#tankaTuesday

Oracle

Open the word list; allow the words to
roll around in your mind for awhile.  Pay
attention to the ones that jump out, that
correspond to intuition.  Observe;
listen; rearrange.  Coherence can be
encouraged, but best to follow Her lead.

Colleen asked us to write a syllabic acrostic for Tanka Tuesday from a list which included the word oracle. I have regular conversations with several of Her manifestations. And as Kate recently asked me to clarify what to do with the Random Word Generator (aka Oracle 2) that I post on Sundays, I decided to use my acrostic to give some general instructions. But really there are no rules.

The top collage uses the Collage Box Oracle, which is just a box of words I’ve cut out of various places that I pull out and arrange in a similar fashion to the Magnetic Poetry Oracle (seen in the second collage and here on Saturdays). For my acrostic I’ve used words from this week’s Random Word Generator as inspiration.

Our surroundings are always singing to us–all we need to do sometimes is be still and take the time to listen.

what do we really know?
the emptiness of space
the rhythm of light

slipping into the sunset

daydreams
open spirit–
expand dance bloom–
the landscape enters singing
secrets

Collen provided another lovely photo from Terri Webster Schrandt for this week’s #Tanka Tuesday challenge. I’ve written an elevenie poem, which is the prompt from Sadje for this week’s W3.

variations

in new translations
love blooms—unclouded, bewinged–
hearts embedded, twined

Colleen’s Tanka Tuesday Ekphrastic Challenge was the above painting by Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller. Colleen pointed out that it was unlikely the woman in the painting would have been using a cellphone in 1860, the date of this artwork (although that’s what it looks like), and asked us to consider that when we wrote our poem.

paradigms

the dark shifts into
wakefulness—I open eyes
to the clear calmness
of the moon—she understands
all languages of the night—

how to repattern
the spectered endings into
way stations—a pause
between shadows cast backwards and
those strung with celestial light

Off prompt for NaPoWriMo but on prompt for Colleen’s Tanka Tuesday where she asked us to capture a moment in the tanka form.

Who Is

The days are pooled, caught narrowly
in pathways with windows
halfway
propped between temporarily
and suspended–limbo–
blurred, grey

~How~

can you tell when you have opened?
What do you use as your
mirror?
Where has your reflection chosen
to reside?  inside stars?
or fear?

When David posted the W3 prompt this morning, where Destiny chose the memento form, which has 64 syllables in its two stanzas, for her prompt, I knew I had the answer for Colleen’s Tanka Tuesday Birthday prompt–to construct a poem formed out of 65 syllables. I added one syllable between the two stanzas as a bridge, as in a puente–turning it into a memuente.

I’ve also used the dVerse prompt from Merril to include a window in my poem.

This also gave me a chance to show some photos of an accordion book I made for an online class that explored artist books. The instructor was not happy with my first idea, and this was not even close what I saw in my mind at all, but it has grown on me. I took many many photos of it, both open and closed–these are just a few. I do like the accordion format and I hope to explore it more.

Of course you know what my reflection chooses…

Off prompt again for NaPoWriMo.

My Muse Considers How to Poem Monet

veils of ephemeral light

how to paint a poem?—I ask you–
how to spell words into magic hue?

petals embossed under luminescent sun–
colors of their language far beyond my tongue–
lavender, saffron, pearl, mauve, cerulean–
phrases lack their vibrance, a pale impression

impossible to ink, to tattoo
linear reflections that sing true

veils of ephemeral light

Once again, combining a number of prompts. For Tanka Tuesday, Colleen provided the above photo of a lily from Terri Webster Schrandt. The NaPoWriMo prompt today is to “write a poem that addresses itself or some aspect of its self”. And The W3 Prompt, from Jane Aguiar, is to write a symetrelle poem that contains the word impossible.

Oh, and also Sarah at dVerse asked for a poem containing some form of yellow.

I’ve done lots of art inspired by Monet’s water lilies. I even did a book of grids and haiku inspired by them. But I’ve never even come close to the beauty of the paintings themselves in either art or words. If you ever get a chance to see one in person, grab it.

Death, or: Life

Elegies
droned on, serious
greyscale tomes,
heavy clouds
in all the shades of sorrow,
tearful walks of words.

But inside
she remembered wings,
how they soared–
drunk with the
sheer beauty of aliveness,
joyful and carefree.

She stood up
and started dancing,
singing songs
that he loved–
uneasy, some laughed–but then
others joined the dance.

Gravity
shook itself off, de
parted, re
placed by light,
by friendship, celebration–
she could feel him smile.

Once again I’ve combined two prompts. From NaPoWriMo: write a poem in which laughter comes at what might otherwise seem an inappropriate moment . And for Tanka Tuesday where Colleen gave us a list of words to incorporate in the shadorma form.

conclusions

vagabonding, I spin–
adrift on the edges of time,
casting reflections
like an afterthought—

adrift on the edges of a time
that whispers of ladders to the moon,
my chimerical bubbles burst,

casting reflections
steadily westward until
they become an abstraction,

like an afterthought–
carelessly lingering in the dreamless
realm of the rising sun

I’m sure you could calculate it mathematically, but the seemingly random appearances of the moon outside my window is a mystery to me. These were taken at dawn this month from my bedroom window, which faces south–but sometimes it sets outside my kitchen window to the west, and I see it while making coffee. Sometimes I only see it early in the night or in the middle of the night when it wakes me shining through the window. Sometimes it grazes the buildings, sometimes it’s so high in the sky I have to get right against the widow and look up in order to see it.

I like the way that last photo becomes an abstract composition of geometric forms.

Colleen asked us to to write about the view outside our window for Tanka Tuesday. I’ve written in the trimeric form. I’ve also used words from the Random Word Generator.

And here’s a recent sunset from the bedroom as well.

I’m lucky to have lots of sky.

Of Eden, or: Paradise Lost

Once rampant with color, its fragrance long gone,
the paint has dried into textured lines–
afternoons of melodic stillness now mourned–
decorative traces lost inside frozen time.

The paint has dried into textured lines,
ringed by the noise of questions unasked–
decorative traces lost inside frozen time
bleeding destruction we haven’t yet grasped,

Ringed by the noise of questions unasked
life is tenuous, scattered, emotions removed–
bleeding destruction we haven’t yet grasped,
as over and over we bandage the wounds.

Life is tenuous, scattered, emotions removed,
following roads that only disappear–
over and over we bandage the wounds–
the darkness rises, overwhelming with fear.

Following roads that only disappear,
like the garden once bursting with growth—
the darkness rises, overwhelming with fear–
sky is silent, empty, brittle as bones

We lived in a garden bursting with growth,
afternoons of melodic stillness, now mourned–
sky is silent now, empty, brittle as bones–
once rampant with color, its fragrance long gone.

I love pantoums, but I usually don’t rhyme them, so this proved challenging to me. It still could use some revision, but I need to let it sit for awhile. Punam asked for a pantoum on the theme of abandonment for her W3 prompt this week. I had also been thinking about Sherry’s prompt at earthweal, asking us to write about all the species vanishing around us. And Colleen’s prompt for Tanka Tuesday, a painting by Monet (below), had me thinking about what we’ve lost since Monet painted all his overflowing gardens at Giverny. Will we one day only know such beauty as a digital image?

I also started out with a lot of words from this week’s Random Word Generator, but some of them dropped out during revisions.

embodied

a misted bridge forms
across the water–
our voices dance
as if they were winged

across the water
we float airborne
touching the sky

our voices dance
uncontained
scattering the light

as if we were winged
needing no reason
playing with life itself

For dVerse, where Lisa asks us to play. Also inspired by the photo, above, by Terri Webster Schrandt, provided by Colleen for this week’s Tanka Tuesday. I’ve written another trimeric poem.