy on Broadway, M Coy, Jackson Street Books, Mockingbird Books and many more no longer with us.
Tomorrow do a Wrap up Sunday May 1, 2022 – If you have the habit now, continue scribbling each and every day. Perhaps your bonus poem will take 4 to 6 lines from previous poems (no more than one line from a previous poem) and create a brand new 12 line or longer poem.
Keep writing.
“Ink runs from the corners of my mouth.
There is no happiness like mine.
I have been eating poetry.”
― Mark Strand
Here’s poems I’ve written this past week. . .
Prompt Poem for April 26th… opposite poem…
Not a smiley-faced poem
by Christopher J. Jarmick
I know you want to smile
to laugh
there are innocent people
being killed by a bully
we need to smile
we need to laugh
I won’t always be able to help you laugh
but I will often try
it makes me happy
to see you happy
if only you were still
here.
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Prompt Poem for April 27th, 2022 . . . Pickleball
The Pickleball Poem
by Christopher J. Jarmick
I have never played the fastest growing sport in the U.S.
I’ve been catching my breath
learning about balance
learning to navigate
putting on a happy face.
It’s called Pickleball
a combo of ping pong, badminton
and tennis played in a smaller place
with two to four players.
Too bad things changed
didn’t remain the same
would’ve been fun
to get out and learn this game.
So Pickleball was invented
near where I live
in Washington State on Bainbridge
by two suburban dads in 1965
same year Johnson signed the civil rights
and voting act ending years of suppression
of the black vote. It was also the year
he started the three year long series of
air strikes in Vietnam. Good with the bad,
bad with the good, I’m still learning
about that too. Some days I don’t even
think of you.
Pickleball is easier to learn and play
than tennis. It might have been named
after a family dog they saywho liked to chase the whiffle balls,
used in the game.
There’s a finesse shot I think
I would like to learn .. . a slow
lobbing change-up shot
that’s called a dink.
When I have a little more time
I will find someone to call
or maybe meet someone new
and we could play Pickleball.
Sound good? How about you?
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“Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.”
― T.S. Eliot
Prompt for April 28th... Headlines two to four or more combined.
At Fitzgerald the Cat’s Birthday Party
by Christopher J. Jarmick
the fifteen who got Covid wandered
into Cate’s new haunted mansion’s meditation
room before reuniting an Alabama teen with
his pet Hen lost after a Civil War reenactment
at the local Cracker Barrell which somehow
had something to do with the Zebra getaway
in Michigan which is a whole ‘nother story. I know
if it weren’t true you wouldn’t believe it. I wish
all we’ve been hearing about the Ukraine
was as made up as a tabloid headline regarding
bat boy, but truth is not only stranger
than fiction, it’s devastating.
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NOTES…..
Every day in April I create prompts for poets (including myself to write from if they so choose). The idea is to inspire AND challenge. I usually scribble something every day for at least 30 minutes… but this is a bit more purposeful during April for me… So today…. I took about 45 minutes and wrote these. I edited them for about ten minutes. Most will need another edit before I decide if I want them published or not (can I let these babies fly away?).
Prompt for Friday April 29th, 2022- Today- in a poem let’s speak of why ART (as in real Art… not just Arty; or Artistic).
ART SET
Poem Starter 429
by Christopher J. Jarmick
Art was not understood at the bar.
So he bought everyone a round.
Conversation, laughter
and soon friendship blossomed.
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No Must (or Only Real Men and Women dare make Art)
by Christopher J. Jarmick
I start my dancing
by walking like Charlie Chaplin
and then my shoulders keep a sort
of rhythm, but it’s my hands,
rolling at the wrist and expressing
a sort of celebratory freedom
that used to make her smile.
Mona Lisa
almost smirks
but no if you really look
you still aren’t sure.
Some days are almost
completely good.
This is the second stanza
it won’t fit in Joseph’s box
of found things and Andy
isn’t interested in silk screening
it multiple times. Maybe Jackson
will spit on it so it will be worth something
even if it is never understood.
It feels like I should grab some
partial random lines from a popular
song and mix them with an idea
or two borrowed from a folk tale
from Ireland. Something might
happen that I didn’t quite intend
and take my breath away.
You aren’t seeing it because
when I did this, I knew it was
dishonest and Art that matters
takes courage because it has to be truthful.
Take that away from what
you create and you have
nothing.
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“There is no must in art
because art is free.” – Wassily Kandinsky
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Warm Ups
by Christopher J. Jarmick
That freestyle
almost stumble
thing expressed by
dancers;
the indoor run into a somersault
and back onto your feet;
the children throwing themselves
the ground rolling down the hill;
blink really fast, loosen the muscles
in your face and shake your head back
and forth making silly noises.
Warm up exercises
for an artist.
Keep writing! Keep creating! Care!
Bonus poem free write April 29th 2:15 to about 2:35pm.
Another Love Lost
by Christopher J. Jarmick
Step right up
to your left were elephants
trained to perform like domesticated dogs.
If you didn’t think how many were mistreated
and how this was an insult to their intelligence
you could enjoy it.
Like the bitter clowns stuffing themselves into
tiny cars and being so silly.
Laugh and laugh and try not to be
creeped out over their bizarre face paint
and don’t think how many drink themselves
to sleep most nights of the week
Chimpanzees, dogs, Lions, even a bear
or two will perform. Shoot folks out of a
cannon… look up at the trapeze,
the tight rope, and that one is gonna dive
from way up there into that little bowl of water.
Most won’t die
but there’s risk and danger.
What fun!
If you get serious about risk and danger
try being creative, write, paint, sing
show a bit of your soul
bleed a little bit
even if nobody has any idea
why you do what you do
it ain’t money,
it ain’t fame
it sure ain’t power
it’s love at it’s core
so hot, so cold
so very very bold
broken heart and all.
———————
“I am the poet of the poor, because I was poor when I loved;
since I could not give gifts, I gave words.”
― Ovid
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Keep Writing!
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POETRYisEVERYTHING 