National Poetry Writing Month 2013 Evaluated

Photo: Sally Douglas

Well, NaPoWriMo's over. I lost the last few days because of a family crisis, but over the month I managed to produce twenty-five poems. Some were completely new, some were old drafts dragged out for finishing. But the great thing for me is, that I have twenty-five poems that wouldn't have existed otherwise. National Poetry Writing Month has got me writing again. It's broken the block - not just with my poetry but with other writing too.

I know the quality is varied, but there are some poems I am really quite pleased with. Shell, This Day, That Thing You've Carried For So Long, Looking Out, Music Lesson - these are poems I am glad I have written. With time, no doubt I shall see some flaws, but that doesn't matter. I can still change them!

I've also had a great time reading poems produced by other poets this month, some by people I already knew, some from the NaPoWriMo website, and some via Twitter. Thanks for sharing your work, people!

Poem 25 - Red-tailed, Bumble

Red-tailed, Bumble

Red-tailed, bumble,

common carder,

cuckoo, mason,

tawny mining,

leaf-cutter, hoop-shaver,

humble, honey,

homeless.

Red-tailed, bumble,

common carder,

cuckoo, mason,

tawny mining,

leaf-cutter, hoop-shaver,

humble, honey,

homeless.

Red-tailed, bumble,

common carder,

cuckoo, mason,

tawny mining,

leaf-cutter, hoop-shaver,

humble, honey,

homeless.

Red-tailed, bumble,

common carder,

cuckoo, mason,

tawny mining,

leaf-cutter, hoop-shaver,

humble, honey,

homeless.

Red-tailed, bumble,

common carder,

cuckoo, mason,

tawny mining,

leaf-cutter, hoop-shaver,

humble, honey,

homeless.

Bee.

Poem 24 - Another Riddle

Photo: Sally Douglas

Riddle

I am a lock turned by infinite keys,

A knot that’s too tight and too fine to untease.

Unpick me too far and my threads turn to dust,

but I’ll let you inside me to make what you must.

I am the white space as well as the mark,

I am the place you can find in the dark

I am said, I am thought, I am harsh, I am kind.

I blow free from the page in the winds of your mind.

Sally Douglas

In addition to being a riddle, this is possibly a manifesto of sorts. And the photo isn't a clue, but I think it fits.

I will post the answers to the riddles - eventually.

Poem 23 - A Riddle

Photo: Sally Douglas

Riddle

I am a judge (but I do not judge).

Soft darkness pours from my empty eyes.

With a shrug I weep onto the ground:

divide (not decide) what’s to keep or despise.

I am the O that holds onto stones,

fragments of twig, and shards of bones.

I am the O pierced all over by light.

I am the O! that is in plain sight.

 Sally Douglas

Any ideas?

Incidentally, if you're interested I wrote a blog post about riddles and readers here.

Poem 21 - That Thing You've Carried for So Many Years

Photo: Sally Douglas

That Thing You’ve Carried for So Many Years  

Once, you could have planted it

in the rich kindness of loam

in earth which would have let it breathe

and then you could have gone away

lived some life

visited the garden just from time to time

and one day found green shoots

clean new shoots which would have cheered you

however frail they were.

But to bend down to the ground

was far too hard.

Sally Douglas

The picture was taken in Bugle, Cornwall.

Poem 20 - More Fun with Oulipo Constraints

Photo: Sally Douglas

This Day's Constraint

Today is a death to sleep.

This set of hours is rest’s oblivion.

Day and dark want that fall’s fall,

ticking tiredly away –

Wednesday, respite’s murderer.

Tomorrow is the birth of wakening.

Today is a day to sleep.

I sit within indigo hills, in wing-singing wind,

below a slope of blade south-east.

On the ground beneath the sounds,

I am low in a sky of calling flight

all arching, flying, hymning over.

Oh, low moon-bowl of owl solos

below a sky of birdsong.

This poem is a result of a bit more playing with OULIPO constraints. The Oulipo Compendium (ed Harry Mathews and Alastair Brotchie, Atlas Press, 2005), describes a way of submitting a line or a stanza of poetry to a series of variations, thereby creating a new piece of work. It sounds both straightforward, and weird. It is weird, but it's surprisingly difficult to do, and the constraints force a creativity with language which can have very satisfying and surprising results. The poem above took some lines from yesterday's poem (actually I combined some shorter lines to make longer ones for this purpose), and submitted them to the following constraints:

First Stanza

1. First line in N+7
2. First line as a lipogram in a
3. First line as a univocalism in a
4. First line with nouns eliminated
5. First line with verbs eliminated
6. First line treated antonymically
7. First line in its original form

Second Stanza

1. Second line as a univocalism in i
2. Second line in N+7
3. Second line with verbs eliminated
4. Second line as a lipogram in e
5. Second line with nouns eliminated
6. Second line as a univocalism in o (Actually this should use the first line, but I made a mistake!)
7. Second line in its original form

It's fun to do, and really stretches the brain! I can't claim that it produced a fabulous poem, but I think it's a brilliant exercise to get the language muscles flexing without having to face the terror of the blank page.  

And I hope I haven't made any glaring errors when applying the constraints.

Or possibly, I hostage I haven't made any glaring europeans when applying the containers...

Poem 19 - This Day




Photo: Sally Douglas

this day

today

was a day

to sleep

in the

sun

under a sky

of birdsong

today

I have

not

wasted

my life

Sally Douglas

Poems 17 and 18 - Blackout Poems

A Blackout Poem

Blackouts are another form of erasure poem, but in a blackout poem the poet selects words to be kept from a text and crosses out the rest. In this way one is left with a space that holds new meaning within the shape of the old. I was reminded of this method by a prompt tweeted yesterday by Jo Bell, who included a link to the Newspaper Blackout  website which has an amazing array of this type of poem. It's fun to do, but can become rather addictive...

Here's another. I've chopped up the columns to fit it in here, but they're in the original order. Michael Gove, in case any of my readers haven't heard of him, is the somewhat Gradgrindian UK politician in charge of education policy.

The Facts



Poem 16 - The Voices

Photo: Sally Douglas

Voices

I am the leaves that grew from the tree

I am the river that grew from the rain

I am the mountain that grew from the rock

I am the waves which grew from the sea

I am the sea that poured through your hands

I am the tree that grew in your bones

I am the rain that washed your heart

I am the rock that splintered your lands

I am the land that is covered with sea

I am the bones that are carved from rain

I am the heart that is chipped from rock

I am the hands that shatter the tree

Sally Douglas

Poem 15 - When

Photo: Sally Douglas

When

and when your hands are black from the stories

wash them with ink

and when your mouth is silent

wash it out with inoculations

and when the horizon is pared to a small impossibility

wash out your eyes with potato peelings

and if you think we are living in a tinderbox of legends

wash it out with flame

wash out the book with mime

wash out the sky with elevens

wash out the bones with milk

wash everything with something and

wash out the everlasting and  

Sally Douglas

This poem came from the NaPoWriMo website's prompt for Day 18: write a poem beginning and ending with the same word.

What's working quite well for me at the moment is taking an external prompt and then going back to my notebooks and seeing if it sparks with anything there. In this case I was drawn to something I had written late one night about washing in ink. This is what resulted.

The photo was taken in St Austell, Cornwall, UK, last week.

Fourteen NaPoWriMo Poems

Well, I'm half way through the month, and I've managed 14 poems. Some are better than others, but they are 14 poems that wouldn't have got written otherwise. The exercise has shown me that I can break the block.

Of course there is a problem with putting these poems out in the public domain. I won't be able to submit them to magazines or competitions, as being on this blog will count as 'previously published'. Also, they are unpolished, a very scary thing for someone who is used to obsessive editing and rewriting over a long period. There are bound to be flaws which I would have noticed with more time to ripen.

But the benefits of this speed production have been immense. It has motivated me to work intensively towards a moment of release. a letting go of each piece, which means that I can go on to start the next. It has also meant that I have to produce something - no excuses - so I have been working very hard on looking for prompts and inspiration.

I'm not sure I shall manage the full thirty by the deadline - there have been and will be the odd days when I actually have no time at all - but I aim to get as close as possible, and to catch up if I can.

How are other people doing? It would be great to hear your experience!