2016 Found Poem Project: Day 8
It’s Day 8 of our 2016 daily write-in. This year’s theme is FOUND OBJECTS. Thanks to all of the poets and writers who contributed objects for our daily prompts.
For those of you who are new to the project, please read my introductory post. You’ll find more information and all of the Week 2 FOUND OBJECTS at this post.
Before we get to today’s prompt, I have an AMAZING treat for all of you.
I’ve been corresponding with my friend Joanne Polner, a photographer and mother of one of my best high school friends. Joanne read all of our poems about the antique box on Day 1 and wrote this response poem for us! I’m sharing it here, with her permission.
The Box Poems
I’ve got the chills
From the secrets
let out to breathe
I turn from poem
to poem and feel
the feather of
inspiration—
the kind that makes
you hold your
breath.
Is it life
or death?
or the spirit
of so many souls
released into
our world?
My rapid heart makes
my face blush;
The tips
of my fingers
are cold
as I slide the
pages
back under
the cover
of
the box.
— Joanne R. Polner
Joanne also sent us a note about the poem. “You see that I have transformed the concept of the individual poems of your contributors into a collection kept hidden ‘lo these many years.’ Truly, I felt those varying emotions that I wrote about. Praises for your contributors!”
Reading Joanne’s poetic response to our work filled me with joy. This is what doing a community writing project is all about, expanding our community and inviting people to join us as readers and writers.
***
As I was going through potential prompts, I noticed a few themes developing among the objects we found. One category of FOUND OBJECTS is pieces of art.
Poetry written in response to art is often called “ekphrastic poetry.” You can read more about this form at the Poetry Foundation.
I wonder whether our poems will focus on the art itself, or on the person or process of making it.
FOUND: SCULPTURE IN THE WOODS
The only note Diane Mayr included with this contribution is “Southern New Hampshire University.” Maybe she’ll enlighten us a bit more in today’s comments.
The sculpture reminds me of the famous poem, “Ozymandias.”
My process today was to personify the sculpture. Also, I wanted to work on twinning this sculpture with the Moon, but didn’t want to weigh the poem down. I decided to put the Moon in the title, and something very surprising happened.
When the Moon Fell to Earth
By Laura Shovan
One day
I will lay
my body down
in the forest,
face tipped
to the canopy
of branches,
and wait.
Falling light
will pass this way
warm
my stony face,
move on.
And I will learn
the stillness
of a stone.
***
Linda Baie’s poem also uses the verb “wait.” And, of course, if you’re waiting, perhaps you are waiting for someone.
Lost Love
It may take longer than you can wait,
but my eyes are open.
The spell has broken,
and my mouth allows a whisper:
“I’m on my way.”
Linda Baie ©All Rights Reserved
***
Jessica Bigi sent me a note about her poem for today. She focused on sounds and what we can learn from them.
Where Have the Forests Gone?
By Jessica Bigi
Lesson
Not a feather falling
Hums of angry toothed chains
Rolling claws of monsters
Man says it is quiet when a tree falls
Lesson
I can hear them crying
Screams of this world being torn and broken
Dreams of my forest children fading
I’m as old as Bulent light
Lesson
I know which direction they fall
Grandfather rock of mountains and sky
Block foundations of ancient cities
Lesson
windy songs of a billion leave
Lesson
Silences
My voice skips across life’s streams
I too face uncertainties of seasons’ change
***
Heidi Mordhorst of the blog My Juicy Little Universe has a series of questions to ask our forest face.
lost not found
bold white bruin man
where your boulder feet?
where your legs,
your stone torso,
your swinging arms?
they crash on
through the forest:
white columns of motion
can’t think what they’ve lost,
lost on the way
bare gash of narrow eye
bare slash of missing mouth
–Heidi Mordhorst 2016
all rights reserved
***
I hope you’ll head over to Carol Varsalona’s blog, Beyond LiteracyLink, where she is celebrating a huge milestone. Carol’s 500th blog post is about a daily writing practice and includes her contribution for today. Congratulations, Carol!
I lie among the shadows of mid-day sun
professing nothing, just residing
with body buried deep within a barren land.
You question what lies beyond my half-smirk,
my reckless abandonment of wholeness.
Half-truths, broken thoughts buried alongside me
within the shadowed forest search no more
for the stillness awakens wonder.
I ask nothing more than you open my eyes,
freeing my soul to continue pondering
the fullness of life in the vast expanse of universe.
©Carol Varsalona, 2016
***
We all need to lighten up a bit after staring at our serious forest face. Donna Smith of Mainely Write came to our rescue.
Herman, the Hermit
By Donna Smith
The hermit crab,
Delightedly, had gone
So far afield,
Returning with
A brand new home,
Though cumbersome
To wield.
With face on back
Who knows which way
He’s headed? To or fro?
And who would mess
With this fierce home
With room enough
to grow.
His girlfriend should be
So impressed
To see his smiling face;
But hoped she wouldn’t
Nag him that
He’d slowed to a
snail’s pace.
***
I’m intrigued by Margaret Simon’s note about process: “I am learning that I have to write before reading anyone else’s responses. So today I wrote a fractured limerick. It doesn’t follow the rules and rather than force rhyme which I am never very good at, I decided to just butcher the form.” What do you do, poets, read responses first, or wait until after you have drafted your poem?
Stone Head
By Margaret Simon
Stone head slips a wink and sly smile
in the forest, long and deep.
His angle is awkward.
His skin snow white.
How does he ever get a wink of sleep?
***
I get really excited when a prompt sends an author off on an unexpected tangent. Here, Diane Mayr found that the prompt she contributed today did just that. “I wanted to find out the difference between a wood and the woods. I came across an old use of the word that put everything in place for me.”
What Say You, Brothers Grimm?
By Diane Mayr
Wood, noun
Madness, Obs.
Someone set the bars
of madness so far
apart a Colossus can
slip through, yet I,
the grandmother to
a girl in a cloak and
hood, can neither go
in nor out, fearful that
the wolf of my soul will
eat me alive, here,
in my own wood.
DAY 9 FOUND OBJECT PROMPT
See you tomorrow for Day 9.
Interested in what we’ve written so far? Here are links to this week’s poems:
Sunday, February 7
FOUND OBJECT: Blood Letting Knife
Poems by: Diane Mayr, Jessica Bigi, Laura Shovan, Catherine Flynn, Linda Baie, Molly Hogan, Carol Varsalona, Mary Lee Hahn, Matt Forrest Esenwine.
Note: You will find links to all of the Week 1 poems at this post.
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