1/30 Rachel McKibbens Exercise #1

Today is the first month of the 30/30 challenge: 30 poems in 30 days. Also loving known as NaPoWriMo (National Poetry Writing Month). I decided to use some prompts prepared by Rachel McKibbens to fuel this spring's writing. You can find her stuff at: rachelmckibbens.blogspot.ca. Happy Writing Friends!!

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Exercise #1

Write down three things that are physically impossible. Now set that list aside and write a fake diary entry about the most ordinary boring day.

1.     rising from the dead

2.     teleportation

3.     mind reader

Today was a quiet day. There was tea and movies and rain. I didn’t cook. I did shower. I forgot to read the mail even though I peered into the mailbox. I ate chocolate covered almonds and didn’t go to work. Got a carwash, filled up the tank. Wished the sun would set and tried to sleep. Wrote this.

Now, get that list. Choose one of the impossible things. Rewrite the journal entry as a person who (fortunately or unfortunately) has the impossible power/ability you chose.

Today was a quiet day

There was tea and movies and rain

and everyone was thinking so loud through it all.

I didn’t cook, felt the recipes would be too much for me

I did shower, a quiet soggy reprieve.

There are memories and sounds that live inside walls that you can’t hear and wouldn’t want to.

I am cursed.

I forgot to read the mail even though

my mind peered into the mailbox, through the envelopes.

I ate chocolate covered almonds

and didn’t go to work-

too loud.

I got a carwash.

The man in the car behind me is worried about rotting fruit,

how the rain will leave the hood with streaks.

The kid pumping my gas misses the kid who broke it off,

wants a raise.

I wished the sun would set so I could try to sleep.

Wrote this,

heard it all.

NaPoWriMo Day 7

Prompt: Circus Act

I can see it so perfectly now,
the chocolate stained benches, stools.
We turned them into a stage.
We turned on the patio lanterns,
cracked plastic setting the tone.

I was always the director
arranging the others into acts,
considering how two songs had to be
interspersed with a joke or dance or
gymnastic display.

I really did want the others to shine,
but the main event in our circus was
the final medley.

My parents shouldn't be surprised that I
keep finding myself on stages
this isn't a new trend or fad.

I feel at home under the cracked
plastic lanterns from Grandma's porch.
I feel at home with a broom for a microphone.

This is just a different kind of circus act,
balancing on tip-toes
instead of
swallowing swords,
expanding my repetoire
of tricks and shows,
showy,
show off under the big top.

NaPoWriMo Day 6

Prompt: Rain

It was holy when the wing
dipped and surged
and all I could see was ocean.
Again,
it was holy when I
stepped toward the sky train and
first smelled that salt lick air.

It was raining
prayers and prayers:
each droplet a quest for mercy
each droplet forgiveness.

It was holy on the walk to the drive
that cherry blossom bloom
exploding.
Again, it is holy how many
people are here
feeding the streets and parks.

It is holy here if you need it to be.
It is holy here because of
spring and
growing and
metaphors.

Sometimes different is the only characteristic of holy.

Because the open sky at home is holy too,
if you need it to be.

Are new and holy synonyms?
More importantly,
why am I out here looking for God?

NaPoWriMo Day 5

Prompt: flying

 

The messy haired girl

sprawled out stretching out the morning

there are so many kinds of people in this place

where the wings send us over peaks

and tidy plots

flimsy, bitty seat belts holding us

safe in the air

I like to watch as we take off.

I like to watch the wheels squish into the pavement

as stomachs do that underwater

summersault thing

I like the 1/3 can of ginger ale

and the garlic sticks and

to watch who’s looking out the window-

who’s overcome by the wonder of it all

I don’t like when the clouds take over,

when the ground disappears from fog/smog/night

I like to see where we could crash.

I think if I flew planes

I would insist on stepping on land after every flight

call me superstitious

but I don’t trust our science.

Feet kissing ground thankfully

those rubber tubes aren’t enough to ensure we’ve hit the ground.

Inside:

Busy bodies with no place to be

pacing

or sipping

or listening intently to a series of commands,

or melodies filled with questions

impatient

Those security pat-downs aren’t as intimate as they could be-

The woman didn’t even smile at me.

Everything is shiny and everyone who works here says they

don’t eat airport food

I make my own breakfast suggestion

swallow the yokes down with a beer

because at 10am in an airport you can

and maybe should drink

before you whisk off again.

This doesn’t feel like flying should.

There should be something mystical in it all.

There should be a sacredness during this take-off

instead

we put in our headphones

pull out our books

anxiously await

in-flight service

wonder what airplane bathrooms look like

and how two people could ever fuck in them with good

conscious

(nothing subtle there-

maybe I’m just on planes too small).

I don’t fly much.

I’m grateful.

I can’t turn this commercial endeavor into a religious experience.

I don’t even know how to get to baggage claim.

NaPoWriMo Day 4

Prompt: Write a poem for a person who crossed your mind today (stranger or otherwise).

I remember packing with a ferocity,

hoping that the boxes would mask the dull ache

of you:

absentee.

I don’t think of you very often anymore

but the days sometimes bend in your direction

and I wonder how fall felt on the lake

and if you’re still parking your car on the

fourth floor of the car-park

two slots from the stairs.

Did the adventures you chose without me

quench the frenzy under your fingernails?

Do you still cook hotdogs for breakfast?

Do you still go home every Sunday for

homemade wonders and blessings?

I can’t hear your voice inside my head anymore.

I don’t remember what you sound like,

the way your skin chaps.

I can’t remember our last kiss.

I’m not sad when I think like this.

Mostly curious,

there is no stinging anymore

maybe just a slight bump-

a lesion that suggests that at one time

I felt pain.

The scar-tissue

miniature,

but still there.

This is not a love poem

or a love/lost poem.

This is a reflection.

A curious,

how are you doing?

that shows up maybe

twice a year.

I’m not going to call and ask any of this myself

and tomorrow

this fleeting thinking time will have passed

a new stranger/

lover/

visitor

will occupy my thoughts.

Absentee-

I know I’m that to you too.

NaPoWriMo Day 3

Day 3 Prompt: Choose a book and flip to the 52st page. Find a word (or words) you like and use that to inspire your poem. I used the book "The Supervillain Field Manual" by King Oblivion PH.D. (As Told To Matt D. Wilson)

 

“Most times,

supervillainy is a solitary profession.”

this might be the quaintest of advice,

the simplest of perspectives

but my wrongdoing tells no lies,

the truth is in the action

and I’ve been liking the truth/action

less and less

and less

lately.

The first step is admitting one’s own

supervillainy

The second, not being so evil that you won’t hear advice

third,

live solitarily.

I was hoping for a giant castle with black

heart fire places

and black marble floors

and black statues that everyone else thinks

are frightening but I find kitschy and endearing

the kind of castle that Dracula lived in

or Frankenstein was conceived inside

or where the Adam’s Family lived

but like,

with daisy curtains to throw people off or something.

Instead, I’m sitting here in this cramped apartment

(with carpets and a cat)

plotting my increasingly extravagant rise to power.

No.

There are no friends in supervillainy.

Just delicious stepping stools along the way.

I have a solitary black heart,

filled with solitary black joy sitting here in my

solitary overly white apartment

(why do they never paint the walls?!).

I think it’s time to move.

This place isn’t ominous enough for my wrath,

this place came with a wall decal that says:

“Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much”