Take the "National Poetry Month" Challenge!

[AuntShecky]

It's April, National Poetry Month.

Do you plan to celebrate or commemorate it in some way?

One thing we could do is read a poem a day for thirty days, either from printed sources (remember those?) or online, and then keep a list of the works we've read, maybe with a sentence or two describing your critical take on it, using a single thread for all thirty of them rather than posting them all separately. There are plenty of good and "safe" online sources for poems on the Web-- Knopf's "A Poem a Day" as well as The Poetry Foundation.

Since yours fooly is probably ripe to be declared certifiably insane, I've decided to try to write thirty original poems for the thirty days in April. I'm planning to post them all in a single thread in the "Personal Poetry" forum. I realize that this burden I've voluntarily placed upon myself is risky--not only in the fact that I might not be able to write that much verse in rapid succession but also casting a jinx on this beleagured PC, "Pong 3.0." Well, what's Fate for if we can't tempt her!

I bet there are other LitNutters out there who'd want to try to do the same thing? If so, it might be a good idea to put them all in a single thread with your screen name on it. (I put mine in the "Personal Poetry" forum, but now I wonder if the Moderators think I should have put it in this Poetry Games and Contests thread.)

[Paulclem]

Do you want comments and encouragements on your poems Auntie?

It's a good idea - a good challenge. I take a bit of time to work on poems as well, but I think the practice is good.

[AuntShecky]

Do you want comments and encouragements on your poems Auntie?

It's a good idea - a good challenge. I take a bit of time to work on poems as well, but I think the practice is good.

I have to confess that I got the idea about 4 years ago from another poetry site, but the LitNet is where I've been living now.

I've gotten lots of encouragement already! Thanks for your comment as well.

The challenge for me is mainly to see if I could do it. Theoretically the quality of the 30 posts might not necessarily be at the same level as those on which more time had been spent, though I wouldn't go so far to say a piece I labored over would not necessarily be stellar, such as it is.

Certainly feel free to comment. Hope other LitNutters (hint, hint) gives it a try as well, just for the experience of producing a number of works in rapid succession.

Thanks so much, Paul!

[tailor STATELY]

Weather, or Naught 2022

Weather, or naught... I often ponder why -
Some say El Niño or La Niña... or sunspots?
it'd be awfully hard to deny - this past
Winter gave us Snowmaggedon at Christmas
time, then left us high and dry

Storms used to line up one after another off mid-
California's coast - and approach our foothill heights
influenced by peripatetic Lows and Highs...
sometimes setting for a piece before once again
departing in an easterly meandering way

When the air fogs, as it often does when the dew
point is just so, one can't see the forest
for the fog, and although ghost frogs sound awfully near
- it's as if the world had shrunk from view

I love the light shows when thunders advance
so's one can imagine hairs standing on end
even when safely indoors fully insulate then
watch the panoply of flash dancers unfold

I look forward to the first gentle sprinkles of
Spring - always surprised when torrents deluge
The rain would permeating the moldering soil -
how I love the sweet smell of petrichor outdoors
as everything is refreshed and renewed

It's raining now, a blessing I hope will last,
at higher altitudes it must be snowing just-a-bit
topping off a meager snowpack - here's praying
for still more moisture, for little is forecast

4/13/2022

Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor STATELY

[tailor STATELY]

Weather Wonders

Welcome clouds, offering the hope of rain
O'er city, sea, mountain, valley, and plain
Floating islands of mist, create rainbows
Bridges of brightest prisms of light flows.

Clouds surely have their personalities
Based upon fluid temporalities
I look up and see fanciful shapes that
Change - a horse, a bat... now a Cheshire cat !

When winds begin to boast and clouds derange
To aspects of grays and black interchange
Primary particles start their romance
Let lightnings and thunders begin their dance

Lastly should tornadoes or cyclones rage
There's little else but time left to assuage

4/19/2022

Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor STATELY