Time

I suppose at least this one has got me thinking. NaPoWriMo Day 3 - something that happens over any appreciable length of time. Yep, it's got me thinking that I should've participated in Camp Nano instead.

Maybe it's just that immediate I-have-no-thoughts reaction to a difficult question. I think I'll have to let this one steep awhile. I'll be back.

Perennial

I saw you in the bright days
Standing tall
Blue brighter than the sky

I watched as cold winds curled you
And you retreated
From the too-short days and bitter nights

Endless waiting
No sign
Nothing to show a life in stasis

Each day bare

Empty

I stopped watching for you
Stopped expecting
Stopped

Other friendships formed
Dancing yellow in the brightening breeze
I had forgotten you

Until you sent a message
Tentative
Tender

A promise

I will see you again

-×-

That delphinium was truly beautiful last summer. It's currently romping away in its pot by the door and I'm just hoping we don't get a nasty cold spell to upset it.

That's me done for today. I'm off to be creative in other ways. Happy writing!

Day 2

So what do you do when a prompt doesn't spark any feeling of creativity?

For me this is what day 2 feels like.

Yes, the prompts are optional. Yes, I could write something else instead. I'm not going to though. I'm going to take that Day 2 prompt and make myself write something.

Personally, participating in NaPoWriMo is less about the poetry produced than it is about putting pen to paper on a daily basis. It really helps to accept that everything is a very rough first draft, and to know that it doesn't have to be 1,666 words a day to keep on schedule.

"But shouldn't this be fun?" I hear you ask. Of course it should, but for me (and, I suspect, for many of us) there is another purpose: that of creating some kind of writerly discipline. Writing every day sometimes feels like the impossible dream when life is so full of, well, life.  Writing when it feels hard is just not an option on a time limit, but that is precisely what needs to change.

So, you want something ending in a question?

Blank

Type tiptoes hesitantly across the page
Then scurries backwards to the start line.

Blink

Blink Blank

Blink

I can wait all day
The watching cursor insists.

Blink

Blink

Anythingjusttoshutitup

Words spew onto the screen
Only to be deleted
Moments later.

More unwriting than writing done.

Will an idea ever come?

NaPoWriMo

I wasn't going to join in with NaPoWriMo but the prompt for day 1 was a little too tempting. If you're playing along too, have fun!

My instructions:

To Make a Quilt

Pieces
Cut smaller
And smaller still,
Remnants of past lives.
Damp shorts covered in sand,
Swirling party dress, sparkling in the light,
That crazy shirt you wore the night we met;
Snippets of memories
You can hold in your hand for a moment
Or more.

Stitch them together with the thread of life,
Join seconds to minutes and hours to make a day,
Use a quarter inch seam,
Press to the dark side
So it doesn't spoil the light.

Arrange your days
In a vibrant pattern
To create the larger blocks of months and years.
No waste.
No scrap too small.

Now that piecing is complete it's time to baste, quilt and bind.
Wrap yourself in your creation.
Make it beautiful.