Photo Credit: Marcus Ganahl who made this image available for free on Unsplash
The final prompt of NaPoWriMo was a challenge to write a cento. This is a poem that is made up of lines taken from other poems. If you’ve never heard of one before, join the club. I hadn’t either.
Here is an example from John Ashbery: “The Dong with the Luminous Nose,” and here it is again, fully annotated to show where every line originated. A cento might seem like a complex undertaking – and one that requires you to have umpteen poetry books at your fingertips for reference – but according to the folks at NaPoWriMo, I didn’t have to write a long one.
In spite of “tips” to help me “jump-start the process”, this was a considerable bigger undertaking than I originally thought.
Because my friend lost her daughter (and my Lizi’s best friend) on this date, I often write a poem dedicated to her on the last day of NaPoWriMo. This poem is in memory of Jacy Lynn Dettloff and in honor of my friends, Susan, Steve, and Mick Dettloff who lost their beloved daughter and sister 21 years ago today.
This year (in August) Jacy would have been 30 years old. I know this because she and my son Aaron were born just a few days apart.
The grief tears at my heart as well.
Grief In Four Parts
1.
The River
Grief is a river you wade in until you get to the other side.
I tell you, hopeless grief is passionless.
When grief comes to you as a purple gorilla
then maybe—just maybe—the hours will carry you
into June, when the roses blow.
The air around you fills with butterflies.
I do not know how to hold all the beauty and sorrow of my life.
The morning air is all awash with angels,
and are we supposed to believe she can suddenly talk angel?
2.
The Desert
Little petal of my heart,
I didn’t know where I was going.
I was always leaving, I was
desolate and lone.
3.
The Night
If but I could have wrapped you in myself
I would I might forget that I am I--
a smile of joy, since I was born.
Things change on the morning of the birthday—
the hope is in wakening to this your last dream.
The shadows of you are around me;
the evening shadow has sunk
gleaming. So I can
come walking into this big silence.
4.
Hope
A daughter is not a passing cloud, but permanent;
she's light and also passage, the glory in my cortex.
Dare the deliberately happy to butterfly the gnarled roots of life—
Grief dies like joy; the tears upon my cheek—
“Hope” is the thing with feathers.
--A Cento poem by cjpjordan
Grief in Four Parts (Annotated)
Grief is a river you wade in until you get to the other side.
Barbara Crooker, “Grief”
I tell you, hopeless grief is passionless
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, “Grief”
When grief comes to you as a purple gorilla
Matthew Dickman, “Grief”
then maybe—just maybe—the hours will carry you
into June, when the roses blow.
Gottfried Benn, “Last Spring”
The air around you fills with butterflies--
Katherine Garrison Chapin, “Butterflies”
I do not know how to hold all the beauty and sorrow of my life.
Cynthia Zarin, “Flowers”
The morning air is all awash with angels
Richard Wilbur, “Love Calls Us to the Things of This World”
and are we supposed to believe she can suddenly talk angel?
Mary Sybist, “Girls Overheard While Assembling a Puzzle”
Little petal of my heart!
Hilda Conkllng, “A Little Girl's Songs”
I didn’t know where I was going
Robert Vandermolen, “Flowers”
I was always leaving, I was
Jean Nordhaus, “I Was Always Leaving”
Desolate and lone
Carl Sandburg, “Lost”
If but I could have wrapped you in myself
D.H. Lawrence, “Grief”
I would I might forget that I am I--
George Santayana, “I would I might Forget that I am I”
a smile of joy, since I was born.
Emily Bronte, “I Am the Only Being Whose Doom”
Things change on the morning of the birthday
The hope is in wakening to this your last dream
Theodore Holmes, “In Becoming of Age”
The shadows of you are around me
Kathryn Soniat, “Daughter”
the evening shadow has sunk
D.H. Lawrence, “Daughter Of the great Man”
gleaming. So I can
Jennifer Richter, “My Daughter Brings Home Bones”
come walking into this big silence
Josephine Miles, “Dream”
A daughter is not a passing cloud, but permanent;
James Lenfestey, “Daughter”
she's light and also passage, the glory in my cortex.
Carmen Gimenez Smith, “The Daughter”
Dare the deliberately happy to butterfly the gnarled roots of life—
Amy King, “Butterfly the Gnarled”
Grief dies like joy; the tears upon my cheek—
Henry Timrod, “Sonnet: Grief Dies”
“Hope” is the thing with feathers.
Emily Dickinson, ““Hope” is the thing with feathers”
A significant factor in the origin of bees and my relationship with them is the nonstop hum of fear immured within me by the bonnie buzzing of their wee wings. Mama always said Grandma made me afraid because she was afraid, and so I learned to be afraid. She and Daddy said I was overreacting, repeating what I saw. Just stop, they said, as if fear was a faucet I could control with strength of will. But when I found myself grown and at last alone with the bees, instead of running, all I could do was stop and wonder at the nonstop hum of life itself.
Hello again! I can’t believe that there are only two more days of this year’s NaPoWriMo. I’m sad to say the least. Today’s prompt was to write a concrete poem. Like acrostic poems, concrete poems are a favorite for grade-school writing assignments, so this may not be a first time at the concrete-poem rodeo.
In brief, a concrete poem is one in which the lines are shaped in a way that mimics the topic of the poem. For example, May Swenson’s poem “Women” mimics curves, reinforcing the poem’s references to motion, rocking horses, and even the shape of a woman’s body. George Starbuck’s “Sonnet in the Shape of a Potted Christmas Tree” is – you guessed it – a sonnet in the shape of a potted Christmas tree.
So, my concrete poem proved difficult to post without the shape shifting when previewed via mobile phone or desktop. What you will find is that I have posted an image of my poem for those reading from mobile apps and a regular copy for those reading from a laptop or desktop. Either way you are reading it, I hope you will be able to detect my “tree” form.
Happy reading!
My Trees
My childhood
memories
are full of
trees like the
giant willow
who grew
in the middle
of the little grove
of trees hidden
behind the new
condo development
It was there that
I dreamed of spending
my adult life
chain-smoking
cigarettes and
clacking the keys of
my old typewriter
as I cranked out
my next best-selling
novel. Then there was
the colossal oak on the
playground--the one whose
ground roots held me like a
comforting mother as I watched
the other children run and play
together from a disassociated
distance. The oak was my friend—
my best friend—and I loved her.
In later years, there was the young
sapling who gave its life to save mine.
It happened when the canoe tipped over,
I slipped quietly into the swirling river, and
I thought I was dead at sixteen--until I spotted
my father uprooting a small sapling from the bank.
He held the tree across the river and told me to grab on;
It was then I knew I was safe in the strength of the tree and
my father. Safe in my childhood memories safe in the arms of trees.
--cjpjordan
Thank you and shoutout to Silas Baisch who made this image available for free on Unsplash.
Today’s prompt was the challenge to write a “duplex.” A “duplex” is a variation on the sonnet, developed by the poet Jericho Brown. Here’s one of his first “Duplex” poems, and here is a duplex written by the poet I.S. Jones.
Like a typical sonnet, a duplex has fourteen lines. It’s organized into seven, two-line stanzas. The second line of the first stanza is echoed by (but not identical to) the first line of the second stanza, the second line of the second stanza is echoed by (but not identical to) the first line of the third stanza, and so on. The last line (or two) of the poem is the same as the first.
This is based on a true story. One day, if the mood seems right, over coffee and croissants, I will share the rest of the story with you.
Come on by and let’s make a date for coffee.
That Day
What I remember most is the ocean releasing— crisp, cool breezes and a bevy of blues.
You left me there by the stony beach—blues and greens assault my senses, I cannot look away
A way off in the distance your boat lurches But not as much as my heart when she slips
Slips slowly under the water, eyes wide open Open arms floating just beneath the surface
The surface of the water explodes With my crazed frenzy. Panic rising
Rising until bile is all I taste, but somehow, somehow… My memory is blurred but I remember—
crisp, cool breezes and a bevy of blues; what I remember most is the ocean.
Today’s prompt was based on the aisling, a poetic form that developed in Ireland. An aisling recounts a dream or vision featuring a woman who represents the land or country on/in which the poet lives, and who speaks to the poet about it.
Today’s challenge was to write a poem that recounts a dream or vision, and in which a woman appears who represents or reflects the area in which I live.
We shall see how this goes today. We shall see what form my dream-visitor takes.
Happy reading!
Our Lady of the Garden
In the garden a tiny, perfect bird landed on my shoulder.
Jewel-toned and stunning, the bird morphed into a beautiful woman right before my eyes.
The trumpet vines flashing brilliant orange flowers shone in the sun like a halo around her head.
My angel with her flaming crown, and delicate hands, she felt born of spirit, born of dream.
Sing, she told me Sing of the Universe. Sing of the beauty of the earth.
In my dream-state I sing her song.
I see in her the land and sky; she connects me to water and earth. The waves roll in her laughter; the plants flourish under her hands.
From my heart I sing of us.
We become a tapestry, woven together— garden and bird, woman and earth.
When I wake, it is daylight. I look out my window and see a hummingbird— wings whirling without resting— sipping nectar from flaming goblets shaped like trumpet flowers.
Thanks and shoutout to Tim Marshall for making this image available for free on Unsplash.
Dedicated to my dear friend who has so graciously allowed others to experience with her how she has processed the religious environment in which she was raised. She is smart and witty and writes so articulately about how she has grown and changed through the years.
I was also raised in this sort of religious environment and can relate on many levels to her story of deconstruction and reconstruction. It is here I find myself in wild-waters, the waters difficult to navigate with grace.
All the stages of grief live in this space of deconstructing and reconstructing—denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. They don’t follow a natural progression and sometimes even after I think that acceptance has settled over my bones, denial and anger can revisit.
You know, just for old times sake.
I didn’t follow a prompt today, instead I let my spirit wander over words until they settled into a poem. This poem and life is a process of growth. My only hope is that I continue to grow and change until I take my last breath.
Of Certainty
She looked as certain as the sky without a cloud never questioning life, never doubting God. Her life was as settled as her eternity, and she liked it that way— without a glimmer of mystery and brimming with the loveliest of certainties. After all, on what could she rely if not that certainty?
She found out unexpectedly that it wasn’t the destination. it was the journey that mattered most. When the unthinkable happened,. the restorative property of a palliative remedy moderated more than mere words. In the middle of her misgiving, she plucked some half-dead daisies and put them in her favorite vase while she quietly waited for certainty.
She found instead the pull of the undertow was so much stronger than the weight of her will. In the end it was the absence of nothing and everything that was the final blow to her certainty. It seemed the questions came, all at once, wrenching and pulling her apart before slowly reconstructing her heart. All that remained certain was the presence of uncertainty and a lingering regret for years lost.
Thank you and shoutout to Ashkan Forouzani who made this image available for free on Unsplash.
Today the challenge was to write a poem in the style of Kay Ryan, whose poems tend to be short and snappy – with a lot of rhyme and soundplay. They also have a deceptive simplicity about them, like proverbs or aphorisms.
I’m not sure if I accomplished it, but here is my poem for today.
Happy reading!
Ghosts in Late Summer
Words hung softly, but still too loud for a dead thing. All that remained of summer seemed spent, so I ran straight away into the chill of autumn nipping. Never mind the plotted hours of living where we found stolen strength to see past what was in front of our eyes. When I heard your last whisper through the wall, I wasn’t ready to face winter alone. I felt lost, for we loved deeply and without many words. Imagine then my surprise at the loud voice of your ghost.
Thank you and shoutout to Richard Lee for making this beautiful photo available for free on Unsplash.
The prompt for today was in honor of today being the 22nd day of Na/GloPoWriMo 2022, and they challenged me to write a poem that used repetition. I was invited to repeat a sound, a word, a phrase, or an image, or any combination of things.
So, here you go fellow poetry loving friends. Not as repetitious as some poems I’ve written, but there is that element throughout.
Happy Weekend to you!
The Owl Sees
Where the mind ends, the owl sees— through Ominous golden eyes It breathes in stealth and exhales darkness gliding through blue-black skies. Underneath the fern unfurls, shivers in the windy wake.
Where the mind ends, the owl sees— with certainty of vision and a clarity of mind; she free falls into the darkness, her mournful cry resounding into the boundless cosmos.
Where the mind ends, the owl sees— the wilderness unconstrained, the weeping child whose wailing seeps into the warping twilight. Inside echos of sadness the owl and child grieve as one.
Thanks and shoutout to Simon Infanger for letting his photo be used for free on Unsplash.
Today’s prompt was one gleaned from the poet Betsy Sholl. This prompt asked me to write a poem in which I first recall someone I used to know closely but are no longer in touch with, then a job I used to have but no longer do, and then a piece of art that I saw once and that has stuck with you over time. Finally, I was to close the poem with an unanswerable question.
Happy writing to me! Happy reading to you!
Sleeping
When the sun is laid to sleep, Darkness drips in desperation The universe shifts and suddenly I become your enemy.
Wordless and wry, my will resolves into Nothing that will matter. But why then does hunger remain? Hunger is hereditary—
I read that once in a poem, At least I think I did. I can’t Seem to separate the silk sails from the flagpole standing still
But my strong knees and stiff back Can carry the weight of my will So all is well. Or is it? When the inky black beckons me
To lie down among the lilies, I resist. I draw all that is good, but the leaves still fall. Tell me why do the leaves insist on falling?
Poetry, Ponderings and Possibilities 