Ensō

mind troubled with images
brush full of ink–
becoming empty

For the final day, NaPoWriMo asks for minimalism in word and gesture.

You can read about the Enso here.

 

Shaded

I’m standing
not in the way but
out—myself
here somewhere
yet not quite ready for this
trough that releases

emptying,
revacating the
premises–
I borrowed time
from all those appointments with
destiny, unkept

Reopen
the scar, make room for
new bloodveins,
roots, branches,
a forest to surround, sing
alive alive-O

Imagine
what strange things fortune
could reveal
in its own
time, centered in a place where
the lines intersect

For Sue Vincent’s photo prompt, above, and NaPoWriMo Day 29(!) a meditation on one of my many states of being.

 

O! none but

silence parched and
barren,
depleted even of rage,
of
refutations to give to death’s
denial of the eternal–
which shiver stands distilled, concentrated, cold?

Today I used yesterday’s NaPoWriMo prompt, to make Shakespeare’s sonnets our poetic inspiration.  I wanted to do a Golden Shovel poem–I like them, and I haven’t done one in a long time.  The line I used was from Shakespeare’s Sonnet XIII, “and barren rage of death’s eternal cold?”

What is a Golden Shovel?  you can read about it here.  And do read both Gwendolyn Brooks and Terrance Hayes as well.

 

surrounded

I consulted the Oracle this morning and ended up with a Lai poem, the featured form at dVerse for May.  The rhymes are pretty slanted, but the message suits this fine morning that has cleared from grey to breezy blue.

I’m posting this for NaPoWriMo, but I may try the Shakespeare prompt later if I have time.

a formula for zero

quick and not yet dead
these visions that hover
inside the unconsciousness of my head
an expanding screen of color

these visions that hover
a journey of blood and cells
an expanding screen of color
orbiting in waves and spells

a journey of blood and cells
the Other I am not
orbiting in waves and spells
multitudes circulating beyond thought

The Other I am not
shrinking in sense and form
multitudes circulating beyond thought
synapses returning unborn

Shrinking in sense and form
inside the unconsciousness of my head
synapses returning unborn
quick and not yet dead

NaPoWriMo asked for a repetitive poem, perhaps a pantoum…

 

and its shadow

Opening my eyes
in the morning this day
into grey light
black branches suspended
between my window and the sky–

the calendar says spring
as I pull the comforter closer
and my thoughts wander
into the kitchen.

My body soon follows
the promise of coffee
warming bare feet
cold floor
distracted mind–

Looking out now–
is that a robin?
No, a sparrow, still–
but the blue jay tells me
he’s somewhere close by.

When will the world reverse
itself, green, full once again
of uncontained expectation?

I sip my coffee,
the aroma comfortable,
friendly.
Its bitter taste
sharpens my mind.

There’s a black hole
covering the front page
of the news.

Oh yes.

No surprise there.

NaPoWriMo wanted a poem about a season and our senses and a question.  This came from notes I wrote the morning early in April that I picked up the newspaper outside to see a photo of a black hole taking up the entire top half of the page.

 

clouds

clouds increase, decrease–
signs of change thickening–
sky moving higher

Today the prompt for NaPoWriMo was to open a reference book to a random page and make a poem from what you found there.  I chose to do a blackout poem from the page I opened in my Encyclopedia of Superstitions which was the one that included “clouds”.

We have a clear blue sky here in NYC though.  I will enjoy running my errands today!

 

Crow Takes My Hand

Crow calls to me from above. There he is—on that roof.  He extends his invitation again and again.

leave sidewalks behind–
rise, and conjure golden fields
waving to azure

skies filled with high flying clouds,
wings singing songs into the air

I know there is magic here, even in places filled with concrete and glass.

Holding out my arms, I wish: carry me home.

watching my child-self
lying in a bed of green–
opened up, shining

For NaPoWriMo today, we are talking to animals.  Crow is always hanging around in my world.

Variation on a Theme

I spend myself with what if.  I pray to spirits I don’t believe in about things I don’t really know if I want.

What do I want? A light-filled room?  Applause?  Kind words, a gentle touch?

And you? Not even the imprint of your body remains in the furniture.  But you haunt me with your past, the one that spills over into my present and keeps me tangled in lost hours, restless days, sleepless nights.

It’s easy to keep repeating variations on the same inner monologue, difficult to quiet it and focus on something that is beyond the boundaries of myself.

And so I talk to the trees, like Chet Baker did. Do they listen?  They give me mornings of birdsong, flowering into green and then transforming into autumn harvests of red and gold.  Their branches, when naked, dance against clear blue skies.

I talk to the stars—
they pull me out, glimmering–
circles of the moon.

Is that listening?

It’s close enough.

The prompt for NaPoWriMo today asks us to write something inspired by another form of art.  For NaPoWriMo last year, all the art I used for the month of April was inspired by the painter Joan Mitchell.  And I have not stopped using her art as inspiration–lately I’ve been obsessed with her tree paintings.  Both paintings, above, were inspired by them.

And so I thought to compose a poem about trees.  The reference today to Frank O’Hara, who was a friend of Joan Mitchell,  got me looking at his poems to see if there were any that talked about trees.  There were, and I modeled the beginning of my haibun on his “Meditations on an Emergency”.

But I also was thinking of Lerner and Loewe’s song “I Talk to the Trees”.  I like Chet Baker’s version, here with Bill Evans and Coleman Hawkins.

I talk to the trees
But they don’t listen to me
I talk to the stars
But they never hear me

You can see some of Joan Mitchell’s tree paintings here.

Child of the Universe

The NaPoWriMo prompt today was looking for surrealistic imagery in a poem.  I’m not sure this exactly fits, since it’s mostly image, but the collage box Oracle tends to brevity in its words.

She
started a ritual–
the answer
on fire,
the seeds realized
as dark matter

I also have a poem, “Numerology”, which is somewhat surrealistic, posted this month at Visual Verse.  You can read it here.

This collage was inspired by Paul Klee’s angel series.