Last poems for April's NaPoWriMo and an accepetance

Okay folks, here are the remaining poems for April.  Please vote for your favourite throughout the month.  Comments make everything worthwhile.  Be back here soon.

April 26th

At the end

The flowers you brought have shrivelled

trying to return to their pre-blooming glory

each petal closing in on itself, but I’m not fooled.

They look worn out with the effort of looking bright –

the colour still hangs on like an ill-fitting coat,

drooping at the shoulders.

The water is putrid, no wonder they close up.

Bad relationships leave bad odours.

********

April 27th - Sonnet

The Long Man

No book can ever keep me from this view

No story line can drag my eyes away

For every time it’s like I see it new

And when I reach this point then come what may

I cast my book aside at Hayward’s Heath

Where this train will divide and split in two

And Sussex lies before me and beneath

In grassy downs where I look for the path

That carves into the hillside where he stands

The man of Wilmington who bears his all

Once phallus hope for women in these lands

Whose fertileness would answer to their call

Whatever else may change he’ll still be there

And folk will marvel at him, stop and stare.

*******

April 28th

Waterlogged

I’m down in this squelchy brown clay

stuck fast, gripped by wet goo

in all its sucky-sucky quicksand feel,

entrapped and directionless. I pull in panic –

the earth will not let me go.

If the sun comes out I’ll fix a pose,

become part of the landscape,

baked dry, entrenched, a human sculpture

plastered and entombed.

*******

April 29th

Surgery

Stark brown limbs in March;

amputated wooden stumps

await their new growth.

*******

April 30th

Traces

He is still here imbedded in the carpet

like tinsel months after the Christmas tree has gone away,

impregnated into sheets however many times I wash them;

the dent on his side of the bed still looks new

as if he’s just got up.

Somehow he has seeped into the walls

and his eyes watch me in every room.

The TV churns out his favourite shows,

the radio his favourite songs.

In the kitchen his mug is a lonely sight,

I’ve put it away but I can still hear its accusations.

I’ve removed everything of his that he’d not already taken

but he claims every inch as a silent ghost.

For a while I would got out every night to avoid him

but there’s nowhere to go where he hasn’t been

and been with me.

Finally, I have had one of my poems accepted for the Open University Poets Anthology which will be published later this year.

A poem about childhood

April 25th

(A prompt, I think from The Poetry Society, about childhood)

Don’t sit on the Chairs!

Mother was a stickler for tidiness

But children are not meant for that

She would upturn the cushions on chairs,

the settee as well, come to that.

But she did give us sheets for our tent house

Which we draped over seats not in use

And would run round the dining room table

Whenever we got to get loose.

We climbed on the arms of the furniture

Careful to not make much noise

But it’s difficult when you are playing

An Indian shooting cowboys.

When I think what my settee has suffered

With gymnastics and such from my boys

I wonder if Mother had something

About cushions not being toys!

*****

(Tomorrow I will be posting the remainder of April's poems all together because I will probably not be able to get to a computer after tomorrow.  It means that I can complete the challenge in advance!)

New Writer Magazine relaunches

The New Writer magazine has just been relaunched and my copy arrived today.  It has joined its sister magazine New Books and now looks slick and professional and is also in colour.  There are writer's prompts for writing groups/individuals, poetry in focus, an article about blogging, Katie Fford writes about five books that have helped her to write and there are competitions for stories, poetry and a photographic competition.  The magazine features some short stories and poetry and writer's gifts to buy.  In have only had a chance to glance through it but I really like what I see.  There are lots of opportunities to to get your work into print.  The magazine retails at £5 but look at their website as there may be subscription offers.

NaPoWriMo - day 24

April 24th

Life on Film

What was happening, well that could be me,

my life being played out on the big screen

with me in the lead role,

my family, those actors and actresses

with lines on cue, the accusations, the

pull yourself together,

the agony of desertion done in one take

and days roll quickly through the camera lens,

scenes race to a conclusion

in just two hours ten minutes.

Ah! but the DVD has the Directors cut,

those extra bits to revel in;

but I cannot edit out the bits I don’t like

I’ve tried but they return to haunt me,

constantly on repeat.

Morning - a poem for Tuesday

April 23rd

Morning

Day starts early,

birds communicate

before light shows itself,

then slowly the room lightens,

objects creep from under cover,

patterns redefine themselves,

colours break out of black,

show their true selves,

textures bulk up from

the flattened night

morning is alive in

sound and shape.

Ideas into poetry

April 22nd

Poems can come from anywhere.  Sometimes we need prompts, sometimes they just seem to arrive and virtually write themselves.  I have used some prompts throughout this April exercise when I needed a quick start or a new idea that perhaps I haven't thought about before.  Today's poem came from reading Quiet Spaces (a sort of alternative everyday Bible study - more creative based and spiritual).  The passage today was looking at Matthew 6:28 'consider the lillies of the field.' The word to concentrate on was consider.  We were asked to consider an object, a pen, say and all it does, it's relationship to us, its knocks and scratches - really to consider it in great detail.  After reading the passage I was drawn to write a poem and below is the result of that.  Never disregard any idea even if it's one line or a few words.  You can always go back to them and see where it leads you.

Ode to The OfficeTeam Mini Ballpoint Pen

Functional and small enough to slip into my micro handbag

you write nicely, smooth and are a comfortable fit in my hand.

Your potential to produce words flow on to the page in blue ink.

Actually, you aren’t really mine but I have adopted you,

teeth marks on your top are your baptism into life.

I enjoy your company, the feel of your royal blue

plastic casing rolled between my fingers.

We know what to expect from one another.

You may not be showy, have a designed name,

a cap or a click in/out facility but you do for me.

You meet my requirements

and because you are different from all the others

you stand out and I can always find you.

Sunday poem

Two for the price of one!  I missed one post about a week ago so today I am giving you an extra poem so that I am still on target for the challenge.

21st April (this is using the prompt of 'mask' from The Poetry School)

Mask

Under the skin are flesh, muscle, tissue and bone

And that’s what we all have in common

But if I could see through the layers, through the mask

Maybe I would get to the heart of you.

Would your feelings flow through your veins with blood?

Surge like a river round every part of you?

Would I recognise you there where every hurt is exposed?

Where you try to keep it in, hold it together.

And if I cut your skin would it all come flowing out?

Would it drain you of every emotion?

I would gladly clean up the mess of your life

Here, my cuts are healing now.  Let me heal yours.

******

Small Stone poem

White vapour trails criss-cross the sky

merging into painterly streaks of cloud,

branches still hold their new growth in,

a brush of twigs sweep morning blue.

Saturday poem for NaPoWriMo

April 20th

Map

The green paint has peeled off the garden heater

after years of wintering and sun

and underneath, the rust is rough and dotted.

It reminds me of an aerial map,

the rust is the earth, red as South Devon soil,

the dots are buildings flowing down

the cliff face to the harbour where the green sea laps

in the bay and the curved lines across the rust are strata,

layer upon layer holding stories of the past.

Friday 19th - NaPoWriMo

April 19th

House Clearance

I’d always liked the Utility furniture,

the light wood wardrobe and dressing table,

the pink cane weave linen basket.

The mantelpiece cleared of holiday souvenirs

stood across the blocked in fire place that granddad fixed.

I could still remember the fire

glowing in this north facing freeze box.

Downstairs there was a bookcase I had no room for.

It all had to go.

Upstairs I heard the men breaking up the bedroom items.

If only there’d been more time.

I left before they got to the bookcase.

I couldn’t bear the guilt of it.

A Thursday poem

April 18th

Tree

Our tree was removed years ago,

just the stump remains,

but every time I pass it I stop and smile,

remember the kisses,

experimental, then more probing,

the longing played out under its canopy.

We’d seen it through a winter and a spring

before our desire moved into a house of its own

and we no longer needed its privacy

in the quiet end of the lane.

But when we visited my folks we’d stop and say hello tree,

recall those early days of new love and hold hands again.

And now the tree has gone the memories remain –

we just shut our eyes and there it is,

our tree in all its greenery wrapping love around us.

Poem for April 17th

April 17th
(The prompt for this was from The Poetry Society to write about buildings)

House of Prayer

I wander the paths of this house with its lofty ceilings,

white washed, its the fresh lemon walls,

corridors maze in and out with pockets left and right,

a cubby hole here an occupied room there.

I come back to the landing with its skylight

shedding the day in sunlit beams to the ground floor,

peace springs off the bricks and paint, the plaster and wood.

Here everything is silent but I listen for the still small voice.

Icons pull me in to prayer,

I wander, I sit, I read,

I do it all again

Time is mine and I cherish it.

Joseph and the boy Jesus watch from the window ledge

as I eat my pasta lunch.  I have the whole wooden table to myself.

I move from room to room recording it to memory

then pack up my Bible, my books and paper and take my leave.

Day 16 - NaPoWriMo

April 16th

Changing Colour

Draped on me the fieriness of a red dress too powerful for today.
It jars in its over vibrant shade, unnerving, too quick, flippant  and on the go.
I shed the red and pull out a mint green jumper and blue jeans,
sighing as I shuffle in.  I hang the red out of sight,
feel my mood shift, settle and slouch into a stillness and calm that's me.

April 15th poem

April 15th (a small stone poem)

Sun glistening on rain drops,
silver specks, diamond gems
shivering in the breeze
on the glass top of the cold frame.

When a poem wants to be a story.

April 14th

A strange thing happened when I was trying to write a poem yesterday.  I was using a prompt from The Poetry School (sounds of a dog bark, bell ring, liquid pour and the poem to sound menacing) but my poem began developing into flash fiction!  So today you get both a poem and flash fiction.....I'm so good to you!  The poem is a Tanka, a poem based on syllables in the pattern of 5-7-5-7-7 and the last two lines are often a surprise.  Mine is a little saucy.  Enjoy.

Barking Mad

A howl then three sharp barks.  I was cringing behind the bedroom door of the country house residence of Dave’s parents.  Everyone was asleep except me.  The damned dog, which I hadn’t seen before, had chased me into the room as I left the bathroom and now it was snuffling on the other side of the door.  I hated dogs.  Actually, I was terrified of dogs and the brewing storm didn’t help matters.

A flash of lightning flooded the room in white light accentuating the wood panelled walls and brooding furniture.  I jumped as thunder crashed and the wind blew the window open.  I cried out.  Rain splattered the floor and the drip, drip from some overflowing gully made a rhythmic beat on some object below.

As if in some gothic novel a heard a church bell ring and wondered who the hell would be doing that at this time of night.  Then there were footsteps on the stairs.  My heart thumped against my chest.  I let out a sob.  The door handle turned.  I stood and pushed against it.

               ‘Jill?’

               ‘David?’ I squeaked.

               ‘What are you doing in there?’

               ‘The dog.’

               ‘What dog?’

Still shaking I slowly opened the door.  I sank back in relief.  Dave put a hand on my arm.  I looked up as he inched through the slit in the doorway.  It was then that he smiled and I saw the fangs.  There was froth on one side of his mouth.  Then he growled. 

Tanka

Open skies, calm sea
of deep lagoon blue, and you
there on the shore line
fishing for my underwear
discarded in our passion.

NaPoWriMo - something light-hearted

April 13th

I'm aware that the poems I have posted so far are a little........sad (you thought I was going to say awful didn't you?!).  I do enjoy a good wallow in poetry I must admit.  Anyway, today I am posting something a little more light-hearted, well I hope it is or maybe that's my weird sense of humour!  There was no particular prompt for this and it kind of went off in its own direction so I went with it.  Have a great day folks.

Ghosts

They come now all of a sudden;

all these years and not a glimpse;

sceptical me had to see to believe -

even now I dismiss them as tricks of the eye

for they pass in a sliver, not quite there…..

but I know.

Is it because I’m older that they haunt?

Wearing me down, a warning perhaps

that I’m soon to go with them.

I could taunt my family and friends I suppose -

I’d like that; get my own back….

and they’d say….

She never believed and now look at her

floating the floor of the dining room,

moving the plates and whispering words.

I could stand in a doorway and just …LOOM!

There’s fun to be had here but not yet……

I’m really not ready for that.

NaPoWriMo - free verse poem

April 12th

I did have a poem ready for posting here yesterday but I was out all day.  I had a quiet day at a retreat centre and didn't want to ruin the atmosphere by logging on to my computer when I got home.  So better late than never here is want you would have yesterday using the prompt of a first line from a random choice poem.....again Mr Farley!

Weathering

(inspired by Paul Farley with acknowledgement to him for my first line!)

Is mine the only heart out in this weather

battling against the ache of the unspoken in the wind,

the deluge of rain tearing down the sky?

I tried to leave it behind by a cosy fire

but it is so attached to me that I cannot wrench it away

and its icy fingers numb my chest.

It is self-indulgent, wallowing in pity

I tell it a joke and it shuns me. How can you? it says,

can’t you hear my anguish?

I wish to abandon it, leave it with the lost souls

trade it in for an unhurt model or one that can withstand

the weathering of emotional turmoil head on.

NaPoWriMo - 10th poem - free verse/random word prompt

April 10th

Random words poem - words from a Christian booklet I had to hand.

Willing                  runners                               Eucharist

Afternoon           creation                              channels

In Communion

I am a runner for God

willing to be his servant.

I am his creation

and when I celebrate

the Eucharist is transforming,

he in me and me in him;

this afternoon

the channels to my Lord are open.

©2013 hcw

NaPoWriMo - 9th poem

April 9th

Howling for the moon

The night now leaves you howling for the moon

Since he has taken all you had away

Now all your hope is cast upon the dune.

Those heady days of summer back in June

He harvested like bundled bales of hay

The night now leaves you howling for the moon.

By day you search the fields, the beach and swoon

Where once you loved beneath the sun’s hot ray

Now all your hope is cast upon the dune.

Your heart and life still sing, but out of tune

You sing for him as time ticks from each day

The night now leaves you howling for the moon.

You can’t forget the way he left at noon

Your aching heart and no words left to say

The night now leaves you howling for the moon

And all your hope is cast upon the dune.

NaPoWriMo - 8th poem

April 8th

I seem to be leaving the prompts behind at the moment.  Sometimes they are not up on the sites when I look so I am thinking out my own ones.  However, this next one was inspired by a prompt by The Poetry School to take a random poem and write a response to each line then play and edit.  The most handy poetry book I had at the time was Paul Farley's The Dark Film which I am still working through.  I took his poem Adults and below is the result - the theme is similar but not quite the same.

The Other Side

He was the one I looked up to

but lately I’d heard him late in the night

and watched him from my window, swaying and giggling

sometimes singing, never in tune

and he’d piss over the garden wall.

By day he seemed normal

controlled, holding it together;

I could forget his stumble up the stairs,

the sound of him puking up

because he was my rock and I would be his.

He’d taught me to ride a bike and he’d ruffled my hair

now he cried over some guilt I didn’t understand;

unforgiven he sought consolation in a bottle

but the liquid never satisfied his thirst

and his angry words frightened me.

What could he want to be happy again?

He had me even if mum looked down her nose at him.

I tried hard to make him smile

yet still he came undone in the night,

weeping, shouting; then he’d pass out.

NaPoWriMo - 7th poem

April 7th

Never go to bed on an argument

He started it

but she was soon batting returns across his court.

Words flew like kitchen plates

until silence came.

Neither acknowledged the other

as backs turned against one another in bed.

She tossed, he turned.

He went to down to the kitchen.

She heard him moving around,

switching on the kettle, then nothing.

She began an argument with herself

about the pros and cons of going down, staying in bed.

Then she heard his footsteps on the stairs.

She pretended to be asleep.

The bed dipped as he got in.

Her wall became higher.

A snore. How could he sleep after all this?

The clock ticked off the hours.

Birds began their twittering.

A feint lightening of the room came.

Finally she began to feel the pull of slumber,

The going under. Then the alarm went off.

NaPoWriMo - 6th poem

April 6th

When I saw you on the dance floor
all the sound disappeared.
A cliche, I know, but there was only you and me.
I'd found my rhythm again
but you turned your back, walked away
and I remember that I'd had the last dance once before
then left you standing there.

(part of a series I'm working on)

NaPoWriMo - 5th poem

April 5th

I'm wilting today.  Looked at prompts.  One is a Cinquain and all about stresses.  Hate those, never can get the hang of them.  I'm a syllable counter not stress counter!  The Poetry School gave a website with some prompts but nothing appeals.  So here is one I wrote earlier and is on the Small Stone Facebook page.  Best I can do for now.

Early April and tiny white flakes

powder puff the face of the earth

in a last hurrah (hopefully!)

NaPoWriMo - 4th poem...sort of

April 4th

Today's prompt from NaPoWriMo was writing a poem with the title of one of Iain Banks' spaceships from his science fiction books.  However, I heard yesterday the sad news that Iain is extremely ill and battling cancer.  The full story is on his website http://www.iain-banks.net/.  I didn't feel I could write a poem under these circumstances but offer the following using a title from the list suggested:


Unfortunate Conflict of Interest

The Quarry could be his last book
for a conflict of interest is a sad page for a writer,
but with humour he makes his plans
explains to his fans
and signs off for now.

*******

Love and prayers, Iain
                                 x

NaPoWriMo - 3rd poem

April 3rd

Sorry this didn't actually appear yesterday but I left home before the prompts were up on the sites and by the time I got to them and had written my offering it had gone 11pm and I needed my bed.  So here it is.  This time I used the prompt from the actual NaPoWriMo site because it appealed to me.  The object was to write a Sea Shanty.  Anyone got a tune?!  (Hopefully back later with today's poem)

When the North Wind Blows

When the north wind blows across the sea

And the sky is black as the devil’s grave

There’s sails to set to keep on course

And we battle lads with every wave.

Chorus:            So heave ho and take the strain

Ride the storm to calmer shores

Listen for your sweetheart’s voice

And row for home, for home my boys.

The lightning strikes and thunder roars

And the rain beats down like there’re arrow heads

All drenched and cold we skid the deck

No rest tonight, so soft warm beds.

(Chorus)

So don’t give in but fight my lads

Homeland awaits and a girl at your side

Dream of the day when we return

On a gentle sway of the morning tide.

(Chorus)

NaPoWriMo - 2nd poem

April 2nd

This is more a bit of fun than a poem.  The prompt from The Poetry School was write about what seeing half price Easter eggs made you feel.  Humm!  Bit stuck with that one and my poem came out of ramblings and nothing to do with eggs!

The Half of It

He is half the man he used to be,

living his life through half measures.

I became half hearted – who wouldn’t?

My other half, the better half…….nah!

NaPoWriMo - first poem

April 1st

Okay here it is!  The prompt for today was to pick three words randomly from a book from pages 5, 12, 17, 21 to form a poem.  I picked mine from the current book I am reading (The Various Haunts of Men by Susan Hill).  The words were:

(5) culmination, perfectly, devastatingly
(12) low, comfortable, cylinder
(17) building, self-contained, strip
(21) birthday, drawing, completely

Here is the result:

Pieces

I’d always been a self-contained person,

comfortable in myself and my abilities.

Then he came, completely by surprise

like a birthday gift.

He restored furniture. I’d asked him

to strip down a table and re-varnish it.

His smile was devastatingly undoing.

Later I found myself drawing him from memory

under the table he’d lovingly brought back to life.

I was perfectly happy there building this picture of us.

The culmination of everything so far

was laid low and all I had become

I sealed in a cardboard cylinder and posted to him.

NaPoWriMo

Have decided to take part in the National Poetry Writing Month challenge - to write a poem a day throughout April.  I'm doing mine along with The Poetry Society with daily prompts via their Facebook page.  This will at least keep me actively writing.

Will be back later on with a poem.....hopefully!