NaPoWriMo April 18, 2020 Prompts 19 & 20

Can you remember who you were, before the world told you who you should be?” ― Charles Bukowski,

 

If you are just starting  to write a poem a day for NaPoWriMo 2020 – welcome.  Enjoy the challenge, develop the habit of writing every day.

 

Prompt 19

Short and Sharp

 

Write a poem using only single-syllable words to mimic short, sharp, precise actions.

 

“I’m nobody! Who are you?

Are you nobody, too?

Then there ’s a pair of us—don’t tell!

They ’d banish us, you know.

 

How dreary to be somebody!

How public, like a frog

To tell your name the livelong day

To an admiring bog!”

― Emily Dickinson

 

Prompt 20

Triffids

Develop a menacing plant metaphor or two and use it in the poem you write today.

 

 

Poem Starter CV19 – 18

by Christopher J. Jarmick

 

Ah….manufactured drama, tweets, aspirational deadlines

fighting words, finger pointing, mixed messages

political games, posturing, positioning, messaging

and the clouds roll in with a little rain for the

flowers and trees.

 

“Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash.”― Leonard Cohen

 

Thanks for supporting your friendly neighborhood independent businesses.

 

BookTree is Kirkland, Washington’s only new and gently-used bookstore and right now it offers curbside delivery, direct by mail books, and gift certificates.  Email: booktreekirkland1@gmail.com    BookTree Website here. 

 

Currently Reading: Apeirogon by Colum McCann ; Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson; Dorothy Day by by John Loughery and Blythe Randolph

 

The root of the word Poetry is from the Greek ποιέω (poieō), “‘I

make’”). , poiesis, meaning a “making” or ‘creation’

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Poetry is Everything

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KEEP WRITING!

NaPoWriMo 30/30 May 1, 2018

“Don’t get it right – get it WRITTEN!” ― Lee Child

NaPoWriMo Day 31

Whether or not you wrote in rhyme

wrote mostly junk or something sublime

writing every day is hardly a crime

and though you didn’t earn a dime

here’s hoping you had a marvelous time!

“To me, the greatest pleasure of writing is not what it’s about, but the music the words make.” ― Truman Capote

Thank you Brendan McBreen for contributing some wonderful, challenging prompts for NaPoWriMo 2018.   Use and re-use these prompts anytime, anywhere.

“Dance above the surface of the world. Let your thoughts lift you into creativity that is not hampered by opinion.” ― Red Haircrow

Keep Reading and Reading and Reading and Writing!

If you are near Kirkland, Wa.  Drop in to BookTree Bookstore at 609 Market St. Kirkland, WA 98033   Say “NaPoWriMo 2018, Poetry is Everything, Please give me 10% off my purchase” (available once per patron through May 31, 2018 – excluding certain collectors and special merchandise).  Please ‘Like’ BookTree’s Facebook page here.    Thank You!

“That’s all we have, finally, the words, and they had better be the right ones.” ― Raymond Carver

Here are my poems written from prompt 29 and prompt 30.

My poem for prompt 29, which involves finding someone else’s laundry in the dryer

Stormy’s Laundry

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

Dear Stormy,

I leave this worn but still provocative 38 double d

lace bra for you, pinned to this board

in hopes you will soon be

back.  I had to prove I’m no liar

(and for the record I don’t know Comey)

but I do have everything you left in the dryer.

I’ll keep it all for a week or so

And then I’m sure my wife will say

either those clothes or she will go.

 

I’ll donate them soon, so please

if you give me mine, I’ll give you yours.

No questions asked, which ain’t easy

because based on the volume of lacy pretty things

which seems to prove your profession is a little bit hipper

than being an accountant.  I mean all the frills and strings

clearly means you must be a professional stripper.

 

However you are not out of luck

as I figure this wardrobe costs more than a buck

or two  than what I wore when I was here today

a quite memorable one for me, I now must say.

Here’s hoping you’ll notice something is amiss

And soon return here to find this,

your lost bra and a little note from

Chris.

 

My Prompt 30 poem –  something old, new, borrowed and blue

 

And still we wait

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

He’s Baudelaire drunk

on Ferlinghetti’s poetic blue America

where politicians return to representing the people,

including the rich, the poor, the recent immigrants and the homeless.

 

We were caught in a storm but all is calm for now.

 

Be still. Breathe in, look

beyond the shimmering nova light.

Let the hopes, dreams and ideals

wash away the dirt of the journey.

We write louder than hate and now

several of us are throwing bottles with notes in them

into the oceans believing our imaginations will inspire one to ask;

what are these words worth, William, tell

us this love, this wisdom is also part of the real America we have waited for.

NaPoWriMo 30/30 April 23, 2018

A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool. – William Shakespeare

It is better to rust out than wear out.  – Edwin Markham

Do not be angry with the rain; it simply does not know how to fall upwards. Vladimir Nabokov

NaPoWriMo Writing Prompt for April 23, 2018

And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything. – William Shakespeare

The writer’s job is to get the main character up a tree, and then once they are up there, throw rocks at them. – Vladimir Nabokov

NaPoWriMo – 30/30 –  Poem-a-Day prompt for April 23, 2018

April 23 –  William Shakespeare  (1564 to 1616),  author & poet, Vladimir Nabokov (1899 to 1977) and Oregon-born poet Edwin Markham (1852 to 1940) were all born this day.  Can you write a poem that somehow evokes all three?

The breaking of a wave cannot explain the whole sea. -Vladimir Nabokov

Force cannot transmit a moral principle: moral ideas can be received only through the reason of the heart. – Edwin Markham

We think not in words but in shadows of words. – Vladimir Nabokov

Keep Writing

My poem for prompt # 21  Write about light and use some scientific terms.

Electromagnetic Radiation

By Christopher J. Jarmick

The exitance of illuminance

radiating from the Luminaire was spectacular

seemingly a large constellation,

small galaxy of shining, scintillating luster.

I joked to my English friend I was feeling phototropic

and asked how many footcandles he would estimate

we were experiencing.

“Footlamberts, you mean….’ he said.

‘Lumens then,’ I countered.

‘It’s not the highest value

or we would be in white out.

Not a lot of noise or even reflectance either.’ he sparked.

I glared at him.

‘Not much of that either,’ he twinkled.

NaPoWriMo Wrap-up and Bonus Prompts

The 2017 NaPoWriMo Wrap-up

 

“Ink runs from the corners of my mouth.

There is no happiness like mine.

I have been eating poetry.”

― Mark Strand,

 

“Safety isn’t always safe. You can find one on every gun.”

― Andrea Gibson

 

NaPoWriMo is done for 2017.   Congratulations!

You owe it to yourself to check out Brendan McBreen‘s just published collection of poetry from MoonPath Press.  Cosmic Egg.  Read a poem from it here.

Want a few more prompts for the next few days?

Here’s 6 more you can try.

 

From Brendan McBreen:

 

Prompt 31 –  Write a concrete poem, a poem physically in the shape of something.

 

Prompt 32 – Use consonance, pick a consonant and use it in each word of a line, pick another for the next line and so on. Try for eight lines.

 

Prompt 33 –  Write an ode to dentists.

 

From  me.:

 

Prompt 34–  Write an ekphrastic poem based on a work of Art you find on a random Google Image search.

 

Prompt 35 –  write a clerihew   (look it up and have at it)

 

Prompt 36 –  Use three words from each of the 6 quotes I’m sharing today to create a 6 line poem.

Here are the poems I’ve written from the 29^th and 30^th NaPoWriMo prompt

Day 29 NaPoWriMo Prompt suggested picking 4 or more Titles of current Best Sellers.

(I went a little crazy using most of the titles on the New York Times and Publishers Weekly Bestseller Lists)

The Burial Hour

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

‘The Fix’ is in!.

‘A Man Called Ove’, told too many

‘Fast and Loose’, ‘Big Little Lies’

collected in ‘The Black Book’

by me, ‘All By Myself, Alone’

because ‘This Fight is Our Fight’

not just ‘The Zookeeper’s Wife’

who was ‘Shattered’ hearing of

‘The Killers of the Flower Moon’

In the ‘Lost City of Z’ by

‘Hidden Figures.’

‘The Women in the Castle’

thought they had told

‘The One Perfect Lie’ to

‘A Gentleman in Moscow’

But ‘The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane’

knew the ‘Dangerous Games’

played by ‘The Cutthroat’ and ‘The Whistler’

were part of the ‘Vicious Circle’

and there were ‘Thirteen Reasons Why’

it all led back to

‘A Man Called Ove’.

 

Day  30  Prompt suggested   Choose 4 lines from what you have written in the last 29 days. These lines become lines 1,3,5, and 8.  Write new material for the  2nd , 4th , 6th  and 7th lines to create your final NaPoWrimo 2017 poem.

 

Previously

By Christopher J. Jarmick

We pretend we’re better

sometimes by escaping with a pill, a smoke, a movie, a book.

Twice, I have changed my reflection.

adjusted the light, changed my focus remembered that place

where imagination meant understanding.

History teaches with every decision, with every belief, there is more to learn.

Walk through the woods, by the lake and ocean, touch living things with compassion.

My brother and I would make a pile of sand.

 

Keep Writing!

Teach you children poetry; it opens the mind, lends grace to wisdom and makes the heroic virtues hereditary.  –Walter Scott

Yet, it is true, poetry is delicious; the best prose is that which is most full of poetry. –Virginia Woolf

Poetry should surprise by a fine excess and not by singularity, it should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.  – John Keats

Poetry is a way of taking life by the throat.  –  Robert Frost

Virginia Woolf

–

NaPoWriMo Prompt for April 20, 2017

DAY 30  – NaPoWriMo Prompt for  Sunday, April 30, 2017

 

“Perfumes are the feelings of flowers.”

― Heinrich Heine

 

The final day, the final prompt for NaPoWriMo 2017!  Hope you stretched and had a good

creative work-out and started a daily habit involving writing!

 

Day  30  Prompt

 

Choose 4 lines from what you have written in the last 29 days. These lines become lines 1,3,5, and 8.  Write new material for the  2^nd , 4^th , 6^th  and 7^th lines to create your final NaPoWrimo 2017 poem.

 

1  Previously Written Line

2

3  Previously written line

4

5  Previously Written line

6

7

8-  Previously written line

 

“To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work.”

― Mary Oliver

 

The 28th prompt  suggested by Brendan McBreen  was to write a poem about a sandcastle.

 

Here’s what I wrote

Jersey Shore Sandcastle Builders

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

We built them several

summer afternoons

for several years in row.

A tradition.

 

We built them just far

enough from the incoming tide

that within an hour we knew

we would witness their destruction.

My brother and I would make a pile of sand,

sculpt it,

then create irrigation

to bring water to our mini moat.

Often there would be an outer wall

Mostly so that we could

watch it disintegrate

a little sooner

than the castle.

Sometimes,

we’d only see the beginning

of its end

because we’d built it too grand

and it was time to go.

 

We didn’t mind,

we would do it again tomorrow

or next summer.

Until suddenly

we were older,

and no longer

building sandcastles

on the Jersey Shore.

 

Keep Writing!

Today BookTree celebrated Independent Bookstore Day.  At the end of the day, several contributors to The Nasty Women Project read their work and signed books.  The proceeds from the book support Planned Parenthood.   Here’s a group picture of The Nasty Women and the co-owner of BookTree bookstore in Kirkland.

NaPoWriMo Prompt for April 29, 2017

DAY 29  – NaPoWriMo Prompt for  Saturday, April 29, 2017

 

“So many things I had thought forgotten

Return to my mind with stranger pain:

Like letters that arrive addressed to someone

Who left the house so many years ago.”

― Philip Larkin

 

The penultimate NaPoWriMo prompt for 2017 is here!

 

And it also happens to be National Independent Bookstore Day!    So make sure that you visit an independent bookstore and buy something today.   In Western Washington 19 independent bookstores have joined together to create a fun contest with prizes and rewards for participants.    BookTree the bookstore I co-own in Kirkland  is part of Independent Bookstore Day too!   We have authors, guests, special limited merchandise, and much more.  BookTree’s event page is here.

 

Day 29 NaPoWriMo Prompt

 

Pick 4 or more Titles of current Best Sellers  (there are several types of lists to choose these from) Choose 4 titles from the lists.     Use the titles (as close to intact as possible) in a poem 4 to 8 lines long.

 

“Sir, I admit your general rule,

That every poet is a fool,

But you yourself may serve to show it,

That every fool is not a poet.”

― Samuel Taylor Coleridge

 

Prompt 27 – suggested we write an Anaphora poem.

Here’s what I wrote:

 

An Anaphora Anaphora

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

Anaphora and a five-a and a…

Anaphora may be botched pig latin for a floral arrangement

Anaphora is a drug they use to knock you out before a major operation

Anaphora is a peaceful place the mind escapes to

Anaphora would make a great name – Anna-Phora Jones and the Cathedral of Chaos.

Anaphora better planet.

“Anaphora, I’m anaphora, Your anaphora, We are all anaphora.”

 

Poem Starter 123,321

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

Poem Starter ,

Poem Starter what are you?

Poem Starter,

Poem Starter; short, to the point

Poem Starter,

Poem Starter return to us soon.

 

Keep Writing!

BookTree Sitting Zone

NaPoWriMo Prompt for April 28, 2017

DAY 28  – NaPoWriMo Prompt for  Friday, April 28, 2017

 

“This poetry. I never know what I’m going to say.”

― Jalaluddin Rumi

 

Welcome to the 28^th day of NaPoWriMo.

If you are anywhere near Auburn, Washington tomorrow

you should not pass up the opportunity to hear two former and the

current Washington State Poet Laureate as well as some other regional

poet laureates.  It will be quite the show- Friday Night.  Details here.

 

AND

 

On Saturday… 19 Western Washington Independent bookstores are celebrating Independent Bookstore Day.  Find out more about that here.

 

Today’s prompt was suggested by Brendan McBreen (he’ll be in Auburn Friday night….)

 

Write a poem about a sandcastle.

 

 “[Poetry] is the liquid voice that can wear through stone.”

― Adrienne Rich

 

Prompt 26–  suggested Writing a couple of short poems embracing an absurd idea as a reality and perhaps commenting on popular culture, or language or history or if you must politics.

Here’s a few I wrote:

 

L.A. Salmon Run

by Christopher J. Jarmick

 

The Salmon in L.A. run,

but they don’t swim upstream;

No!

They drive

like everyone else.

 

Poem Starter 4217

by Christopher J. Jarmick

 

I just noticed something about

the word ‘artisanal’

It’s ‘art is ana’l squished together.

WTF!

 

Poem Starter 4247

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

Reality is now

something to

be negotiated

since many choose

to believe whatever

they feel like regardless of

its relationship with

the truth.

 

Poem Starter 4237

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

When in doubt

take the fork

in the road

and eat your soup

with it.

 

Keep Writing!

Another Talia created version of the BookTree logo!

 

 

NaPoWriMo Prompt for April 27, 2017

DAY 27  – NaPoWriMo Prompt for  Thursday, April 27, 2017

 

The purpose of poetry is to remind us

how difficult it is to remain just one person,

for our house is open, there are no keys in the doors,

and invisible guests come in and out at will.”

― Czesław Miłosz

 

Prompt 27  Let’s use anaphora in our poem today.

 

Anaphora comes from the Greek for a  “a carrying up or back,” and refers to using successive phrases or lines that begin with the same words.  It can resemble a litany, it can be as simple as using a single word in each line of your poem or using a longer phrase.  It was used by Shakespeare, and is used in a lot of the world’s religious poetry including biblical psalms.

 

“A poem begins with a lump in the throat; a homesickness or a love sickness. It is a reaching-out toward expression; an effort to find fulfillment. A complete poem is one where an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words.”

― Robert Frost

 

Prompt 25 as suggested by Brendan McBreen was to write an upside  down poem.

Here is what I wrote.

Not A Right Side Up Poem

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

1.

I am standing on my head

trying to write

a poem

(but not this poem),

About something said

that almost

led to a fight.

It’s too difficult to

continue

and writing upside down

is NOT an upside down poem.

 

2.

Read this poem while

Standing on your head.

I realize that doesn’t make

the poem an upside poem

either, however.

 

3.

You are probably light-headed

ater standing on your head

for a few minutes.

You probably believe in your

present state

that this could be

an upside down

poem.

 

*Brendan’s suggestion to write an upside down poem seemed interesting and challenging.  Still does despite this awful write I’ve come up with.

 

Keep Writing

Robert Frost

NaPoWriMo Prompt for April 26,2017

DAY 26  – NaPoWriMo Prompt for  Wednesday, April 26, 2017

 

“Poets are shameless with their experiences: they exploit them.”

― Friedrich Nietzsche

 

Welcome to Day 26 of our poem-a-day marathon in celebration of National Poetry Month.

Prompt for Day 26:   Write a couple of short poems embracing an absurd idea as a reality which perhaps comments on popular culture, or language or history or if you must politics.

 

“Poetry puts starch in your backbone so you can stand, so you can compose your life.”

― Maya Angelou

 

The Prompt for Day 24  involved writing a poem about letters in the alphabet.

Here’s what I wrote:

 

Misprint

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

A book toppled off the shelf.

No one was near it.

I saw something moving on the floor.

It wasn’t a worm but could it be

a book fly?  A book ant?

As I picked up the book

I saw what looked like two eyelashes

moving on the floor

and bent down to get a closer look.

Two letters!

 

I was alone in the bookstore;

was I dreaming?

I looked away

then back at the

letters

making their way toward a space

underneath the bookshelf.

The letter ‘q’, and the letter ‘f’

moving together

almost as one.

‘Q’ and ‘F’?

What was this?

Were they escaping

from the book?

Has this sort of thing

happened before?

Did it happen often?

 

Perhaps the letters

were in love.

Perhaps love affairs between certain letters

was not permitted.

‘Q’’s are usually with ‘u’’s

they go together,

are almost always together.

But a ‘Q’ and a ‘F’?

This was an act of subversion.

 

I could understand

a  ‘Q’ and ‘X’…  they both

seem somewhat

anti-social… neither very

good team-players,

but certainly unique,

distinct.

A ‘q’ and  ‘g’ I could

see as a case

of opposites attracting;

But a ‘q’ and  ‘f’?

For several days,

I was in a daze

regarding the remarkable

thing I witnessed.

I forgot to keep track of the

book that the letters

escaped from.

And I realized

some day

a customer may come in

and talk about a misprint

they found

And I might be tempted

to inquire if it involved a missing ‘q’

And ‘f’.

I might be tempted to relate

my story

knowing it might  make me

sound unhinged.

Letters escaping from a book?

Letters magically alive?

Was I promoting something akin

to a conspiracy?

Did I really think there was

an alternate (or parallel) universe,

where the letters themselves

rise up against the traditions

and rules of grammar

and letter pairing?

And would that make the

father and mother of

this revolution

the ‘q’ and ‘f’

I observed

running off

across the bookstore

floor?

Best to keep

uiet  orever.

 
Keep Writing!

Maya Angelou

NaPoWriMo Prompt 25 for April 25, 2017

DAY 25  – NaPoWriMo Prompt for  Tuesday, April 25, 2017

 

“Poetry is a naked woman, a naked man, and the distance between them.”

― Lawrence Ferlinghetti

 

Welcome to Day 25!  We are on the homestretch of NaPoWriMo 2017.  I hope some of the writes stretched your writing muscles and imagination.  Perhaps you’ll find it easier in the future to be inspired to create.

 

Today’s prompt # 25  was suggested by Brendan McBreen

Upside-down is the theme, write a poem.

 

“I am the poet of the poor, because I was poor when I loved; since I could not give gifts, I gave words.”

― Ovid

 

Prompt 23   – suggested that we write a poem revealing an ugly truth.

Here’s what I wrote.

Ugly Truth

By Christopher J. Jarmick

 

Our necks strain toward the scene

of the accident.

We want to see what we

really don’t want to see.

Scandals, bad news,

attract us like gnats to a bright light.

We like rags to riches stories,

but absolutely love, love love

when those on top

fall off their perches

and belly flop loudly

complete with juicy lurid details.

We pretend we’re better

than that whenever it happens,

we comment about it:

‘they were too greedy. . .’,

‘it was too good to be true’,

‘they never deserved the good fortune,’

‘kharma, baby, kharma. . .

And some always say:

I saw that coming ages ago,

I knew it was going to happen.

Yet for all our wisdom

we remain gullible

and more naïve than cynical.

We like shiny success.

Perhaps we think

some of the shine

will reflect off of us.

Hell, someone has got

to win the lotto, right?

Wish I could write more

but the police scanner is

blaring and there’s breaking news

on the television…..

 

Keep Writing!