Do you ever do like a bee? Are
you lured by the scent and colors and the wild loveliness of flowers? Do you
talk to the green that grows in your yard or the park or the street or (if you’re
very lucky) the nearby woods?
I hope you’ve answered “Yes” to
at least one of the questions above. Because for today’s prompt, I invite you to write 3 micro-poems (in 3 lines or fewer) inspired by
flowers.
Here are some examples from my very own doing like a
(human)bee moments:
spring births bright
purple crocuses
through dead leaves
Falling can be a chance
to appreciate familiar beauty from a different angle.
when it rains,
tulips blow kisses
at the clouds
You don’t have to include pictures with your responses. But…
if you have them, I hope you share them. Also, feel free to use the pictures I
just shared as inspiration for this prompt.
Add the direct link to your poem (the 20th! if
you are participating in 30/30 in April) to Mr. Linky. Do visit other Toads.
And as always, share your thoughts on the ink-flowers blooming in their
Imaginary Garden.
Hola, dear
Toads (and other word-loving creatures with deliciously charming smiles).
Today, I invite you to play with homographs, or words which share the same
spelling but have rather different meanings. Yes, I’m referring to words like gay and just and park and “Engagethrusters, Mr. Zulu.” Sorry, my Star Trek reruns binging is starting to show *cough*.
For this weekend mini-challenge,
write a new poem that includes one homograph (or more), and (1) use at least two of the homograph’s
meanings in your poem (as in “her lips were too close to my mouth for me
to close
the door in her face without knocking out my teeth”); or (2) use the homograph in your poem in a way which allows two of its
meanings to apply (as in “I wish to be close enough to her to kiss her lips
without violating her sensibilities or the laws of physics”).
The cloud below includes a bunch
of homographs to choose from. You can find more here.
Please add the direct link to
your poem to Mr. Linky. Visit other Toads. And have fun, fun, fun with words.
For this weekend's art collaboration, I am introducing Tomasz Zaczeniuk surreal artist and photographer from Poland. Tomasz has kindly given permission for us to use his amazing piece,The Temple, for our poetic inspiration.
A completely unreal vision from the Polish coastline.
It took me a decent few hours to create this with around 20-25 layers.
The Temple by Tomasz Zaczeniuk
Used with permission @fotowizjer
If you repost the image on your blog, please give attribution to Tomasz, using the following link:
https://www.instagram.com/fotowizjer/
Feel free to pay Tomasz a visit on Instagram or check out his website, FotoWizjer, where more of his amazing pieces are to be viewed, but not used for this prompt.
If you post your poem on Instagram, using Tomasz's image, please tag @fotowizjer and mention him as the collaborative artist in your post.
There are no restrictions placed on this challenge: Let the image speak to you and respond in a poetic or prose form of your choosing: Literal! Figurative! Reflective! Narrative! Symbolic!
As an alternative, you may write a Flash 55 inspired by the photograph, or on a subject of your choice, in memory of Galen, who first imagined this challenge.
"He felt a strange sense of relief as he watched the documents fly off into the street.."
For this weekend's art collaboration, I am introducing David Bülow, Danish architect and imaginer in ink. David has kindly given permission for us to use his amazing piece, The Turning Point, for our poetic inspiration.
The Turning Point
David Bülow
Used with Permission
If you repost the image on your blog, please give attribution to David, using the following link:
https://www.instagram.com/bulow_ink/
Feel free to pay a visit to @bulow_ink on Instagram or the Bulow Ink website where more of his amazing pieces are to be viewed, but not used for this prompt.
If you post your poem on Instagram, using David's image, please tag @bulow_ink and mention him as the collaborative artist in your post.
There are no restrictions placed on this challenge: Let the image speak to you and respond in a poetic or prose form of your choosing: Literal! Figurative! Reflective! Narrative! Symbolic!
As an alternative, you may write a Flash 55 inspired by the photograph, or on a subject of your choice, as we keep the memory of Galen alive, and send our love and support to Hedgewitch, during her time off from hosting.
Don't Touch My Meez “Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do."- Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Hello Toads! Toni here for this challenge. It is my turn to give the prompt and I am pumped. I hope you all enjoy this. Years ago when I was a dish washer working my way up to fry cook, to line cook to sous chef and finally to chef, I learned a very important lesson which has gone with me all through my life - cooking and civilian: Mise en place (meez ahn plahz). I use this when ever I home cook, cook at the Food Bank, cook at the church. I use it when cleaning my house and writing poetry. Mise en place literally means: everything in its place.
I learned early to have my board at the restaurant ready to go: crocks for softened butter, chiffonaded herbs, chive sticks, diced veggies, bottles of oils, vinegars, wines - at the ready. I also had a supply of side towels stashed because you need those clean dry towels for wiping plates, picking up hell hot saute' pans, wiping your board clean.
.I had been a line cook for one rush hour when the chef left his station and slammed his hand down on my board - hard. It sounded like an explosion. We all jumped. He then held his hand up to my face brushing my nose with his hand. "You see this shit? This is what your brain is like on the inside." His hand had crumbs, bits of herbs, a smear of butter. He was right. I also learned not to rob my compatriots' meez either. The meez was sacred. I learned the lesson and kept my board clean for the 20 years I worked cooking. I still keep a supply of side towels tucked into my apron. So what this is leading to is, what does your workplace look like at home? Where do you write your poetry? Do you do it in a comfy chair with a mug of something close to hand? Do you write in bed? The bathtub? Do you have a desk? Do you keep a pad by the bed for when you wake up out of the blue and have an inspiration to write down? LOL, if I did that, I can guarantee it would not be readable. My handwriting at the best of times is illegible.
Where Emily Dickinson Wrote her poems
I want you to write about where you write poetry - home, office, car, back porch. It can be any length or form. Just tell us about it. The scents, the sights, the music, the cat or the dog in close proximity, the kids interrupting your flow of thought, your thoughts over the first cup of coffee in the morning or the last cup of tea at night. I don't want to know the why, I want to know the where.
So wipe your boards clean, clear your mind and get to writing. I am looking forward to reading about your place of inspiration. And please do visit the other folks who have posted. They put out good work and deserve a pat on the back.
The object of this challenge has always been to write a poem of between one and twelve lines, in a form of your choice, but for the month of October, I would like to expand on this idea.
First, as it is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, I am doubling the number of lines.
Back in August, I felt inspired to begin a new project, one that would take my poetry to a different platform. I did something, which for me, is quite out of my comfort zone... yes, I ventured into the world of social media and opened an Instagram account. Since then, I have been rediscovering some of my own poems, and I have fallen in love with "notebook" poetry. It has reminded me of how I first began to write my words down with a pen on paper, rather than as I do now, wholly in a word document. It had got to the point that a poem didn't gel for me unless I saw it developing on my monitor in Georgia font! Now I am taking my time, using a nib pen dipped in ink, and even illustrating a few pieces. This month is known as #inktober on Instagram where today's prompt is "Breakable".
I wondered if I might inspire others to return to the comfort of pen and paper. I do not expect you all to rush about looking for an ancient bottle of ink (like I did) but I would love to see a photo of your work written in your own handwriting, or some kind of graphic presentation of your poem.
This is not a stipulation of the prompt... merely a request. Let us all remember the joy of the process!
This challenge comes with a wide angle and any filter of your choosing. However, the image puts me in mind of Hedgewitch's Fibonacci Challenge of August 24, 2014, so I have provided a link for anyone who might like to check it out and give it a try.
Hello, dear friends! Let’s try a simple and elegant form this weekend that may allow us to focus on balance. I could use some more balance in my life, how about you? Our form today is the TETRACTYS.
Toads! Let’s have some fun today. Let’s write palindrome poems! LOL.
We all know that a palindrome is a word or phrase that is the same when read forward or backward. Like WOW or CIVIC or LOL or HANNAH. (Hi, Hannah!) Heaven (Grace) introduced the palindrome in the Garden a few years back, HERE. It’s the same idea, except that a palindrome poem can read forward and backward word by word or line by line. Here’s a quick example that I wrote for Grace’s challenge, called “Minor Key Riots”:
Wayward night, this feeling like ripe dahlias-- Rioting, escaping the laden shrill étude that is Life-- Is that étude shrill, laden, the escaping, rioting? Dahlias, ripe like feeling this night-- Wayward.
Since then, I’ve discovered the brilliant palindrome skills of smarty-pants comedian Demetri Martin, offered to you today for inspiration:
Dammit I'm mad. Evil is a deed as I live. God, am I reviled? I rise, my bed on a sun, I melt. To be not one man emanating is sad. I piss. Alas, it is so late. Who stops to help? Man, it is hot. I'm in it. I tell. I am not a devil. I level "Mad Dog". Ah, say burning is, as a deified gulp, In my halo of a mired rum tin. I erase many men. Oh, to be man, a sin. Is evil in a clam? In a trap? No. It is open. On it I was stuck. Rats peed on hope. Elsewhere dips a web. Be still if I fill its ebb. Ew, a spider… eh? We sleep. Oh no! Deep, stark cuts saw it in one position. Part animal, can I live? Sin is a name. Both, one… my names are in it. Murder? I'm a fool. A hymn I plug, deified as a sign in ruby ash, A Goddam level I lived at. On mail let it in. I'm it. Oh, sit in ample hot spots. Oh wet! A loss it is alas (sip). I'd assign it a name. Name not one bottle minus an ode by me: "Sir, I deliver. I'm a dog" Evil is a deed as I live. Dammit I'm mad.
Wikipedia says Martin wrote this poem about alcoholism for a fractal geometry class when he was an undergraduate at Yale. Showoff! :) And Martin wrote a 500-word palindrome poem published in his first book, This Is a Book. The poem is HERE.
Amazing!! Okay, Toads--have at it, palindromes! Like a snake head eating the head on the opposite side (according to They Might Be Giants).
I’m writing this prompt in the early morning as our town wakes up under a blanket of fresh snow. Soon I’ll be out driving in it, headed to work. Are we done with this yet? Let’s travel somewhere else for a spell.
For our weekend fussy form challenge, let’s head to the Phillippines and try the TANAGA.
With apologies and love to you-know-you, the tanaga is similar to haiku and tanka, being a compact quatrain with four seven-syllable lines. The tanaga can be written in various rhyme schemes, but traditionally all four lines rhyme, like aaaa bbbb cccc, and so on:
X X X X X X A X X X X X X A X X X X X X A X X X X X X A
Or you can try other rhyme variations, like aabb ccdd, or abba cddc.
A tanaga poem can stand on its own four lines, or the verses can be strung together for a longer poem. Usually titles are not used with tanaga poems.
The key to tanaga is that it is a witty poem, emotionally charged or heavy on metaphor, sometimes begging a question that demands an answer.
For a longer/better explanation, Pirate Grace O’Malley introduced the tanaga in the Garden some years ago, here: TULOY PO KAYO
For a quick example, here is one of my attempts from that time:
The golden arches beckon. Hungry travelers reckon, "Just once." No condemnation, I understand temptation.
Okay, let’s try it. Have fun with this clever form, and please feel free to link up one or many tries as your rhyming heart desires. Enjoy!
The National Flower of the Philippines: Sweet & Fragrant Sampaguita
Hello
Toads! For our little form challenge today, let’s try invoking the rule of
three in a form that allows for poems that are short or longer--the TERZA RIMA.
We’ve played with three in the Garden plenty of times--think triolet or
sevenling--but I don’t think we’ve tackled this form directly. It also follows
nicely from the chained rhyme we worked on last time, so let’s dig in.
The
terza rima has a long pedigree, having been created by Dante for The Divine
Comedy, but it is really quite simple in concept. Perhaps that is why it is so
long-lasting. It is a series of interlocking three-line stanzas in which the
end rhyme in the second line provides the rhyme for the first and third lines
of the next, like this: A-B-A, B-C-B, C-D-C and so on, to your
heart’s content.
Another famous example of terza rima with which you may be familiar:
“Acquainted with the Night” by Robert Frost
I have been one acquainted with the night. I have walked out in rain—and back in rain. I have outwalked the furthest city light.
I have looked down the saddest city lane. I have passed by the watchman on his beat And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.
I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet When far away an interrupted cry Came over houses from another street,
But not to call me back or say good-bye; And further still at an unearthly height, One luminary clock against the sky
Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right I have been one acquainted with the night.
Usually
the terza rima is written in iambic pentameter, but this is not required. It is
suggested that the lines be the same length or syllable count, but again, not
imperative. There is no limit to the number of stanzas one might include in a
terza rima. One can write a terza rima sonnet as Robert Frost did above, like
this: A-B-A, B-C-B, C-D-C, D-E-D, E-E
Academy of American Poets has a longer article at poets.org about terza rima that may be interesting or helpful: ARTICLE
As a sweet-special and totally inspiring added bonus, I found audio of dearest Adrienne Rich reading her poem titled “Terza Rima,” which flies far afield from the form and, of course, amazes: AUDIO
And here is a review of Arts of the Possible, Adrienne Rich's collection in which this poem appears: REVIEW
